Best Buy's sucky customer service

[Becks]

It always seems you get asked if you need help every 10 seconds when you don't, but as soon as you want assistance, employees are nowhere to be found.

Happens to me all the time!!!

[Skrae]

This makes me laugh, because usually when I go into Best Buy, I'm pestered repeatedly when I just want to browse cds. It always seems you get asked if you need help every 10 seconds when you don't, but as soon as you want assistance, employees are nowhere to be found.

The amount of help you receive is inversely proportionate to the amount of help you need.

[toomanycalls1]

Maybe it's the store you go to

I have 2 best Buys I go to. Mainly because my job has a discount thingy with them.

The difference is night and day between the service level etc of the stores. One is across the street from my job and it's the one that sucks. I only go there when I really want a DVD or CD that is coming out that day.

The one that is about 2 miles from my house is really really nice.

[Andara Bledin]

My local Best Buy is a pit. The staff is unhelpful, unfriendly, slow, and someone decided that they didn't need a sound booth for their stereo department, so the whole store is usually thumping with excessive bass.

The Best Buy the next town over, however, is cleaner, the staff is friendlier and more knowledgeable about what they carry, and the atmosphere is much, much nicer.

Either way, however, for the small stuff, they're incredibly overpriced.

Nekojin & I were looking to pick up a SCSI to IDE cable, so we stopped at the good Best Buy on the way to somewhere else. For what BB was charging for that simple cable I could have gone to NewEgg.com, paid to have it shipped out to me on the Next Day Priority delivery, and still have over half of the money BB wanted left over.

Oh, and just so you know: The price you see on the Best Buy website in the stores may not be the actual Best Buy website price! It turns out that Best Buy has both a public Internet site and a private intranet site, and some stores would actually use the intranet site to cheat people out of getting sale prices when corporate would run a special.

I remember there was a big news story about it. It was a while ago, though, so I don't know what the upshot of the whole thing was.

For most electronics, cds, and games, Fry's Electronics is the mecca. However, you really need to be prepared when you go, becuase their staff is usually woefully undertrained for technical purposes. Plus, their stores have some really great designs. (Redondo Beach has a tiki theme, Anaheim is a shuttle theme, City of Industry is a steampunk theme, Fountain Valley is Roman aqueduct, complete with flowing water, San Jose is an Aztec temple)

^-.-^

[AFpheonix]

Not to be a turd of any kind to the OP, but I'm confused. You said you had 10 employees walk by, but then you couldn't find anyone to ask questions of? Did you just sit in the aisle like a bump or did you go find someone to talk to?

Maybe I'm just a weird shopper, but if I need help, I go track someone down.

[Mike Taylor]

Yeah they do, which is what shocked me even more, because my husband and I were looking at really expensive laptops there... Which is usually their biggest commission items

Gotta jump in here. Best Buy employees do not work on commission and haven't done so for a few years. Personally, I loathe working in a commission-based sales environment. It can turn employees against each other (I saw a LOT of that when I tried to sell cars.)

Speaking as an employee, I apologize on behalf of the company for anyone that has had bad service at Best Buy stores. Unfortunately, when you get as big as we are the sucky staff tends to be a lot more visible. I always endeavor to give the best service that I possibly can in my department, which is Media (movies, music and video games). Unfortunately, our payroll is such at my store that we don't have as much coverage as we might like all the time. Payroll is directly affected by sales figures, which are down across the board at EVERY electronics retailer and not just Best Buy. Circuit City is about $16 million in the hole and has fired 3400 employees. Comp USA is headed for bankruptcy. We can't throw more people on the sales floor if the money isn't rolling in to pay for them. Anybody who has worked retail knows this.

I can offer a few hints, though. If you are in Best Buy and looking to buy something in the media department (music, movies and video games) go to the video game part of the department. Both for sales and security reasons, there is supposed to be an associate stationed in that area at all times.

We also price match. If you bring us any print ad for a local competitor (Wal-Mart, Target, Costco, Circuit City, Sears... whatever) we'll match them. If we can, we'll do one better.

Lastly, if something is not being handled to your satisfaction go directly to the LP desk, the greeter in the yellow polo at the front of the store, and ask them to get a manager for you.

Again, my apologies to anyone who has had bad service at any of our stores. It embarrasses me to no end when I hear about this. Bad service is not what we're trained to give. I consider myself fortunate to work in a store that routinely gets praise from our customers and something like that is unacceptable.

[Bella_Vixen]

Maybe I'm just a weird shopper, but if I need help, I go track someone down.

There are times when you SHOULDN'T have to track someone down.

[Mike Taylor]

Best Buy employees get commissions off selling "PSPs", which are their warranties. Circuit City used to pay nice commissions and have well trained and knowledgeable staff, but they wanted to copy Best Buy so badly they got rid of commission and just recently laid off all the salespeople nationwide who were making the most money (aka the best people on staff) so now both stores have kids working a job to get through college rather than professional and knowledgeable sales staff.

Gotta correct some things here.

1. Best Buy employees do not make commission on anything. We are paid straight hourly wages and we are paid very well.

2. A product service plan is not a warranty. A warranty only covers defects in the product as it is shipped from the manufacturer. Best Buy does not sell those. They never have. A product service plan, at its bare minimum, covers power surges, internal heat, moisture, dust, and normal wear and tear, none of which are covered by a warranty. On things like computer monitors and handheld game systems, it even covers things like pixel failure. The more detailed plans cover things like accidental breakage (your laptop falls off a table and the hinge snaps). All PSPs and PRPs include a "No Lemon" policy. If an item bought at Best Buy (and covered by a PSP) has to be brought back four times for certain qualifying repairs, then the item will be replaced with a brand new one. It doesn't matter if one repair was made in year one, one made in year three, and two made in year five. Lastly, Best Buy product service plans and product replacement plans are insured by AIG. This means that if Best Buy were to close its doors for any reason, the owner of that plan would still be able to get the necessary service work done that is covered by the plan. Show me a warranty that does that?

3. I am a professional and knowledgeable salesperson. I have been working in retail in some way shape or form since 1989. Part-timers form a minority of the sales staff at my store and even where they exist they are extensively trained. The same thing holds true for our sister stores in our district.

[Mike Taylor]

There are times when you SHOULDN'T have to track someone down.

I won't dispute that. Unfortunately, when a supervisor is told to slash the hours for his or her department coverage suffers. HOWEVER, if you're having problems seeking help because three blue shirts have decided to goof off over in the corner-- I'll be right there with you and my manager to make sure the issue is squared away. I hate seeing that junk myself.

[Andara Bledin]

Lastly, if something is not being handled to your satisfaction go directly to the LP desk, the greeter in the yellow polo at the front of the store, and ask them to get a manager for you.

The one time I went there, the Lakewood Best Buy staff were full of attitude. And they had a lot of staff standing around the front by the registers doing nothing but chatting, half the registers themselves closed, and a line snaking around for about 30 feet back from the registers.

And here is a link to the Internet/Intranet fiasco from lawyersandsettlements.com.

The advice about what to do when buying CDs, DVDs and games is a good one. Any retailer that keeps any type of merchandise behind a case will have a nearby desk that should be constantly manned. It is very rare to not find someone near the games section, especially for any place that also carries consoles.

^-.-^

[Mike Taylor]

I was made aware of that from our last store meeting. Unfortunately, I can't comment on that as I don't know all of the particulars. Just so you know, we can access both websites from our store and the customer kiosk screen says up front that the pricing is "regional" in a big Yellow and Black banner. The national sales prices are the same across the country because the same ad goes out to everybody. If a customer buys an item on the website and the store has it on sale for less, he can essentially return the item at the store and then buy it back at the lower in-store price.

Also, I'd report the Lakewood store, citing specific dates, times, and names of staff-- especially the manager on duty that day. There's a customer service number printed on the sales receipts and I do believe that you can take the survey online as well. That stuff does get noticed and sent to the General Manager, the District Manager, and the Territory Manager. Hell, if you're in MY store and I act like a total asshat (which I generally won't), I'd want you to do the same.