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TO ASK A QUESTION: If you have a question or need help with Office, please feel free to use the 'Click to Contact' link at the bottom of this page. You'll get a form that you can use to email a question to me. (I had been getting a ton of spam when accepting direct emails, so only emails that use this form will get through to me.)

Please be sure to mention the version of Office you are using when you send your question.

I answer all e-mails that I receive via this form, as long as they are polite :)

Since disabling comments on this site, I'm actually hearing from more of you with questions ... so, as it seems people prefer to email rather than comment, I'm going to leave comments disabled. As always, you can ask me any Office-related questions you have. If the question is outside of my expertise, I'll try to direct you to where you can get an answer.

So, I have a rant and a rave to post today ... thought I'd start with the rant so that the top post, the one that will stay up top for a day or two, will be the rave. The rave is NOT about HP. The rant most definitely is....

Anyone who knows me or has read my blog for awhile knows that I don't write negative things about anyone or any company. It's not my style. This situation, however, is unbelievable - and I want to post it to warn others before they make a purchase they'll end up regretting.

Never in my experience with computer products have I ever had such a bad experience as I've just had with HP. And it wasn't 1 person, it was several people, at several levels, over a period of a month...

About a month ago, I realized that what initially appeared to be an Office 2007\Vista SP1 issue (crashing on exit) was actually just a conflict between my printer driver (Photosmart C4180) and Vista SP1. I reproduced the same issue on 4 separate computers by installing Vista SP1 where that printer was installed or installing the printer on an SP1 machine. Uninstall the printer and the issue goes away, 100%, every time.

So - I contacted HP to see if it was a known issue, if they had a fix for it yet - and if not, to report the issue and provide them with repro steps. Here's how that went:

1 - Call 1: the level 1 tech support said the Vista drivers on the site are old and he would transfer me to the department that could send me a CD with updated drivers. 1/2 hour on hold, provide nearly enough personal info to steal my identity, and the new person says the drivers on the CD are identical to those on the site. There's no point in sending me a CD and he can't help me.

2 - Call 2: the new level 1 tech support person says he doesn't know the solution. he puts me on hold to research (seems reasonable so far) and says he can't find anything but he's sure he's heard about it and wants to research. he tells me to give him a week to get back to me. I was impressed. BUT - It's been a month. He never called back. No longer so impressed.

3 - Emailed support: I sent detailed, written repro steps on the issue. Conflict between HP driver and Vista SP1. Two days later, I got an email with a link to a MSFT KB article about crashing when an Office program opens - having nothing whatsoever to do with printers or with the issuer reported. I reply to that effect.

- I go back and forth with several replies over weeks ... each time getting another irrelevant link (getting so bad that the last one was a link to a KB article about problems opening Office documents in IE (yes, really, it was that bad). I repeatedly ask for the case to be escalated to level 2 and that request is repeatedly ignored.

4 - This morning I call HP support again, asking to talk to a manager. I no longer want to troubleshoot - I want to report the abominable support experience. After being put on hold several times, disconnected twice, I am told by two people (I called back again because I figured the first was just (*&! but no such luck) ... that they can't transfer me to a manager because my product is now out of warranty. It was IN warrantee when the case was opened. I explain this to them, explaining that I don't want tech support - i want a manager to report the issue to, and I'm told the same thing - only in-warrantee customers can talk to a manager, and the fact that the product was in warranty when the case was opened is not even acknowledged.

5 - I wait for HP's west coast corporate office to open for the day and call. I'm transfered to what I'm told is the highest level of customer contact. A case manager for multifunction machines such as mine. I explain the above and he tells me that what I'm asking is out of the scope of support and that the support staff was right to tell me that my product is out of warrantee and there's nothing they can do. I ask him if he realizes he's telling me that HP thinks it's acceptable to take so long addressing an issue that they can just wait for the product to go out of warranty and then say they can't help. He says that I'm putting words in his mouth and then he becomes rude. He tells me that he's the highest level of customer contact, so my only other option is to send a letter to the black hole, general mailbox of hte corporate office that transfered me to him or to email general customer support (i.e., back to level 1).

I realize that I am much better off buying a new product from a different company than trying to get any type of satisfaction from HP.

I called Canon pre-sales support to ask some information on a few models. After less than a minute on hold, a helpful person gave me all the information I needed. That's a good sign (I hope) ... fingers crossed ...

... and on to the good news for the day...

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