HP LaserJet P2015d printer purchase

Issues at hand: It seems that we are unable to make it through the day without our cell phones and computers. For those of us who run a business, we definitely need both. Over the years, I've been a big fan of HP B&W LaserJet printers. I've been using them for many years in our business. As for color printers, I use an Epson model and am happy with their print quality.

The main reason I use HP printers, besides the quality, is the fact that they stand behind their products. In 2005 I purchased an HP 2200dt LaserJet printer and finally retired it in 2008 because it was "going stupid" and parts weren't available for repairs. After doing my homework, I decided to purchase the HP LaserJet P2015d. Rather than buy it locally, I purchased it directly from HP in 2008. I also purchased the 2-year/1-time replacement extended warranty (HP Care Pack).

It seemed that everything went downhill after this last printer purchase. I first attempted to call HP tech support to find out why the extended warranty said it was for an HP Color LaserJet 1160 and 1320 instead of the HP B&W LaserJet P2015d I had just purchased. After about 20 minutes of trying to get through their automatic phone system, I realized their system didn't recognize the model number of the printer I had just purchased. I was disconnected twice while trying to get through to tech support.

I headed back to the store side for answers about the extended warranty as well as to report my problems with their phone system. I was told that their extended warranty is a generic warranty that covers both B&W and color printers. I still don't agree with that answer. Their records of my history with HP do not reflect my purchase of an extended warranty on this printer. They contacted the sales department and learned that I did indeed purchase the warranty; it will just take time for it to get into their system. This first call took about 2 hours of my time.

A month later I noticed that some things didn't print as good they should have. When I installed the drivers for the printer, it installed the PCL 6 driver. I attempted to contact tech support and again was unable to get through their phone system because I was disconnected three times. It still didn't recognize the P2015d and wouldn't let my call go through.

This time I spent about 2 hours on the phone when I decided to redirect my call to another department so they could put me in contact with tech support. Now, I was on the phone for a total of about 4 hours when tech support told me that the PCL 5e driver may be a better driver for my application and it would be best to download it from their driver support site.

Okay, now I'm up to 6 hours of wasted time. My time is worth more than what this printer cost!

I thought that adding extra memory might help the printer process the amount of information that we were spooling. I went to HP to purchase their 288 MB memory stick, but it was so expensive that I could have purchased a round-trip ticket to Las Vegas for the same money. I ended up purchasing it from a specialized online memory store.

This was all a huge headache! After I installed the memory, I began to get printing errors—the printer wouldn't print at all. So here we go again! I contacted the HP tech department and was actually able to get the through their phone system and to the right department. Wow! However, this time around I ended up calling a foreign country and attempting to communicate with a tech who spoke only 2 percent English and appeared to be reading from some type of script.

He said there shouldn't be any issue with the memory, but he would be happy to send me a 32 MB memory stick at no charge to see if there was a compatibility issue. I agreed to that but still spent about 2 hours on the phone from start to finish.

I sent the memory stick back to the place of purchase and they sent out another one to try. Now I had one from HP and one from the online memory company. Again, the one from the online memory company did not work; it turned out to be a compatibility issue. I ended up using the 32 MB memory stick from HP. I still don't know for sure if the printer will accept a 288 MB stick from HP. It's too expensive to find out.

With this under control, I've now wasted a total of 8 hours on the phone with tech support. I received a call from an outside US firm that monitors HP customer service, and I explained that I was not happy with how HP farms out tech support to non-English-speaking countries. I also mentioned that HP was unable to find the extended warranty I purchased. She gave me her direct line so I could call her when I don't get satisfaction with tech support and then she transferred my call to another department to check on the extended warranty. I wasted another 2 hours and didn't get anywhere. I called her back the same day and left a message to let her know how the conversation went—to date she has not returned my call.

After a period of time I began to notice that the black tone of the print was more on the gray side, and it appeared to happen more often with .pdf type files. I also noticed that we were going through toner like there was no tomorrow and I was having issues with installing the HP toner cartridge. I could see four screws protruding down from the underside of the printer toner cartridge compartment where the front two screws were digging into the top front edge of the printer cartridge case.

Again I contacted tech support and wasted another 4 hours only to be told they would like to replace the unit under its normal warranty. I explained that I had a replacement warranty but they could find no record of it. He made it clear that they haven't had design issues or any complaints regarding printer toner cartridge installation. I asked to have my comments forwarded to the powers that be, and he suggested that I go online and make a comment.

I have now spent roughly 14 hours on the phone with tech support. I could have purchased 3 of these printers for what my time is worth. Finally I realized that HP is not the same company they once were. Customer satisfaction appears to have been thrown out the window. It was clear to me that HP was not going to help, even with the extended warranty I purchased directly from them. I simply could not waste any more time on the phone with HP; I hung up on the technician.

Lessons learned: While I did do my homework on the product and read reviews, there weren't enough negative comments out there to discourage me from purchasing the HP LaserJet P2015d printer.

Here's what I learned after purchasing a LaserJet printer directly from HP:

1. I should have spent more time researching the printer toner cartridge to determine if I had other options before making my purchase.
2. The unit is supplied with an HP 53A toner cartridge that sells for about $89.99 and yields about 3,000 pages. What they don't tell you is that they also sell a high-capacity toner cartridge under product number HP 53X. It yields about 7,000 pages but has a hefty $164.99 price tag. I can tell you that the 53A toner is a waste of money if you are printing any type of volume. The HP 53X does the job and, quite frankly, I was surprised at the life this toner cartridge delivers; however the price is hard to swallow.
3. No matter which toner cartridge you use, you will still have an issue with two of the four screws digging into the cartridge at the top front edge of the case.
4. After doing some research, I found the same high-capacity toner cartridge (NT-C7553XF) online through www.abcinc.com. The quality is the same and its life expectancy is neck-and-neck with the HP 53X toner cartridge. However, they beat HP because the case of the NT-C7553XF has a little different shape at the front so it doesn't hit the two front screws as the toner cartridge drops into place. The best part of it is the price because these are remanufactured toner cartridges. You can purchase 5 high-capacity toner cartridges for a total of $185.19 and that includes free shipping. That's $37.05 per high-capacity toner cartridge. You do not need to purchase the original brand name toner cartridge, at least not in this particular situation!
5. Before you contact HP tech support and you have an extended warranty (HP Care Pack), be sure to register online first. It will make a difference when tech support looks at your history.

It appears that HP comes out with new printers about every 6+ months. I had the opportunity today to visit our local office supply house to look at the HP printers. What I noticed was the new model P2055dn, which looks just the P2015d with one major difference. I took the toner cartridge out and looked at the underside and could see they redesigned the plate so there were four recessed areas so they could use shorter screws. Now the four screws are still in the same place but do not protrude below the plate.

Hmm! Didn't the technician tell me they didn't have design issues with the P2015d? If so, then why was this area redesigned to accommodate shorter screws?

As for HP customer service—in simple English—it sucks! My experience with them over 11 years has been great—until 2008. What I went through last year is enough—my company is moving on and finding a better printer manufacturer to work with. It appears that HP doesn't want to keep a customer happy, so when this unit dies, I will move on to another major brand printer.

If you have had a bad experience with any manufacturer's product and were able to get things corrected to your satisfaction, I would like to hear from you. Send us an email with your story and lessons learned!

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