HP is standing behind their HP Edgeline Access VAR's and the CM8060/50 with one big stick.
"Overview
HP Products are designed and manufactured to meet both our customer's and our partner's performance expectations. If after working with HP Edgeline Support, an Edgeline Access partner is unable to bring an HP CM8060/CM8050 Color MFP's performance in line with specifications, HP will contact the partner within one business day to arranged for an HP representative to visit the customer site, schedule delivery of a replacement unit or initiate a refund of the unit price."
Ok, before you start picking the above apart (because one could) stand back and think about this, especially if you are in the copier industry - if you're a dealer, say...I dunno, let's just call you ICON - how easy is it to get a replacement unit out to your customer? Can you show your customer Canon's documented, replacement policy? How about K/M or how about Ricoh?
Sure you can get a like-for-like, meaning some old, returned, used but "functional" unit, pulled out of the service inventory.
And if you think even deeper - about a refund - who offers refunds on copiers?
There will be dealers out there who see this as a negative - who pays for pick up, how does this work with a lease, do I get a service credit from HP for all the time my tech spends trying to fix, and how come the service rates are so high - blah, blah, blah...as one of my characterized role models said, "I find your lack of faith...disturbing."
On the other side, there is a risk of dealers trying to "fit a square peg in a round hole" by using this as a closing tool - short sighted simpletons who will lead with this guarantee - they just don't get it. Indeed, the biggest risk to HP is in what the VAR channel does with this - but all things will be revealed.
The single most important aspect of this move is HP's apparent feeling that they have a super-duper, grand slam, slam dunk product; a Tiger By The Tail - a true "Copier Killer"
And they do.
And this is just the beginning - I can "Bear"-ly stand it!
Much more to come -
I support 90-100 independent copier dealers as a representative of the manufacturer.
ReplyDeleteI know of none that wouldn't give you the same guarantee as HP. HP is a great company and the independent dealers are more local and will generally give even better service.
Yes, of course, absolutely!
ReplyDeleteThis post reflects my feelings on the responsivenes of HP towards it's channel.