Dell hell, neverending

Dell hell, neverending

: OK, I’m going to the Apple store and putting in my EVDO card and if it works, I’m walking out with a real computer.

After four days, I still have not heard from the reputed supervisor who Sunday said I’d get a new disk drive but still, after three emails from me, has not followed through to get it to me. The wireless networking is now completely schizo: it thinks it’s not working when it is and is working when it’s not. And this morning, I woke up to another blue screen of death, a fine way to start the day.

I just sent this email to Michael George, chief marketing office and vice president for US consumer business:

Mr. George:

Since you are in charge of both marketing and Dell’s U.S. operation, I think you would find it instructive to look at your own files to see how I am being handled by your company after having just bought a machine — my third and last Dell — that is broken in innumerable ways.

I am writing about this on my weblog in detail and you are losing customers by the day… including me. I am going to the Apple store in one hour. You may go read what I’ve written here. But first, I urge you to read what consumers say in the comments there. And before that, again, please read your own customer service email trail first and tell me whether this represents the best of the Dell brand.

In its first two weeks of use, this machine has so far gotten a new motherboard… cpu… memory… keyboard… wireless networking… and case. The disk drive is so bad it won’t even run your diagnostic. The wireless networking still does not work. The machine goes to the blue screen of death frequently. The keyboard is still faulty.

I paid for both at-home service and complete care but have received neither. Your at-home care is a fraud; your own person has said in writing that the technician would arrive without parts sufficient to fix the machine. Complete care? The machine is clearly a lemon under federal warranty statutes and regulations and you’d be better off just to replace it. If it just burned up — which it has come close to doing — you’d send me a new one. But instead, your people put me through service hell. And I am left unable to do my work because I have an unreliable Dell computer.

The email trail is positively frightening. Your people don’t even pay sufficient attention to get my name right. Sunday, a reputed supervisor told me I needed a new disk drive but I cannot get them to reply to three emails to follow through and get me that.

My readers on my weblog have been very helpful. They have said I was an idiot to buy Dell and its service plan and that I should get an Apple as soon as possible.

The last straw: Four days without a response from your alleged supervisor about a disk drive and one more blue screen of death today as the machine can’t figure out whether its wireless is on or off.

This machine is a lemon. Your at-home and complete care service is a fraud. Your customer service is appalling. Your product is dreadful. Your brand is mud.

But at least perhaps you can learn from the experience.

Sincerely,

Jeff Jarvis