Big Box Store Reps Push Unnecessary Recovery Discs 380
Ed Albro, PC World writes "At PC World, we've got a story today on salespeople at Best Buy and Circuit City pushing consumers to pay the stores' technicians to create recovery discs for their new laptops. Recovery discs are important to have, of course, but the fact is that they're easy to make yourself. Or you can get them from the manufacturer of your PC, often for half of what Best Buy and Circuit City charge you. The salespeople often tell you that you can buy from the manufacturer — but they claim you'll pay twice as much as the stores charge."
What happened? (Score:5, Interesting)
Old Dupe? (Score:3, Interesting)
Turnabout! (Score:2, Interesting)
If the salesman refuses, raise hell with his manager. Purchaser gets the disks for free, salesman gets reprimanded (or fired).
Heh.
What happened to the Manufacturer's disks? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's been awhile since I bought any computer equipment from a big box store, so excuse any ignorance, but don't the manufacturers include recovery CDs in the packaging?
Are the big box stores removing the manufacturer's CD from the packaging and either tossing it, or re-selling it? I can't imagine the latter would go over very well with the manufacturers.
kids these days have it too easy (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:No suprise (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What I find interesting about that . . . (Score:3, Interesting)
However, in today's era of Internet purchases, this usually partially/fully disconnects you with the stuff you bought on the console. For example, if you replace your 360 in Best Buy, you have to submit documentation to Microsoft detailing this exchange before they'll reimburse you for any purchases for your paid downloads.
Ahhh.... Young'uns.... (Score:3, Interesting)
100% correct. (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope someone mods this up, especially since there are a lot of folks like me that have ACs auto-modded down.
You're right on the mark. Here's the thing. If you buy warranties on everything you buy that they're offered on, at some point, you will come out ahead on some particular item. A laptop, a refrigerator, a microwave oven, a television, an iPod... Something. And, as the parent post noted, good for you.
However, that thing that you came out ahead on has a nasty way of ingraining itself into your selective memory. You remember that thing that you came out ahead on, because wow, you saved hundreds of dollars. You tend to forget the thousands of dollars you lose $50 to $100 at a time by buying extended warranties that you never need or use.
It's simple psychology, and retail stores are taking advantage of it, along with people's lack of knowledge about computers and their tendency to react to fear, to make billions of dollars a year. Ask any financial expert or consumer advocate and they'll all say the same thing: The only time you should ever purchase a warranty is if you literally cannot function without whatever it is you're buying the warranty for.
Plus, that doesn't take into account the fact that most of the time, it's a lot harder to actually get companies to follow through on their warranties than the salespeople claim it will be. Keep in mind that when companies have to pay out warranties, that's taking money away from them that they had considered pure profit. It's very likely that they'll avoid fulfilling the terms based on some technicality. For example, did you keep all of the original packaging? Even the driver CD? My dad got burned on that one once. He tried to claim an extended warranty repair, and they wouldn't fulfill the warranty because he had thrown away a three-year-old driver disc.
Last, but not least, it may seem like a bargain to buy a $200 five-year extended warranty on a $2000 computer. But in five years, what will that computer really be worth? If you're lucky, maybe $100 on eBay. You can get a replacement cheaper than you can ship the durn thing.
Just don't do it. Take all money you would have spent on extended warranties and put it in a savings account. You'll earn interest on it, and in no time, you'll have enough money in the bank to replace anything like that that you would buy and you'll never need another warranty again.
Re:What happened? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Ahhh.... Young'uns.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What happened? (Score:4, Interesting)
My question is, when you buy a top of the line system are you treated the same way? I'm not talking about the corporate 'buying experience' which is a whole different game...
Re:Best Buy Geek Squad Employees are Morons (Score:2, Interesting)
As for your 1 year warranty bit... *smirk*. Maybe you don't do much with your computer. Or maybe you're just a troll. Take a look at failed HDD rates from every manufacturer except Sony (for some reason they seem to have the least failed HDDs). You'll see a helluva lot start happening around the 8 month mark, and peaking at pretty close to 16-18 months. Seems a bit outside your 1 year. Laptop batteries? Forget it. If you use that thing at all, that bettery WILL need to be replaced at some point within 2-3 years (the limit of BBYs service plans, 4 years for CC). Batteries CAN be (although certainly not always) hellaciously expensive.
And what happens if little Billy son-of-a-bitch spills his coke acrossd the laptop keyboard? Oh I'm sure Gateway would LOVE to help you there (along with about a $1,200 bill for parts & labor). Here's the thing, ACCIDENTS HAPPEN. Now that BBY and CC both offer plans that protect against "Accidental Damage" it's almost stupid NOT to get the plan. Wait until the plan is about to expire, spill some coffee on it (damn thing doesn't work now), and as you walk in the store, when the niec young man in the pretty yellow shirt start to put a sticker on it, lose your grip and drop it (now he feels bad too, to which you can amicably say "ah hell it didn't work anyway"). Well, it's a good thing you have that service plan, now you're getting a brand new laptop after 3 years (you have to wait a week or so for them to discover that parts aren't available, or are prohibitively expensive), and instead of costing you $1600 (if you bought a fairly decent one), it cost you a whole ~$300. I've been through 4 laptops in the last 2 years (finally got a good one), and would have been totally screwed without that service plan.
And for those of you that are quick to praise the MFG, think about this. HP Voided the warranty on the laptop I had prior to this one (It's actually HOW i got the one I have now, because HP wouldn't honor the warranty, and HP didn't supply a specific part that it needed, saying they did that repair themselves, but they would NOT do it under any kind of service contract, so BBY replaced it right then and there), because I installed Windows XP Pro on it. The machine came with Windows XP Home, I burned the recovery disks first thing, grabbed all the drivers that the hardware was using, then wiped the laptop and put XP Pro on it.
The video issues I had noticed within a day of having it became worse (I seriously thought it was just my eyes that were bugging out). After 3 weeks it became something that was absolutely without a doubt screwed up. I talked to HP, and they said, and I QUOTE "We do not support upgraded drivers like Windows XP Professional. Since you no longer have the XP Home driver, we cannot warranty your laptop."
As for the recovery disks costing $29. Again, services like that are not for me, they are not for you, they are for the people that either can't be bothered to do it themselves (and most people won't), or don't know how. Period.
If a salesperson is lying about anything to try and sell something, they need to be fired. I was the best sales person in all the stores I worked for services, and not ONCE did I lie to any clients. I always told the truth, absolutely, told peop
Re:Turnabout! (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Turnabout! (Score:3, Interesting)
I used to live near a Best Buy store and went there fairly frequently. Because it was nearby and on my way home, I nearly always just went in there for a specific item. I'd buy it and leave. If I needed something else the next day, I'd go over there for that item.
The only store that was closer was a Circuit City, but I flat refused to do business with them at all by that time.
Years ago, when CDs were just starting to catch on for computers, I went to Circuit City to buy a CD player. The package just said it was compatible with Windows 95 and 98. So I told the salesman that since I was using NT, I'd just bring it back for a refund if it turned out not work with NT.
His manager was standing behind us and told me that would not let me return it under those circumstances -- their policy was that if it worked on the systems that were listed on the box, then they would not accept it back.
I walked out, went to another store about a mile away and bought the same model CD player from them after making sure I could return it if it didn't work with NT. It worked fine.
At the time, my stereo had broken and I was in the market for a new stereo. I had already picked out the one I wanted at Circuit City and had intended to buy it that same trip. Why pick up the bulky objects first and carry them around the store? I ended up buying a different stereo elsewhere rather than do business with Circuit City.
To this day, I will not step foot in a Circuit City store and do not intend to ever do business with them again.
Re:Turnabout! (Score:3, Interesting)
So, I look at the other stuff you're buying, to see if we're making any sort of profit on you at all. If you're loaded up with stuff that we actually make money on, I'd be happy to do you the favor. Otherwise, I'd be more than happy to sell that computer to someone we'll make a profit on instead.
Go ahead, threaten to take your business elsewhere. We'd much rather you buy the computer somewhere else, and cause a competitor to lose money. Raise hell with my manager if you want. He'll promise you that I'll be "dealt with" just to make you go away, and then he'll come over and say to me, "man, that guy was a total asshole." I can't even tell you how many times I saw that happen.
I've worked at Best Buy as well, for both the computer and Geek Squad departments. While it is true that Best Buy does not make much money off a computer sale alone, you forget that a non-sale of a computer is still lost revenue.
Pick a scenario:
1. Make an immediate sale, but with less profit.
2. Deny the sale because of the "measly" profit and have the computer sit there for a few more weeks.
From a business perspective, you've already lost money on wages, electricity, rent, products, etc. By having your product just sit there, you are doing nothing for the overall productivity of the company. Dell makes huge profits because they have a negative product-stocked/sales ratio. They actually sell the product before they have to store it in their warehouses, if at all.
Best Buy, from what I can remember from our store meetings, have a product shelf life of about 1-2 weeks before they have to replenish stock. The process goes something like this:
1. Buy products from manufacturers. (Lose money)
2. Keep products in warehouses.(Lose more money on rent/maintenance of warehouse)
3. Sit on store shelves, awaiting sale. (Lose more money on employees and other retail costs)
4. Finally selling the product to a customer. (Profit!)
It's understandable that you'd want to sell the computer bundle for as much money as possible, but there are times when that won't happen. Customers will simply come in for the computer itself and nothing else. At times when it's a huge sale and with limited quantities, I've seen employees say they're out of stock simply to stop the sale from happening. Ethics aside, I can see why a store would want to do that (though I don't agree with it). But when that computer will just be sitting there for weeks, what's the point in not selling it? You're just going to cost the company more money.
Re:Turnabout! (Score:1, Interesting)