More about bulling IT man

A huge thankyou to everyone. I've learned a lot more about computers. Also, that I am capable of doing more for myself, rather than relying on traders. I tried to mediate but he offered to sell me a new laptop [one of his hybrids, no doubt) or 'repair' mine [£60 callout] or deduct £165 for 'cleaning' the laptop if I took it back.  I told him that rather than argue I will mediate via CAB/trading standards - then small claims court if that doesn't work. For the sake of £180 he's lost his golden goose.

It's so great to have this chatroom. In times past I would have spent sleepless nights wondering worrying also getting angry. Also, because I find trusting people difficult, this might have set me back. Instead, I feel encouraged and empowered by your responses. 

TheCatWoman said:

information goes straight to long term memory without spending any time in short term memory,

Ah, I get that. I have some issues like that. I can remember a name I've known for years one day, forget it the next then take several hours to recall after deliberately trying to focus on remembering. It is hugely frustrating and gets worse as I get older.

Well, you are blessed with a great sense of humour, kindness and sharing your knowledge, so that's enough for any human being.

Thanks Marianne, but my skills definately do not go as far as tech, I am the person who has crashed a digital egg timer. Even Iain has asked that I never do online banking as with the number of things I've crashed, I probably make the worlds banking systems fail.

There's a block in my brain somewhere, and I have a learning difficulty where some information goes straight to long term memory without spending any time in short term memory, this mean that whilst I know I've done something like C&P numerous times every time I do it is like the first and I have to struggle through it. It's not good people just say press this and click that it's easy, it dosent' stay in my memory, It dosen't matter what form the information is presented in either, my special needs person at uni got really wound up about it as she couldn't find a way to help with it. The thing thats even worse is that nobody ever thinks of how frustrating it is for me, only for themselves.

I think you underestimate your capabilities. You have great talent in cooking and skill in detecting the makeup of dishes, which is a form of chemistry. These skills comprise analysis, logic and synthesis, which are the root of learning.

I've never got on with you-tube videos an I've looked at a few, often they have annoying background music which puts me off and I can't concentrate. I don't think video's help me to learn much unless they're a documentary, the other thing is I could watch a video and mess about with my pooter as I only have the one. Even stuff for dummies is over my head and often these things ar American and American keyboards are often laid out diferently and they call things diferent names, something I find difficult when trying to learn something.

For sure some tech sellers deliberately over complicate their ‘advice’. I had this problem years ago with an ‘IT expert’ who turned out to be less an expert and more a con man. 

Excellent advice, thank you. I've learned more in the last few weeks than for years. It turns out some of the stuff is easier to do than I thought. I think I've been the object of obfuscation because I'm 72 and sellers think I'm stupid.

https://uk.pcmag.com/how-to/88534/how-to-wipe-your-hard-drive

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/reset-your-pc-0ef73740-b927-549b-b7c9-e6f2b48d275e

I hope this works.

I moved over to Apple years ago so I’m out of touch. It’s more expensive but its operation, including cleaning, wiping and reset, is so very easy and seamless across all devices. 

Marianne72 said:

he wants £165 for wiping data and cleaning if I return it.

That's seems very excessive to me.

A comparison: Currys currently charge £45 to wipe data from a laptop, for those who want to keep it. They also offer free wiping and recycling of laptops that are finished with (as do many other tech recycling providers).

So I agree with your conclusion, in one of your replies below:

Marianne72 said:

I think his £165 data wiping fee was to discourage returning the laptop.

Hi D , Thanks for the comprehensive reply, which I really appreciate.

I bought this laptop a year and few weeks ago. I never used it a huge amount - emails, chatting on here and a bit of Word for writing. I have a PC which I used less during the winter as my little office is cold. I will look at that Frame laptop - but as I'm retired now and as I do less writing, I am considering using my PC and not having a laptop - after all this stress.

I think his £165 data wiping fee was to discourage returning the laptop. I never save passwords and don't keep books and other files on the laptop, just the one I'm writing at present on Scrivener.

The issue started with the fan constantly on, then it wouldn't down load updates. I use a pukka laptop stand and have done since I bought this, but he never mentioned it before. I only discovered he used cheap parts when he started boasting about buying '4 for 1',of the cost of genuine parts, and how these last '4 years' which he considered a bargain - but that means customers have to start calling him out for repairs 2 years sooner. 

Overall, his attitude is blaming me; offering to  'help' whilst charging £60 minimum for every callout. It's now a rant of emails with excuses, but putting his neck in a noose by reminding me I paid £500 for the PC - also claiming I wanted 'a camera' when this was only loosening a screw he fitted too tight in a security camera. A decent supplier would not do this - why have I been so blind! 

Iain said:

You can scrub this data safely yourself

Yes, I'll try.  ArchaeC mentioned 'PC reset'. I've cleared data from other computers using, 'format' - would this do the same thing?

I'll use a computer shop chain in future, not a one man band whose assistant he doesn't trust to do home visits. The local one also offers remote repairs, instead of home visits. 

Thanks for your input.

ArchaeC said:

Reset PC option

Thanks for that! I'll look it up. The cost seems phenomenal. I feel stupid, as I've paid him a lot over 7 years.

TheCatWoman said:

I feel at the mercy of what anyone tells me

Yes, I've felt like this for some time. That's why I started trying to repair things myself from online videos. There are a lot of generous people on YouTube.

Cinnabar_wing said:

probably relying on people being too scared of computers to question him.

He told me a lot of his customers are elderly and some have Alzheimers. He was scoffing about some of his customers not remembering what he told them - I informed him of the symptoms of Alzheimers but he didn't seem bothered. Yes, I think you are right. I've been gullible.

Marianne72 said:

The laptop developed a fault just over a year later.

Was this for a HP laptop? I think my parents bought one years back. They would usually ask me about such things first but my mum found an offer. 2 weeks after the 1 year warranty expired, it was apparently running slow. When I looked at it, the hard drive was on the verge of failing completely. They would use it at a table so it wasn't even being moved about a lot while it was on, just poor quality or defective part. I replaced it for a more suitable laptop drive and the only issue for years after that was the battery being completely knackered.

Marianne72 said:

He blamed me for not shutting it down properly, yet this was the advice he gave.

Was this in relation to hardware faults? It's not good to turn off with a hard reset, but it shouldn't cause major damage. It was more of a problem when computers had moving parts like spinning disks. In modern computers the only moving parts are usually the fans and they don't have anywhere near the same momentum. A hard reset is more likely to cause software issues due to files not being cleared properly, or file changes being cut off mid write, but again, this should be quite rare now unless you do it during an update.

Marianne72 said:

especially the advice he gave about using a knife to detach the battery!

Seems you're already cautious about this, but do not try to remove the battery with a knife. A sharp knife may pierce the battery and cause it to explode. A dull knife is slightly better, but if you manage to short the contacts it could catch fire and explode. If none of that happens, you're still using metal against I presume plastic components, which is likely to bend and/or break them. Not as sturdy, but you want to try a trim removal tool first. Plastic on plastic fairs much better. If it does end up needing a knife/screwdriver, be vary careful.

Marianne72 said:

I suspect the battery is a tight fit because it's not a HP part.

It's possible. Batteries can be tricky too if the cells start to swell. That's more likely if it's been left in the sun, overheated, been left on charge constantly or allowed to drop to 0% for a long time, or it can happen with cheap low quality batteries, which sounds extremely plausible. Overheating in laptops can be caused by many things. Poor design, blocked vents...

Marianne72 said:

But he wants £165 for wiping data and cleaning if I return it.

I've not looked into the pricing for such services as I've always done it myself, but that does seem a high. There are tools built into Windows and other OSes for this. If the drive is damaged it's a lot more tricky, but generally it's just part of re-installing Windows. You set it installing and leave it to do it's thing. There are extra steps can be done to check the disk health, but it's not often someone would do this unless there's a specific problem with the drive. If you want any data saving and restoring then that is more involved.

If you're looking for a new laptop, depending how much you're willing to spend, I would highly recommend Framework laptops. They are expensive even compared to laptops of similar spec, but they are high quality and have the big selling point that all of the parts are available to buy as spares, along with guides on how to swap them out. Not that I've ever had an issue in the 2 years I've had mine. It's running smoother than the day I received it.

Marianne72 said:

he wants £165 for wiping data and cleaning if I return it. This is ridiculous - paying him so he can re-sell it.

This is not for his benefit but for yours - if you return the laptop with your data on it then he and/or the person he resells it onto will have access to your data, your browsing history, your passwords (if you save them) etc.

You can scrub this data safely yourself if the computer works but if you return it to him he will fix the hardware issue, get it running and your data is there for easy access.

Marianne72 said:

A week later, the laptop would not load a windows 11 update.

This is quite a common issue with Windows 11 it seems - I have had the issue and I have helped lots of others roll back their updates and it has helped persuade me that it is time to get rid of Windows in favour of one of the free Linux versions out there. Not all the software you use may work on Linux but it depends how often you need to use it - if it is only rarely then you can create a virtual Windows PC to start up on Linux to use for the duration of the work.

It sounds like it is time to find a new IT support provider. The current relationship does not seem to benefit you much.

Marianne that’s a shocking saga and I’m sorry you have been going through this. 

His ‘IT skills’ and ‘business acumen’ sound dodgy. I know Windows 10 and 11 have a built in Reset PC option that wipes and cleans everything if you are reselling it, so it shouldn’t cost £165 as it’s designed to be easy for the user to do themselves. I don’t know enough about Windows to suggest anything to help. 

He does sound like he is ripping you off, probably relying on people being too scared of computers to question him. If you can get online, there are often videos about how to fix things which is probably all he is doing. 

You can also buy stuff directly online yourself which will probably be more reliable and you'll have proper receipts and guarantees, not some delboy selling you reconditioned and not telling you about it.

I'd try someone else, this guy sounds useless and he's ripping you off.

HP is a bit of a marmite brand some love it and others hate it, I'm the later, one of the problems I've had with them are things like not accepting generic ink cartridges which are about a quarter of the price of the HP ones and if you have something like an HP printer hooked up to something that's not an HP computer, it seems to insinuate itself all over the place, adding things like task bars and then it's difficult to get rid of when you need a different printer.

It's horrible feeling like you've been taken for a fool, I sympathise, because I know so little about computers I feel at the mercy of what anyone tells me and I can't do my own due dilligence stuff.