Best Buy is the crappiest store on earth!!!!(NSR)

[skier666]

Here's my frustrated story for a friday:

So my wife buys a cybershot without telling me....even thought I told her that if she ever buys a camera to get one that takes SD cards, I have tons of them...but whatever, its a good camera.

The Salesman convinced her to buy a $59/4 year warranty on a $399 camera. That's a 15% straight profit...and 4 years? Who the hell uses a digital camera for 4 years? Not me...by then I think its time for a new one.

Told her she could "run it over with a car and just get a new one."

So used it for a while, and a broken pixel or dirt or something is in every shot I take...bring it in Best Buy. After talking to probably 5 people acting like their head is cut off, I finally get the guy I need. Show him the warranty, and he agrees with me that this is something wrong with the camera. I act politely to try to convince the guy we need a new camera...we got the warranty right? He then tells me that they usually service the camera a couple times before they replace it. So I reply "that's funny because they sold this useless warranty to my wife, telling her that anything could happen and a new one would be issued."

So I tell him, send it in, no big deal...

He tells me that it should only take a couple days, and tells me that they'll call me when it comes in.

That was 11/11/2004 ....not one call since. A week ago I tried calling...but their phone system is broken so you can't talk to a person.

So I roll in after work, again millions of employees with less intelligence than a tree are running around getting ready for xmas. The customer service lady tells me that it'll only be a minute, and the tech will be out to help me. Nope, he's gone...so she tries to help me but has no idea how to find the camera. I finally talk to a guy, but its his day off but he helps her anyway. I'm 5 feet from them and I hear them saying "that's wierd, it usually doesn't take that long"...then she comes over to me and says..."ummm its the holidays, so they are a little backed up, I'm sure it will only take a couple more days."

Now that was funny, I heard the whole thing, but she gives me some bullshit answer... So I tell her the phone system is screwy and she says that "yeah...been like that for a while"....but she says she'll call when its done.

So I call this morning for an update...Its now been 1 month since I brought it in.....6 people transfer me until they give me the "if you would like to make a call, please hang up and try again."

I call back...I'm on hold for ever...and then I hang up...and now I write this to tell you guys to NEVER BUY ANYTHING THERE AGAIN...

[tuffy109]

i was just about to buy a refrigerator from them, can i use you as a reference?

[cj001f]

They suck. I special ordered a camera from them last year. Was supposed to be in stock the next week. Two weeks later, no camera. Bought it from another store for 10% less than BestBuy. Went to Bestbuy to cancel my order. Cancelling the special order took an hour. Then they told me I'd have to wait in a 20 person line to get my money refunded on the camera that I'm never going to receive

[Superstar Punani]

666: http://www.bbbonline.org/consumer/complaint.asp

Generally I've had good shit come from a BBB bitching. After you submit it to the BBB, print out the letter, and mail it to the consumer affairs dept, the store manager, the regional manager, and even, no shit, the CEO....shit will get done pretty fast. Not a lot of effort to do, but you'll definitely rock the boat.

Last Time I pulled this stunt it involved a car dealership and I got a $100 check for my "inconvenience"

[Mountainman]

http://www.bestbuysux.org

[The AD]

I agree. Best Buy sucks donkey dick. I was looking for an LCD monitor a few months ago and found one that was similar to the one I wanted, but had a slightly different model number. Turns out the one they stocked was just like the one I wanted, except had a one-year warranty instead of three. We asked the salesman about it and he said "oh, you want a three year warranty? Well, we can sell you one..." I pretty much walked straight out.

This got me thinking. The other thing that pisses me off big time are mail in rebates. Are these the biggest scam ever? Every so often you actually get the rebate (it always takes forever), but I swear at least 50% of the time I've had some problem. They try to claim you didn't send in the correct paperwork when you know that's complete bullshit. I've had particularly bad experiences with OfficeMax. Fuck them. Some muckraking journalist should investigate this bullshit. There's no douubt in my mind they are consciously screwing people out of their rebates.

[Arty50]

The employees there are worse than used car salesmen. I walked into Best Buy for the first time a couple of months ago just to see what it was like. I was there for maybe about 15 minutes at the most, but I had no less than 10 salesmen walk up and try to sell me a line. I was sooo fucking pissed.

I went in again last week against my better judgement to look at digicams. I knew I wasn't going to buy from them, but I just needed to check some out. Natually I successfully fended off the morons that work there, but listened in to what they were telling others. It was really sad. One lied and told a couple the Kodaks have vastly superior battery life to the Canons. And another tried to tell me that the Canon A series wasn't as good as the S series because it used AAs vs. Lithium Ion. The AA based A series actually takes twice as many pictures as the Lithium Ion base S series. Not to mention you can buy rechargeable AAs. The Kodaks aren't even close to the A series in battery life. Nothing much is.

[skier666]

Just sent my story to that website....bottom line is that I'll never go there again. Thank god I live in area with every store imaginable.

Rebates....I remember listening to a talk show and some expert saying never to buy anything with a rebate. So I've pretty much stuck with that...other than say Norton Ultities or similiar cheap software...or cheap products that you need...say a USB bluetooth adapter.

I bought a new cell phone months ago with an AT&T rebate...they wrote me a letter saying that they couldn't fullfill the rebate, which was $50. The whole reason was that they couldn't match my cell phone number to thier the system...It turned out that they misread my phone number and didn't even bother to match (look up) my name to a number...I've had an account with them for 5 years. I got the rebate, but I'd say most people would just flag it.

[Beaver]

Don't tell us your tale of woe. Tell them. Write it down and send it to the manager of that store and cc it to the regional manager.....

Emails are not worth shit. Put itin an envelope and send it snail mail.

[Mcwop]

i was just about to buy a refrigerator from them, can i use you as a reference?

The refrigerators that they sell are smarter than the employees.

[Arty50]

http://www.bestbuysux.org

Great site. Here's why 666's wife got the extended warranty. It's also pretty consistent with my thankfully brief experiences there.

---------------------------------------------------

Date sent: Sun, 5 Dec 2004 14:01:48 -0600

12/5/04

Dear Sirs:

I would like to report to you, my wife and I, shopping experience, at your St. Cloud Best Buy Store, that has changed our minds about shopping your store again.

On Sunday November 21, 2004, my wife and I went into your store to purchase a Toshiba HD Wide Screen TV (Model # 46H84) and a Toshiba HD VCR/DVD Player,(Model #SD-V592), both were in your Sunday Sale Flier.

The first thing the salesperson told us, was "He had to check if they have the TV's in stock"! It seems the store had only "2", one in back and one on the floor. The HD DVD-VHS player was no problem. The Second thing was, the Salesperson started on about how we "HAD" to buy your "Service Agreement". I told him NO, and he keep up telling me "WHY" we "HAD" to buy it. Then he ask me why I did not want the plan. I replied, "That I have purchased them in the past and have never used them". And when I ask where was the "Tech" from, he replied Little Falls. The Third thing was the Salesperson, told us that we needed to buy "HD" cables for the TV and DVD/VHS or we would have dirty picture and sound. The first cable he grab were "$149.99", video cable, and "Told us we HAD to have these". After we told him NO, four times, then he decide to explain to us why we need these cables and not use just any cables. We ended up buying $89.99 video and $39.99 Audio Cables. The Fourth thing is, a second Salesperson comes up to me and ask me "WHY am I not buying the Service Agreement"?, I told him the same thing I told the first Salesperson. The Fifth thing, is a third Salesperson comes up to me and "TELL'S" me, he "HAS" to explain to me about Surge Protectors. I replied, I know about Surge Protectors, I work in the Copier/Computer Field and I have one at home, that I bought from Best Buy and.................Boom, he cut's me off, and "Tell's" me that one will not work, I "HAVE TO" buy this one, and he pointed to a $199.99, Surge Protector. I told him NO. He walked and away and started talking to my wife, who was talking to the first Salesperson we had contact with, to the point of making her upset. My wife told him to talk to me. The Sixth thing is a third Salesperson comes up to me and "Ask's, why am I not buying the Service Agreement"?, I told him what I told the other two Salespeople. He then go's over to my wife and starts asking her the same question and start telling her his little sales pitch, she became upset and walked away from him and the first Salesperson and walked over by me and ask if we can leave, that all these Salespeople were driving her crazy and making her upset. The Seventh thing was as were checking out a Fourth Salesperson ask us, for the Fifth Time, "Why we did not want to buy the Service Agreement". He started in his little Sales pitch and I told me to end it or we are walking. We had enough.

Never in my entire life and working in the Customer Service Industry for 27 years, I have never been so pissed off. Why would you have "4" Salespeople ganging up on two people? Is it that your that hard up for cash? Losing business?

If this was my store, these 4 salespeople would have a Paycheck in one hand, a pink slip in the other and my size 13 boot up their ass and out the door they would go.

I don't know why you would train your people to treat customers in such a "Rude", way? My wife and I almost walked out of your store and were willing to go someplace else to buy the TV and DVD/VHS, even if we had to spend a little more money, being treated as human beings and having a Salesperson who "explained" everything to us up front and has some Customer Service Experience, would be worth the extra money. But my wife and I did learn one thing from this experience, when we go shopping for other big tag items, Best Buy will be one store WE will not be shopping in.

[Superstar Punani]

Don't tell us your tale of woe. Tell them. Write it down and send it to the manager of that store and cc it to the regional manager.....

Emails are not worth shit. Put itin an envelope and send it snail mail.

What Beaver said....copy, print, and mail to the Best Buy Store Manager, Regional Manager, Best Buy Consumer Affairs and the CEO!

The e-mail response to the BBB website is the shit though. I've used them a couple of times and they're totally on the ball.

Best Buy
Corporate Customer Care
P.O. Box 949
Minneapolis, MN 55440

Mr. Bradbury Anderson
Chief Executive Officer
Best Buy Co., Inc.
Corporate Headquarters
P.O. Box 9312
Minneapolis, MN 55440-9312

[skier666]

Ha....thanks guys...pretty slow day at work?

[SponsoredByDuctTape]

Great site. Here's why 666's wife got the extended warranty. It's also pretty consistent with my thankfully brief experiences there.

---------------------------------------------------

Date sent: Sun, 5 Dec 2004 14:01:48 -0600

12/5/04

Dear Sirs:

I would like to report to you, my wife and I, shopping experience, at your St. Cloud Best Buy Store, that has changed our minds about shopping your store again.

On Sunday November 21, 2004, my wife and I went into your store to purchase a Toshiba HD Wide Screen TV (Model # 46H84) and a Toshiba HD VCR/DVD Player,(Model #SD-V592), both were in your Sunday Sale Flier.

The first thing the salesperson told us, was "He had to check if they have the TV's in stock"! It seems the store had only "2", one in back and one on the floor. The HD DVD-VHS player was no problem. The Second thing was, the Salesperson started on about how we "HAD" to buy your "Service Agreement". I told him NO, and he keep up telling me "WHY" we "HAD" to buy it. Then he ask me why I did not want the plan. I replied, "That I have purchased them in the past and have never used them". And when I ask where was the "Tech" from, he replied Little Falls. The Third thing was the Salesperson, told us that we needed to buy "HD" cables for the TV and DVD/VHS or we would have dirty picture and sound. The first cable he grab were "$149.99", video cable, and "Told us we HAD to have these". After we told him NO, four times, then he decide to explain to us why we need these cables and not use just any cables. We ended up buying $89.99 video and $39.99 Audio Cables. The Fourth thing is, a second Salesperson comes up to me and ask me "WHY am I not buying the Service Agreement"?, I told him the same thing I told the first Salesperson. The Fifth thing, is a third Salesperson comes up to me and "TELL'S" me, he "HAS" to explain to me about Surge Protectors. I replied, I know about Surge Protectors, I work in the Copier/Computer Field and I have one at home, that I bought from Best Buy and.................Boom, he cut's me off, and "Tell's" me that one will not work, I "HAVE TO" buy this one, and he pointed to a $199.99, Surge Protector. I told him NO. He walked and away and started talking to my wife, who was talking to the first Salesperson we had contact with, to the point of making her upset. My wife told him to talk to me. The Sixth thing is a third Salesperson comes up to me and "Ask's, why am I not buying the Service Agreement"?, I told him what I told the other two Salespeople. He then go's over to my wife and starts asking her the same question and start telling her his little sales pitch, she became upset and walked away from him and the first Salesperson and walked over by me and ask if we can leave, that all these Salespeople were driving her crazy and making her upset. The Seventh thing was as were checking out a Fourth Salesperson ask us, for the Fifth Time, "Why we did not want to buy the Service Agreement". He started in his little Sales pitch and I told me to end it or we are walking. We had enough.

Never in my entire life and working in the Customer Service Industry for 27 years, I have never been so pissed off. Why would you have "4" Salespeople ganging up on two people? Is it that your that hard up for cash? Losing business?

If this was my store, these 4 salespeople would have a Paycheck in one hand, a pink slip in the other and my size 13 boot up their ass and out the door they would go.

I don't know why you would train your people to treat customers in such a "Rude", way? My wife and I almost walked out of your store and were willing to go someplace else to buy the TV and DVD/VHS, even if we had to spend a little more money, being treated as human beings and having a Salesperson who "explained" everything to us up front and has some Customer Service Experience, would be worth the extra money. But my wife and I did learn one thing from this experience, when we go shopping for other big tag items, Best Buy will be one store WE will not be shopping in.

Sometimes I actually like dealing with people like this. If you don't mind their incesent "salesmanship," it can be fun to mess with them. One thing I learned from the old man is that you just have to be more of an asshole than the salesman if you want them to leave you alone. And it's funny that no matter how much of a dick you are to them, they will still kiss your ass when it comes to making that sale.

[FNG]

Best Buy is a good place to go if you need a cheap printer, some CD's, or other little items. They're only good during non-peak hours as they rarely ever have more than two or three people working the check-out lanes. Unfortunately for me, I live in Minneapolis. If you can't buy it at Best Buy or Target, you're pretty much out of luck here.

[mrw]

Everyone I know that has purchased something from Best Buy and then has had either a return or repair has been screwed over. They charged a single mom a "restocking fee" of 15% when she returned a computer she bought her daughter. I spend no $$$ ever at BB

[Arty50]

Hmmm...I just remembered reading this in the Journal a while back. Remember, the customer is always wrong.

Next time I'm assaulted by one of their lackeys I'm going to ask the following, "Quick, what am I, a Barry or a Buzz?"

[Lackey response]

Me: "Wrong. I'm neither. I'm actually a really fucking irritable person and I hate have peon assholes bother me while I'm shopping. Now leave me the fuck alone."

Edit: Woodsy posted the Journal Article. It's much better.

[Keoni]

I had a charge account there and bought a bunch of shit over a couple year period.

Last year they fucked with me over a $49 prepaid Virgin Mobile cell phone I got my daughter for Christmas. Long story short, I made a huge scene, got a new phone and cancelled my account the next day.

They probably lost a couple grand because of their poor customer service.

[KQ]

Was and always will be Jafco - ick.

[Woodsy]

THEY MUST THINK YOU ARE A CRAPPY CUSTOMER


HEY, BIG SPENDER

Best Buy hopes to encourage profitable angels and shun customers giving it a devil of a time

By GARY McWILLIAMS The Wall Street Journal

Brad Anderson, chief executive officer of Best Buy Co., is embracing a heretical notion for a retailer. He wants to separate the “angels” among his 1.5 million daily customers from the “devils.”

Best Buy's angels are customers who boost profits at the consumer electronics giant by snapping up high-definition televisions, portable electronics and newly released DVDs without waiting for markdowns or rebates.

The devils are its worst customers. They buy products, apply for rebates, return the purchases and then buy them back at returned-merchandise discounts. They load up on “loss leaders,” severely discounted merchandise designed to boost store traffic, and then flip the goods at a profit on eBay. They slap down rock-bottom price quotes from Web sites and demand that Best Buy make good on its lowest-price pledge.

“They can wreak enormous economic havoc,” Anderson said.

Best Buy estimates that as many as 100 million of its 500 million customer visits each year are undesirable. And the 54-year-old chief executive wants to be rid of these customers.

Anderson's new approach upends what has long been standard practice for mass merchants. Most chains use their marketing budgets chiefly to maximize customer traffic, in the belief that more visitors will lift revenue and profit. Shunning customers — unprofitable or not — is rare and risky.

Anderson says the new tack is based on a business school theory that advocates rating customers according to profitability, then dumping the up to 20 percent who are unprofitable. The financial services industry has used a variation of that approach for years, lavishing attention on its best customers and penalizing its unprofitable customers with fees for using ATMs or tellers or for obtaining bank records.

Best Buy seems an unlikely candidate for a radical makeover. With $24.5 billion in sales last year, the Richfield, Minn., company is the nation's top seller of consumer electronics. Its big, airy stores and wide inventory have helped it increase market share, even as rivals such as Circuit City Stores Inc. and Sears Roebuck and Co. have struggled.

In the 2004 fiscal year that ended in February, Best Buy reported net income of $705 million, up from $99 million during the year-earlier period marred by an unsuccessful acquisition, and from the $570 million it earned in the less troubled fiscal 2002.

But Anderson spies a hurricane on the horizon. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, and Dell Inc., the largest personal computer maker, have moved rapidly into high-definition televisions and portable electronics, two of Best Buy's most profitable areas. Today, they rank as the nation's second- and fourth-largest consumer electronics sellers.

Anderson worries that his two rivals “are larger than us, have a lower (overhead), and are more profitable.” In five years, he fears, Best Buy could wind up like Toys R Us Inc., trapped in what consultants call the “unprofitable middle,” unable to match Wal-Mart's sheer buying power, while low-cost online sellers like Dell pick off its most affluent customers. Toys R Us recently announced it is considering leaving the toy business.

This year, Best Buy has rolled out its new angel-devil strategy in about 100 of its 670 stores. It is examining sales records and demographic data and sleuthing through computer databases to identify good and bad customers. To lure the high-spenders, it is stocking more merchandise and providing more appealing service. To deter the undesirables, it is cutting back on promotions and sales tactics that tend to draw them, and culling them from marketing lists.

As he prepares to roll out the unconventional strategy throughout the chain, Anderson faces substantial risks. The pilot stores have proved more costly to operate. Because different pilot stores go after different types of customers, they threaten to scramble the chain's historic economies of scale. The trickiest challenge may be to deter bad customers without turning off good ones.

“Culturally I want to be very careful,” said Anderson. “The most dangerous image I can think of is a retailer that wants to fire customers.”

Anderson's campaign against devil customers pits Best Buy against an underground of bargain-hungry shoppers intent on wringing every nickel of savings out of big retailers. At dozens of Web sites such as FatWallet.com, SlickDeals.net and TechBargains.com, they trade electronic coupons and tips from former clerks and insiders, hoping to gain extra advantages against the stores.

Anderson's makeover plan began taking shape two years ago when the company retained as a consultant Larry Selden, a professor at Columbia University's Graduate School of Business. Selden has produced research tying a company's stock market value to its ability to identify and cater to profitable customers better than its rivals do. At many companies, Selden argues, losses produced by devil customers wipe out profits generated by angels.

Selden had never applied his angel-devil theories to a retailer as large as Best Buy, whose executives were skeptical that 20 percent of customers could be unprofitable. In mid-2002, Selden outlined his theories during several weekend meetings in Anderson's Trump Tower apartment. Anderson was intrigued by Selden's insistence that a company should view itself as a portfolio of customers, not product lines.

Anderson put his chief operating officer in charge of a task force to analyze the purchasing histories of several groups of customers, with an eye toward identifying bad customers who buy loss-leading merchandise and return purchases. The group discovered that it could distinguish the angels from the devils, and that 20 percent of Best Buy's customers accounted for the bulk of profits.

Best Buy concluded that its most desirable customers fell into five distinct groups: upper-income men, suburban mothers, small-business owners, young family men and technology enthusiasts. Anderson decided that each store should analyze the demographics of its local market and then focus on two of these groups and stock merchandise accordingly.

Best Buy began working on ways to deter the customers who drove down profits. It couldn't bar them from its stores. But this summer it began taking steps to put a stop to their most damaging practices. It began enforcing a restocking fee of 15 percent of the purchase price on returned merchandise. To discourage customers who return items with the intention of repurchasing them at an “open box” discount, it is experimenting with reselling them over the Internet, so the goods don't reappear in the store where they were originally purchased.

Store clerks receive hours of training in identifying desirable customers according to their shopping preferences and behavior. High-income men, referred to internally as Barrys, tend to be enthusiasts of action movies and cameras. Suburban moms, called Jills, are busy but usually willing to talk about helping their families. Male technology enthusiasts, nicknamed Buzzes, are early adopters, interested in buying and showing off the latest gadgets.

Staffers use quick interviews to pigeonhole shoppers. A customer who says his family has a regular “movie night,” for example, is pegged a prime candidate for home theater equipment. Shoppers with large families are steered toward larger appliances and timesaving products.

The company hopes to lure the Barrys and Jills by helping them save time with services like a “personal shopper” to help them hunt for unusual items, alert them to sales on preferred items, and coordinate service calls.

Best Buy's decade-old Westminster, Calif., store is one of 100 now using the new approach. It pursues upper-income men with an array of pricey home theater systems, and small-business owners with network servers, which connect office PCs, and technical help unavailable to other customers.

At stores popular with young Buzzes, Best Buy is setting up video game areas with leather chairs and game players hooked to mammoth plasma-screen televisions.

Anderson says early results indicate that the pilot stores “are clobbering” the conventional stores. Through the quarter ending Aug. 28, sales gains posted by pilot stores were double those of traditional stores. In October, the company began converting an additional 70 stores, and the company intends to customize the rest of its stores over the next three years.

The devil is in the details. But Best Buy figures that if it converts its stores properly, far fewer devil customers will be in its aisles.

[The AD]

These visits -- by what Best Buy calls its "devil" customers -- involve rebates, returns and re-stocking

I guess they want to offer rebates, but don't want to actually give the rebates.

Instead of Barry, Buzz and Jill it should be Shit-for-Brains, Doofus, and Ditz.

[Keoni]

Was and always will be Jafco - ick.

I thought that was just, BEST?

[KQ]

I thought that was just, BEST?

I thought they all morphed together - if not, my mistake BUT none-the-less sounds just as crappy.

[FNG]

The official brother of the FNG had to threaten violence to get a $50 rebate.

And I quote, "$50 may not be a lot of money to you, but it sure is a lot of money to me. Now if I don't get my money in the next three days, I'm driving out there to get either my $50 plus gas money or the equivilant in ass-whoopings. It's your choice."

I was in tears of laughter. Wouldn't the customer service rep be suprised by getting $50 in neck-punches?

[DJSapp]

Easiest way to get stuff at BB returned/repaired: Demand the store manager as soon as you walk in the door. Make him do it, right then and there and if he tries to push you off on the customer diservice dept., tell him that they're an incompent bunch of fuck ups that you wouldn't trust with a paper bag.

One of my best experences at BB was purchasing a video card

me: I want that video card for $80.00

lackey: Do you want the 3 year warranty for $40?

me: Why the hell would I want a warranty on what will soon be an obslete piece of computer hardware that cost half as much as the product?

lackey: Ok, so no warranty, would you like me to install it and configure it?

me: Depends, let me ask you this, what is the default IRQ setting for this video card (answer on back of box, IRQ 9)

lackey: Uhhhhh, doesn't windows configure it for you?

me (now fucking with him): I run Red Hat Linux

lackey: Oh, no problem. Linux doesn't use IRQ.

me: Do you have any idea how a computer works?

lackey (now defensive): Of course I do, that's why I'm certified to install these parts (pointing at the button on his shirt)

me: Riiiiiiiight, can I speak with your manager?

Service Manager: Can I help you?

me: Yeah, just a suggestion, when your lackeys are trying to convince me to let them install a component, make sure they know what they're talking about.

Service Manager: What do you mean?

me: Your "expert" told me that linux doesn't use IRQ settings for video cards. He obviously has no idea what he's talking about.

Service Manager: But Linux doesn't use IRQ settings for video cards.

me (grabs nearby Linux for dummies book): Let's consult your training manual. Hmmmm, IRQ conflicts... Hmmmmm conflicts with video cards... You don't know shit. Your 'expert' just tried to tell me that Linux doesn't use a basic computing fuction which is one of the basic computer problems you see. You're never touching my computer.

I'm sure the manager blamed it all on the lackey. The best part was I applied for a job there the week before. Glad they didn't call me back.