The title says it all – I don’t like Best Buy. Let me tell you about my experiences with Best Buy, the home electronics chain here in the US. Let’s start this story several years ago.
My wife and I, for a wedding gift to ourselves, decided to purchase a big screen rear projection TV. What better place to go then Best Buy, right? Don’t get me wrong, the TV has been fine. It was the promises made by Best Buy that were the problem.
They told us if you get this warranty, every year a technician will come to your house, for free, and adjust the guns on the TV. They will make sure everything is in tip top shape. All you have to do is just pay a little extra for peace of mind.
Well, a year later, we called and they do no such thing. They never heard of such a thing. That was the main reason we got the warranty! I also love how the employees say,"We don’t make any money for commissions." That is not true. Notice how they don’t say that anymore?
Next, we have the story of our digital camera we bought at our beloved Best Buy. Again, we purchase another warranty.They told us that if we get this warranty they will replace the camera if it breaks for free. Well ,that’s not really the case either. Ours broke and we brought it in.
They said they would need to ship it to get fixed and it would take 2 – 6 weeks to fix and return. If it happens to break 4 MORE TIMES, they will replace the camera. Wait a second, your sales guy didn’t tell us that detail. So we had it fixed and within 2 weeks it broke again. Same problem as before. It made more sense for us just buy a new one. We have small kids and we can’t be that long without a camera that when we get it back might not work.
Well you might be saying to yourself, it’s your own fault for not reading the fine print. You’re right, I should have read the fine print. But instead of trying to ensure the place I spend my money is not going to try and screw me, I just won’t shop there at all. I can buy the same things for cheaper online. Problem solved.
Now let us get to our main part of the story. My wife and kids were on a road trip to New York. She called me several times on the road to find out where they were and what was around them. Like restaurants, gas station, stuff like that. The next day I was going to meet then in New York so I decided it was time to get a GPS. My friends all have them and love them. We wind up getting the Garmin nüvi 350
I needed it that day. I would have just gone to PriceGrabber and purchased it online for cheaper. But I needed it now. So I had to go to Best Buy.
So I went to their site and remembered that I should print out the price and bring it to the store because of the Best Buy Secret Website Scam. Just another reason to hate on Best Buy. But I noticed you can do an in store pick up. So I’d thought I’d give it a try.
I made my purchase online and everything went well. It said I would get an email within 45 minutes to go pick up my purchase at the store. Well 45 minutes went by and nothing. 2 hours went by and still no email. So I decided to call.
They said come on in and pick it up anytime. OK, so I should have just disregarded the instructions you gave me. That makes sense. How could I be so dumb!
One of the features of the in store pick up is the product ready for you when you arrive within 1 minute. Well of course that didn’t happen. I went in and waited about 7 minutes before the person got my product. Not that big of a deal but the fact I had to call them to remind them made it worse. Another broken Best Buy promise.
On a side note I did receive the confirmation email. WHEN I GOT HOME!
So what I tell people is avoid this store if you can. Buy products online using sites like pricegrabber.com or monoprice.com If you do decide to shop at Best Buy, never do their warranties and bring the price with you. Do a search on google for Best Buy. You’ll see I’m not the only one. Also don’t get me started on their Geek Squad.
You have been warned. 😉
