N.Y. Attorney General Sues Dell

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
The New York Attorney General has accused Dell and its financial services affiliate, Dell Financial Services LP, of "bait and switch" tactics, false advertising and deceptive business practices.

Round Rock, Texas-based Dell lured customers with zero percent financing, then switched them to a higher rate without their knowledge at the time of purchase, according to the lawsuit. Cuomo announced details of a lawsuit filed a day earlier in the New York Supreme Court, claiming that Dell and Dell Financial Services LP engaged in fraud, false advertising and deceptive business practices.
Click to expand...
 
Wait, let me get this straight. A lawsuit without RIAA or EU appearing in the article blurb? What's going on here?
 
I don't know about the financing issue, but the "in home" service has been problem for a long time. Perhaps if you're in a major city you get it, but I know in the small cities I've lived in everyone had to either do the repair themselves or send the computer to Dell. I suspect the same is true for HP. I'm pretty sure that IBM did have in home service, but that may have been a fluke.

Paying extra for more of the same makes even less sense.
 
I really hope this becomes a class action lawsuit. I had a Dell acount a few years ago and they stated that your interest rate is based on your credit history and I run a Finance company and I personally know for a fact that my credit history was perfect and my score was around 720 at the time and I still got the shaft with like 19% interest.

There all a bunch of bastard's in my opinion.;)
 
I used to do the phone tech support for Dell. It shouldn't have but it did surprise me at how many people really didn't know what support they purchased through Dell. The default used to be 1yr in-home service and then the extended plans were either you fix it (dekstops) or mail it in (laptops) no matter where you were. I don't agree with the small city scenario as I had to send a tech out to a remote place in Alaska to work on a laptop before (the next business day didn't apply but they did get to the lady). Most people it seemed once you explained everything to them didn't really have an issue with the support. I personally think that the lawsuit will go just about as far as the trashcan of some judge.
 
**** I don't know anything about the 0% interest part and that may have merrit, so that part may actually see the light of a courtroom.
 
bbenz3 said:
I used to do the phone tech support for Dell. It shouldn't have but it did surprise me at how many people really didn't know what support they purchased through Dell. The default used to be 1yr in-home service and then the extended plans were either you fix it (dekstops) or mail it in (laptops) no matter where you were. I don't agree with the small city scenario as I had to send a tech out to a remote place in Alaska to work on a laptop before (the next business day didn't apply but they did get to the lady). Most people it seemed once you explained everything to them didn't really have an issue with the support. I personally think that the lawsuit will go just about as far as the trashcan of some judge.
Click to expand...

I can promise you that my mother has had Dell laptops for the past 15 years, and the in-home service never EVER happened. And the same was true with desktops as well (Dell and Micron). If you had a problem within the warranty period, you had to remove the part and install the new part yourself or ship it off to the manufacturer.
 
I have (as well as my parents and a previous employer) had MAJOR issues with dell's so called "in home service warranty".
We paid the extra coin to get next day in home service only to have them want us to take out the parts ourselves or replace them ourselves once they ship us a part.
You literally have to threaten them and state the terms of your warranty for them to send someone out, but then this is a double edge sword.
Once the guy comes to fix the computer, he is a contracted worker who most the time does not know what he is doing, or doesn't care ... or both and makes matters worse.

Don't get me wrong, I really like my E1705 laptop and can easily fix/replace parts myself, but I shudder to think what I will have to go thru if anything goes wrong with it and getting my paid for warranty worth.

Also, like the old lady said in the article, I can't believe when they told my 80 year old grandpa to crawl on the floor and open his computer.
All I can say is he let out a stream of foul language that even left me impressed.

I hope things like this forces dell to really change their ways.

D.
 
I have never had any issues and I know I personally sent out hundreds of technicians to replace parts. I do know that some of the techs weren't always the brightest, b/c I took several calls from them asking questions on how to remove parts or fix something. I'm also definitely not saying they are perfect and I know that I am not the average user and I also know how the system works there and know how to get and get my service quick. I just also know that I have had way more issues with other OEMs than with Dell.
 
I haven't had any issues with the warranty support but I have seen Dell engage in deceptive practices. I recently purchased an XPS1210. It took 5 reps to call the correct number to talk to me because their online service wasn't working for what I wanted. I had a quote printed with a price quoted to me. By the time the one of the reps was able to dial my number correctly they said they were quoted something else then said they would take $250 but that didn't even give me a discount from what I was quoted since my quote included tax already. I spent an hour on the phone with tech support to find out that the packing slip was misleading and the sales rep lied to me about what my laptop was getting. I can easily see this go bad for Dell.
 
I am one of debauchers clueless uncaring Dell field tech contractors - I bow to his superiority as I only have 18 years field experience....

As for Dell not doing on-site service, I must be dreaming that I am fixing Dell PCs in peoples' homes all over the UK ten hours a day.

The contractors who do the work may not be perfect - but given that field techs in the UK are paid less than £10 per fix (regardless of how long spent on site - my best is 3 hours on site for £9) and have to pay all their expenses out of that (buy their own car, pay for their own gas etc.. none of which is reimbursed) I can understand how some guys are not super-motivated.

Dell do the extended diagnostics on the phone to prevent unnecessary call-outs (I went out today to swap out a laptop motherboard for a problem that turned out to be due to Norton Antivirus freezing the machine) and to try to ensure the correct parts are sent out to prevent re-attends to the same machine multiple times. Dell's margins are so low that as soon as a tech attends a warranty call on a PC Dell are losing money on that unit.

Not trying to defend Dell here as most field techs are getting shafted by Dell every day (as are their service partners and other suppliers). Just get tired of people generalizing about Dell's support - today I visited four customers and three out of four scored Dell's support at 8.5 out of 9.

The market decides as always - if people don't like Dell they shouldn't buy from them.
 
GeezerButler said:
I am one of debauchers clueless uncaring Dell field tech contractors - I bow to his superiority as I only have 18 years field experience....

As for Dell not doing on-site service, I must be dreaming that I am fixing Dell PCs in peoples' homes all over the UK ten hours a day.
Click to expand...

Since this seems to be directed at me, I will reiterate that I'm talking about personal experience (which is in the U.S.). Other parts of the country (and certainly other countries) likely have different experiences. I can only say that I remember my mother replacing hard drives. Now granted that's fairly easy to do, but the choice was do it yourself or ship the unit back to dell (this was a desktop unit, not a laptop) and the time frame was 10 to 13 years ago (pretty sure warranty was as good, if not better, than it is now). There were other issues, but that's the one that sticks out the most.
 
debaucher said:
I have (as well as my parents and a previous employer) had MAJOR issues with dell's so called "in home service warranty"....
Click to expand...

GeezerButler said:
I am one of debauchers clueless uncaring Dell field tech contractors - I bow to his superiority as I only have 18 years field experience....
Click to expand...

nilepez said:
Since this seems to be directed at me...
Click to expand...

Anywho, I have never dealt with Dell's at home service, although I can say in my experience the online chat help is easier and faster than attempting to talk to someone (named "John" in India...) over the phone.;) Also, the factory image restore functionality built into their laptops is a POS and doesn't work, which is why I had to go through the hassle of talking to tech support to obtain a copy of windows.
 
bbenz3 said:
I used to do the phone tech support for Dell. It shouldn't have but it did surprise me at how many people really didn't know what support they purchased through Dell. The default used to be 1yr in-home service and then the extended plans were either you fix it (dekstops) or mail it in (laptops) no matter where you were. I don't agree with the small city scenario as I had to send a tech out to a remote place in Alaska to work on a laptop before (the next business day didn't apply but they did get to the lady). Most people it seemed once you explained everything to them didn't really have an issue with the support. I personally think that the lawsuit will go just about as far as the trashcan of some judge.
Click to expand...

Actually since this was brought up in a NY court, Dell will settle and pay a fine, no one effected will get anything back, and NY state can use the money to give our homeless better laptops(I'm being faceitous about laptops for the homeless, but our homeless do get free cell phones so it's not that crazy of an idea)...

Andrew Cuomo is starting to do his best Eliot Spitzer impersonation, almost noone of the companies Spitzer sued while AG went to court because their feared him. Motorola tool Spitzer on and beat him in court... I'm sure Dell will just settle for whatever fine and then move on...
 
RandomNY said:
Actually since this was brought up in a NY court, Dell will settle and pay a fine, no one effected will get anything back, and NY state can use the money to give our homeless better laptops(I'm being faceitous about laptops for the homeless, but our homeless do get free cell phones so it's not that crazy of an idea)...

Andrew Cuomo is starting to do his best Eliot Spitzer impersonation, almost noone of the companies Spitzer sued while AG went to court because their feared him. Motorola tool Spitzer on and beat him in court... I'm sure Dell will just settle for whatever fine and then move on...
Click to expand...

If Dell really did a bait and switch on interest rates, I'd expect a class action suit to follow. Frankly, they'd deserve it if they switched qualified buyers from interest free to 20 or 30%.

I'd think that there'd be a recording of the close, if not the entire the conversation.

As for Spitzer, sometimes I thought he was dead on and sometimes I thought he was over-the-top. Wasn't he involved in suing the former head of the NYSE for making too much money? Pretty sure he was and was at least paritally successful, though my recollection is that Grasso had to bend over when all was said and done ;)

Kevin
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top