On February 10 I bought a "Wireless Gear" mobile phone charger "for use with all Motorola, Nextel, and Blackberry phones" at Dollar General. I paid $7.00 plus tax. The charger would not work with my Motorola TFC139B. The next day I carried it back to Dollar General.
I was told that Dollar general does not warrant electronics, and that I would have to call the technical "support" number on the merchandise box. Reluctantly, I did. There was no toll-free number, so I decided to spend a little extra to confirm what I already knew—"there is no one available to take your call." This was on Wednesday morning at 9:00 and 9:20 AM CDT. If there is no one at these times, most likely there will never be.
But there was a remedy! I could return the merchandise (at my expense) to the importer with a $5.95 shipping/handling fee under the terms of "ESI Cases and Accessories'" "lifetime warranty." No thanks! Being ripped off once in one week is enough.
In effect, Dollar General is selling cheap electronics at a not-too-cheap price with absolutely no customer support. Dollar General will not warrant it. The "world's largest manufacturer of cellular and IPod accessories" did not have anyone to answer the phone in the middle of the week, but they have an air-tight "lifetime warranty, " if you are sucker enough to exercise it.
Over the past ten years, I have bought a little over $200.00 in electronic merchandise at Dollar General. Never again! That will cost them a lot more than seven bucks. How many hundreds or thousands of people will read this? How many of them will avoid electronic merchandise at Dollar General? Circuit City shot itself in the foot with this kind of customer service. Dollar General, take heed.
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