I went to Best Buy the other day to buy an mp3 player. I already know which one I wanted (the Creative Zen Extra 40GB), how much it was, and how to use it. When I got there, I waited patiently for the rep to finish helping an Asian couple decide what color iPod they wanted, then flagged him down. I pointed to the mp3 player and asked, “What can you tell me about this one?”
“Ah, well that’s a Creative, so it’s top of the line.”
“Right. And…?”
“Well, it holds 40GB, so you should have plenty of room to hold all your music files.”
“And…?”
“And like I said, this is a Creative, so it’s top of the line.”
I don’t really know what I expected him to say, but I thought he might at least tell me about the interface or something. Clearly he didn’t know anything and was just reading off the description card. But that was certainly fun. Next time I’m bored, I may go in and pretend to be buying a computer, just to see what they have to tell me.
I went to Best Buy a few days ago and purchased a computer. The guy asked me if I wanted the service contract. I asked if I could think about it for a few days and get back to him but he insisted I had to get it that day. I told him I just wouldn’t purchase the computer then because I didn’t have enough money for the contract that day. He mumbled “Let me check on something” and I watched him as he walked around that aisle and came back about fifteen seconds later to let me know his boss said I had two weeks to decide on the contract.
I saw him the whole time! Big liar!
Now I’m wondering if a service contract that costs almost two hundred dollars is really worth it for a four hundred dollar e-machine. I’d ask at the store but who knows if the guy would be honest about anything!
When I went to buy Ivylad a Sony Playstation 2 for Father’s Day a few years back, the cashier tried to sell me a service contract, explaining about all the things that could go wrong with the SP2. I looked at her, aghast, and said, “Goodness! I had no idea the thing was so fragile! Does everyone know Sony puts out such a defective product? Maybe I better not get it after all!” She stumbled and mumbled and rang me up as quick as she could.
Then, on a Xmas shopping spree with my SIL, the cashier tried to sell her a service contract on a $75 portable TV/DVD combo that could travel in the car. I stood right by her at the register and countered all of the cashier’s arguments.
I’m pretty clueless about Macs. A friend gave me an iMac loaded with Panther. I haven’t figured out how I’m going to use it. Right now, I’m using my new G4 PowerBook. It will be used for editing (it has Final Cut Pro) as soon as A) I have some content to edit, and B) I learn how to use Final Cut Pro.
(My friend says I should sell the iMac, since I have the PowerBook and a PC. I might leave the iMac up here for the Internet when I move back to L.A.)
If you figure out the break even point for the company, their service contracts usually make them look really really bad. If it’s a three year contract, and they are selling it for half the price of a new one, the break even point is basically if 50 percent of them break after three years. This puts the salesperson in a rather uncomfortable position, because they are either gouging you horribly on the price or the machine is a royal piece of junk. You can have some fun asking the salesperson which it is, then sit back and watch them squirm.
The main thing to think remember about these warrenties is that they are on top of the manufacturer’s warrenty. Your product already has a warrenty. If something is wrong with the product it will probably show up during the original warrenty. If the product breaks in two years, do you really want your old computer fixed, or a new one? You will already have the $200 in your pocket that you did not spend on the warrenty for the new computer.
This is not exclusive to Best Buy employees. Ms. D_Odds complains that I don’t ask store employees about items. That’s the reason why…they don’t know. Sure, you might get an employee who’s a fan of the department or product you are enquiring about, but the odds are against you. Working in these big box stores, the clerk realizes that customers expect you to know minutae about every product, and management does not want to dissuade them from that notion, so clerks end up talking out of their ass far too often.
Lord Ashtar, how about if the conversation went this way?
LA: Tell me about this creative zen mp3 player.
BB: (reads card)
LA: What else can you tell me?
BB: That’s it.
LA: Why would I get this instead of an iPod?
BB: I don’t know.
Does he get credit for being honest? My experience (over 20 years ago) is that the customer responses start to go more like this:
BB: I don’t know.
C: What do you mean you don’t know? You sell the product, don’t you?
BB: Yes ma’am. We do sell it. I’m just not familiar with the product.
C: Don’t they train you on all this stuff? How can you sell something you don’t know? etc.
I’ve been on the receiving end, more than once. Easier to make something up, based on hearsay and overheard conversations (I was doing this before anyone could look up anything on the internet).
Don’t forget that the service contract is through Best Buy. That guy who lied about talking to his boss? Too honest for the service department. Probably too competent, too. Did he jab himself in the eye with anything while you were talking? Break anything?
I’m not impressed with Best Buy’s service department. I wouldn’t buy a service plan from them if it was a dollar.
About four years ago, I had a computer that had a teensy problem with some software compatability issues. I was (and am) a total noob at tech issues, so I decided to take the box back to the Best Buy I bought it at. Gave it to the service department, they tell me it’ll be ready in about an hour.
I go to lunch, come back. They tell me, “All fixed”. I bring it home… It now has -more- software problems. Bad ones. I call BB and they tell me to bring it back. I do so, they tinker… “All fixed!”
On the way home, I stop by a birthday party for a friend, let him know what’s going on. He tells me, “Here, here’s a number of a friend of mine who does tech support for your model of computer. If you still have problems, give him a call.”
I get home… Even -more- software problems. Almost in tears, I call the friend.
He tells me he has a four-step solution for my problem. Steps one through three take me less than five minutes and fix everything. I thank him profusely and ask him about step four.
“Tommorow, I want you to drive out to best buy and slap the guy who did this to your machine.”
From me, yeah. I worked at Best Buy in high school. Luckily I worked in the CDs and video games. Being a teenager, I had plenty of experience in both of those. But if they had tried to put me in, say, car stereos or appliances, I wouldn’t have known a damn thing.
If he had said, “You know, I don’t know anything about these Creative players. Everyone else just wants an iPod,” I would’ve thanked him and bought it anyway. Remember, this was all just in good fun.
If you’ve used your average deck-to-deck video editor (as I’m sure you have) then FCP will be very intuitive to you. It has lots of fancy features and stuff, but your basic mark-in-out-in-go! stuff is right there.
Am I right in thinking that Best Buy is the equivalent of the UK computer chain store PC World? (i.e. a national chain of computer supermarkets, somewhat notorious for inflated prices, poor customer service and lack of understanding of their own products?
If so, perhaps it would be appropriate to relate a brief, but astonishingly poor experience I had at PC world:
I had promised to produce some video material on DVD, but had only really tiptoed into the arena of DVD production. I went to PC world and asked if they had any DVD authoring software.
“DVD altering software?” exclaimed the software sales person.
“No, DVD authoring software - it’s what you have to use if you want to make DVDs”
“Ohhhh… blank DVDs are over there, with the blank CDs.”
“Ummm, I know. I want to buy a program that I can install on my computer so that I can create DVDs”
“You mean copy DVDs?”
“No, I mean create them - from video footage that I have recorded for myself, on a camcorder for example”
“You’ll want a DVD writer”
“I’ve got a DVD writer. I want a program to use with it - you know, something that can put it all together and create DVD menu screens”
“I’ve never heard of anything like that, what’s it called?”
“DVD Authoring”
“DVD altering?”
“Never mind”