Is NETGEAR taking advantage of customers??????

Question

Netgear has a free limited 90 days support and customer service.. and after that you are required to pay $37.00 for any additional problem .. such as configuration etc...

After my 90 days period, I started having problems to connect my wireless computer on the internet.
I called them and they said that in order to help me with the configuration I would have to pay $ 37.00.

I asked to talk to the supervisor or the manager and this agent (who was talking to me from somewhere in India) told me that the supervisor would tell me exactly the same thing.. And that in order to be helped, I would have to pay the fee.

My concern is, It seems to me that this is an strategy created By the company to collect extra money from the customers.

I have a friend who is an engineer that came and tried to fix the problem himself and the message we received is (NETWORK WITH LIMITED ACCESS)


SO, suddenly I have a LIMITED ACCESS and no way to change this on my settings!!

In addition I have another friend that has bought netgear sometime ago and had to change to another wireless router , since after his free 90 days tech support he started having problems and had to pay additional money every time he needed help!

I would like to make sure that this company has integrity and is not taking advantage of customers.


It seems to me that it is easy for them to intentionally change the settings and generate technical problems , so the customers would have to call them and pay extra charges.

Ohh... I have contacted my computer manufacturer that I bought with a 2 years warranty.. they checked the computer and connected right the way in their wireless network! I also can connect it to in any cafe that has a wireless access...

So.. it is definitely the netgear network problem!

Answer 1

most router support is not great anyway. most of them really dont know how routing and dhcp and nat works. I do tech support I have talked with tech support from quite a few companies, and its a roll of the dice on how knowledgeable someone is and how well you can understand them.

on to the problem....
when you get a message with something like limited or no connectivity , in laymans terms that means that the computer and the wireless router arent really communicating with each other.
They see there is a device on the other side, but thats it.

The first thing I do in this case is go to your control panel on the computer, then to network connections ( assuming your using xp ) then right click on wireless connection and go to properties. click on wireless networks. remove anything thats in your preferred networks list.

Close your wireless connection properties. then right click on wireless connection and click view available wireless networks. it should show what networks are in range.

Now if you get a message here that says windows cannot configure your wireless network, then you have 3rd party software controlling your wireless connection. You want to click let windows manage my wireless network , or follow the directions it gives to let windows do it.

now if you see yoru netgear wireless router when you view available wireless networks, select it and click connect at the bottom of the window there.

If you have any wireless security set up like WEP or WPA it will then prompt you to enter your security key.
put it in and it will then say like acquiring network address.

If he doesnt acquire the network address either your security key isnt right or the router isnt working right.
You may at that point need to connect to the router with ethernet, open a browser browse to 192.168.0.1 ( netgears default lan ip address ) when it asks for username and password enter what you set it as or if you havent set one netgear uses admin for the username and password for the password by default.

you will need to go to the wireless settings and check your security key at that point. then try connecting again and entering the right key.

If you still cant then your going to have to try and reset the router and try one more time and if not you will then have to call netgear for a replacement if its under warranty.

This isnt every little thing but I was as thorough as I could be.
hope its helpful.

Answer 2

The reason that they have limited support for hardware issues is because they have to pay their help desk techs. Netgear is not the only company that has limited warranties, and they are better than some other companies. I know that Microsoft will only help you with 2 seperate issues, and then you have to pay a hefty fee for any additional support if you call them.

Anyway, to your problem. Limited Access is a setting your computer has when it can connect to the gateway, but cannot connect to the internet. This is a usually a configuration problem with your router. If you reset it, and run the setup on it again to the settings you want, that should resolve it. Limited access is not something that Netgear does to force you to pay them additional fees. Every single network adapter has this setting and will display it when it can connect to it's gateway, but the gateway is not connected to the internet. The address of your router will bring up a configuration utility and you can configure your settings there. The address (by default) is usually either 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1.

Answer 3

That's unlikely.
You computer got messed up and lost some configuration about wirless networ, or the Netgear hardware had some issues, and the settings changed. Just get into the web configurator and see what's wrong (usually http://192.168.1.1)..... my Netgear access point is working like a charm since 2 years.

Answer 4

Unfortunately it is called big business. Netgear is a reputable company, and all big computer companies do the same thing. Dell will give you a 1 yr. warranty, but if it's something out of the scope of the standard warranty you will pay out the ***. Thats how companies like that make there money. Off of service fees.

Answer 5

All netgear products have a limited one year warrenty, I believe. So just swap it out for a new one.

Lots of companies practice the same thing. Thats why you should always come to YA with your problems :-)...we're free.

Answer 6

This router is still within 1 year warranty so return it for a refund and buy a Belkin or Dlink etc. If everyone with problems does this they will soon regret their policy.

Answer 7

There is one thing you can do to resolve ALL you rproblems... Hit the reset button and reconfigure it. I used to set up routers for people (wireless) and if it all went to hell I'd reset and redo. Usually resolved any issue.