I made the decision to ditch Hewlett Packard as our primary hardware vendor after being an HP advocate for 15 years. I love HP Servers, but their channel support is atrocious.

As an HP reseller I have always been anti-Dell, but given recent events with HP we’ve committed to switching to Dell.

Our goal was to obtain a Dell Premier login, thereby freeing us to order equipment on the web at significant discounts. With our Dell Premier login our margins are almost triple what we received as HP resellers.

Dell operates on a direct model, where all Dell equipment is purchased from Dell or resellers like us. HP forces resellers to purchase from distributors like Ingram Micro or Tech Data. This was a big part of our decision to switch. Low margins coupled with an incredibly difficult ordering process from distribution pushed us towards Dell.

The event that finally pushed us over the edge is HP’s ridiculous process for registering warranties. Warranty registration was taking 20 minutes of our time for every HP product purchased. When we bought this to the attention of a Channel Manager we were asked to provide proof of our sales to qualify for support. Completely unacceptable. The previous 15 years of goodwill were wiped out over a period of six months as HP dropped the ball on providing solutions to simple problems.

Let’s make this clear HP. We are trying to sell your products. You should grant us acceptable margins and provide clear and reliable avenues of support. When we need support we are not interested in filling out your Channel Manager’s spreadsheet so that we can get the help we need. You didn’t keep your end of our bargain and you have been replaced. We’ve moved on.

Goodbye HP.