Complaint Review: Dell Computer

Letter to rippoff.com Jan 15 10:56 AM

I have been dealing with DELL with regards to two notebooks that are ripoffs (which I also bought multiple year service contracts on) and because I could not get any assistance from technical service, customer service or financial service, and could not reach Dell over the net repeatedly, I actually sent the following letter "snail mail" to Michael Dell via "snail Mail"

Insult has continued to be added to injury by Dell sending me to a collection agency for $30US who continues to call me everyday at 8AM, despite the fact that I explained I do not owe this money - and even when I explain that I have an incurable illness that keeps deteriorating because of the constant harrassment of their company ICS Tara X6735 TEL 877-221-3940. She says they can call me from 8AM to 12 PM anytime they want.

Letter to Michael sent "snail mail" and to Dell electronically.

Mr. Michael Dell et al.
I am writing to you as a last resort to express the deplorable state of your customer service.
I am a business owner as well, certainly not as large as yourself, but my business philosophy has always been - "if there is a problem with my product or service, tell me, not your neighbor or not your friend, because they cannot do anything to fix the problem, I can and will!" Obviously, that business philosophy is meant to insure that I find out there is a problem, that I fix it, and that my customers know that I truly care about them. It is also an attempt to preempt losing a valuable customer - because TO ME every customer is VALUABLE - and also to straighten out any misunderstanding, or to lose other current or future customers. It's just good business sense, which is something I'm sure you already know.

Therefore, again, I am doing this again as a courtesy - I have not joined any chat rooms or started to bad mouth Dell to any of my customers.

Here are the facts ... I will put them in as much chronological order as is possible. I cannot guarantee the exact chronology, because the problem has been ongoing over several months.

Starting in the summer of 2004, I, Jo-Ann B. and my mother Louise B. both purchased Dell notebooks. They did not function correctly from the outset as I now realize but because I was used to the IBM Think Pad, I just thought the issues were a "quirk" of another companies product and as I became more "familiar" with the machines, the "problems would just end up being, in fact "operational differences". I was mistaken.
We are specifically speaking of 2 DELL notebooks, my own, a Dell 600N Service Tag Number JQKL051 and my mother's Inspiron 5150 Service Tag number 9NNLX41.

The first incident you will find under express service code number 42965557237 which was caused by installing the Microsoft XP SP2 "downgrade". It crashed my computer and because I was not sent the original boot disk with my system, I had to wait for your service people in God knows what country to "overnight" the correct boot disk ... which took 3 days.

It then took over an hour, maybe 2, my memory fails me, but if you would like the EXACT time it took, I can contact a technical support representative from GMA who was on the three way call with me the entire time because neither of us, the GMA tech person or myself could make YOUR tech support person Jennifer understand what the problem was.

At that time I was given your case expedite number case no 81875400 and dispatch number 049998819 and told I could call and speak directly to the supervisor of the department Robert at x 75034 or his assistant John at X 75617 as soon as I received the disk. If I did not call them, they would call me in 3 days time to insure the problem was resolved. I resolved the problem myself and never received a call from them despite leaving several messages to them on the extensions I was given.
ALSO, PLEASE BE ADVISED WE PURCHASED YOUR EXTENDED SERVICE AGREEMENTS TO FORESTALL ANY ISSUES AS THESE LAPTOPS ARE USED TO RUN A BUSINESS AND ARE CRITICAL TO ITS OPERATION!

Next Issue: begun about 10 days ago
I called to report problems with both computers again! I was assisted by a very nice technician Des who unfortunately was about to go on vacation. I explained the situation and he said he would speak to his supervisor in great detail because he believed that only new computers would solve these ongoing issues.

True to his word, he called back within 10 minutes but because he was only a tech support person he could do nothing for me. He explained that it was now an out of warranty issue, which frankly I did not understand since we have multiple year service policies on both computers and said I had to call OTS directly and explain that the SP1 and SP2 fixes would not correct the problem and that he would also record that both computers, to fix them and keep from having my 76 year old mother and myself who has an incurable illness which aggravation and having to explain over and over and over again to everyone I am transferred to at DELL causes a full blown episode that lands me in bed for 2 full weeks each time.

I called the number I was given 800-288-4410, the phone was answered by a machine and (I called twice by the way) and was put on hold for 20 minutes both times before I finally just hung up. I was given case # 089337075 by Des who kindly promised to call me back after his vacation.

Then I was told to call customer service directly at 800-624-9897 at which time I spoke to Angela 973-70 who was also unable to assist me.

I asked to speak to her supervisor who said his name was Robbe or Ronnie who after a few minutes hung up on me or perhaps lost the line but never the less, did not call me back.

Since Des was so helpful, and dealing with your contingent of unhelpful customer service people had already caused me to have a full blown illness relapse, I decided to wait for Des to return to help me so I would not continue to have my health deteriorate.
In the middle of all this, I have Dell's collection department call me and tell me they are going to put me into collection because I owe you $30US. I also have Bill Me Later calling me because I mistakenly sent a balance owed to DELL and not Bill Me Later of $US 39.00.

When DELL financial services called me at 8AM in the morning and proceeded to tell me I owed them money, I asked her to wait one minute while I got the documents with the names and telephones numbers of both the DELL people and the Bill Me Later people who I had already had numerous conversations with and it had already been settled. She said,"I am not allowed to speak with any other department and you must just pay this bill!". When I asked her if I could speak to her supervisor, she said, "no, I don't have one and you can't speak to anyone else other then me!" ... to which I informed her that I didn't know who she was but I lived in America and I COULD WRITE TO MICHAEL DELL IF I WANTED TO! She said she didn't care and she would NOT make any notes on the account other then "the customer refused to pay" and I finally lost my patients and hung up on her.

FOR YOUR INFORMATION NEITHER THE DELL ISSUE NOR THE BILL ME LATER ISSUE HAS BEEN RESOLVED TO THIS DATE. I HAVE JUST CONTINUED TO BE THREATENED BY BILL ME LATER THAT (I INITIALLY OWED THEM $10us) AND THEY WILL CONTINUE TO ADD $10us EVERY MONTH I DO NOT PAY! THE BALANCE IS NOW $30US.
Back to Des and my OTHER still unresolved issue. I have called the number he said was his personal number 3 times. I was under the understanding his vacation was one week so I waited the week and then began my calls leaving VERY specific messages.

What I have received twice back from Dell is:
"Dear B. JO-ANN,

Thank you for contacting Dell Tech Support. It was a pleasure working with you in our attempt to resolve the issue you are having with your system.

The following information relates to your recent call.

Case # : 089337075
Rep Name : Sugata
Rep ID : 92093
Rep Team ID: TCSP021
If you need further assistance with your CURRENT ISSUE, please feel free to contact our team specialist by replying to this email. Please include:
1. Preferred way to contact you (phone or email)
2. Best time to reach you
3. Include the phone number (if you choose phone in #1)
4. For proper routing of your reply mail please leave the subject line unchanged.

For all NEW ISSUES, please email Dell Tech Support from the following web page:
http://support.dell.com
You will be assigned a new case # for the new issue.

Thank you for choosing Dell.

Sugata"

My initial email reply was:

Yes I need further assistance with THIS issue. It has NOT been resolved.

1. I would prefer an email suggesting a time when we can speak over the phone. That way I will make myself available and be at the appointed number at the appointed time. So PHONE CALL with PRIOR email scheduled date and time are preferable. However, I need this issue RESOLVED ASAP as it is costing my business everyday. So if email and then phone call will slow down the process, I can be reached at either of 2 numbers from 8AM to 12PM
EST ###-###-#### or ###-###-####.

Thank you,

Jo-Ann B.

and then again came another DELL email ...


----- Original Message -----
From: "Dell Technical Support"
To:
Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 9:37 PM
Subject: Team TCSP021 Email #~347677~# Confirmation - CaseID=089337075


> Dear B. JO-ANN,
>
> Thank you for contacting Dell Tech Support. It was a pleasure working with you in our attempt to resolve the issue you are having with your system.
>
> The following information relates to your recent call.
>
> Case # : 089337075> Rep Name : Sugata
> Rep ID : 92093
> Rep Team ID: TCSP021
>
> If you need further assistance with your CURRENT ISSUE, please feel free to contact our team specialist by replying to this email. Please include:
> 1. Preferred way to contact you (phone or email)
> 2. Best time to reach you
> 3. Include the phone number (if you choose phone in #1)
> 4.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
On 1-12-05 I received: The following addresses had fatal errors:
Dell: 501 need user@domain at

WARNING! Attached message is truncated.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
This is because of a problem with only being able to receive emails in outlook express (Comcast) but not being able to reply to them in express so I have to copy them and then go to Comcast online and try to respond from there. Obviously that didn't work because of the aforementioned message from DELL.

After bringing the problem to Comcast's attention (twice) they said I had to speak to the manufacturer and the manufacturer said install SPXP2 WHICH I CANNOT DO BECAUSE THEN I WILL NOT HAVE ANY WORKING COMPUTER AT ALL!!

I then called AGAIN today and left ANOTHER VERY SPECIFIC MESSAGE at the number given to me by Des that I cannot use the reply to answer his messages and that it is necessary for him to CALL ME and I left several numbers where I can be reached with a message that no matter what I was doing, I was to be interrupted. As sick as I am, I will spare you what the things I might be doing, other then sleeping might be!
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
It is now January 12, 2005 at 9:45 PM. I started to document this email at 6:45 PM. That is ANOTHER 3 hours of my time wasted by DELL. Before I became ill, my billing rate at PriceWaterhouseCoopers was $395.00US an hour.

I began my own company in 1995 after running the US and South American subsidiary of a British software company as President and COO. My company was under exclusive contract to PriceWaterhouseCoopers for five years prior to the diagnosis of my illness, which was so severe it ended my career. Since then, I have tried to maintain my minimal lifestyle by running a very small home business because I am incapable of more then 2 hours of activity at any one time.
I leave it to your conscious to figure out:
1. How much money this incident with DELL has cost both my 76 year old mother and myself.
2. How much this incident has set back my recovery from this incurable and extremely painful illness I have been fighting for 5 years.
3. How far I have been set back in trying to recover financially when all of the tiny bit of energy I have each day has been spent making unending calls to DELL and being put on hold for what adds up to hours at a time.

IN SUMMARY: all I am asking is that you make RIGHT the situation which once more I will remind you is not charity, but was bought and paid for IN FULL and with a multiple year warranty service contract on both computers!

I began this email by saying I am trying to afford you the same courtesy I myself would like to be afforded. Should you choose not to rectify this situation in an appropriate amount of time - one week - then I will take further public action.

Sincerely,
Jo-Ann B.

Mr. Dell, my career may not mean anything to you, but at least with the career I had, I could support my 76 year old mother and myself before I became ill. Now, after 5 years of living on disability USD 1,660/month and paying $660.00US out ogf that for medical coverage, I was attempting touse the two hours a day I was able to get out of bed to try to run a small home business and save myself from losing my house.

Sir - I only hope you or anyone else are NEVER struck down and cheated out of your personal disability policy, and have to live on social security disability and try to survive. I also hope that if you reach out to people, SOMEONE will be there to assist you as I have been looking for legal, medical, insurance and emotional assistance for 5 years and now, your company has taken away the small chance I had to help myself by completely ignoring my 2 laptop issues. I leave it to your conscience to think about - if you are even capable of that - how it would feel.

CLICK here to see why Rip-off Report, as a matter of policy, deleted either a phone number, link or e-mail address from this Report.

Joann
Watertown, Massachusetts
U.S.A.

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