Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Best Buy Not Good

You remember the scene from the movie Fargo where car salesman Jerry Lundegaard (William Macy) is trying to con a customer into paying for the Trucoat sealant he didn't want.
Jerry Lundegaard: Well, we've never done this before. But seeing as it's special circumstances and all, he says I can knock a hundred dollars off that Trucoat.
Irate Customer: One hundred... You lied to me, Mr. Lundegaard. You're a bald-faced liar. A... fucking liar. Where's my goddamn checkbook? Let's get this over with.
Best Buy is the consumer electronics version of Jerry Lundegaard.

There was a time when customer service at the company meant helping customers. But that was back when they had serious competition. With CircuitCity and CompUSA shells of their former selves, Best Buy is a giant among midget competitors. So nowadays Best Buy is all about selling the extras. You go in shopping for a product and their salesmen have an endless list of high pressure pitches for this service and that extra. All over priced and all generally worthless. Like that Trucoat sealant.

And if you make the mistake of actually paying for a service their Geek Squad will take months getting around to it if they even bother doing the service at all. A lot of their profits come from exhausting their customers into giving up and accepting paying for nothing.

Best Buy is not what it once was, which is a pity because they were once a very good company. They are now one of the sleaziest retail businesses around.

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