The View From Here

I journeyed to The Home Depot today in Rocky River, a CLE suburb that borders Lakewood on the West End.  I was just running in for a minute, but I had to use the little boy’s room first – when ya gotta go, ya gotta go.  What I witnessed was a classic moment in Big Box Store Customer Service.  It kind of helps one to understand why it takes so long to get phone help.

As I wandered back to the restrooms, I heard a guy on his cordless phone tell a customer “It was in this week’s ad ?  I’ll have to go look at it – please hold.”  He then preceeded to the restroom ahead of me (at least he washed his hands after), moseyed through the store with no sense of urgency whatsoever, and located the “ad rack” by the entrance.  He then – with the same lack of enthusiasm – meandering back to the Kitchen Department.  When he went to retrieve his phone from his pocket to address the customer’s question he dropped the phone, with the battery ejecting across the floor – dropped call !

Obviously I was shadowing him (from a distance – he didn’t know) to see how this played out, and it basically went exactly as I thought it would, except for the “dropped call” part.  Now I can better understand why it takes FOREVER to get telephone questions answered at these places – I really don’t think most employees care.  As stated, when ya gotta go, ya gotta go, but maybe they shouldn’t take the customer with them when they do…

Without going into all the details, we recently had a horrible experience with Insignia Products, Best Buy’s “house brand” – which is made by LG I believe – and Best Buy.  The problem was with a DVR recorder that also transfers VHS to DVD as one unit.  We bought the Insignia product because it seemed to have all the features we needed, and was moderately priced.

 We got sucked into the “Best Buy Syndrome” because they always had everything we needed at a decent price, a wide selection, and stuff was usually “in stock”.  We do not purchase a lot of consumer electronics – our main TV was a 15 year old 20-inch tube.  We upgraded to a 27-inch tube a couple years ago.  We’ve also purchased a couple refridgerators, laptops, iPods and other miscellaney, all without problems.

What was different about this experience ?  Well, over the Summer the DVD unit failed.  Best Buy repaired it and it’s been fine since – until a couple weeks ago.  The same problem recurred, and I wanted it fixed for free since it WAS a recurring problem.  After many go arounds with Insignia and “Geek Squad”, all I had to show for it was frustration.  Neither party was willing to accept responsibility, and basically implied I should have bought the Extended Warranty – whatever.

 After explaining our dilemma to the store manager, and chastising her for her inferior house brand and worthless Geek Squad, I advised that we would NEVER buy ANYTHING from Besy Buy again.  I mentioned the thousands of dollars we have spent at their store, and the fact that we would never be back.  I cut up my Best Buy Card (with their scissors), dumped it in her hand, and stated “I won’t be needing this anymore”…