Anybody had any recent experience with Dell Customer Service?

ian

ian

Administrator
Staff member
Has anybody here had to recently deal with Dell, as in the last two years to get a faulty product fixed?
I am considering buying one of their monitors, but dont want to deal with them if they have lousy tech support for a faulty product within warranty. If they are like Samsung, I will give them a miss.
I use dell monitors at work, and I do like their picture quality and the overall quality of their monitors. The one I was looking at was the dell U2410
http://configure.ap.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?oc=t14u2410wau&c=au&l=en&s=dhs&cs=audhs1
 
ian

ian

Administrator
Staff member
Speaking to the sale people, seems like some foreign call centre, where the people have very little product knowledge. I was wondering with so many unemployed people, how hard would it be to get people who knew the product. But I can order online no problem.
Jeremy Zawodny, from the first link, is a fairly important dude over at Yahoo, I would trust his recommendation, although that was from 2005. Not sure if things have improved since then.
 
Twist86

Twist86

Active Member
Honestly if tech support is that desired then buy a Samsung or ASUS monitor. They have never had issues with support for their many other parts so why wouldn't that same quality be on their monitors? Also they have a smooth rolling RMA setup (least I think so). HP/Dell/etc are junk companies and are not worth doing business with ever.
 
voyagerfan99

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
I've dealt with both their business tech support and standard user support.

The standard user support (Inspiron, XPS, Studio, etc.) is usually someone from India that is just reading a manual. I work for a computer shop and know how to test for a faulty hard drive. However when you call them you absolutely HAVE to run the diags while you're on the phone with them. Eventually you can convince them you have a bad hard drive under warranty and they'll ship you the new one.

Business support is far better, especially Gold tech support. A lot of our refurbished machines are normally out of warranty, but occasionally some still have some time left. I had a GX620 with a bad motherboard. I called tech support and actually spoke with an American :eek: He was in Texas! And I could EASILY understand him! I said the machine has a bad motherboard and it needed to be replaced. The tech said ""Okay. Do you want us to send a tech out or just send the part?" No questions asked. (Of course I just had him mail the mobo out :D )

My co-worker bought a used Latitude E6400 off eBay that still has a Gold warranty until the end of this year. The latch was broken and some of the casing was cracked and broken. He called Dell up and they just said "Okay a tech will be out there tomorrow!" While the tech was there my co-worker mentioned a small scratch on the screen and the tech said "Okay. I'll just replace that too."

Needless to say, the Business support with Dell is incredible! Just be sure the warranty is transferred to your name to avoid needless phone calls and wait time :)
 
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gamblingman

gamblingman

VIP Member
voyagerfan99 said:
I've dealt with both their business tech support and standard user support.

The standard user support (Inspiron, XPS, Studio, etc.) is usually someone from India that is just reading a manual. I work for a computer shop and know how to test for a faulty hard drive. However when you call them you absolutely HAVE to run the diags while you're on the phone with them. Eventually you can convince them you have a bad hard drive under warranty and they'll ship you the new one.

Business support is far better, especially Gold tech support. A lot of our refurbished machines are normally out of warranty, but occasionally some still have some time left. I had a GX620 with a bad motherboard. I called tech support and actually spoke with an American :eep: He was in Texas! And I could EASILY understand him! I said the machine has a bad motherboard and it needed to be replaced. The tech said ""Okay. Do you want us to send a tech out or just send the part?" No questions asked. (Of course I just had him mail the mobo out :D )

My co-worker bought a used Latitude E6400 off eBay that still has a Gold warranty until the end of this year. The latch was broken and some of the casing was cracked and broken. He called Dell up and they just said "Okay a tech will be out there tomorrow!" While the tech was there my co-worker mentioned a small scratch on the screen and the tech said "Okay. I'll just replace that too."

Needless to say, the Business support with Dell is incredible! Just be sure the warranty is transferred to your name to avoid needless phone calls and wait time :)
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100% agree with Voyagerfan.

And though the average consumer ends up talking to someone in India, as I have in the past, the majority of those on the phones are nice people who speak English well enough. Though, at work I've spend a lot of time on the phone with people from India, China and Pakistan, so maybe its just easier for me to understand their accents.

Also, its a little time consuming talking to them at the non-business line because they will walk you through every step in the troubleshooting procedure! But they have to do that or they lose their job.

I've never had problems, and Dell can be REALLY fast getting stuff to you. I recently needed the reinstall and the utility disks. So I called them about 2pm central time and I had the disks by 3pm the following day! I couldn't believe it was so fast.

Also, yeah I've had them drive out to fix several computers. They are prompt, fast, and friendly.
 
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1337dingo

1337dingo

Active Member
i have had calls with dell all the time (working in a school) and depending on what support you get (pro or gold) can be good or better, pro is just normal kinda hard to understand but easy enough to get things fixed, Gold support is great you actuly get people you can understand.
 
ian

ian

Administrator
Staff member
thanks for the feedback, especially for australian feedback. I am fedup with Samsung at the moment, will not be buying another one of their monitors. The choice for alternatives is not all that wide.
While Dell products are made overseas, I like the idea of supporting an American company.
 
ian

ian

Administrator
Staff member
1337dingo said:
sarcasm about the auzzie feedback? gets hard to tell online hahaha
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no, not sarcasm, sometimes Australian customer service differs from the american customer service. As an example, I sent a tweet to Samsung service america and they replied straight away. Send an email to Samsung Australia and you will be lucky if they reply at all, they will only reply if you ring to complain. And they don't return calls. So it is good to hear some local feedback.
 
gamblingman

gamblingman

VIP Member
ian said:
no, not sarcasm, sometimes Australian customer service differs from the american customer service. As an example, I sent a tweet to Samsung service america and they replied straight away. Send an email to Samsung Australia and you will be lucky if they reply at all, they will only reply if you ring to complain. And they don't return calls. So it is good to hear some local feedback.
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Any thoughts on why its harder to get in touch with the support in Australia?
 
ian

ian

Administrator
Staff member
gamblingman said:
Any thoughts on why its harder to get in touch with the support in Australia?
Click to expand...

No idea why.
I think this complaint post on Samsung Australia is accurate
When I called they would not let me speak to a supervisor, they would not give me their head office address, they wouldn't return emails or phone calls. I am amazed we accept such a lack of service. Nothing was resolved until I managed to speak with an employee who was American - the change in approach was remarkable. It makes one wonder if its the Australian attitude rather then the company. We can expect breakdowns in products but its how that is handled that creates the frustration.......
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http://www.notgoodenough.org/viewtopic.php?t=35748&postdays=0&start=0
Well I dont think it is an australian thing, I have received excellent customer service from both Apple and Panasonic here in Australia.
 
C4Radon

C4Radon

Member
I had a hard drive error, went on their website and got some "chat with a professional" thing. Pretty much an overly formal Indian guy. Told him my problem, got a new hard drive sent to my door. I fixed the problem before it got there, they called maybe 3 times to say to send in my old one. I never picked up the phone and haven't had any calls since...aka FREE 500 GB HARD DRIVE! (This was about 5-6 months ago). But I cant verify if this is their usual MO, Ive heard it can also suck terribly. Possibly because it was in the warranty window. Maybe right after the warranty expires they treat you like shit. Not sure.
 
Ankur

Ankur

Active Member
My Dell Studio XPS Laptop Mobo blew up two times, in the first case they repaired it. In the second time they bought a new Mobo with them and changed it. The process was pretty fast. BTW they haven't taken back their old Mobo.
 
dellxps420

dellxps420

banned
Ankur said:
My Dell Studio XPS Laptop Mobo blew up two times, in the first case they repaired it. In the second time they bought a new Mobo with them and changed it. The process was pretty fast. BTW they haven't taken back their old Mobo.
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what an old mobo to them ?
 
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