A few months before Christmas, I decided it was time to finally replace my old trustworthy desktop. It is about ten years old at this point, and while it still functioned to do what I needed, it had slowed to the point that pretty soon it would no longer be operational. Every time you update Windows or update virus protection software, these updates go onto a computer’s C drive. While I had plenty of drive space on D, E, F and so on, the C drive of my computer is only fourteen gigs… huge for its day, but now is insufficient for properly running Windows. The more updates, the more in-stable the computer becomes.
Anyway, I eagerly explored my options for a replacement computer. I had been doing everything possible to keep my old desktop running hoping it would make it until Window’s 7 was released. I had heard so many horror stories on Vista that I did not want to replace my puter with anything running Vista. Naturally, my old desktop started really waning about a month before Window’s 7 was to be released.
There is something about a sale that makes one loose the caution one normally has in regards to expensive purchases. I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted in my new computer. It is a big purchase, and I wanted something that could survive another ten years and perhaps another malformed Window’s release. Black Friday, a one day sale appeared on the Dell website for a computer I thought was sure to do the trick.
Nervous about making such a large order spontaneously, I first contacted a sales rep on one of those instant chat thingies that websites now have. The sale was on only until Midnight and it was already eleven o’clock. After waiting for nearly a half hour, I asked the sales rep if the computer had a specific feature I really wanted. “Yes” was the reply. Seemed a bit too simple an answer, but time was running out, and so I placed the order.
The next day I began to worry that perhaps this item was not really a part of the system. It is a pretty standard thing on computers nowadays for computers of a certain price range, but I decided it was better to be safe than sorry. I called the Dell support center to ask them if this feature was available on the computer I ordered. If it wasn’t, the computer order had not yet been sent and could be can canceled. Four hours of musak version of “Lollipop Lollipop”. Five transfers. I finally get a sales rep.
So, I asked if the feature was a part of this computer. Waited for person to check. “Yes, that is a feature of that computer” said the sales rep. I felt much better. My order was due two weeks before Christmas. Would be nice to have shiny new puter Christmas day. Week before Christmas I get an email. Delivery has been delayed until after Christmas. No appologies or special discounts, just the offer of a free Christmas card saying that computer would arrive eventually. No big deal, it wasn’t a gift. I contemplated mailing myself one of these free Christmas cards and decided not to.
Being in a wheelchair, I can not setup a computer myself. I know how to setup a computer, mostly what wires go where… but can’t crawl on the floor to actually hook them up. I thought about having a service person do this, but at two hundred an hour, the cost was ridiculous. My old computer is a monster. My friend laughed at me when he saw it. Over ten years, the computer had become an octopus of tangled wires, usb gizmos of technology now and past. The first job would be to dismantle this monster that I had relied upon for many many years.
Two days of dismantling I kid you not. I had wires hooked into this puter that led to nowhere… things plugged in I still have no idea what they are for. Each Christmas and birthday it seemed, someone gave me another usb device to plug in. USB hub after usb hub over ten years had turned my once sweet little computer into a monstrous malformed creature which wanted to grasp at anything approaching it.
Anyway, I finally unhooked the beast … or rather my parents did. Tempers can raise when one is tossing computer equipment about and loosing wires to things that may or may not be critically important to the new computer. Lets just say, having my dad disconnect a computer is a bit like sending a bull into a china shop to pick out your glass pattern. My room is now an absolute disaster area… wires splayed from one room to the next. Well… least it will be worth it to have a nice new computer that actually works.
Setting up a new computer is like the dismantling, but in reverse but without knowing where things are suppose to go. It would seem that computer manufacturers some time ago had this clever idea to not include instructions with computers so as the average person, confronted with hundreds of unlabeled wires, would simply give up and hire their company to install it. All day long we unpacked the computer and struggled to find the connection ports. This would of perhaps been even harder except for the fact, there seemed to be a strange absence of connections on the back of the computer. I think at the time i was thinking more about how little things like a mouse pad hadn't been included, no speakers, and other little things one expects to be included with a relatively expensive computer.
It was around the time we got down to the last few connections when we realized something was missing other than a mousepad. Yes… that very connection I contacted Dell about not once but twice. There were no video ports, no AVI ports, nothing for video input. It was missing the component I was assured it had.
Today. On this dinky lil netbook I finally got Dell support. “So sorry sir, your computer does not have that component. I understand if you want to return it. You will have to call our customer support number.” I knew I was in trouble as soon as they told me had to call customer support. Customer support is the modern equivalent of hell.
From twelve thirty until four I was on the phone. As “Lollipop Lollipop” droned on for the first hour, my temper grew. Now, mind you, I generally am not a person who gets angry. And when I do get angry, I am very very easy to console and make un-angry. But something about this musak is like slowly twisting a tourniquet around my brain until steam comes out. Hour and a half…”We must transfer you to our service department, please hold.” Then the familiar tone of a phone being disconnected. “SON OF A BITCH! ” I shout outload before family members unaccustomed to hearing me curse.
This time I ignore the automated messager asking me to tell it which department I wish to contact… which of course does not include the return department. Finally after the computer repeats the message a hundred times stating it can’t hear my response, I get to some poor operator whom I yell at. “One moment please… I’ll transfer you to the service department… please hold.” Before I could protest, more musak of “Lollipop Lollipop” which is apparently Dell’s new trademark song.
Time seems to stand still on hold. I was transferred maybe four of five times and back on hold again before at last, after several hours on hold, an actual person in the service returns department.
“Yes Sir, I understand why your upset. Would a thirty-five dollar credit to your account make up for this instead of return? ” I think I actually laughed. The missing component alone without installation cost over a hundred. After she went back and forth to her supervisor she offered a usb plug in version of what was suppose to be an installed component. At first I was going to accept this, but my parent’s had already re-boxed the computer for return. “Well Sir, you can return the computer, but there is a fifteen-percent restocking fee.” OMG… I was furious. They mis-represented what the computer could do, than they had the nerve to want to charge me for their mistake. I asked to speak to the supervisor. On hold again.
“Ok Sir, I’ve been authorized to drop the restocking fee.” At this point, I was too exhausted to fight over the fact that I also paid for shipping and handling for a computer that was not what I ordered. Too tired to bring up the fact that I spent three entire days to dismantle an old computer I would now need again and setting up then unsetting up a computer that I could not use. My only revenge is to post this here, and hope that it may in some way affect their future sales.
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