Customer service fun

I have two experiences to share and some advice when you do have to deal with cutomer service.

First story was years ago with a video card that i got from 3dFX. I had a problem with a v3000 if i remember correctly. I sent in the card after the trouble shooting didn't work correctly and they said they would test it and send a new card.

Now in the time that they had the card (about a month) i moved. i forgot to tell them and when they shipped out the replacement card the package got rejected. i called up to ask where the card was and realized my mistake, but since they said the package was sent back they would ship it to my new address.

Now i waited another few weeks and still recieved no new video card. So i call them back up and ask what happened. I turns out that they shipped it to the old address another two times. On the third time someone signed for it, although not in my name. 3dFX tells me that there is nothing they can do now and that i will have to call the shiping company.

I wasn't too happy, but relized that this was partialy my fault. I asked the customer service person to look up my last chat, where i had given the new shipping information. They looked it up and saw that i had indeed given the new info but the last person i had spoken with had put it as a note instead of the shipping address. Even still they said they could not help me.

Now this made me upset since this time it wasnt my fault. So I sent a letter into the shipping department and to the VP of 3dFX. I got two letters back within a few days saying that they were very sorry and would take care of the problem.

The next day i get two boxes overnighted. One contained a special v3500 that had handpicked ram that wasnt offered on the standard card. A card from the "lab" i was told in a letter. The next box was from the VP and had a V5500 their newest video card. I was exstatic. It took a long time but they came through in the end.

Funny thing is that a few weeks later I get a phone call from the people that moved into my old place. They said they had been away, but had recieved three packages for me and hadnt had a chance to call. I go over and pick them up and it turns out to be the 3 new v3000 that had been shipped to the wrong address. Turns out that all three had been delivered, and the system just showed them as being returned.

After seeing this company operate so smoothly, it was no surprise when they went out of business a week or two later.





Second story was with a Dell laptop. The button that senses when the screen is closed and shuts down the LCD was sticking. This problem grew worse and worse over time to the point that the computer was unusable.

I build my own computers and am generally pretty handy so i decided to see if i could fix it. I took off the plastic cover, which took all of 2 seconds, and saw that the switch was actually part of an electronics board that plugged into the LCD, motherboard and other parts. This i didnt want to play around with.

So i called up the tech support. The person I spoke with started going through the procedures. Try restarting, what bios are you using, are you using Windows...... I tried to tell her that it was a physical problem and i could actually see the piece in question getting stuck. This information just bounced right off her. Every time I tell her it is a HARDWARE problem she comes up with something new to try, like Ctrl-Alt-Del. This goes on for an hour.

Finally she pulls up the diagram of parts. I tell her it is NOT the plastic cover and that it is actually the PCB board. This was just to much for her. It took 30 minutes of me describing all the buttons and cables plugging into the board for her to finally understand.

Eventually she says that she has it and will ship it out for me to replace. I say hold on, I am not comfortable replacing that part and I would like a tech to come out(i have in-home repair policy). She tells me that it is a user replacable part. I tell her that I dont think it is and that she must have pulled up the wrong part. She tells me I am wrong and that there will be a charge for a tech to install it. After another 30 minutes of trying to clarify what part it is, I give up knowing that she is sending the wrong part. She does send out a tech however, saying that it will be free this time as a curtousey.

The tech shows up a few days later after the part arrives. He opens the computer and tells me that they sent him the wrong part within 5 minutes. I told him that i already knew that. He shares my pain saying that a lot of the customer service people there are not to bright. Anyways he ordered the part and got it in a week and took care of the problem.



I have learned the best way to deal with customer service is to roll the dice. When you get a rep that is a real idiot, hang up, call back and hope you get someone better. That seems to be the best way. I rather wait on hold for an hour than spend 2 hours beating my head against a wall trying to explain something to someone who has an IQ smaller than their shoe size.

If this upsets any Customer servoce people out there, realize this: You are problably the smart ones that I hope to get. The idiots probably dont know how to use the internet.