Acer aspire 3 right hinge

Been emailing acer and was all about to send the laptop off to be repaired when read 'physical damage' is not covered. So emailed them back "Hi,

I just got sent this email this morning, what do you mean by physical damage? It has never been dropped and has been handle carefully. It broke as the casing was sub par and the metal spring/hinge was to strong.

Sending you another photo. As the condition of the casing has deteriorated since the last photo and it has now unsafe to the extent that the lid cannot be closed.

Can you please tell me that this is covered under warranty as i do not want to face an admin fee etc for something that was clearly not our fault."

Got this, this morning "
Please be advised that Hinges are not covered under the warranty and this would be a chargeable Repair on our end."

I thought it was just the casing.
Anyway these are the photos that i took this morning so am confused asi thought it was just bad casing. Someone please help. Bought the laptop in November.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/k8/9cn3dfgcwnzn.jpg

. So

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/ej/66v8pngidxjb.jpg

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aphanic

Like hell hinges are not covered, where do you live? I'd like to check the legal text of the standard warranty that governs your product.

If the product is use as expected, hinges aren't things expected to break. I'd understand the battery not being covered, unless it was clear that its degradation happened as a result of it being damaged from the beginning, but hinges? What's next, the hard drives aren't covered either if they fail? Or SSDs? Because the cells of an SSD do wear out with time.

Unrelated to the hinges problem, but, from the one that covers consumer Aspires in the US, this is a clause in the exception list:

RESULTS OF NORMAL USAGE, SUCH AS GRADUAL IMAGE DEGRADATION, UNEVEN SCREEN AGING, BURNED-IN IMAGES AND PIXEL FAILURE WITHIN DESIGNED SPECIFICATIONS OR THAT DO NOT MATERIALLY ALTER THE PRODUCTS FUNCTIONALITY;

I'd like to know what those designed specifications are to begin with, I'd like to know what are their acceptable and expected problems for screens for example, but I guess that's not detailed anywhere nor will they agree to share if asked.

There is another exception:

NORMAL TEAR AND WEAR

That sounds vague and unconvincing, but they don't elaborate on that. I wonder what the hell is the legal team doing here, aside from covering Acer from liabilities.

Or:

COSMETIC DAMAGE OR EXTERIOR FINISH THAT DOES NOT AFFECT FUNCTIONALITY INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO SCRATCHED OR CRACKED DISPLAYS

What? So if your laptop screen was made out of glass, and by opening it the glass shattered, or a crack appeared because of structural stress of the glass... that wouldn't be covered either? I mean come on... have some common sense...

Those are just excerpts, but there are more and they are bad, hell, you're even accepting not to take them to court if you live in the US or Canada (except Quebec) and submit to mandatory arbitrage instead. How is this lawful? I may need to revise my own agreement in regards with the current laws in Spain

I can understand their position, it is hard to prove something happened because of misuse or deliberate actions so they try to cover themselves, but maybe it was taken too far...

Still, they have to comply with the laws that apply to the country where the item was sold, if the agreement is not in compliance with those laws it'd be declared void.

In your specific case, I don't see how the damage to the hinge could have happened out of normal use if it wasn't structurally compromised from the beginning. I don't think it wasn't user error, just that it is highly unlikely that it was, I don't know about your particular model, but in mine are strong and screwed to the chasis to keep them secure.

If they were to become loose, or break like that during the terms of my warranty I'd hold them accountable for it, I'm not opening the laptop with sledgehammers...

Britmummybites

Live in the uk.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/zn/3dhy1ler4f1e.jpg

aphanic

How long has it been since you bought the laptop? I know you're not in the EU anymore but the directive 1999/44/CE may still be incorporated into your laws.

It stipulated that any object (there were exceptions, but it applies to computers) sold to a consumer inside the EU carries a 2-year warranty that implies it meets the quality you'd expect for such a device.

If any of the parts were to stop working (and not deteriorate, for example batteries are known to be consumibles so they generally have only 6 months of warranty, but if they stopped working altogether for example) withing those 2 years the seller has to fix or replace them without costing the customer a single cent. In fact if the seller had expenses sending the equipment to the manufacturer those are on them as well.

Now, if the device becomes defective in the first 6 months, it is presumed that the defect was there all along and you need to prove nothing. After that you are still covered but the seller can now claim that the defect was caused by some action derived of non-normal use of the device...

But! It's on them to prove that, not on you, they have to prove that the action X you did is what caused that (I'm already talking about courts though). And when I say prove I mean prove, correlation is not causation.

If the seller refused your right to repair or replace the device you could sue them in a civil litigation reporting the case to the national authority (which in some places doesn't even require layers).

I'm talking out of what I remember from that directive so take it with a grain of salt, and it only applies if the item was sold to a consumer, not a company.

By now, EU member nations have all to have implemented that directive in their respective national laws, but Brexit and all I don't know how it stands there. I'd say that whatever was written in the directive still applies, but you need to check for your local laws and see what applies and what doesn't.

I hope it doesn't get to that, but they do have to understand that it was not accidental and even though you may not need to prove how it happened you can tell them details so they know it wasn't your fault but a design flaw, or the screws weren't tight enough, who knows.

Britmummybites

November last year.

Commodore_1995#

I agree with colleague aphanic. Here in Brazil, this type of problem is usually covered and repaired under warranty. I believe that the repair center must prove that the problem was caused or not by the user.

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