31 Jan 2012

Does anyone know where in  the United Kingdom I can buy a replacement top case/body part for a Vaio VGN-NW11S (UK version)? That's the panel that surrounds the keyboard and attached to the base of the laptop.

After multiple emails to and from Sony "Support" (it's anything other than that) all I have met with are statements that they do not supply such parts to end-users and that I should send them my Vaio for assessment. 

Well, after reading some of the Community posts here, I am not keen on being ripped off by Sony for unnecessary "assessment". I could do the work myself if I had the spare part. In addition, each of my emails have been answered by different 'Support' service personnel, each on seemingly unaware of the emails I previously sent to their colleagues and each one seemingly incapable of reading or understanding or acting on the information I have previously sent. Sony's 'Pass the parcel avoidance routine' is working at full throttle.

I am very unimpressed with Sony's arrogant, obstructive, horrendous "Support"; its demonstrable policy of deliberately avoiding the provision of a customer-focussed after-sales support.  If we can order almost any spare parts for our cars or houses or white goods, why cannot Sony do the same for its products?  They obviously have the parts but refuse to provide them to me, the customer.  The answer seems to be that Sony wants to force its customers into using Sony's slow, over-complex, inefficient and hugely over-expensive repair/rip-off centres. It amounts to blackmail or usury.

My Vaio works OK..ish but soon after purchase I picked it up by grasping the base, with my thumbs resting on the bottom casing, just above the poorly positioned left and right USB ports. Those areas of very thin plastic cracked so the casing is demonstrably under-designed in mechanical strength terms. As a follower of Corbusier's 'Form Follows Function' design philosophy I am critical of Sony's approach which appears to be 'Design it so that it breaks' and rip-off repair approach. Sony is not a customer-focussed company and it deserves to fail on the basis of my experience with them.