Could I refund my XPS 13 9380 after only 2 months of minimal use?

Question

TL;DR - Would I still be able to get a full refund for the XPS 13 I bought? I bought a Dell XPS 9380 and I thought I’d treat myself and get the FHD, non-touch 16 GB RAM/ 512 GB storage, so it was a lot of money At first I was actually really happy with it. Now the screen won’t turn on but the keyboard light and front light flash. This laptop is only like less than 2 months old and I’d only been using it for uni work such as browsing, MS word and occasionally netflix. I called Dell, the guy on the phone assumes it’s the motherboard. So he’d set up an Next Business Day on-site technician to come and fix the problem and change mother board (if meeded), but the replacement motherboard to is unavailable at the moment and the site says I can’t reschedule because the time slot is now unavailable. So they’re not coming tomorrow I assume. Which is unfortunate because I’d expected my laptop to be fixed by now, I have quite a few assignments and deadlines in the next few weeks or so (including a late one because of this issue). Since I can’t really give up anymore waiting around for Dell to fix this, which could take weeks/months at most. I was thinking I could use some of my savings to buy a less expensive laptop in-store tomorrow and I’d make the money back (plus some extra cash) when the refund money comes through. So would I still be able to get a full refund for this? I just don’t want to buy a new laptop and then suddenly I can’t even get the refund. How long would that even take until the money is processed? I paid through their Dell Finance system if that changes anything.

jphughan · Answer

To my knowledge, the return period is only 30 days regardless of issues.  However, if you continue to have issues like this, request a system exchange, which they will typically approve with newer systems if they encounter several issues and/or repeated attempts to solve the same issue are unsuccessful.  In a system exchange, Dell sends you a replacement system, and then you returning yours (in that order, i.e. you don't ever end up without a laptop.)  When system exchanges occur late in a laptop's warranty period where identical replacements might no longer be available, you'll typically get the closest match in terms of system model and specs, and it will probably be a pre-owned system from the Dell Outlet.  But sometimes you still end up with a better system than you had.  But with an XPS 13 9380 today when that's the current generation, there's a chance that the replacement would be brand new.

XPS

Could I refund my XPS 13 9380 after only <2 months of minimal use?