Carol's Corner Office

I have received a comment from Christopher M. who purportedly works for Dell in their Online Community Program in their headquarters in Round Rock, Texas.

Christopher addresses only one small part of Dell Hell – that being the issue of refurbished parts. Christopher states that “after 21 days from the invoice date replacement parts will be used.” Hmmm….Christopher, here is my question to you – Say you purchased a brand new 2009 automobile and twenty-two days later the transmission went kaflooey. You manage to drive it back to the dealer and the dealer informs you that they will put a rebuilt transmission in your nice new auto – are you going to be happy about that? I think not.

Christopher also says that “Refurbished parts and systems are parts or systems that have been returned to Dell some of which were never used. All parts and systems are inspected and tested for quality.”

Wow if that is true, then what the heck happened with my brand new computer? Hmmmm…inspected and tested for quality eh? It does boggle one’s mind then that the entire computer had to be rebuilt and supposedly the original parts were new! This computer has been in my possession less than three months and has only been used a little over a month.

I don’t see anything on the Dell Website where they sell you computers telling you that your computer could fail entirely when it is new and that it will be rebuilt with refurbished parts. I doubt that many people would purchase them if that were the case.

Christopher also does not mention anything about the horrible customer service or the fact that Dell wants to charge me a monthly fee for the privilege of speaking to someone who actually understands my language. He also does not speak to the fact that the tier three Dell tech seemingly didn’t know how to do things he was supposed to know or the fact that he downloaded the wrong drivers onto my computer or the fact that he refused to let me speak to his superior. Or how about this Christopher – how come there is no phone number listed anywhere for the corporate offices of Dell?

No, Christopher doesn’t have an answer for any of those things, at least not that he has articulated to me.

Dell would have been much better served to to have some good customer service representative extend some good customer service to me and replace my computer instead of rebuilding it with used parts. Perhaps then, I would have been able to look past the horrible customer service and perhaps I may have still purchased Dell computers.

As it stands now, I have been treated badly and I will never purchase another Dell product and will do my best to urge everyone I know not to purchase Dell computers.

Yes Christopher, you commented but just like all the other Dell representatives before you in Dell Hell, you didn’t give me a straight answer about anything. I stand by my articles. The lack of customer service was abominable, not to mention all the money I lost because I didn’t have the use of the computer I paid for. Some folks might think that is a lawsuit waiting to happen when you pay for goods and services and they aren’t delivered…