Getting the "cost" of Windows repaid
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| dominic Jul 25, 2006 8:15 AM EDT |
My girlfriend recently bought a new Dell laptop. When it arrived, she turned it on and it showed her the EULA and asked if she agreed to the terms. We talked about it for a bit and decided, we did not agree. We wrote down the phone number listed on the screen, rebooted and installed GNU/Linux. My girlfriend then called Dell and explained she did not agree to the terms of the Windows license and asked for her money back, specifically, what was paid for the license. I wasn't around when she called so I don't know how it went but she said it wasn't as bad as expected and she did get them to send a cheque. A few weeks later, she got a cheque in the mail for 50$ and that was that. So to anyone getting a new laptop, I would recommend Dell. Get your money back since that's the clearest way to send a message to the vendor and to M$ that you don't agree to their terms. YMMV. -- Dom |
| Inhibit Jul 25, 2006 8:36 AM EDT |
Hmm. Good call. Although I'm not a huge fan of Dell's hegemony on the market their product isn't horrible. |
| devnet Jul 25, 2006 8:45 AM EDT |
Holy crap..this is pretty cool. Just did it and it worked! The check is in the mail! |
| Rascalson Jul 25, 2006 8:50 AM EDT |
Hmm curious. Are either of you in the USA or another country. Last I knew many of the OEM's had modified their refund wording to basically say that the software and the PC were not seperable. Which agrees with MS's current stated view on OEM software licensed with a computer. In other words if you don't agree to the license return the whole PC. |
| Sander_Marechal Jul 25, 2006 9:51 AM EDT |
What surprises me more is that by this way Dell reveals that XP costs them about $50 a pop, instead of the $199 or so that end users normally pay. IIRC it's against Dell's EOM license to reveal that. Someone sue them ;-) |
| devnet Jul 25, 2006 10:06 AM EDT |
Quoting:In other words if you don't agree to the license return the whole PC. If that's the case, they'll have to provide that license in writing along with the OEM PC. I didn't receive that license. I checked it out and couldn't find any reference to the PC being inseparable from the OS. So Dell hasn't done it yet evidently. |
| wind0wsr3fund Jul 25, 2006 10:17 AM EDT |
Dominic, First off, good job on following through. I'm happy to hear that you did not encounter the level of resistance I had to endure when dealing with Toshiba several years ago. However, I'll suggest that the $50 check was in fact, a standard "customer satisfaction" discount and did not actually represent a reimbursement for the unwanted Microsoft products that were bundled with your hardware. Did your invoice include a line item for the Microsoft Products that showed what was charged? Did the check include any language indicating that the refund amount was Microsoft-product specific? Personally, I'd love to see some hard evidence of a Dell policy which allows customers to be refunded the cost of these tied products. If you have any evidence of such a policy, I'd love to publish it on windowsrefund.info so others can learn of it. |
| dominic Jul 26, 2006 12:47 PM EDT |
FYI, I am in Canada. No, neither the invoice nor the cheque itemized the cost of the MS Windows. Either way, it costs Dell 50$ on something they make little enough margin on so the message is clear. We're not satisfied with the product, we do not agree to the MS EULA. |
| dinotrac Jul 26, 2006 5:09 PM EDT |
dominic - Will wonders never cease? W3f is actually right on this one. If you're Dell, you have to decide whether or not it's worth your time and effort to offer Linux pre-installed. Any kind of volume business incurs a cost by offering different choices. Doesn't even have to be that high volume -- think of Southwest Airlines and their all 737 plane fleet. If Dell can make money selling computers to Linux users without having to set up any kind of provision for supporting Linux -- not even having to change their web site product listings -- it might well be worth the $50 to them. |
| moopst Jul 26, 2006 6:36 PM EDT |
Well, I bought the cheapest Dell desktop I could get and got a discount because of an agreement with my employer, plus free shipping (that saved 100 bucks!). I asked them for a refund and no luck. Maybe it's because I'm in the US or maybe because my machine was so cheap but whatever. I just popped in an 80 gig drive and installed Slackware, then i got 512 Meg of Kingston ram after a rebate so it has 768 Meg in it, which makes it a pretty decent machine. I logged it as a support issue. In my view, M$ owes me for oem pricing on XP Home and another machine I have which had XP Professional. I'm not holding my breath but afaic, the pirates are all up in Redmond. |
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