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I have purchased and placed quite a few Dell PCs and laptops over the years. Not so many lately, but that is because my business is transforming from purchase and install to let them purchase and me install. Makes life simpler and I make the same money; I just don't carry clients for a month or more. I do miss the airline miles, though.
Anyway, I got a call from a client last week. A very nice lady in her 70's. She had downloaded IE 8 because "they" told her it was a good idea. I never did find out who they were. After downloading and installing she could no longer get to the Internet. She has Qwest DSL so she called them for help. They ran in circles for a while and sent her to Dell.
It took her 5 minutes to get through the automated "I am a stupid computer and if my owners are lucky you will get frustrated and hang up" system, 30 minutes on hold, and a very, very long conversation with a man in India that she couldn't understand half the time.
With a heavy East Indian accent. Ya know what I mean?
She said that every few minutes he tried to talk her into buying something. Over and over and over.
He convinced her to allow him to return her computer to Dell Factory Default. What a swell guy!
She lost all her pictures, music, documents, programs etc. He did not bother to install any drivers except the ones in the OS (XP) and did not tell her how to do it herself.
And when dillwad was finished she still could not connect to the Internet. Well, duh!
Oh and he sold her a "memory something or other" for $110.00 that I finally figured out was a 1GB (or so she thinks) DIMM. $110.00!!!!!!!!!!!! I told her to call me when it arrives and I'll help her shove it up his....
Moving past her fun with support...
So I get the call, finally. Got the drivers installed, contacted Qwest and had them reset everything and bam! Internet. I got her updated up to the SP2 installing and told her to call me when it got done. Couldn't see any reason for her to pay me to stare at a screen while SP2 installed.
During my time with her she told me her son (another client) chewed her out for not calling me first. Sure would have cost less, and taken less time. Her strees level would have been a lot lower, too.
I don't think I'll be recommending Dell to anyone from here on out.
What a story, no big surprise though, most tech support people are McDonalds rejects. I'm a Dell and HP reseller, and the first thing I tell my customers is call me first, do not under any circumstances call Dell/HP support. Unfortunatly the problem isn't just with Dell, it's everywhere.
I had a business client that had verizon broadband which became fairpoint, and I can tell you those people are the stupidest people on the planet. My customer lost internet access, after much troubleshooting the idiot decided it would be a good idea to change the static IP on their domain controller , and my client didn't know any better, so the obvious result was the server wouldn't come back up after a reboot and their entire network was down. it wasn't long after this the "tech" noticed they were receiving multiple calls on outages in the area and determined it wasn't a problem with the server. Last I heard he was trying to get them to reimburse the $110 it cost him for me to go out and fix it.
I don't think I'll be recommending Dell to anyone from here on out.
One person, one bad experience, and condemn the whole corporation?
Please tell me one major company in any industry in the country that does not have a customer/former customer that has not had a bad experience and rants and raves about not recommending/purchasing from, etc blah, blah blah.......
I have managed the installation of thousands of Dell, and other vendor computers as corporations do a technology upgrades. There will always be a certain percentage of DOA's and other issues. The #1 rule is to have vendor "X" certified techs contact the vendor "X", and there are no games, just next day replacement parts delivered to the site.
....... I have managed the installation of thousands of Dell, and other vendor computers as corporations do a technology upgrades. There will always be a certain percentage of DOA's and other issues. The #1 rule is to have vendor "X" certified techs contact the vendor "X", and there are no games, just next day replacement parts delivered to the site.
Same here. Where I work, we have used HP, Dell, Lenovo, and now HP again for computers. HP and now Lexmark for printers. I call or go to a web site and parts are delivered the next day. Once Dell offered to go ahead and send me replacement motherboards for 126 computers that had not failed yet. HP had a tech call my cell phone after I got to the office with the problem and talk me through it. Lenovo has been OK, but not so great. I'd rather order parts online, but I have to call them. At least I'm calling Atlanta, although some of the techs sound like English is a second language.
One person, one bad experience, and condemn the whole corporation?
Please tell me one major company in any industry in the country that does not have a customer/former customer that has not had a bad experience and rants and raves about not recommending/purchasing from, etc blah, blah blah.......
I have managed the installation of thousands of Dell, and other vendor computers as corporations do a technology upgrades. There will always be a certain percentage of DOA's and other issues. The #1 rule is to have vendor "X" certified techs contact the vendor "X", and there are no games, just next day replacement parts delivered to the site.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mensaguy
Same here. Where I work, we have used HP, Dell, Lenovo, and now HP again for computers. HP and now Lexmark for printers. I call or go to a web site and parts are delivered the next day. Once Dell offered to go ahead and send me replacement motherboards for 126 computers that had not failed yet. HP had a tech call my cell phone after I got to the office with the problem and talk me through it. Lenovo has been OK, but not so great. I'd rather order parts online, but I have to call them. At least I'm calling Atlanta, although some of the techs sound like English is a second language.
If you had actually read my post you would know that the problem had little to do with parts. True, she had a DIMM shoved at her constantly during the call, but the problem is that the dumbass in India reset her system to Factory Default (unnecesarily) without explaining to her the loss of data that it entailed, and then left her on her own to figure out how to install drivers.
Getting parts ordered and shipped is a no-brainer for almost any company. Getting a tech that totally screws you over is another thing entirely.
BTW this isn't an isolated incident, it is the one that finally convinced me to drop Dell. I don't condone an entire company for one bad tech, we all know they're everywhere. It's just the latest of a long line of fixes I've done over the last two years that point me to the fact that Dell has dropped the ball for the Home User.
And yes, I have installed thousands of computers in corporations also. Doesn't mean beans. When you call a company you don't (or should be smart enough not to) call the same people end users do.
BTW this isn't an isolated incident, it is the one that finally convinced me to drop Dell. I don't condone an entire company for one bad tech, we all know they're everywhere. It's just the latest of a long line of fixes I've done over the last two years that point me to the fact that Dell has dropped the ball for the Home User.
And yes, I have installed thousands of computers in corporations also. Doesn't mean beans. When you call a company you don't (or should be smart enough not to) call the same people end users do.
I agree, but in today's world please name one company that does not have a flock of dim bulb script readers as the tier 1 support you talk to in regards to any problem?
Call centers pay squat, and you get what you pay for.
Fortunately some companies have received enough backlash from customers and the press for overseas call centers, and are bringing some of it home, at least where you don't also have to wade through some thick accent.
Being a reseller, certified tech (DCSE), etc. gets you past the puppet script readers at a screen that the majority of callers have to be deal with.
I agree, but in today's world please name one company that does not have a flock of dim bulb script readers as the tier 1 support you talk to in regards to any problem?
Call centers pay squat, and you get what you pay for.
Fortunately some companies have received enough backlash from customers and the press for overseas call centers, and are bringing some of it home, at least where you don't also have to wade through some thick accent.
Being a reseller, certified tech (DCSE), etc. gets you past the puppet script readers at a screen that the majority of callers have to be deal with.
The fewest complaints I've received (and I am not sure the relatively small number is a good candidate for statistical analysis) is HP. I have called (as a home user) a number times and had very good results. I still can't understand half of what they say - partially deaf - but the information given is at least intelligent and usable. I did have a client get the "factory default" spiel last fall from them but was smart enough to pass on it.
Not sure how someone can "loose data" by resetting their computer to "Factory default", are you talking BIOS settings, or something software related? In the case of software settings I find it amazing (based on my experience) that Dell's 1st line support would even begin to do anything software related other than ask what OS the client is using before they pass the case onto their field tech or ask for the laptop to be shipped back for repair. They are all limited by their 'scripts' and no 1st line support operation these days allows the use of initiative or an individuals experience/knowledge.
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