eMachines are junk - steer clear!!
Here's a letter I just wrote to glorious eMachines:
April 10, 2007
Dear Mr. XXXXX,
My name is XXXX, a customer of yours who purchased one of your eMachine desktop computers in December of 2006. I truly dislike starting letters off on a sour note, but words cannot express my disappointment in the lack of empathy in the service that I have received from your technical support line and corporate office in assisting me with repairs of a non-operational eMachines desktop computer that I purchased.
I guess the best place to start is the beginning.
December 26th, 2006: I purchased this computer as a Christmas gift to myself at the local CompUSA. I brought the PC home and set it up, and how excited I was! Well, as the holidays are for everyone, I was pretty busy and didn’t get much of a chance to use it except for maybe a few hours to check my email.
January 2nd, 2007: The computer started out with some small glitches and then horribly crashed and I couldn’t even get it to boot up. I called your technical support long distance number and spoke with Jim (badge # 71438) who we trouble shot for a while and he decided that the install disc that came with my computer would not be enough and sent me a full master reinstall disc so I could wipe the hard drive clean, reinstall everything and hopefully all would be well. Jim did an excellent job and is to be commended!
January 22nd, 2007: I received the disc and called technical support and spent quiet some time on the phone with Israel (badge # 71703) around 9pm. We tried to reinstall the software but it would not take and he stated that he was shipping me a box to mail my entire PC to their shop to repair it.
February 8th, 2007: I became very excited when I saw a delivery sticker on my door. I signed it and left it for the next day so I could finally have a PC that works instead of paying $50 a month for high speed internet that I could not use!
February 9th, 2007: What should have been a festive occasion turned into a bust on this day when I opened my door to discover a FedEx envelope with shipping label in it. I didn’t understand why I was receiving a shipping label when eMachines already had my computer. Wait, speaking of, where is my computer – It’s now February! I called technical support again and expressed my concerns and dissatisfaction about the situation. I spent an hour and ten minutes on the phone (mostly on hold trying to talk to a live person) and finally reached Tom (badge # 108749). Tom explained to me that “The model number on your computer didn’t match up to what we have in our records. Your computer is in our warehouse and they had to try and match them up, so that’s why our system automatically sent you a shipping label.” Huh? What? At this point I was becoming very frustrated and asked to speak to a supervisor (although Tom was very nice, he’s more of a computer guy than a “people” person).
I was connected through to Mike (badge # 68948) and I explained to him how frustrated I was that it was now February and why don’t I have a working computer? I am not going to say I was a model client on the phone, but I was in no way out of line in asking questions about my $500 purchase. I was letting him know my dissatisfaction with eMachines at that point and how I wished I had just gotten the Dell I was looking at originally. It was at this point that I became appalled as to what came out of a supervisors mouth: “Well since you want it back so bad, I’ll send it back to you and you can take it back to the store. Although, it’s after 30 days and I bet the store won’t take it back, so here we go, I am filling out the paperwork now.” WAIT A MINUTE! I literally had to cut him off. His lack of empathy and his severely sarcastic/smartellic tone almost knocked me on the floor. Has this guy ever had customer service training?
February 26th, 2007: Well, I finally received my computer back and it worked for a whole 2 days before crashing completely this time. I called LONG DISTANCE to the technical support line AGAIN and spoke with Charles (badge # 108329). After a 53 minute phone call, he was shipping out another box to have my computer resent to the repair shop.
Fast forward a couple weeks and I finally received my computer back for a second time and it worked fine for a couple of days. After only installing the Microsoft Updates and cruising the internet, then it slowly started crashing again – same exact symptoms. I made several attempts at reinstalling all of the software and OS again to no avail – it was a lame duck. I became frustrated at it and didn’t even want to look at it for the next week due to the sick feeling in my stomach.
March 15th, 2007: I finally got a free afternoon and made yet another long distance phone call to the technical support line about my computer and spoke with Tracy (badge # 701203). I immediately informed Tracy that I wanted a new computer, that this one was not working and that I wanted to speak to a supervisor. My thought process is, I paid for a new computer, I sent it in twice to be fixed and it returned broken each time. I have wasted hours upon hours on the phone accruing long distance charges as well as paying $50 a month for high speed Internet. Obviously the tech support department does not know how to track down problems with a computer, even after I spent the time to go into GREAT detail as to what my computer was doing. Tracy placed me hold for 10 minutes while trying to transfer me to “CRM”. He finally came back on the phone and informed me that Cory should be on the line also. After a few minutes of Tracy messing with the phone, he realized that Cory was no longer with us, so he placed me on hold AGAIN. This time he was able to transfer me through to Vinny (badge # 71655) who, after 38 minutes on the phone, was told that I had three options:
1) Ship it back to them a 3rd time. (Are you serious – It’s MARCH 2007!)
2) Take it to be fixed somewhere.
3) It could be replaced with a REFURBASHED computer.
Needless to say, after spending quite a few dollars on long distance calls, $50 a month for internet that I can’t use, I wanted what I bought – a new computer. Vinny informed me that there was nothing else I could do except call the Corporate Office. I did call the long distance number to the corporate office and received the same answer.
I then decided to take my chances and return it (or exchange it for another brand that works) to CompUSA. Well, my luck has run out again, for I arrived at CompUSA only to discover that they have had to sell 160 of their stores and now the closest store to me is 4 hours away. They stated that they couldn’t replaced it or take it back themselves for eMachines won’t honor this return because I have had it for so long....even thought eMachines had it most of the time! That just makes no sense!
April 10th, 2007: I have finally considered my self defeated and called the technical support line back to let them know that I will settle on the REMANUFACTURED computer to replace my NEW COMPUTER THAT DOESN’T WORK.
Now on a side bar, normally I do not mind remanufactured items, but so far my trust in the “fix it” department is zilch for obvious reasons. So why would I want another persons broken computer when they can’t even fix the one I’ve sent to them TWICE? I apologize for all of the uppercase print and I might be wrong, but that is my thought pattern on this subject.
When I finally got through on the phone this morning, I spoke with Shane (badge # 701039). I gave him my information and let him know that I am willing to stoop down and take a remanufactured computer, upon which he informed me that my 30 minute long distance phone call was basically pointless (in my opinion, not his words) because I would have to call the Corporate office. Great. I asked if he could transfer me over and he stated that he couldn’t. At this point I told him thanks for wasting a half hour of long distance time and his response was “Yeah, whatever.” Now normally I wouldn’t mind someone saying that, but he thought he had hung up the phone and the tone of voice that he used wasn’t just to blow me off, but was more of an aggressive tone. I felt like he basically told me to go take a long walk off a short pier.
Again, I am flabbergasted at the lack of empathy shown by these associates. I guess you should probably know that I too work in the customer service field running 3 departments over 75 associates and if ANY of my employees EVER spoke in that tone to one of our guests, no matter how nasty the person was, they would be out of a job in a heartbeat.
My main reason for this letter is not to get people in trouble, and not to bash a tangible good that I purchased, but is to hopefully bring to light some areas of opportunity that I encountered while trying turn a bad situation into a good one. At no point did I ever ask for free upgrades. At no point did I want compensation for all of my time and misery that I experienced during numerous long distance calls and wasted money on four months of high speed internet that I was not able to utilize. The only thing I did ask for was on one occasion I asked for another free 60 trial to Microsoft Office that came with my purchase of the computer and was told no because it is not eMachines product. I BOUGHT IT WITH MY COMPUTER AND WAS NOT ABLE TO USE IT DUE TO MY COMPUTER BEING BROKEN!
I look forward to your response in this matter for I feel I have been grossly mistreated, disrespected and “taken for a ride” financially.
Sincerely,
Yours Truly.
Needless to say, I finally received a box on 4/21 and promptly shipped my computer back out that same day. I called to check up on it today and they say I should receive my REMANUFACTURED computer in about a week.
Grrrrrrr!!!
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In a similar situation,,,....... 
I'm going for it! -Thanks Dave & Bob 
Thanks DS. 
