Hi there,
I usually do not post blog posts anymore about personal stuff because it never seems to get anywhere but today I will make an exception. I have only ever shared my opinion about a company once before when Verizon Wireless would not replace my device and kept saying that the slow network connection was just life. It ended in me contacting BBB and getting the issue resolved by someone from Verizon Executive Relations. They sent a tech out to figure out that the issue is because we live in a hill and transmission from the tower is bad. The resolution; an apology, two months of free service and an iPhone. The result of this resolution; I like Verizon provided I don’t have to go through customer service “hell” again and deal with agents whom “care about me being the 36th call of their 50 call streak”.
My current issue is with Dell (AKA Alienware; yeah Dell bought them… I never knew this.). So I buy this nice “New” Alienware A51 with Premium Support (On-Site and supposed chat, phone and email support; mind you the phone support is “premium” too :D). The computer gets to me and I set it all up but realize that this was Dell and tried to refund before I get the computer. Since it was already shipped (and I had to wait two weeks for that; on top of that the refund/cancel I put in took a week for anyone to look at… Strange how that works.). I finally got a response to that and the customer service folks gave me $70 for the error… Fine a payment on the financing I got it on… Great; I’ll keep the computer… That was Jan 7… Then comes Jan 11! I had been noticing I could not hibernate the system… After hours of Dell Forum-Warrioring I decide to contact Technical Support and am greeted by a representative (He said he was in Porta Rico if I recall; he sounded more like he was from India reading me a script)… He takes me through hours of using Dell’s tasty “Fix-It” application which does everything I already tried (Apparently these folks think me telling them I work in IT and KNOW WHAT I AM DOING to actually mean “I am a moron and know nothing; please hand hold and redo everything I just did”). After hours of this his shift ends and he calls me two days later. He says his “escalation” team needs to check this further. A week later they tell me to use the Alienware Respawn to reformat my computer. I say no; he says this is the only way to fix the issue. I say it did not work since the system ARRIVED before I did anything to it. He then updates the ticket and says he will have it looked into… A week later… The resolution is still “Reformat” so I go ahead and resolve the issue myself after contacting Dell’s Executive Service team and waiting a week for nothing to happen. (Notice how “Premium this support is so far!) I finally email Dell telling them how I resolved my issue… And no response to this day… Good job dell; so “Premium”; no chat support, only two emails, weeks waiting… no on-site visit… I would be happy to go through this again… This is so worth the extra $300. I should spend more money to be told “Reformat” by phone support Indians reading a script. I remember my old Latitude laptop; they actually sent out technicians, provided US BASED SUPPORT TECHNICIANS WHO ACTUALLY HAD A BRAIN! (Enterprise support?) and they actually offered live chat and email support…. Nevertheless they actually let me (and my IT background diagnose my own problems and REQUEST REPLACEMENT PARTS via a TICKET and ACTUALLY DISPATCHED THINGS TO ME WITH A TECHNICIAN…. Just like HP for the life of my HP EliteBook Support Contract… Why hath thou forsaken me Dell?! I R NED SUPPURT DELL… Y CAN HAZ NO SERVICE… WINDOWS 10 RESOLUTION AND .HLP FILE COMPATABILITY PROBLEM -_- MICROSFOT ANSWER DESK IS VERY “ANSWERFUL” COME SAVE ME DELL ENTERPRISE SUPPORT… I NEED INDIANS AND MORE TICKET SUPPORT, LESS “Hello sir, I am Harmod; I have come to help you today… Please reformat your computer.” T_T.
Josh
(Note: This is not an IGA post; this is my opinion on how Dell’s service has become less than desirable. If you don’t want to read this you don’t have to.”