Linda posted on September 15, 2009 08:52
Yesterday I ran across an article in one of my trade magazines titled "Best Buy's Bad Business". Steve Burke's account of his editor's experience with big box computer repair reminded me of an experience I had earlier this summer.
One of our residential clients called our store late in the afternoon and asked to speak to me. When I got on the line, he was yelling at me because he had taken one of his three computers to Best Buy, where it had been purchased, and they told him that the AVG Anti-virus software he had purchased from us was one of the worst products around and that it would not adequately protect him. Now, he had the computer for a week, connected to the Internet, before he installed the software and it had always had issues that caused it to blue screen.
He had also just had two other computers in our store for some work and had started a virus scan as soon as he got them home. The scan immediately turned up 'problems' and he was convinced we hadn't really done the work he had paid us for.
I understood his frustration completely. He had just spent around $400 for work on 3 computers and now felt that we had led him astray. I will point out that only half of that was spent with us and we had worked on two of the three computers.
Since his call came from out of the blue and I didn't personally do the work, I asked him if he could bring the computer he believed was still infected into the store so we could look at it again - at no charge - and he could talk to my repair manager. He agreed. Unfortunately, this was a evening when prior commitments prevented me from staying to talk to him in person.
So in the time between his call and his arrival, we printed off several independent anti-vurus software evaluatons that he could look at and come to his own conclusions. When he arrived, we brought him into our repair area and ran the scans that had come up with problems. The only problems found had to do with cookies, which we typically do not remove. Removing them means that passwords are no longer saved and many of our residential clients do not know what all of their passwords are. (Go figure - I have trouble with that one myself.)
After spending a little time educating this client, he came to the conclusion that in fact it was not Best Buy that was acting in his best interest, it was KI. He is still our client and is one that I know will refer business to us when the opportunity arises.
As a local provider without the marketing budget of a big box store, I will not be able to stay in business unless I am doing a better job than my competition. Fortunately, when you hear stories like this one or the one Steve Burke wrote about, you realize that it isn't that difficult to be better than they are.
So if you live in my area or not, take the time to find a locally owned computer repair shop to service your computer. Ask your friends and neighbors if they have worked with someone they trust. Not only will you get better service, more of your money will be staying in your community.