Marsha and her fianc√© have a long-distance relationship right now. Normally, that wouldn’t be relevant, but that it means that by the time he bought an Archos Android tablet for her, configured it, and sent it to her on the other end of the country, she was past the ten-day return window Staples allows. When her tablet wouldn’t connect to the Internet, she had to turn to Archos for a warranty replacement. But instead of grabbing a tablet for her from the “refurbished and restored” pile, they grabbed one for her from the “scratched, dirty, and full of porn” pile.

I live in Florida and my fiancee lives in NY for his job right now. A month ago he bought an Archos 80 G9 tablet from Staples for me. He took the week to make sure that it works and since I don’t know how to use a tablet, he set it up and installed all the apps I would need. Everything worked fine. He shipped it to me.

From the day I received it, the internet was a problem. Unless I was standing right next to my wireless router, the Archos would not pick up the internet. Even if I just walked 4 feet away. The router is not in my bedroom, so I could not go online most of the time and since I wanted the tablet to mostly use the internet, this became frustrating fast. My fiancee did not pick up the problem because as he lives in an apartment, the tablet was always close to his router, so he was never offline with it.

By this time, I could not take it back to Staples because they only have a 10 day return policy. I called Archos customer service and they kicked around idea after idea and none of them worked. Finally, the customer service rep convinced me to do a factory reset, which undid all the work my fiancee had done to set up the Archos for me and it still didn’t work.

At this point, Archos admitted defeat and had her send the defective tablet back. The phone representatives had assured her repeatedly that they’d be sending out a new tablet as a replacement, but this isn’t true: replacements are refurbished units. Still, even if she had been expecting a refurb, she wouldn’t have expected what she found in the box.

The Archos screen had dozens of fingerprints on it and no amount of wiping and cleaning would remove them. The body of the tablet was scratched up and it looked like someone owned it for a few years. I called about the lack of a charge cord and they explained that I made a mistake in sending everything back, but were nice enough to send me a replacement cord. However, I was told that the other customer service reps should never have told me that I would receive a new unit. They only send out refurbished units. I was not pleased.

I explained about the body damage and was told that they could set up another RMA. I had visions of me wasting money mailing Archos units back and forth to them only to receive other old looking units, so I just said forget it. This one could go online and it wasn’t broken (anymore) so I would cut my losses.

I could not use the Archos yet as it was not charged and I had no cord. Four days later, the cord was waiting for me after work. My family gathered in the den with me to watch our nightly shows. I plugged in the Archos, turned it on and was ready to start setting it up and customizing it. My two nieces 5 and 7 came over to look at it because they knew that I would download some games for them to play when I was finished.

As I scrolled through the icons on my “clean and refurbished” Archos, my hand accidentally hit the video app. Before I could hit the back button, my family AND I were shocked to see (and hear) lesbian porn playing. I quickly turned it off but my young nieces understandably had questions that none of us wanted to answer. I had to wait until the morning to call Archos again and I was far from happy.

I looked through the information on the Archos and was surprised to see that they never wiped it. It seemed like it was damaged in some way. The person sent it to Archos, they fixed it and sent it to me without removing the information of the previous owner.

I called Archos in the morning and explained all the issues I’ve had with the product since I first received it. The CS rep sounded so bored and disinterested I could have been talking about the weather. Finally, he said he would set up an RMA and send me out another refurbished item and I am pretty much fed up.

As a gift I received a brand new Archos that was not working correctly. All I want is to receive a brand new Archos that works. I have never had to do RMA’s and returns with a company. I am also not someone who likes to cause trouble or expect to get something that I am not owed. So I am asking for your help and opinion. Is it wrong of me to want a new working product, instead of a used, broken and fixed (refurbished) product with visual damage that may or may not [contain] porn?

Or should I continue to play musical chairs and do the RMA hoping for better resuls? I really want to call on Monday and try to speak with a manager. I am frustrated and very unhappy with the company, customer service and their product.

Well, Marsha, it’s Monday, and you should give them a call. This result was unacceptable. You don’t send in a tablet that’s been barely used for a week and get one that’s clearly been used a lot more in return. Even if it does come with free porn.

Ask for a manager next time, and if that doesn’t work, escalate. You deserve a working tablet that, even if it isn’t fresh off the factory floor, is at least new-looking.

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