Is this a scam??? Help!!! [Dell purchase] [ed. title]

Factual Questions
21

While on the phone talking to some people, I went ahead and cancelled my original order. I was just asking them about the legitamacy of the whole thing, and they were like “Yup, that’s how it works… lets see here… mmmm hmmm… yeah… one second… Okay you’re all cancelled and ready to go.”
What the hell? I didn’t say “Cancel”. I just said “Someone called me claiming to be Dell Employee Pricing Center and said he was going to repurchase my order, but that I needed to cancel my old one. Does that sound right?” And he went ahead and just did everything right there.
Damn… Dell is fast!!! I hope the customer service works like this in the future!

Anyway, so I was all cancelled and sitting there with the joy of being debt free again… and my lil buddy called…

He went through the whole order with me line by line telling me everything that was on the original order. I never had to give him any financial details except my Social but I hardly consider that sensitive information nowadays. Bank account or CC #s is one thing. But a social is like giving out my birthday as far as I’m concerned. That debate is good for another thread I guess…
Anyway, I went ahead and redid the order.

After all was said and done, I saved like $140 bucks (I was expecting something a bit more but whatever), got an additional year of Warranty for free, and I got a free carrying case.
Meh…

22

I guess people complained about Dell’s customer service in the past because they recently changed it to be good… a little too good. I’ve never had service employees pretend to care so much about my order. I bought a camera from them and accidently bought the wrong type of memory card. I called them and the lady who answered also had me order a new memory card although she cancelled the order that was being processed. After I hung up, I got an email saying that the issue had been corrected. She called me at home a week later to make sure everything had been taken care of correctly in addition.

I was so happy with the level of service with my camera, that I bought a new laptop from them. I didn’t realize that it would take so long for it to be made before shipping and I wanted it soon, so I called them back to change my shipping to a faster method. I was fully prepared to pay the higher fee, but the helpful lady changed it to next day shipping for free. She apologized that the printer, which was included in the price, would not be available 'till later, but I was just happy that they did next day shipping for free. They also sent me an email later asking if everything had been taken care of correctly. They called me on the days that the packages were coming to my house to let me know that the packages should be there that day and they sent a follow up phone call and email asking if everything was ok with my order.

I’m thinking about getting a desk top from them now…

23

Wow! That’s great. And they really were going out of their way with me too. I first ordered it online, but then I realized I wanted a faster processor. So I called them on the phone. I was so worried that I would never get through to someone. It started off with the autoanswer, fake operator thing. I didn’t have any info like order number or anything like that yet. So I was like “Crap! What now…” But all I did was press enough random buttons and I was connected to a real life operator in under 30 seconds on the phone!! I thought maybe it was a fluke. I got it upgraded and everything was taken care of. Come to think of it, she had to cancel my original order and reorder it with the upgrade. So it must have something to do with their system…
And I called a couple times today and got right through to real people.

What a shame that customer service has declined so much in this country that when a company actually does things right, we get paranoid and suspicious of it.

24

[QUOTE=Bear_Nenno]
After all was said and done, I saved like $140 bucks (I was expecting something a bit more but whatever), got an additional year of Warranty for free, and I got a free carrying case.
Meh…
[/QUOTE]

Well, it was going to be a $300 savings, but there were all those phone calls he had to make to you and take from you :wink:

Glad this all worked out as legit, but you’re right, it’s a very sad state of affairs when a company that actually does things the right way is immediately suspected of fraud :frowning:

Be that as it may, I’m still pretty sure I didn’t win the UK National Lottery as the email I got today claimed :smiley:

25

Here are Dell’s customer service #s
Home use 1(800) 624-9897
XPS 1(800) 964-8321
Federal Gov 1(800) 727-1100

Call them and explain your concerns. I’ll bet they know about this whether its a scam or not. If they don’t and it is a scam, they probably would like to know.

26

In all of my experiences with Dell CSR’s, they have been outsourced Indians (I asked specifically once and she told me she was in India) who barely knew how to communicate outside of a script. Interesting that you had such a different experience, kimera

27

Dell has some kind of deal with affiliates in other countries that do sales for Dell in that country. When I was looking at buying a Dell 24" monitor, there were a couple of Dell reps working for a large computer sales company in India that were selling them for $150 cheaper than I could get direct from Dell. They had a Dell phone extension, and the monitor was shipped from Dell in the US, but they actually worked for the other company and got a commission from Dell.

28

[QUOTE=Rigamarole]
In all of my experiences with Dell CSR’s, they have been outsourced Indians (I asked specifically once and she told me she was in India) who barely knew how to communicate outside of a script. Interesting that you had such a different experience, kimera
[/QUOTE]

Indeed. When I called with a major problem with a Dell I’d bought for the kids ( still under warranty ) I spent six HOURS in one day on the phone with India.

I spoke to Steve, Dave, Kevin, Alicia and- the supervisor who called me uninvited because I’d spent so much time on the phone with Kevin- a “David”.

Finally, David pushed me too far. I said flat out, What is your name? " Oh, David, sir". I say , “really? Well, I’m here to tell you that I for one am delighted that there are so many Jews in India that a fellow named David - a nice Hebrew name- is working there for Dell. Tell me, how far away is your temple from where you live?”

Silence. Utter silence. Then, a painfully polite " Is there anything else we at Dell may help you with today, sir?" He had to adhere to the script, no matter what.

:rolleyes: Please.

I do care that IT support has been outsourced, but that’s for another thread.

Sorry to participate in the hijack. As far s the OP goes, I gotta say it smells like a very overeager new sales person, who is permitted to review orders placed in the last --24 hours, in the hopes of “flipping” an order over and getting the commission on the replacement order.

Feels kinda skeevy but i suspect it is completely legal, and Dell permits it.

Hey, enjoy the new machine and nice padded carry case !!

Cartooniverse

29

[QUOTE=Rigamarole]
In all of my experiences with Dell CSR’s, they have been outsourced Indians (I asked specifically once and she told me she was in India) who barely knew how to communicate outside of a script. Interesting that you had such a different experience, kimera
[/QUOTE]

Interesting. When I had to talk to Dell CSRs, I got good ol’ Americans. This was WRT a problem with a machine bought on a corporate account, so maybe that had something to do with it, but they were prompt (enough), polite, and followed up with a couple phone calls to verify a time they could come in and fix my machine, how was my service, etc.

That said, they were still reading from a script obviously intended for the lowest common denominator of technically inept callers (which I won’t begrudge them, but being able to deviate from it when the problem is 100% isolated would be nice), and they sent repair guys out twice(!) with defective replacement parts, but that’s another rant altogether. :stuck_out_tongue: