Update on the Health of the VAIO

It turns out that the VAIO was missing a vital organ necessary for proper recovery from its upcoming surgery. I had to order a set of recovery disks for the VAIO system direct from Sony—a set of disks that should have come with the laptop to begin with, but somehow did not end up in the box. This has delayed the surgery by a week.

The experience thus far has been quite frustrating. We began with DHL delivering the box from the Computer ICU (in which I am to ship the VAIO back for treatment) to an apartment building down the block, and marking the delivery as being “left at front door” of a house number that does not exist. If I had not had the brainstorm to check the only other multiunit apartment building on the street, I would probably still be waiting for the box to arrive. The buildings—especially and including mine—are very clearly marked over the doors with the street number in large black numbers, so there should have been no reason for confusion. This made me slightly squicky about allowing DHL to take custody of the laptop for fear that they would leave it “at front door” of some random address, gifting one of the neighborhood youth or some dishonest neighbor with a laptop.

Then I discovered that the proper paperwork had not been included with the box. When I called to request that paperwork be mailed to me, the representative suggested that I just send it back without the papers. Nice try, but I want the carbon copy for my records, you know, just in case the laptop goes missing and you idiots try to tell me that you never received it for repair.

Then I find out the about the missing disks. In addition to the financial outlay (which was not entirely cheap and galled me on principle), I had to wait for the stupid disks. In order to avoid using UPS (a.k.a. The Devil’s Delivery Service), I paid extra for expedited delivery. Lo and Behold, it was given to DHL. Given the fact that I was planning to be in the City of Light for the holiday and the fact that a signature would be required, I requested that it be delivered to Finbar’s place. The nice thing about paying the extra expedited delivery is that delivery was guaranteed by noon. That meant that I could wait to sign for the package and still have the whole afternoon for trawling the racks of the excellent Goodwill and AmVets in the City of Light for additions to my “professional wardrobe” (‘cause I’m going to work in D.C. this summer!!).

Ha.

I sat through both ER re-runs on TNT and called Sony to find out what happened to the package. Sony informed me that the package was “left at front door”. Leaving aside the fact that it was supposed to be signature required, I was fairly certain that it wasn’t true, as I had been sitting facing the picture window facing out on the street and would most likely have noticed the approach of a large delivery truck. But just to be certain, I opened the front door. Nothing.

So I got the tracking number and the 800 number for DHL and called to see what they had to say about this little discrepancy. Well, was I sure that the package wasn’t left? Yes, I was, but here, let’s look again. Hmm… nothing in between the storm door and the front door, nothing in the bushes next to the door, nothing on the front steps, nothing hung on the doorknob, nothing in the mailbox (not that DHL should be delivering to a mailbox, anyway)… I’d say the package isn’t here. OK, we’ll radio the driver and have him pick the package back up from wherever he delivered it and bring it to the door for you.

Lather, rinse, repeat. Four times.

Finally, shortly before the clocks chimed three, DHL snuck in and left the package. Sony was nice enough to refund my extra fee for expediting and I hope they’ll be taking it up with DHL. But the thing is, now I am REALLY squicky about the fact that I am going to be entrusting these morons with my precious laptop. One mistake was human error (although a particularly stupid one), but two in the space of four days in two separate cities makes me wonder about the institutional practices of DHL as a carrier. I wish, more than anything, that I could change to Fed Ex. Unfortunately, I don’t get a say in the matter.

I might miss the daily phone calls to one or another of the four entities now involved in this process when the VAIO is finally returned to me, hopefully better than new. But I doubt it.