... 3000 V100: International Warranty not honored by Lenovo

Well, here's a sad story, I'm not looking for sympathy, rather contact in the right quarters higher than CS, or practical suggestions...

I'm on the Chinese mainland with a Lenovo 3000 V100, 6 months old with a 2 year International Warranty. The fan is dead, and using it in temperatures higher than a cool room means a cpu overheat forced shutdown. The Laptop was purchased in Hong Kong with the International Warranty and an assurance that it could be serviced anywhere on the Chinese mainland which is where I work.

When the fan first stopped 6 weeks ago, the local mainland Lenovo service center did a fast job on it, cleaning the fan and saying it was fixed.
Very shortly thereafter the fan stopped again, and now that it needed a proper job done, "proof of purchase" via a sales receipt was demanded, despite the fact it is a unique machine and in the Lenovo database records.

Nobody wanted to understand why a businessman on a one suitcase work assignment doesn't carry all his office paper records with him. When the Hong Kong retailer agreed to supply a receipt as a pdf, Lenovo China CS at once ratcheted up the ante, demanding proof of entry to Hong Kong, and proof of entry to the Chinese mainland, subtly adding that "difficult to read passport stamps would not count". As it turned out, Lenovo Hong Kong provided a sales receipt for another machine number, and now will not answer emails or act on phone requests for the correct one.

So, 6 Weeks have passed, the laptop has 60gb of business data, and is working only because of a purchased fan bed which is insufficient above 20 oC (68 oF). The phone calls and emails are numerous, about 40 hours of time wasted and Lenovo Hong Kong have given up trying to get their mainland counterparts to honor the warranty.

The guy to drag into the mess is David D. Miller, President of Lenovo Asia Pacific, and directly responsible for Regional Service and Support : he is also a Chinese mainland veteran. He's based in Singapore but is extremely well
hidden, way beyond my laptop problem.

A round trip back to Hong Kong, the nearest place that will honor the warranty will cost $US300+..., about 30% of the price of a new one.

I noticed that the laptop was running quite hot after I bought it (not knowing the laptop line, I had no idea of whether this was normal or not), and am now starting to wonder if it is more than a simple fan replacement.

Like I said, if anyone has got some practical suggestions on how to remedy this debacle, I would appreciate the help. Thank you

This post refers to the Lenovo Asia Region

 

you should just by a new fan and change it yourself. It is not hard at all to do.

 

Is not 40 hours of your time worth $300? Are they saying that your notebook does not have international coverage? A notebook sold here for $900 is unlikely to have international service. Running in low power mode will help with the heat.

 

Gamemint : tks for the reply, the warranty will be honored anywhere outside China, and I don't need future warranty problems in the case of serious issues if any CS takes a bad view of me having fixed it

ZaZ : tks also
As stated, I have 2 years International Warranty...
Hong Kong is a duty free port FYI
The data at this time is worth far more than my time
I will be here for a while, and unless I get higher than CS, I will be in a bad position if something serious fails on the laptop in the future...
Mainland China is notorious for not honoring warranties, Lenovo? well seems they've joined that club also....

 

Fan replacement is a little more complicated on the 3000 compared to the ThinkPads, but I think you could still do it. Can you call Hong Kong and have them send you that part to mainland?

 

Optomos : tks for the post
I can try asking today, can you clarify what is more complicated?, what to do?
There is also my reference that I noticed the laptop seemed to run very hot when I first bought it (the review on this site states the opposite), so I still wonder whether it is more then the fan that is the problem.
Any thoughts on that?