A California woman won $10,000 in court after suing Microsoft for forcefully updating Windows 10 on her work PC. The woman argued that the upgrade crippled her PC and her business lost money.
Teri Goldstein told the small claims court that she has never given her permission for her computer to be upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 10. Yet, after the unauthorized upgrade the hardware was rendered almost unusable.
She reported chain crashes and problems with the external hard drive. Plus she was forced to restore her lost files and had to do several things before she was allowed to log in her own computer, every day.
Reportedly, Windows 10 maker gave up the appeal and agreed to pay the $10,000.
The woman also proved that the computer was vital for her business. However, Goldstein hasn’t sued Microsoft the moment problems emerged. The upgrade happened in August 2015, and for several months she tried to work things around with Microsoft customer service representatives.
After countless calls to technical support and several visits to the company’s retail store, her patience ended. Her business was also affected. She explained in court that September to December are the busiest months for her travel agency.
She noted that she was not able to put her business on hold for several days until she bought a new PC and a technician set it up and transfer all her work files on the new workstation.
Some of her customers complained that she hasn’t answered their e-mails. So, she had to explain on the phone that her crippled computer didn’t allowed her to. Reportedly, some of clients canceled bookings.
In October, she was able to buy a laptop and tried to run her business from both machines. In late December, when customer traffic was lower she finally managed to buy a new desktop and replace the old work computer.
However, between August and December her business lost about $17,000 in lost contracts and extra expenses to upgrade the hardware due to the Windows 10 problem. The businesswoman based her calculations on previous years’ revenue data for the same period.
Goldstein said that Microsoft technicians never managed to fix her old computer. One of them was constantly rude and told her to never contact him again while another one offered her $150 to vanish.
“I used that as proof of guilt. They knew what was happening,”
the woman said.
Image Source: Flickr
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