What Dell Doesn't Want You To Know

I never thought I'd say this, but having been a PC user for 20 years, having owned over 10 Dell PCs personally, I am so disenfranchised by my whole recent experience of Dell, I'm now strongly considering switching to Mac.

Why? I want a machine that is stable, well supported, that lets me get on with my life and work. If there is an issue, I want it resolved fast.

I have lost a huge amount of time in my recent dealings with Dell, and here is what I've learned and observed. If you have issues with your Dell computer, here is what you may be up against.

I think Dell would prefer that you didn't know what follows:

Dells recent approach to business includes:

1) Poor quality control
2) Time wasting customer service
3) Interactions that are incredibly expensive to the customer in non monetary ways (that they totally disregard the external cost of).
4) Ultimately, Dell limiting their liability to a refund despite negligent behaviours on their behalf
5) A culture of mixed-integrity, occassional flagrant dishonesty and manipulation towards customers

Based upon a pattern of repeated experiences I have borne witness to, Dell regularly get it wrong, and then they cost the customer time, money, morale, opportunities should the customer wish to make this right.

As part of this, Dell load resolution with effort on the customers behalf and "friction points".

FRICTION POINTS are designed to slow people down, or affect their momentum.

This pattern is so prevalent throughout my recent experience with Dell over the last 12 months that it seems obvious to me that this is by design.

I don't know how consciously Dell doing this, and my experience relates to the home team, but my guess is somewhere there is a profit optimisation consultant in Dell who knows exactly what they doing.

From my experience, I surmise / detect Dell are applying the following principles in how they run their business:

BIG PICTURE: Dell know they can save money on quality control by releasing products that are effectively in BETA with lots of bugs / niggles / issues, in the thinking that, if it's quite good but not right, they can get away with it most of the time with a very clear approach to limiting liability via time wasting customer service.

The formula is as follows:

"REGULAR POOR QUALITY CONTROL" + "TIME WASTING CUSTOMER SERVICE RIDDLED WITH FRICTION POINTS" + "NAIVE BUSY CUSTOMERS" = Dell can get away with a lot.

In more detail:

(1) Dell knows that most customers are not especially technically competent, which allows them to get away with a lot of stuff, like shipping semi-faulty machines, or incorrect presales advice and information. Dell knows that their worse case scenario is to lean on their terms and conditions, and perhaps offer a refund. They only offer refund the monetary cost of the computer however, and cannot refund time or morale.

Insight: By making the time and morale cost super high, most people will never get to the point where they get a refund.

(2) By selling to customers with limited tech competency, they can get away with it by making the burden of acheiving resolution so expensive for the customer that the average person will literally give up. (Someone in my office said she just gave up after three visits and a week on the phone). They literally load the support service with "friction points". You have to be unnaturally determined to deal with them or they will drive you mad.

If Dell can get people to give up, they save money.

Because Dell are a mail order business, it is much easier for them to get away with this.

(3) Keep in mind that, if there is a faulty computer, you have to initiate the support request. There is a shockingly high failure rate in the first year (according to the poll here, over 25% fail in the first year!!!!!)

Dell computers have 25%+ failure rates in first year.

(4) I suspect that, if you ran a survey asking, how many people on this form experienced more minor tech issues with their machine in the first year, it would be *WAY HIGHER*. Most posts on this forum govern these "minor faults or issues".

The tech support team will usually suggest that in order to determine a hardware fault or a "niggle", like the USB3 port crashing, or system latency, or the SD card reader crashing, you have to first reinstall the OS.

Dell tech support said "my computer shipped with a faulty installation of windows". They don't care that there is a HUGE external cost to reinstalling the OS *especially* if you are a power user. If you request less time expensive methods, like shipping a new HD with a perfect install of the OS as a test, they will say to their system as not permitting this. A few months later, a my OS got reinstallted twice in three days, there were still issues.

Poor quality control leads to many minor faults / imperfect machines. Dell know that for many users, re-
installing the OS is such a friction point that users will give up before resolving these, so force people to live with minor faults. Need proof of minor faults? Google "L702x fan noise".

(5) If you seek support, you will meet with a tech support team who are often highly manipulative and know they stand behind a veil of anonymity.

Need proof? Next time you call, before you begin the call, ask for their whole name, email address and dell employee ID. They will usually get evasive tell you that's against poliicies blah blah blah, and maybe put you through to their supervisor. If you argue, sometimes their supervisor will give you their Employee IDs, but not easily. You literally need to be a communications trainer to deal with the frame control / NLP techniques employed by many of their managers. I encourage you all to tell them you are recording their calls and see what happens.

Dell tech support staff hide behind veils of anonymity, allowing them to get away with a lot. They often refuse their employee IDs, and use NLP style techniques to deal with customers. They have lots of practice. It takes 1/2 an hour of arguing to get things escallated, then they don't take action, even if Dell is clearly at fault = FRICTION POINT.

(6) There is a lot of variance in the skills / competency of the tech support team. I think Dell figure they can get away with this low level of quality control because most users are not competent so can't tell.
- After my PC was serviced and the SD card didn't work, the support guy said I had to install all of the WWAN (wireless mobile) device drivers, even though none were in my system, to resolve issues with the SD card (which is totally unrelated hardware). It didn't work.
- They suggested upgrading my i7-2630qm with an i7-2640m. I.e. quad core to dual core. If I was someone of my parents generation who didn't have a clue about processor numbers and specs, I wouldn't have known they were suggesting a downgrade.

More concerningly, I suspect they didn't know themselves.

- When my machine was rebuilt on site & HD replaced, the engineer was supposed to install OS & drivers and leave me with a "perfect machine". He didn't finish job (unknown devices in device managere / 1st generation drivers etc) and when he called Dell, they told him he must move on to next job.

Poor quality control at the system design level PLUS Poor quality control / semi-competency in the tech support team = LOADS OF CUSTOMER TIME WASTED REPEATEDLY and/or NAIVE CUSTOMERS MANIPULATED

(7) Most of the their reps and technical support team will ACT politely (and some are geniunely decent) but the system is set up so that most of the people you can reach have limited power, and seem to work to targets / quotas, with a management pyramid. Customers end up being filtered up this pyramid by Dells system of support, where only great effort and time gets anything escalated, and then they will try to get you to give up. The technical support system plus the people who use it create expensive experences for customers.

They don't take responsibility, or jump over hoops, even when issues are CLEARLY ACKNOWLEDGED as their fault. IF you ask for things to be escalated, they call you, but don't leave a return number or means of contact.

INSIGHT: Dell have SYSTEMICALLY DESIGNED their business to limit limit their financial cost as an absolute priority, REGARDLESS of the cost of customer time or morale EVEN WHEN DELL ADMIT THEY ARE AT FAULT.

INSIGHT: Dell have friction points that dampen efforts to achieve resolution. Their POLICIES PLUS SYSTEM disregard lifestyle of customers. For example, refusing to ship a replacement machine a few days before the original is picked up, so that customer can face minimal downtime.

INSIGHT: Each time there is a problem, customer must jump through similar set of friction riddled hoops. When issues are not resolved, this gets really time expensive.

INSIGHT: Dell manage the productivity of customer service staff by not supplying phone numbers, even though this inhibits productivity for customers.

(8) No one in Dell takes responsibility, even their senior staff in escalations like "Sukanya" who despite what she said, indicated in her responses that she hadn't actually reviewed in detail my case, she refuted the statements of her colleagues, obviously didn't listen to phone records. She suggested that Dell staff only record details of cases that suit them.

If you ask them to put their verbal statements in writing, they will try and wriggle out. Literally, it took 3 weeks and me asking five times (including to Mourin) to get written answers from Sukanya. Her answers demonstrated she hadn't actually reviewed my case in detail and seemed highly political.

INSIGHT: There is a culture of very mixed-integrity in Dell.

(9) If you make a fuss, cases get escalated but only after hours of time have been wasted. Eventually they offer a replacement machine (on a collect and return basis, with a seven day gap of no computer) or a refund (machine collected, last refund took two weeks to process). As part of this, they give no credence to the external costs of dealing with them, no assurance that a replacement machine won't have the same problems, and strictly hide behind their limitations of liability. Even when they have already cost the customer a huge amount of time, they wont go out of their way to help customer.

Dell hide behind their limitations of liability, which forms the basis of "business as they can get away with it".



Conclusion:

"POOR QUALITY CONTROL" x "TIME WASTING, FRICTION RIDDLED CUSTOMER SERVICE" = A HUGE WASTE CUSTOMER TIME.

Consider that there is a 25% failure rate on computers in the first year, and probably over 50% ship with "minor faults" such as some faulty ports, SD card readers with niggles, crazy fan noise, this is a MAJOR ISSUE.

This is really BAD BUSINESS.

This is especially immoral when you consider the part computers play in most peoples productivity and life. A faulty issue riddled computer is like a taxi driver with a car that keeps breaking down. I think this literally exploits many older customers / vulnerable customers.

As someone who often has friends of parents etc who ask me for advice, I find my experience of Dell this time around to be totally obnoxious, because I can do the math, and I know that most people won't get resolution in the above scenarios.

Having been a PC user for 20 years, having owned 10+ Dell

computers personally since 1999, including:

- Latitude CPx,
- Latitude C600
- Latitude C810
- Latitude x200,
- Dell XPS M1710,
- now Dell XPS L702x

And desktops:
- Dimension 4100,
- A few Dell Optiplex GX150s
- Precision 370,
- Dimension 9150

And monitors:
- Dell Ultrasharp 2005FPW, Dell 2407FPW, 4 x Dell 1705FPW

And printer:
- Dell 5100CN

And I have personally been responsible for US $50 - 100,000 of Dell kit being purchased by various companies and colleagues also.

Now I am seriously considering switching to MAC, which for me is like changing religion.

As I type this, the fan on my L702x goes from silent to loud several times a minute in a way that is very distracting. Dell have still not offered any acceptable resolution.


This isn't personal anymore. Now I'm going to do this for all the old / naive / less tech competent computer users, in the hope that Dell change their policies.

If my experience and gist of Dell matches yours, please help me by linking to this post until Dell take responsibility for the issues highlighted. If you have other things you think Dell doesn't want the public to know, please add them in this thread too. Knowledge is power. Maybe collectively we can change something, or at least prevent people from such stressful experiences.

 

1. A survey of 169 not randomly selected, not from the general population, people is NOT in anyway shape or form statistically reliable.

2. The word is naive.

3. Dell is similar to any other company trying to make a profit.

4. Many computer and electronic failures do happen in the first year!


I've had failures on all kinds of computers, ASUS, HP, Dell, etc. Dell has actually been the most responsive company I've encountered. At work the techs show up within 3 hours for critical components and one day for non critical components. I had an Alienware Monitor have a band show up down the middle. I called at 7 PM on a Wednesday, and a new monitor was on my doorstep at 11 AM Thursday. I couldn't believe it. I wish you luck on your email.

 

I've been personally a Dell customer for 7+ years, and my mom has been with them since at least 1997. We've bought over 12 Dell laptops and 10 desktops, never really had an issue with any inside warranty. Everything is anecdotal. Dells can appear to have high "defect" or "failure" rates because they sell ALOT. Same with HP, etc etc. In fact, Dell support is top notch, they always take care of the customer in the end, and much better than HP or Lenovo in terms of customer service.

 

Buy business. I second that Dell business support is best in class. None of this send to partner or depot rubbish. Consumer hardware and support sucks.

 

@Turbot Sorry to hear about your frustration. I can assure you we don't have a 25% hardware failure rate, as does no manufacturer I'm aware of. Having said that, there is no excuse for poor customer service no matter how you look at it. I apologize for your experience to date. I understand someone from our social media services organization is working with you now. Hopefully we can get things resolved so you can move on in whatever direction you decide to go in the future. Either way, thank you for your support through the years, and I sincerely hope we are able to make things right for you.

 

Bill,

On 8 April 2012 (six weeks ago), I sent you a PM on this forum that you did not reply to. I received no reply from you at all, until now.

I am wondering what prompted you to respond to me this time publically, when you didn't respond to me privately six weeks ago?

As there is an oft expressed sentiment on this forum that Dell business support is superior to home support, can someone from Dell clarify if Dell has different (internal) policies for home support versus business support?

Also can someone in Dell clarify why Dell so regularly suggest re-installing the OS, citing the OS as the source of issues. In my case, on Friday I was told the only way to resolve issues was to reinstall the OS, even when it had been reinstalled on Thursday by a Dell engineer, after which I spent the rest of my day reloading software onto my PC?

If re-installing windows is so fundamental in Dell's problem resolution process, why doesn't Dell you have a total seperate installation of windows in a different partition of the harddrive, instead of getting customers to wipe their computers and start again to *test* if the issue lies with windows?

 

All Dell computers have a recovery partition that can be accessed through F8 and Repair My Computer to Dell DataSafe software. If you did a clean OS install and wiped out the partition, then you'll need to use your Dell recovery media.

What Commander Wolf meant by buisness support, Dell's Pro Support has much better support (get a tech in 2 minute or less, US tech support, etc) but of course business/enterprise customers have different support than consumer support, they pay more money for it, more support = more $$$.

 

I have 104 unread messages in my PM box. I have set no expectations at any point on replying to PMs here. It's simply not sustainable or scale-able, considering that my role at Dell goes beyond forum interactions. Sorry about that. I wish I had more time to get to all my PMs, but I simply don't. I try my best. This is why I have provided links to get the quickest service from Dell that we provide in my forum signature.

The reason I replied publicly to this particular post is that the agent working your case for the social media team has no "Dell-identifying" credentials on this site, and wanted to make sure someone from Dell replied publicly to let anyone reading your post know we are trying to assist.

Hope this helps to clarify. I'm happy to keep up with your case if you post back here and let me know how it's going.

 

I like the new Dell XPS line, the screens are nice and they seem well built to me. But other than that, myself and people around me have purchased several Dell's and most of them have had lots of problems, I would stay away from all Dell's, unless they are a premium line, like the XPS.

 

Dude, this is almost novel-length.
I can only imagine the frustration that you have right now! :incrediblehulkmeme:

Although I'm pretty sure they will LOSE more than they SAVE if this is their business plan.

I would be a hyprocrite if I joined your cause, simple because my after-sales experience was decent to say the least. Not everyone in their support team are blundering baboons.

So take a breather then keep pushing. GL.

 

I love that %25 failure rate you pulled out of your .

 

I believe he got it from a survey posted on this site. Out of only 360 or so people, 25% had a problem in the first year.

I understand his frustration with his experience, but Dell is the same as any other company. Look at a company most people think is great, like NewEgg. Two times I've been blown away by how stupid their policies are. 1. I was told to price match I'd have to refuse my shipment and reorder something. Even after I pointed out they'd have to pay shipping twice (since it was free shipping), the customer service agent refused to budge. 2. A shipment was lost by UPS. They told me they couldn't ship me a new item until UPS and they completed their investigations. I asked how long that would take, and the response was two to three weeks. Luckily it wasn't a mission critical part I was ordering, but just amazing.

 

Bill,

1) You requested that other people on this forum PM you in various, which is why I did so too.

2) I PMed you because my experiences with support were far from satisfactory *OR* quick.

3) I'm glad you can relate to how time precious work these days is, such that you don't have time or resources to respond to 100+ messages. Personally, I can't afford the time Dell has cost me through poor quality control and time wasting support.

4) If there are 100+ people who have PMed you for various reasons, perhaps there is a perceived communal expectation that you will reply. The only thing I surmised from your signature was that you encouraged people to contact Dell support directly as the alledgely "quick way".

BTW, if there are 100+ people who have PMed you directly, how much would it cost to give them all even a cut and paste response? At the very least, you ought to state explicity in your signature that you neither read nor reply to unsolicited PMs, to respect the value of their time, just as you heed your own.

Did this happen only because I tweeted Michael Dell?

There are 100's of people across these and even Dell's official forums that are experiencing unresolved issues with their machines. If you're a social media strategist, why don't you suggest that Dell uses Radian-6 to proactively resolve everyones issues, instead of leaving the onus on the customer with the where-with-al to even seek support?

As you can understand, when you state that Dell CARES, this seems to be a superficial, customer facing, marketing message that does not run deep.

I sent the "Dell Cares" team my details on Friday, who said they would look into it on monday. They have my email address. I have not heard from them yet. It is now Wednesday.

However, I did request contact details for your data protection officer on 30 April, and only yesterday, May 22nd, three weeks later, did I receive a reply.

I'm citing the results of a survey on this forum, that discussed "how long your Dell laptop lasted before repair". Still this survey is comensurate with my experience of Dell consumer laptops.

Keep in mind that Dell's support process is reactive (I.e. only customer initiated requests are taken care of) and not proactive (whereby Dell preemptively solve issues they are responsible for). Lots of older people buy computers but literally don't know enough about them to know the cause of issues.

For example, my father purchased a Dell studio 1558 with an i7 processor to do light video editing, but the computer struggled to play even a single stream of AVCHD footage.

It turns out this laptop will throttle the processor speed to prevent overheating, which in turn makes video editing unproductive, or an i7 which behaves more like an i5 or even i3 processor.

If you purchased a 1000 square foot apartment, but half of it was locked away because the building wasn't stable, you are not getting what you paid for. Processor throttling just means you're not getting what you paid for. When computers are mission-critical components underlying the tasks people want to engage in, there are huge external costs to Dell not living up to full responsibility and accountability in this part played. It's very mean spirited to provide computers don't live up to what they are supposed to do. This is not the output of a process of "care"

If trading standards had more people who were highly tech competent (like some of the users of this forum), Dell could never get away with such things.

Bill, many people who are not tech competent just get dismayed when stuff doesn't work and they haven't done anything "wrong". Why doesn't Dell reach out to all the Studio 1558 owners and proactively resolve their throttling issues, instead of making it their problem?

I'm not making this up:

https://www.google.ie/search?hl=en&q=1558+throttling&=

 

Never requested you PM me for anything, but like I said, I try. You PM'd me at a point when I was getting ready for vacation. Customer service is a function performed by other teams at Dell. Sometimes, when I have the time, I help where I can. Had I seen a public post from you or your PM at a time when I wasn't trying to transition projects and daily duties in preparation for a vacation, I would likely have seen your PM and responded in a day or two. Again, I post the links to get service in my signature for a reason. Feel free to take advantage.

Normally a good idea. See above reference to pre-vacation transition activity.

Again, sorry for your poor experience, and again, my role is not primarily customer support. I help out where I can. I provide the links for the quickest service in my signature.

Perhaps there is a perception that I'm here for technical support, but I'm not. Perhaps this perception is there because in the majority of instances I provide value to the community in some way? Not boasting. Just saying I never said at any time I was a customer service rep, but I try to help where I can. I guess I could make it more clear that I am not in customer service, but I prefer to be as helpful as I can and try my best to represent my brand and my customers. I can't win in every situation, but I won't stop trying.

An excellent suggestion that never occurred to me. I will ponder this. Thanks for the tip, really, thanks.

Nope. I answered this question in a previous post. I only replied publicly because Scott from the @DellCares team asked me to since he has no Dell-identifying login for this site at this time. He normally works primarily on Twitter and tweets that are addressed to Mr. Dell, so I suspect your tweet may have had something to do with it, but not "only," as you asked.

We've been using Radian6 since like 2008. (The workflow of your case is being tracked in the Radian6 Engagement Console all along.) The Dell forums are user to user based, like this one. We help where we can. In my various roles in social media at Dell since 2007, this situation with traditional contact centers like phone support queues versus social media support has been in what I'd characterize as a state of evolution. In my opinion, the evolution is taking too long, but there are folks way, way above my paygrade who know a lot more of the bigger picture who set this cadence and make these decisions. If it were up to me, I'd have pulled agents off the phones and cross trained them for social media support in stages starting in 2008. Something like 20% to start and incremental increases that match volumes in social media versus volumes in the call centers. I would guess we'd be looking good, coverage-wise, if we landed on a number around 50/50 SoMe/phone. But again, I am very far from qualified to make these calls, and I firmly stand behind my leadership's decisions here.

You are one of many customers. Despite your anecdotal evidence to the contrary, we actually do help customers and resolve issues on a regular basis. This is not meant to sound trite or to minimize your frustration. I stand by my apology for the poor experience and offer myself to assist where I can with your case. I know the details, but I won't comment on them publicly, because we are obligated to maintain your privacy. Whatever Scott tells you your options are is what I will stand behind, good or bad for you.

I will ask Scott to reach out and update you momentarily.

From Mourin, I believe, correct? I gave her the information she needed to communicate to you after I saw in one of your emails you had raised this concern. You should have received this on first request.

Far from empirical and all-encompassing methodology to make an assertion of fact on a broader level, IMO, but it does speak to the imperfections we have. We're not perfect, but we do try.

False. We do a lot of proactive resolution. See: exploding Sony battery industry-wide issue where Dell was the first to implement a proactive recall that was easy for customers to use. See: recent Ivy Bridge order fulfillment issues where we identified, quantified number of affected customers and reached out to them in many cases before their order shipped to let them know we were here to correct the problem. Trust me, I could go on, but you should get the picture. We don't proactively solve every problem, obviously, but we do try.

I worked this issue on the Dell forums when I was a moderator. Your dad needs the latest BIOS and a 130W AC adapter. If you want to PM me his service tag, I'll get someone to overnight him the adapter.

 

My experience with xps was good, but never had to call India for support, but have heard horrible stories. I sold my xps just after the warranty ran out to avoid possibility of going thought headache.
I'm leaning more and more towards MacBook just for these reasons, their customer service is unreal comparing to other manufactories, but how it should be for all.
I would like to have windows machine, but seems forced to get MacBook to have piece of mind.

 

I also call BS to a 25% failure rate. The industry as a whole is in the mid single digit. A 25% failure rate would have HUGE repercussions for Dell and would have gotten a lot of negative attention from the industry. I currently have purchased several laptops from Dell and they have all been reliable and stable.

Btw i'm typing this on my ultra reliable 5 year old Dell laptop.

 

Agreed. There's 5 dells in my house (6 if you include the Alien) 3 of which are over 3 years old. None have needed warranty claims.

I'm sure Dell has their fair share of issues, but I can't believe the failure rate is that high.

 

Dells support is great............once/IF you get through the thick layer of outsourced customer service, which is unfortunately very difficult for a lot of people without knowledge of communication skills.

It personally took me a LONG time to get the horrible GPU issues with my M1530 resolved, which in the end amounted to somewhere around 4-5months over the course of about 3 years. Though the issues were eventually resolved, the manner or timeline in which it took place did not even remotely reflect the $2,000 I initially spent, especially once you include the time of ownership lost.

The people Dell have on this forum seem like excellent representatives, and probably do one hell of a job! Unfortunately there are only so many of these guys and unless you "know" how to get a hold of them through email/twitter/forums you are left to fight with the outsourced service reps.

I may just be biased, so take this all as just my opinion...........I want to give Dell another try personally but to pay a "premium" for their support which is either hit or miss just feels too much like gambling to me

 

All I can say to Turbot, is keep trying, escalate your concerns, and the Dell Reps here will definitely try to help, and they have done so many times with others.

I have been buying Dells for years, as well and dealt with many of the other computer lines out there, and Dell still offers the better options and support out there.

it should be no surprise that there is an expectation to pay more for the higher level support which is always available as an option during the configuration and build process. This by no means is unique to Dell.

Most other brands come with a basic 1 year warranty and that's it. any extended warranties are offered by the resellers IE Best Buy etc.

I also owned Business machines (Vostro and Precison) and a Alienware M17, and the support for these computers was always top notch.

 

My experience is that Dell has a sprawling bureaucracy with limited point of contact. If you didn't pay for the point of contact option and you aren't speaking with their executive team, it's unlike that you'll ever speak to the same person twice. This can make it very frustrating since any representative or technician to phone you for a follow up has likely only read a short case summary. Most of these people also don't have a great deal of administrative power or knowledge; it's likely that any single representative will give you a wrong answer to your inquiry and will be unable to help you with serious problems.

My satisfaction with Dell support is somewhat varied. I feel they're slow to escalate you to a single point of contact who has meaningful technical or administrative knowledge or power. This is very frustrating. On the other hand, their system is very good for entry-level problems, they're highly responsive and most representatives are polite and articulate.

Here's a recent example. My power adapter was defective so Dell sent me a replacement. They sent me physical and electronic instructions to return the defective parts using a pre-paid mailing label or they would send collections after me. However, the instructions also indicated that I should have received packing materials for the return. When I asked Dell if I should have received packing materials, they informed me that I wasn't supposed to return the parts at all. Both sets of instructions and the pre-paid mailing label were sent in error. Talk about frustrating and confusing.

As part of a longer tale, my outlet XPS 15 (ordered 06/11) came with quite a few problems: a service tag with no download privileges, the wrong factory installation, a defective motherboard that slowly destroys adapters and a display panel with damage concealed under the top bezel. Dell bent over backwards to help me with these problems, but I wouldn't say it was easy, and they were unable to fix most of the issues. I spoke to something like two-dozen representatives, and while most were very pleasant, a handful of whom were very rude, and several of whom gave me contradictory and wrong information. It was an extremely frustrating experience.

The outcome was mixed. Dell was unable to fix the service tag problem even though they told me it should have download privileges - I asked outright if they were absolutely positive of this fact for an Outlet machine - and repeatedly said it would take "days" to fix; it was over a month before they told me it wouldn't ever be fixed. They were completely unable to make the Datasafe backup utility function; it was not installed by default and is used to create recovery discs. They sent out multiple software CDs, first for the missing software and second for backup, but were unable able to send certain software to me; I had to make do with an older "premium" version of one software plus a monetary refund. They sent a replacement power adapter when I reported clicking but failed to identify the known motherboard hardware problem; on the followup, a technician remote-access flashed the BIOS (against my explicit request) for the same motherboard hardware problem.

During this entire ordeal, someone should have said "This machine is a lemon. Why don't we just replace the system and take his back for a proper examination?" Instead, Dell tried to address each individual problem with mixed success and has agreed to address any further individual problems under the (relatively expensive) three year warranty I paid for the system. This strikes me as impractical from every perspective when you consider the costs for Dell in sending / replacing these parts and the cost for the consumer in time and frustration. I'm also sure those representatives could be using their energies more properly.

The problems were so bad that I even asked if I could pay extra to have the warranty upgraded with ADP or converted to a business level warranty. I didn't even ask Dell to pay for this; I said I would cover these costs myself. Their response? It would cost me another $300 (on top of the $300 for 3-years) to get certain "unspecified" premium upgrades which seemed largely software related, I couldn't upgrade to ADP after the fact even if I sent my notebook in for examination, and I couldn't convert my contract. Dell also refused to provide an executive representative as a consistent point of contact; if you have another problem, they said, go through the home user service tiers again.

Some of the solutions Dell offered were also simply impractical. For example, they volunteered to replace my drive with a functional and proper software installation, but I declined; I had something like 300 GB of working data on the drive by that point, and I was unwilling to do a complete backup relative to the importance of the non-functional and missing software. I asked if they could send a clone of the factory drive on DVDs (which, AFAIK, is the function of the Datasafe backup software). This would have largely addressed the problem of the non-functional Datasafe backup software and the improper factory installation. They told me this wasn't doable; they could only send me a replacement drive.

I give Dell the benefit of the doubt since my family has owned Dells for years without any problems. My mother owns an Inspiron E1505 which has functioned without any problems for five or six years. Just a few months ago, I purchased an Ultrasharp U2312HM, and I'm highly pleased with it. But last month, my mother decided to upgrade that E1505, and my father and I bought her a Lenovo IdeaPad instead of a Dell Inspiron or a Vostro. I'd be lying if my recent experience wasn't a partial factor.

 

As a European customer neither me nor any relatives experienced any serious problem with Dell's customer service. They were usually responsive and helpful.

Don't know about their failure rate though nor if it's significantly different from their competitors', I think it's highly subjective. A while back I've had to replace a display after a few months (black screen of death) and last year my brother purchased an XPS 15 that went barbecue (literally, smoke was coming out of the vents lol) and was quickly replaced too, but I wouldn't dare to pretend my own personal experience is is a good representation of the reliability of their products...

 

well.... just to add to this...

I received my Dell system end of Feb2012. Problem encountered immediately and I notified Dell within the 7day return & refund period. I asked Dell to either ship me a replacement or collect the system and issue a refund. They convinced me to let Tech Support look at it (despite me saying that if they wanted to do that then I still wanted to be able to send back for a refund if it wasn't resolved by the end)…

%insert stuff about Dell messing about trying to fix it%

Fast forward to present day about 3 months after taking delivery and Dell have been unable to fix and also tried numerous times to say that I'm not entitled to a refund because it is past the 7 days return.

I have had to escalate many times, provide email conversations that clearly show "if you want to do Tech support and can't fix then I still want a refund or I'm sending it back now".... I had to threaten to take to the small claims court and still they resisted.

Fortunately I have managed to get a refund authorised last week and now it has been >1 week since their returns team were meant to call me and nothing.

Dell *can* be very good, but they can also be a steaming pile of poo.

true story.

 

Sorry to hear about your frustrating experience. If you want us to follow up on that return and refund, feel free to reach out to us using the links in my signature. We have social media care and tech agents who work with our teams in all regions that can make sure things are moving along. If you are on Twitter, you can tweet to @DellCares and do a follow/follow back in order to give them your email and customer number. They can take it from there and find out what's going on. If you're not on Twitter, you can hit our Facebook page using the message link, and John should be able to run everything down. If you are on neither Facebook or Twitter, you can send me a PM here with your details, and I will forward to the team for follow up.

 

Hello Bill,

I called them again today and they *assure* me (again) that I will get an update tommorow. If I don't hear anything then I'll contact you - hopefully you can use your "hammer of resolution"

Thanks

 

Of course, I got an e-mail today that I hadn't sent back my adapter as I was required. Every time I have to do this dance, a part of me dies. It's frustrating how often Dell representatives have given me conflicting or false information. I have multiple e-mails in my box which outright contradict each other. I even said I'd prefer to send back the adapter with my own packing materials, and I was told that wasn't required.

You know what makes me seethe though? This last part.

That sounds like you might have put out a debt collection notice. If that does show up on my credit report and influence my credit rating, I'm going to be insanely mad.

 

In order to play the game you have to know the rules.

Always know what the refund period is with any company. If I buy a new or refurbished product and it is defective I am not going to spend time with technical support (where english is the second language) to trying and fix a product that should be working correctly. Instead call customer service and get a return and refund immediately.

Amazon is actually excellent on returns including computers. Everything is done online and they even send you a prepaid shipping label for the return.

 

I don't know what to say.. heard stories beyond my worst dreams.

And you are probably correct to some degree, but my 4 year old M1530 doesn't lie although exceptions are to be made

 

LOL Dell is a for-profit business. Businesses care only about the bottom line: PROFIT. Customer service, social media, it's all BS damage control nonsense. Look at the other manufacturer subfora on here, I don't see a buncha social media reps on their boards. Notice also that this board has the most complaints about the manufacturer, and we get multiple Dell Reps here for some reason. Make sense now?

Integrity is inevitably lost when any industry is scaled up beyond the artisan level (cobblers, bespoke suitmakers, rural doctors, etc.)--especially to a global market. The bigger, the more anonymous, just like OP pointed out. Reputation still matters, it just works differently.

That's just how the game is played... but a previous poster was right: know the rules of the game. Arrives with overheating --> immediate return. Don't waste your time/energy with CS.

 

No. It does not make sense. The presence of Dell helping out here is evidence of poor service or quality? Did you do a count on complaint posts to determine there are more about Dell? Not saying there's not. Just trying to understand your methodology.

Why not ask why the other manufacturers are not here? Is it because no one is complaining on their boards? Is Dell only here because of the number of complaints? If that were true, we'd have left a long time ago based on no ROI. I've been here over 4 years. No plans to leave no matter if what I'm doing is changing those numbers or not.

Quick count:
154,626 Dell/Alienware threads.
36,916 HP threads.
I'd venture to guess if there are 4X more Dell conversations than HP conversations, by your assertion (basically paraphrasing) that "more complaints=Dell reps here is BS," then we should be able to count all the complaints and see 4X the complaints about Dell. I doubt you will see proportionately equal numbers, but it's your assertion, not mine. Of the HP complaints, what percentage receive an HP response, or does that matter since it would be social media, marketing BS hype anyway?

 

Well I owned somewhere about 30 dell laptops ranging back to the early days in Dell, and I only had 2-3 major repairs, and maybe 1-2 minor repairs done

That's including the Accidental coverages when laptops took a fall.

I only had one new dell arrive DOA, which was promptly taken care of.

Dell is one of the few if only vendor who will allow user to upgrade memory, drives etc and not void the warranty.

I have to laugh tho at some who think they are going to get the same level of support for a 400 dollar laptop as you would a $ 2000.00 laptop.

Having worked as a technician for over 30 years I know Electronics can and will fail, and most times do so within the first year of use.

Is Dell Perfect - no, but my History of support has been good, and having the Dell Reps hanging around these and other sites speaks volumes to me, So thanks Guys.

 

I have had 2 laptop, 1 consumer & 1 business, both support are excellent.

Thanks

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2

 

My wife and I are both in academics, we use computers alot. We use all Dell. I've been a dell customer for a long time - I've found the products to be really quite good and as advertised. We've had a few technical issues & repairs needed over the years (nowhere near 25%) and I've received prompt and helpful support every time.

I just bought an XPS 13 Ultrabook which I'm very happy with. It hasn't needed any tech support (except for a minor thing I think I've fixed with a BIOS update) but there was a payment issue when I ordered it (due to my bank's very aggressive anti-fraud program) which Dell helped me sort out the same day with no delay in delivery. And by the way, I believe that customer service rep was in India - he was very bright, knowledgeable and helpful - in fact he was assigned to personally track my order through the process until the Ultrabook was delivered to my home - which he cheerfully did.

I was also impressed that not only did I receive a customer service survey, but the e-mail signature of my CSR had the e-mail address of his supervisor and an invitation to contact his supervisor regarding his performance. Which I definitely did because it was really quite excellent.

So I guess others may have had different experiences, but I've been quite happy with Dell & I don't plan on changing brands unless that changes in the future.

 

Thank you dejazz, dave-p and jcjensen for your positive feedback!

@Dave-P, it is very encouraging to hear that our presence makes a difference to you!

Mourin@Dell

 

My 3 weeks up tomorrow, I plan to keep my XPS17. No problems with the power adapter yet (knock wood). I still dont have my USB-3.0 external drive, so have not tested that. Hate the fact that there is no hard buttons for volume control, and it has been pretty tedious to get the touchpad working acceptably (Still no "Scroll item under pointer") But for most part this computer is pretty decent, and good price. Lots of power that I probably dont need.

Since Y2K, I have had a Vostro 1700, 2 Inspirons, an old LT that I cant remember, (+4 various non Dell lap tops, various versions of Windows and Linux) before that several desktops. All still running, Win7, WinXP, Win2K, and WinNT. I had one Dell laptop that needed a keyboard replacement, Dell sent it, I put it in; one that needed a display, I sent it in, they fixed it. Both still running. (Just checked, my first laptop was an Inspiron 7500, so that makes 3)

I noticed this thread while scanning to see if there were problems I need to prepare for, and was very interested in several notes that users were going to change to Mac!!! I suspect that these folks have never used a Mac. I have, and I think they are wonderful... for people who treat their computer like driving a car, if their car is a Caddy. If you want to turn the key, put in gear, press pedal, add gas as necessary that is fine. I want my vehicle to be able to carry cargo, pull a trailer, shift into 4WD, and do what I want done. I want my computer to be MY computer, not controlled by someone else. If you are just a USER, if you just want to press the buttons designed by corporate programmers, then Apple is a great product, but it does not give me the freedom to work the way I want.

Bottom line, I think all the manufacturers are getting a little lax, and service is a little sloppy, but after a 3 months casual study, I went with Dell... again.

 

I just had a great experience talking to your chat service. CLKsmb_Angelo_188645 helped me with a laptop with a faulty fingerprint reader and a refurbished monitor that has a bad USB hub. Pleasant, helpful, and scheduled my replacement/technician in under 15 minutes, including the time I spent on the phone with someone else. As always, SMB Dell gets 5 stars for service.

 

I had an old Dell Inspiron that lasted forever. I subsequently purchased an Acer (junk) and then Toshiba laptops... The Toshiba, despite online reviews, was the most unreliable laptop that I have ever owned!

I work as a geological consultant and at a university. I am seriously considering the purchase of a Dell Precision M4600. I want a perfect machine, is the support different for Premier buyers?

 

yes the support is better for Premier Buyers, and on Buisness line computers

 

If you add on ProSupport to your M4600 purchase, I seriously doubt you'd ever have a complaint about service. Those guys are amazing. Their methodology is very old school Dell- support everything with best effort, even if it's not defined as supported by the hardware warranty.

 

I've been a computer hardware industry professional since 91, know the industry at all levels very well, and have owned / authorized the purchase of / recommended a large number of Dell machines since their beginnings.

I cannot remember ever having had a Dell machine problem that wasn't attributable to pilot error within the first 5-7 years (!) of ownership.

The OP may have gotten a rash of bad machines.... or maybe he's a Mac fanboy.... or maybe he's just mad he called in 2 years after purchase and they wouldn't exchange his unit for a brand new one..... who knows.... however, he is the only person I've ever heard seriously bash Dell.

 

Nonsense! Now who's being a fanboy? You need to read more ... even this site's threads contain a normal amount of complaining about Dell service. It is ... errr ... normal.

No offense, but I don't find this particularly credible. I am involved in our company's hardware purchases and defects in new equipment are normal. Dell is rather average in that regard.

That being said, I have to agree that Dell normally has decent service. Nowhere near what it was 10 years ago, but then, what is? Outsourcing customer service has, IMO, made the process frustrating and unreliable. But, in large part, you get what you pay for. I think the OP is correct about the superiority of Apple service, but you pay dearly for what you get. My wife swears by her Mac and I would never own one. She needs to have her hand held and expects instant service. She can get it at the Apple Store but at a minimum 2x the price I pay for comparable or more powerful computing.

You can't really compare Dell to apple. You can compare it to HP, Acer and Asus. It is probably the best of that lot, although HP enterprise service has a bit of an edge over Dell's enterprise service IMO - that is why my company stopped its Dell Only policy two years ago and expanded permissible notebooks to include other business class units (I have the only consumer notebook in the company ). But, we still have quite a few Vostros being used by staff and Latitudes by our professionals and the reliability is quite good. I am currently looking at a Dell for a new professional hire ATM. That alleged 25% defect rate is not accurate IMO and was pulled out of thin air.

As far as warranty service, try to purchase a next day onsite warranty from Acer. Even Lenovo and HP who offer them charge an arm and a leg for them. Dell's is the least expensive and at least as good as the others, making it the product/warranty option of choice for many companies because of price. Plus, Dell has the best outlet in the business with great warranty options.

If you think Dell has instituted policies intended to frustrate customers, try getting Asus to honor its warranties. My experience has been that Asus might as well write its warranties on toilet paper. We do not allow Asus anything in our company.

I also appreciate Dell's participation in these threads. Bill does a decent job and it is a step forward in service. We had a similar experience in the HP Slate 500 tablet thread with HP's department head checking in from time to time,and it made our life so much easier when addressing issues. But, given the medium, there is only so much he can do or say here.

I guess my bottom line is that I don't think the OP's concerns should be trivalized here. But, some of the comments about Dell generally are obviously the result of frustration and, possibly, expectations that are a bit unrealistic. For the rest of us, including Dell fans, cooler heads should prevail.

 

well said + Rep

 

I current got in my possession a M4600. Before that I had a M6500 and before that an E6500/E6400. But I too have owned or had in my possession Dell inspirons (XPS included).

This is what I found: Stay away from anything consumer. Buy only business. Dell home is included in this star away from list.
Want a good experience generally?: Run towards Dell Business.

The support in Dell Pro Support (precision/my E6500/E6400) has been by far the best support I have ever received. I mention the problem and the solution, 2-5 minutes later they dispatch a technician or sent me the part needed. No troubleshooting required, not hassling, not "please check the AC plug".
The first person I speak with is the last person I need to speak with. From ordering a replacement, having a tech come by, to sending parts, to issuing refunds. One person is all I need to talk with. I always joke about support centers: I don't want to speak with someone who has to ask for permission to breathe.

In a contrast of experience: I have dealt with every manufacturer for personal or business (on behalf of customers) with every laptop manufacturer minus Sager directly (Dealt with a retailer, was a pleasant enough experience).

Dell business has been the absolute best for me. Overnight on-site tech, to great support.
Even Apple didnt have this kind of support (their support is above average and for some problems can be quite pleasant but far from the best).

 

I know 4 people with dell laptops(pretty expensive and designed for gaming)in real life,all of them got failure with their laptops(problems gpu or mboard) in the first year but at the end Dell fixed problems quickly,same for me,Dell just replaced my gpu in 2 day after my contact with them,they even did not ask reason for replacement

 

I came across this sad story written by a father of a sixteen year old who was very dismayed by Dell after many ridiculous problems emerged with his computer, and felt totally messed around by Dell,. The whole story sounded very familiar to me:

Is Customer Service Alien To Alienware?

Please note that, Dell, just arbitrarily locked the thread with no reason given. If the above link becomes inactive at some point in the future, then ask yourself why?

RE: BUSINESS vs HOME
It seems very unfair that Dell have different standards for business versus home users as seems to be a commonly expressed sentiment in this forum. And Dell either isn't learning from it's mistakes *or* Dell doesn't care enough about the things we are discussing here. Most home users don't have the wherewithal or resources to follow up with Dell, and face limited time and opportunity for service calls.

For example, some recent L521x owners are saying their computers also throttle. This is the same issue that afflicted my father very unfairly by Dell that *could only* be fixed by a different bios and a different power supply. How is most of the World supposed to figure this out? If people on these forums can figure out that their computers throttle, WHY HASN'T DELL TESTED COMPUTERS TO PERFORM PROPERLY, WITHOUT THROTTLING, BEFORE SHIPPING?

Bill, please answer my question re: why you didn't proactively contact all Dell Studio 1558 owners to resolve their throttling issues, and instead only resolve this issue for people who contacted Dell querying this? Where is the integrity in this approach? Where is the bulletin clearly posted on the Dell website regarding this issue (that requires a hardware fix)?

 

The person on the thread you linked seemed rather... pushy and quite frankly abusive.
They demand a replacement with better specifications... for being sent a DOA system? They haven't even gone through repair and they expect compensation?
Sorry but it's one thing to ask for a brand new replacement (which is fair) and another to be greedy about it.

#2. It is not Dell's problem that the customer is not doing well Financially and had to save for many years. Why should Dell all the sudden become responsible for what your son can and can't afford with your limited budget or goals in mind.
This is quite frankly the problem, they don't have the money to go elsewhere. So in their desperation they're trying to get Dell to compensate them.

Anyways I've dealt with these types of customers. They dont even want to give you a try, they just want compensation immediately but when it comes to paying,they're cheap.

 

The thread looks to have been locked because the OP was not on topic. He was offered a solution that was a policy exception, and he refused. Then he chose to ignore the fact that reps were trying to reach him and continued to post about how he was getting no resolution and turned the thread into a "What's wrong with Dell?" rant, which was OT. Thread was closed because it was going OT. Pretty common practice, and no, it won't be deleted, despite your accusatory speculation to the contrary.

No proactive notification was given because not all users were affected. If a user reports the problem on the 1558, he gets a solution in the form of a BIOS update and a higher rated AC adapter, if memory serves.

The front line reps you are asking your questions of are not the proper target. You are asking VP level and higher questions of people who work hard for an hourly wage and focus on helping individuals*. If all you want to do is increase awareness of your claims, it's unnecessary to hassle front line reps who are just trying to do their jobs. You can just rant away without asking the guy who pumps the gas why it's not got a higher octane rating or why it has 10% ethanol and still accomplish your apparent goal of bringing to light your concerns.

*In fact, when you take this approach, you are taking time away from people who are trying to help people. Kind of makes altruism not one of your traits, wouldn't you say?

 

I have been a Dell customer as well as a Dell reseller for a while, and I have had my share of both good and bad experiences. After reading all of the posts here, I thought I would add my 5 cents worth. I have bought probably 300 systems over the past couple of years for my business and clients, and of those, I have had issues with maybe 10 of them during their warranty periods (most common is drive failure).

There is a reason that there is a disparity in support between home and business, and it is both a economic and efficiency related. For the most part, those who call home support have little IT experience and thus it is pointless to staff the help center with high level tech support that most people wouldn't understand. This does make it quite frustrating though for those who have computer skills. My suggestion for those people is to have all the troubleshooting steps done and try to push through to advanced level support.

In my experience, business support is generally good, especially if you have taken the time to do some general troubleshooting before calling. Of course all computer companies have 'lemon' products, and issues with parts that are not up to par (no company is free of these issues, even Apple has it's large share of these kind of problems).

I have found that there are two good ways to get problems addressed that seem to be taking to long or are not resolved. One is reaching out to Dell through their social networking, ie @DellCares, the other is to use the 'Unresolved Issues' link at the bottom of the Dell.com pages ( https://support.dell.com/support/to...t/dellcare/outstanding_issues?c=us&l=en&s=gen) - it is generally a good idea to already have an SR# before using either of these sources as there is not much Dell can do if you haven't reported a problem.

Compared to the other companies I have had tech support experiences with, Dell by far has the best overall support. I have yet to see another company that can routinely offer AND provide next business day service on their business products - almost every time I have had an issue, Dell has either drop shipped me a user replaceable part, or had a tech onsite the next day (sometimes two days depending on what time of day you make the inital call). Sure, there are some systems that have more problems that others, but all companies have problem systems.

The one area that I would like to see more improvement in customer service is in order support, especially the Outlet, which seems to have more issues that other departments that take a while to get resolved.

Although I have had some trying experiences, I will say that either @Dellcares, or using the Unresolved Issues link has gotten all my issues resolved in the end. I will stick with Dell because they seem to be trying and are certainly better in the business department than any other company I have dealt with. (try to get warranty on some Apple products - now THAT will have you pulling your hair out)

 

Computerpen,

Thanks for this great feedback. We continue to work to better our customer service and truly value your thoughts. I will forward your praise to the support team. Thanks again for being a Dell customer!

Mourin@Dell

 

I have bought 4 machines from Dell Business and 2 from the consumer side. Customer service on BOTH sides has been top notch. I have had 2 out of the 6 machines repaired by Dell during the warranty period. One was the fault of Nvidia (8400GS-M manufacturering defects) and the other one was the fault of Dell (Mainboard was bad).

For the Vostro 1400 (2007 vintage) i was sent a "coffin" and I received my same shell back exactly 7 days later completely repaired and now 4 plus years later the machine is still running like a champ

For the Studio 1558 (2010 vintage), it was dead within a week of ordering and when I contacted Dell and told them the issue, they had a tech out the very next day with a new mainboard and dvd drive. The issue was an intermittent hang during POST just before the DVD drive was checked. 2+ years since and no issues to speak of.

Vostro 1510 is still running to this day dispite being beat to death by it's user (dropped many times, cracked bezel, missing keys, filled to the rim with dirt and other crap)

Studio 1735 machine that my dad has is just now starting to have troubled, hopefully it is something simple to fix.

To the guys from Dell that regularly come and visit this forum and try to help people, God bless you, seriously, as you really got your hands full and I would like to say thanks for taking the time out of your day to help the rest of us when needed....

the biggest thing you can do before you contact Dell support is to keep a level head and treat the people you talk to with kindness and respect as it's not their fault you are having issues. Saying please and thank you goes a very long way...

 

I don't think Dell is unique in the sense described by the OP at all. A lot (most?) companies have bad service...but I've actually had better experiences with Dell's customer service than a lot of other companies. That's why I keep buying their computers...