Lionel sent a message to Kazuo Hirai,President and CEO, Sony Corporation that said:
Dear Mr. Hirai
I am contacting you because I have exhausted all the other communication avenues designated to help customers. I know someone in your position is very busy, so I will try to get to the point quickly.
On July 2014, I talked my son into buying one of the last offering of the Vaio laptop line. This would be our 7th Vaio in 12 years. The unit was purchased at Best Buy (Houston Texas). The cost was $800US after taxes. The unit was model # SVF14325CXB Vaio, Serial . My son took this unit overseas to the Caribbean where he started med school.
Towards the end of November 2015 he called me to let me know that the unit would not power up and his project for one of his major classes was on the hard drive. He was not able to get profession help to check his computer to see what the problem was. A month later he travelled to another island where he had a profession computer shop test the unit. They concluded the motherboard had failed.
I contacted Sony support who told me to take the unit to Best Buy. I told them that were difficult but I just needed to purchase a replacement motherboard. I was then told to go to the two authorized parts supplier. I provided the Sony part number off the existing motherboard (the computer shop provided this) A2011581A. I was told that Sony does not offer this part number since they removed it from their parts database. I was told to call Sony Repair center, I asked about the part number and I was told quite rudely that I should not be calling there and that if the part number was âretiredâ Sony could not provide a replacement. When I asked about why Sony would retire parts for a unit sold in 2014, I was told that everyone knew that Sony was not making laptops anymore, and why would I purchase a Vaio. I told the person on the line that I had asked the sales staff at Best Buy if Sony would support this 2014 unit with parts and service. I was told yes, so I purchased the unit then. The Sony rep told me to go back to Best Buy they could not help me.
I then went to the Best Buy store and spoke to Geek Squad group. They pulled up the info on the unit and tried to find a replacement mother board. The Best Buy Geek Squad called their contacts with the mother board part information; they were told that the motherboard was not available. Best Buy checked my loyalty account (7 Vaio, 5 Sony TVs, 2 Sony Monitors, 4 Sony Cameras and 3 play stations) and offered to discount a re-furbished Sony unit. I told them no, because it was the same type of Sony laptop which could fail and be unsupported like the unit in question.
I am not looking for a handout and I acknowledge that the unit was just over a year when it failed. I would be willing to pay for the replacement motherboard so I can retrieve my sonâs information from his laptop.
The online community has mentioned that I contact the legal firms that have support lawsuits against Sony in the past, or go to the Federal Trade Commission or make a formal complaint against Best Buy and Sony to the BBB.
Sony has always been supportive to me in the last 15+ years that I have been a faithful customer and I hope your Company came help me with this problem.
Thank you for your time and attention
Respectively
Lionel
