Were you hoping Canon might be held accountable for its all-in-one printers that mysteriously can’t scan when they’re low on ink, forcing you to buy more? Tough: the lawsuit we told you about last year quietly ended in a private settlement rather than becoming a big class-action.
I just checked, and a judge already dismissed David Leacraft’s lawsuit in November, without Canon ever being forced to show what happens when you try to scan without a full ink cartridge. (Numerous Canon customer support reps wrote that it simply doesn’t work.)
Here’s the good news: HP, an even larger and more shameless manufacturer of printers, is still possibly facing down a class-action suit for the same practice.
As Reuters reports, a judge has refused to dismiss a lawsuit by Gary Freund and Wayne McMath that alleges many HP printers won’t scan or fax documents when their ink cartridges report that they’ve run low.
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Interestingly, neither Canon nor HP spent any time trying to argue their printers do scan when they’re low on ink in the lawsuit responses I’ve read. Perhaps they can’t deny it? Epson, meanwhile, has an entire FAQ dedicated to reassuring customers that it hasn’t pulled that trick since 2008. (Don’t worry, Epson has other forms of printer enshittification.)
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Source: Canon is getting away with printers that won’t scan sans ink — but HP might pay
Robin Edgar
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