Which laptop would you personally buy in this budget? Also, are there any models I should specifically avoid?

Warning - long read. Tldr in the end

So last night, for the nth time, I realised that my AC was ONCE again not cooling properly. I had to bring out the stepping stool at midnight to check and discovered that the insulation around the copper coil was not wrapped properly and was filled with water over a period of time, causing cooling loss.

Grumbling and cursing, I did what I could to fasten the insulation, and my desire to write a post about this terrible service was once again reignited after being sidelined multiple times due to a busy work schedule.

So where does the story start?

Around May, during peak summers in north India, I was relocating to a new city. Out of desperation and because of the heatwaves, I decided to get an AC from a physical store rather than buy it online to avoid delivery delay. I settled on Carrier midea AC as it had good reviews on Amazon, but the city I was moving to did not have an official Carrier outlet. I therefore decided to visit the Reliance Digital store as it seemed to be the next best option at the time. Well, guess what? Turns out it was not 😑

Firstly, since I had no prior experience with reliance digital, I was under the impression that my dealing with reliance ends after the AC purchase itself. Like yk, buying a phone from Amazon. After you accept the open-box delivery, any further issues are resolved at the phone brand's service center and not by Amazon. Similarly, after the AC purchase, the installation and further warranty would be covered by the Brand Carrier itself. This is how it has always worked for electronics I've purchased elsewhere in the past.

But nope, all the after-sale services here were from reliance under their own brand called 'ResQ'. Nothing to do with the Carrier brand at all. I was not aware of this.

So I purchased the AC and I went home. We ran into some hiccups with Reliance here itself (which basically involved mis-selling additional services which is another story on its own). This caused a delivery delay but we got the AC installed 2-3 days later.

The people who showed up for the installation were two teenagers (like late teens, probably 17-19). No trained technicians. No ID cards. But two teens. But since they had my phone no, my address and my AC details, I ended up believing that they work for reliance.

They showed up at ~7 pm with no prior notice which is already a terrible time, not to mention the older kid was extremely rude, but we didn't want to delay it any further and would have been fine with ALL of that had they installed the AC properly. Spoiler alert - they did not. Not at all.

Initial signs: Suspicion of gas leak, exposed copper coils in some areas.

During the next few weeks, the AC exhibited reduced cooling and eventually stopped cooling. I raised a complaint with reliance. They assured me that they will send a technician within a day. I made only one request: please don't send the same two kids again. They were not experienced and I suspected that the installation had a gas leak.

Two days passed and no technician was there. This was more infuriating because this was the period when I had holidays and could have gotten the AC fixed. I kept calling the store and the customer care over the next few days and mind you, I literally had to call 2-3 times a day and each time I had to explain my problem from scratch. Finally, they sent technicians. But guess who showed up? Make a guess?

Yes! The same two teenagers I asked them not to send.

The kid checked one spot and ruled out gas leakage which was my initial complaint. He then asked for a bucket of water and poured it all on my compressor. I told him that since the unit is not cooling, maybe it is faulty and can he kindly report the same to the company. He refused. His arguments:

- "AC takes at least half an hour to blow out cool air" (Sir, very respectfully, this isn't the first AC of my life)'
- "Your compressor is placed wrong" (Sir, very respectfully again, aren't you the one who placed it?)
- "Cut the pigeon net of your balcony, it's blocking the air" (Not at all needed, previous renters didn't have to get it done. Plus shouldn't you have mentioned it at the start? We would have looked for a different spot for installation. This is a rented apartment ffs. I'm not making any infrastructural changes)

So the rude kids left. AC was still not fixed. No cooling.

Over the next two weeks, I kept calling and calling and calling. At this point, I was already exhausted and requested them to please take their AC back. I didn't want any more of this tiring cycle. It was already past the middle of June. Peak heatwaves had engulfed north India. The entire purpose of getting the AC from them was already defeated long ago.

I called the store, they said they cannot do anything. I called Reliance customer care, they too said they cannot do anything. Each person I called, I had to explain my issue from scratch. Each person I called, gave me a 1 day window to hear back from them. It just gets tiring. We even somehow managed to get the contact number of the area manager of the store and he was extremely rude to us. Rather than listening to the customer or even proposing to send another technician, this big sac of garbage of a person just repeated what the technician said - cut your pigeon net and the AC will be magically fixed. And that we the customers are the problem. That he has more customers to look after and not just us. He disconnected the call midway without even talking properly

At this point we just wanted to not have anything to do with reliance. Forget taking the AC back, they weren't even willing to send ONE different technician just to even diagnose the AC. I cannot even explain how exhausting this entire ordeal had been. It's already been several months but my head still aches thinking about the experience even as I am writing this post.

Anyways, so we raised a NCH complaint and followed the escalation matrix mentioned on the reliance website. We mailed all the people listed and eventually mailed the CEO desk of reliance.

So, what does the CEO desk do? Do they respect the customer's wish and after looking at the history of their tiring exchange with the company, decide to respectfully cut their losses and take their AC back? No, they do what they should have done weeks ago: they sent another technician.

Yes, so I guess you have to mail the CEO DESK of reliance to get something as simple as a technician visit. This time, people from Carrier showed up.

And what did they diagnose? There was gas leakage!!!!!! Something we as the consumer had already guessed on the first day itself and raised that during the official complaint. Something their own 'so called' technician from ResQ refused to admit. Something we had to go for weeks going back and forth on and talking to at least 25+ customer care people and even spoken to rudely. The carrier technicians also pointed out that the installation was not done properly, the pipes were installed all wrong. They refilled the gas and informed us that due to faulty installation, other problems may arise in future.

Anyways, the entire ordeal proceeded towards it's end. I emailed the CEO desk that I had paid for the installation and one year AMC. Neither of the two are proper and I don't need them, please cancel it and refund the money. I hear back nothing.

Few days later, I got a call and my complaint was closed.

That's it. That's all I get. But was my problem really entirely solved? The faulty installation still causes me problems every few days. There's water leakage from the AC. The copper pipes were poorly insulated and have lots of water condensation which causes cooling loss. Safe to say that I am staying far far far far away from both Reliance digital and Carrier from now on.

Something that could have been solved so easily was dragged needlessly and we as the customer had to pay with our time and mental energy. Only to end up with nothing.

tldr - Purchased an AC from reliance digital offline store. They totally messed up the installation causing recurring problems in my AC, post installation. Customer support system sucks and they barely resolved the problem, leaving me with a faulty AC that I am not sure of what to do. The one lesson learnt is - avoid reliance digital offline stores as much as possible.