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Recourse For Poor Customer Service?

Posted by kdawson on Sun Nov 30, 2008 05:06 PM
from the in-harm's-way-a-long-way-from-home dept.
Businesses
eleventypie writes "I am in the Army and currently stationed in Afghanistan. Recently I found myself without a laptop so I decided to build a studio 17 from Dell. I designed/customized my laptop on 2008-09-17 and placed my order, which totaled approximately $1,700. The laptop was built and apparently shipped on 2008-09-28. Given my APO address, I know mail can sometimes take a little while to get here, though 7-10 days is normal. Dell said to give my laptop 6-8 business days and occasionally, it might take as much as 4-6 weeks. So on 2008-11-12 I sent another email to Dell informing them I still had not received my laptop. One person said to give it more time, while another person responded to my message telling me to send my address again and they would send me a replacement. So I sent my address immediately and never got a response. It is now the 30th of November and I still have no laptop and Dell seems to have quit responding to my emails. This is very frustrating being out $1,700 and not having a laptop to talk to my friends and family and do school work. Phone calls aren't easy so calling them is pretty much out of the question. Any advice on what I can or should do at this point to get the computer I ordered or get my money back?"
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  • Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Rick Zeman (15628) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:08PM (#25936799)

    ...and dispute the charge. No laptop = no payee.

    • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Mana Mana (16072) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:37PM (#25937123) Homepage

      Two things that you can do that will work.

      If Mad: call dell and threaten a "charge back!" Vendors hate that and will snap them to attention as nothign else.

      If Really Mad: call CC company and have a charge back done. It's all dell's problem then - you are out of there.

      Don't feel sorry of someone stole said property en route. That is called insurance, doing business for dell. They have processes to find it, the thief or gain restitution.

      • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

        by TheRedSeven (1234758) on Sunday November 30 2008, @09:05PM (#25938873) Homepage
        Late post, so this will likely never see the light of day. But nevertheless...

        The Consumerist offers 3 options that seem to work well:
        1) Chargeback on your Credit Card.
        2) Launch an Executive Email Carpet Bomb [consumerist.com] (EECB) to get their attention and get a response. They even offer information on Michael Dell's email address [consumerist.com].
        3) File a suit in small claims court. This probably doesn't work if you're still stationed overseas.

        Good luck fighting the evil corporate overlords!

      • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

        by toddbu (748790) on Sunday November 30 2008, @09:15PM (#25938963)
        I did my first chargeback ever a few weeks ago, and I've had a credit card for about 25 years. The key thing is that you have a limited amount of time to do this, so pay attention to dates. I think that 90 days from the date that the charge first appeared on your statement is typical, but check to make sure. When I did my chargeback, there was a ton of stuff to document, so make sure that you preserve *everything*. At minimum, you'll need a copy of the order and any communication that you had with them. Send them email, preferably using an account like Hotmail or Gmail. If you call, make a note of the date and time, the rep that you spoke with, and any details that they told you. And if you are going to do a chargeback, do everything that you can to show a "good faith" effort with the merchant. This means contacting them several times using both email and phone, and make more than one attempt with each. Then when you make your claim, instead of saying "these jerks screwed me", just point out everything that you did to work with the vendor and then say, "I did everything that I could to resolve this with the vendor and have run out of options". Your bank will love you for this because it helps them to justify the chargeback decision.

        One final note - chargebacks aren't guaranteed. They work a large percentage of the time, mainly because the cost for the vendor to research what happened is much higher than the loss that they take on the product, and they are still likely to lose. When you put together your documentation, keep a copy in case you lose the case with your credit card company and need to take legal action against Dell.

    • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

      by LVSlushdat (854194) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:42PM (#25937179)

      What seems to work wonders with Dell (disclaimer: I deal with them quite a lot, as I support over 150 Dell desktop/laptops at work) is the "unresolved issues" link on the very bottom of the Dell front webpage. Just the other day, my hope system, an Optiplex GX620 decided to start getting weird on shutdown/hibernate, such that it would shut down ok, and power the system off, but then it would immediately power back up again on its own. I did all the obvious troubleshooting, including seeing if it could be a bent windows install by installing a clean copy of XP on another drive, and sure enough, same problem, it also occurred on an install of Ubuntu. This strongly pointed to the motherboard having problems, so I submitted a support ticket, telling the tier one drone the problem AND the steps I'd taken to isolate the issue.. Drone apparently couldn't read plain English, because he told to do all the things I'd already done.. I replied that I'd already done these things, and believe it or not, he wanted me to do them again.. I simply went to the "unresolved issues" link and filed a case there, referencing the case id I'd been given by the drone, and the very next day, I got an email telling me I'd get a replacement motherboard shipped to me... This link seems to connect to clueful people, and more importantly, ones who can take ownership of a problem and get it resolved... Give it a try.. BTW: Thank you for your service to the country, I salute you!!!

      LVDave

        • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Dogtanian (588974) on Sunday November 30 2008, @06:14PM (#25937459) Homepage

          It would be really great if they would send you an e-mail telling you that they were shipping you a replacement motherboard and firing the representative who handled your case initially.

          That would probably make you feel better, but a lot of these drones are restricted in what they're allowed to do and they're forced to go through standard scripts and procedures.

          I've been through similar trouble with other companies. I had one idiot drone ask me what version of the operating system I was running four or five times in a row, when I was answering him each time. I finally asked for a supervisor and directly asked the supervisor to fire this moron.

          I'm sure that the supervisor appreciated some random asshole telling him how to do his job and manage his staff.

          Most companies care not even the slightest bit for providing non-terrible customer service.

          Bingo. Customer support is expensive, and usually carried out by a third party who have a vested interested in "processing" you as quickly as possible, regardless of whether or not it solves your problem.

          There might be some stupid and/or lazy staff, but the fundamental problem is at the top.

          • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:4, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 30 2008, @06:39PM (#25937647)

            There might be some stupid and/or lazy staff, but the fundamental problem is at the top.

            The fundamental problem is with people accepting poor customer service. If the average customer will accept the cheapest customer service, it generally works out in the business' favor to go with that lowest-rung option.

            You can't blame a businessman for running the most profitable business he can.

              • Re:Cost of customer service is business damage (Score:4, Insightful)

                by gcatullus (810326) on Monday December 01 2008, @11:21AM (#25945845)

                That is the Walmart Effect in a nutshell. That store only delivers what its customers want. They want low low prices, and easy returns. The products don't have to be high quality or made in the USA. The cashiers don't have to be too friendly, or even too quick, just quick enough. The stores don't have to be too clean, just not disgustingly dirty. If the average consumer wanted to spend a little more for service, maybe we'd actually get it

          • If the supervisor thought I was wrong in requesting that somebody who asked me for my operating system version four times in a row when replying to an e-mail in which I explicitly stated my operating system version, then he should be fired too.

            Once is chance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action. If this guy can't figure out that I am telling him my operating system version four times in a row, then he needs to find a new line of work. If there are somehow procedures which require him to ignore

            • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Funny)

              by Zathain Sicarius (1398033) on Sunday November 30 2008, @07:23PM (#25938033)

              Aw... Don't pick on the poor drone. The only thing they can do once they get to the end of their script is to start it all over again. It's quite a sad existence. For only $1 a day you can help these mindless drones gain a sense of conciousness and individuality. Dontate now to the Mindless Drone Enlightenment Association.

                • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:4, Insightful)

                  by HeavyD14 (898751) on Sunday November 30 2008, @09:42PM (#25939151) Homepage

                  Please, I've already given this information previously. I am using Mac OS (Mac is not an acronym, by the way) 10.4.8, and I am not using [software].

                  You still sound like an pompous ass.

                    • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Interesting)

                      by smidget2k4 (847334) on Monday December 01 2008, @12:44AM (#25940205)
                      Yup, I'm going to agree here. When I worked a lowly tech support job, people who were jerks were instantly added to the very bottom of my "shit to take care of" pile, if I even wrote down their contact info.

                      In a job where you deal with asshats all day, you tend to actually want to help the few who are pleasant toward you.

                      Bottom line is: they aren't getting paid enough to deal with you being a dick. You can complain to their bosses if you want, but most of the time the boss is going to agree with the employee: you're just being a dick.

              • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

                by arth1 (260657) on Sunday November 30 2008, @11:55PM (#25939999) Homepage Journal

                No, but sophisticated support is expensive. For the most part, they can retain loyalty by simply providing a good show, even if the resolution process is long and more riciulously painful than it should be.

                This is why good companies have a many-tiered support staff, and escalate based on technical merits and not how squeaky the wheel is.
                If 10% of all support calls get routed to level 2, and 10% of them again get routed to level 3, you still can survive because almost all of your support staff will be script-reading drones, with a few technicians being paid three times as much, and a few professionals being paid six times as much.

                The main problem when doing a multi-tier system is if you outsource the lowest tier. They won't have any incentive to figure out just which calls to escalate, and quite often are penalized for escalations, so they will do what they can to get the customer to give up before it gets there.
                Customer slams on the receiver in frustration = Log one successful call.
                For a multi-tier system to work properly, the level 2 staff should be the supervisors of the level 1 staff, and the level 3 staff should be the supervisors of level 2.

        • Re:Call your credit card company.... (Score:5, Informative)

          by baxissimo (135512) on Sunday November 30 2008, @07:13PM (#25937943)

          Ever since Dell outsourced their customer service they've never been the same company. Every niggling little thing they push back on customers to do, every endless phone menu you have to take time to navigate, takes a little of the value away from their product.

          Don't use the phone to contact Dell. Don't use email either. Use their web-chat interface. You get a written transcript just like email, but unlike email someone actually responds right away. Whatever you do when dealing with Dell tech support you're going to have to jump through all the hoops on their checklist. So just do it. Whenever you talk to a new rep, they'll probably ask you a lot of the same questions. You have a transcript, so just copy-n-paste from it till the new rep is satisfied. You can read your email or cruise Slashdot while you're waiting for responses from the rep. Far far better than waiting on the phone.

          That's my 2c. I had some faulty memory. I'm in Japan but it's a US-bought Dell laptop. I tried email first. No response. Then I tried the chat interface. Much better.

          Of course, using the chat interface requires you have access to a working computer, which you may not if you're in Afghanistan waiting for them to deliver the blasted thing to you.

    • Another thing to ask is if they ever shipped it and if they did what the tracking number is. At least this way you can try to work out whether the blame is with Dell or the internal courier service used by the military to get it there (I imagine this how it works). Once you can work out where the computer should be you will know who you be dealing with.

  • Contact your credit card company (Score:5, Informative)

    by SpiceWare (3438) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:09PM (#25936815)

    and have them reverse the charges

    • DON'T do this first! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I'd agree that you should know your card company's chargeback procedure, and understand how to do this. But don't start with the chargeback.

      Disputing the charges is "the nuclear option" in terms of working with a customer service department. It will generally make all future conversations adversarial. It will rarely help you get your order fulfilled--at best, the company might grudgingly agree to cancel your order. It can also in some circumstances result in getting a collection agency placed on you (an

  • Blame the APO (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LostCluster (625375) * on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:11PM (#25936829) Homepage
    It most likely got stolen by a corrupt employee on its way to you. Dell thinks you got it and won't send another one, so the place to take this is your credit card's fraud resolution process, who will most likely eat the loss.

    • Re:Blame the APO (Score:5, Informative)

      by proverbialcow (177020) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:27PM (#25937017) Journal

      The credit card company won't eat the loss - they'll mediate his dispute, and unless Dell can prove that he received the laptop, Dell will be out the one (or two) laptops they claim to have shipped and the OP will have his money refunded by his card company, who will in turn deduct it from Dell's account.

      Given that it's an APO address, it will be hard to prove receipt. Better call the card issuer soon; chargeback rights vary by issuer, but typically expire 60-90 days after purchase.

    • I had an APO address for three years at Ramstein AB (ie, the place that *all* APO mail headed to Europe and SWA goes first). The OP's representation of the amount of time it takes to receive mail from the US is misleading at best. It takes 7-10 days to receive letters from the US. I have received packages in that little time, but the average was perhaps 4 weeks, and 8 weeks was not unusual. A few times it took up to 10 weeks. The package is being sent to a *war zone*, have a little patience.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by mysidia (191772)

        Trust me VISA will not be eating it. The ability to reach in and take it from Dell is 100%.

        Visa is never actually even a party to the transaction, they're the only winner in the case of a chargeback.

        Every Visa card is issued by a bank.

        Every merchant that can accept Visa cards has a merchant account with another bank.

        When you pay for a purchase with a CC, the transaction is processed by the retailer's merchant account.

        The merchant's bank uses Visa's network to record the transaction.

        The amount

  • It's obvious... (Score:5, Funny)

    by falken0905 (624713) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:12PM (#25936851)
    Send in the Marines! Once Dell HQ is surrounded I'm sure they'll find your laptop.

  • Worth a try.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:13PM (#25936861)

    Honestly e-mail CNN with a story about how hard it is to deal with issues like this when you are out of country in the service. You can even file an iReport. If they run with the story I think you'll find your laptop showing up in record time with a heartfelt apology from Dell.

  • How to get your laptop... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:16PM (#25936899)

    Get your problem posted to the front page of slashdot?

  • Sounds like you need to submit this to (Score:4, Interesting)

    by kipin (981566) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:19PM (#25936941) Homepage
    consumerist.com

  • See your local JAG attorney (Score:5, Informative)

    by jrminter (1123885) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:19PM (#25936945)
    My son is an Army JAG Attorney. He was telling me that helping servicemen with such problems was part of the job that gave them much satisfaction. They can write some very good letters on your behalf. You probably have a few deployed with/near you.

    • Re:See your local JAG attorney (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:32PM (#25937067)

      Yeah, well my son flies Apaches. Not as impressive as being a fancy pants Army attorney, but he too says helping servicemen with problems such as this gives him much satisfaction.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by fm6 (162816)

        Is your son offering to fly an attack on Dell HQ? If not, the JAG attorney probably has more potential for resolving this problem.

  • Two must-do moves (Score:5, Informative)

    by psychosis (2579) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:23PM (#25936987)

    1) Dispute charge with your credit card issuer (as others have recommended)
    2) Check out the consumerist blog (consumerist.com) and use their guidelines to get consumer satisfaction.

    Don't let them BS you - put the beef out in public and you're more likely to get results. Dell and other large companies don't care about you, an individual consumer - make it public and affect thousands of buying decisions and you'll likely fare better.

    Note: If they resolve this to your satisfaction, also post/email/whatever a follow-up showing that they made good on a bad situation. If they do not, of course you should let everyone know that as well.

    Good luck!

  • Homeland Security (Score:5, Funny)

    by unlametheweak (1102159) on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:51PM (#25937239)

    Recourse For Poor Customer Service?

    Homeland Security. I've had the impression long before 9/11 that Al-Qaeda has infiltrated Dell customer service.

  • I used to work for Dell (Score:5, Informative)

    by MercysVictim (915709) on Sunday November 30 2008, @06:37PM (#25937635)
    I used to work for Dell in a call center doing technical support for business and the Army was one segment that I supported quite often. I dealt with many calls from overseas Army bases and it was always a headache. It's called OCONUS or Outside the CONtinental United States and it is a completely different process to send something OCONUS than it is to ship normally. The reason for this is because of export restrictions and other trade regulations. If Dell screws up and sends something where they aren't suppoesto they could loose their ability to ship anything outside the US so they take it very seriously. There is a special department in Round Rock TX that deals with this, all of my shipments went through them. I had to set it up a certain way, or it wouldn't work, nothing would be shipped and I wouldn't know it wasn't shipped unless I remembered to check back a couple of days later and see the status of the shipment. So, the end result is that because most agents don't get many OCONUS calls, possibly 1 or 2 a year, they either don't know that it has to be done a certain way, or they can't remember how to do it the right way so it fails to ship and the agent who set it up is NOT notified unless they take the time to check a few days later on the status which they usually don't have time and would not think to do anyway as 99% of the time it is unnecessary. Now bear in mind, this is in hardware warranty support, not sales and it has been about a year since I last worked for Dell so things could have changed but, I kind of doubt it. This was an ongoing issue for me as I worked the night shift so I got at least 3 or 4 OCONUS calls in a week which is much, much more than the average agent. I became the go to guy for OCONUS (in my department) calls because I did so many of them. Another issue is the APO address. We were told NEVER to ship to an APO if there was any other address available because it could often take 3 to 4 MONTHS, not weeks to get there if it ever did. I ALWAYS had issues shipping to APO's. So that could be the issue as well. You need to realize that the agent could be trying to do their best to give you good service (which may or may not be the case) but they are very limited on what they can do and more likely, do not know all the options they have available to them. As this is a rare case - shipping OCONUS to an APO, most agents would not have ever done this and not know how do do it correctly. I would follow the advice of some other posters and call and talk to a live person, during business hours in EST which probably means you need to call at 2 or 3 am your time. Be prepared with all the information you can possibly get and be ready to spend quite some time on the phone as it is better if you can stay on the phone while the agent goes and talks to someone who knows what to do or looks for someone who knows what to do. Shipping overseas is a pain and is always a hassle. also it's not Dell making the hassle it's the US trade regulations so blaming the Dell agent won't accomplish anything, even though it might be their fault for not sending it correctly in the first ( and second and third...) place. Asking for a supervisor won't work as there are no supervisors for you to talk to. there are managers who do not talk to customers, the best you can do is get another agent but then you will be starting back at square 1 and have to explain everything all over again. Another person posted offering to follow up with Dell for you, this won't work as they are not the person how placed the order or the cardholder so Dell probably will not talk to them, this is the normal customer confidentially policy Dell has. the easiest thing to do would be to have a family member buy a computer for you and then send it to you the way you normally receive mail from family and friends. Any other company (like HP or Apple) will have the same difficulties shipping to you as Dell but they might have better trained agents, or not. I'm not trying to defend Dell here just tell you the realities of shipping from Dell to your APO.

  • First, you get a lawyer... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hyades1 (1149581) <hyades1@hotmail.com> on Sunday November 30 2008, @06:57PM (#25937809)

    Sounds to me like an open-and-shut case of breach of contract. They took your money. They failed to fulfill their side of the bargain. Unless they refund your money (perhaps with interest, perhaps not) or give you the laptop you paid for, they're guilty as hell. Maybe I'm naive, but I'd bet a lot of judges, juries and predatory, razor-toothed lawyers would take a pretty dim view of a corporation ripping off somebody risking his life in service of his country.

    I imagine a letter from the aforementioned predator (maybe accompanied by a warning that the media would be involved soon) would generate some kind of response.

  • Call a media spokesmouth in your home town (Score:4, Interesting)

    by mrmeval (662166) <mrmeval&gmail,com> on Sunday November 30 2008, @07:31PM (#25938101)

    or pretend to be one and ask them if there is some problem shipping laptops to asscrackistan

    Contact Media Relations

    Working media members may contact Dell's Media Relations team by calling our press line at (512) 728-4100 , or by using the form below.

    The press line is staffed from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Central Time, Monday through Friday. A recording at that number provides emergency and weekend contact information.

    • There are members of the U.S. Armed Forces who attend college while enlisted and even while stationed overseas. Certainly you've heard of online degree programs offered by schools such as Argosy University or University of Phoenix?

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by LiENUS (207736)
        Actually in the Army you can get a degree from most normal colleges while deployed as well. Theres a college exchange program where you can take classes at any approved college (including some classes taught by the army itself both online and offline) and receive your degree at the participating college of your choice (and they do have a good selection of participating colleges.)

    • Re:Dissapointed with Dell (Score:5, Informative)

      by xSauronx (608805) <xsauronxdamnit.gmail@com> on Sunday November 30 2008, @05:20PM (#25936961)

      meh, i would have had the laptop shipped to a relative and asked *them* to ship it in a plain box (not one marked DELL DELL DELL) with insurance, delivery confirmation or whatever option they could get from USPS or whoever.

      as others mentioned, do a chargeback.
      then buy a thinkpad :)

      • Re:Dissapointed with Dell (Score:5, Insightful)

        by p0tat03 (985078) on Sunday November 30 2008, @08:13PM (#25938395)

        I wouldn't. Insurance by the postal service is worth almost as much as no insurance at all. It takes literally years of fighting past insane bureaucracy to get reimbursed, and even then they will try to weasel out of every single penny they can.

        Dell would probably treat you better than the USPS.

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by xSauronx (608805)

          actually now that you mention it, youre right. i once bought postal insurance and they refused to pay, because i couldnt produce receipts for the items, and the one i *did* produce a reciept for they bitched about.

          but still, i had delivery confirmation and the *box* got to me, at least, so there!

    • When our son, deployed in Afghanistan, ordered his laptop, we had it delivered to our house, then repacked it in a plain brown box, before shipping it out to him insured. Sure, people can still look at the customs form and see it's a laptop, but that's better than shipping a box with "Dell" in large letters on the side that you can read at twenty paces.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by bastion_xx (233612)

      Chargebacks vary, based on the transaction type, from 45 to 180 days. Trust me, a chargeback, or even threat of a chargeback will escalate this within the customer service department.

      It's a MOTO transaction (card not present) where you didn't receive the goods. Unless the association rules have changed dramatically in the past 3 years since I used to deal with them, it's pretty much a slam dunk you'll get your money back.

      If they continue to give you grief, then explain to them when they say they will disput

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