Dell Scammed Us

A couple weeks ago someone from Dell called us up and said that Comcast indicated that broadband was available in our area, and as valued Dell customers were we interested? Regular readers will note that I've been using satellite broadband from DirecWay for a couple years now and it's not exactly as good as the DSL I used to have in downtown Portland. In fact, the one second plus latency of the system is miserable for VPN.

Well, we jumped at the chance, especially when they said that it was only a $50 fee for “professional installation.” They needed some information for renting the modem and so on, but we went ahead.

Later, supposedly someone from Comcast called us, but we missed the call. So my wife called Comcast up and tried to figure out where we were in the system. They had no record of us and, in fact, the closest address that could get broadband from them was over two miles away.

So, I have to decide now between the possibilities that someone in Dell is both an aggressive seller and an incompetent executor or that I just got scammed by a pretty smart cookie. All the ticket information I took down, except the 800 numbers to call, are bogus, so I'm leaning towards “scam.” I don't see any charges on my credit card, yet, so I'm still not sure what the deal is.

Anyone else out there get nailed by this?

Josh Poulson

Posted Thursday, Apr 28 2005 09:33 AM

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Comments

There are 5 comments on this entry.

Should the heading not be:

"Did DELL scam us??" or:

"Where I scammed by DELL??"

The way you head it now, you point a finger at some entity, who as far as your on post goes have NOT contacted you.

Regards,
Michel Briand

Micjel

Posted Thursday, Apr 28 2005 12:56 PM

Since they had my Dell customer ID on file, and caller ID identified them as Dell, I'm leaning towards "scammed by Dell".

Josh Poulson

Posted Thursday, Apr 28 2005 01:06 PM

But all the information you have except the 800 number is not correct. And DELL are saying that they did not call you, what would prompt a company the size of DELL to go through that??

I understand that it is a strange/weird situation, but no-one should be considered guilty, until found so by a jury of his peers. Regradless of DELL's insistence of innosence, you make a bold acusation as the header of your post, rather than placing it as a possible scenario (sort of what I suggested).

By doing so, do you not then become "villian" (spelling) yourself??

Regards,
Michel

Michel

Posted Friday, Apr 29 2005 02:04 PM

They're either evil (they knew I couldn't get service but got me to sign up and share my VISA number anyway) or incompetent (they didn't know I couldn't get service and didn't bother to check, they just wanted my VISA number) and the effect is the same: I wasted a bunch of time and exposed my VISA card to them. That's a scam.

The 800 numbers were all correct. The ticket number could have been wrong. I was in their system as a customer, but not as a Comcast subscriber. They probably removed me as soon as they realized that Comcast was not available at my address.

I don't think I'm doing anything wrong. I feel like I was scammed.

Josh Poulson

Posted Friday, Apr 29 2005 02:45 PM

I never ever bought anything from DELL. I have no plans of ever buying anything from DELL. By reading your blog, you seem as a person that will live with a fair system, and I just see this particular post, or rather headline of a post as out of character for you.

Someone tried something, but the ineptness of it point away from DELL. And with what you write yourself, there is no reason to think that it was DELL who scammed you.

There fore you are making yourself, and what you seem to be by reading your blog, a disservice by blaming someone, who most likely should not be blamed.

You have your mind set on this, I will let it lie.

Regards,
Michel

Michel

Posted Saturday, Apr 30 2005 10:57 AM

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