[c0011j]

I am pretty sure by 'off site' he meant another department to handle this issue. I know in Advanced Tech we cannot do anything with purchases within 30 days. That sucks though...
I know whenever we do AE's we try to send to a store first so they can determine whether it is physical damage to prevent the cust from being charged. If it is sent through the AE process with that type of damage customers are charged because it should have been process through assurion.
But in your case it was already defective so should have just been replaced.
I hope it works out.