Dell and Walsh Western - Where is my laptop?

January 4th, 2008

Dell and Walsh Western - Where is my laptop?

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Dell and Walsh Western’s incompetent, useless and lying customer service drives me close to mental but no closer to my laptop.

On December 5th I ordered a nice new laptop from Dell. They charged me an extortionate £60 for delivery but even so they were still cheaper than comparable laptops elsewhere so I decided to order anyway. They also only deliver to the cardholder’s registered address which is not great when I’m out at work all day but I figured I could arrange a redelivery for a convenient date and take the day off work.

Initially the delivery estimate was December 14th. On December 12th they email to tell me it will now not be until January 3rd. Ho hum. Happens some time. I resign myself to waiting.

Imagine my surprise when I check the Dell order status website just after Christmas to discover that my laptop has been delivered. Delivered when and to whom? According to the tracking website of Walsh Western (Dell’s delivery company) it was delivered on the morning of Christmas Eve and there’s even a signature to prove it. Except, it’s not my signature and I know I was at home Christmas Eve. They also claim to have attempted delivery a few days earlier and left a card - this is a lie.

I discovered all this at the weekend when both Dell and Walsh Western shut down their phone lines. I start worrying that they’ve delivered to the wrong address and some unscrupulous bugger has decided they’ll accept the free laptop and keep it quiet. Or maybe one of my neighbours received it and hasn’t told me yet. I contact something like 25 of my neighbours but none of them have seen it.

I called Walsh Western’s customer service on New Year’s Eve but all I get is an automated system telling me my parcel has been delivered and giving me no option to speak to anyone. I call their head office and get told all I can do is call the customer service number. I say, there’s no human being there. They say, try in the new year.

I phone Dell. I go through something like two million options and wait ten minutes to talk to someone in India. The someone in India says he’s the wrong person and he’ll put me through to someone else. I wait another ten minutes (all this on an 0870 number of course).

Eventually I speak to someone in Ireland who tells me that Walsh Western pass the parcel on to a local delivery company for the actual delivery. The local delivery company have decided they didn’t want to hold my parcel over Christmas so they’ve sent it back to Walsh Western’s depot. That apparently qualifies as a delivery which explains the status and the signature (presumably of the person at the depot who received it back).

The nice Irish lady says she’ll get them to send it again. I ask if I can have it delivered to my work address. She says yes but it will delay things while they find the parcel and change the label. Not a problem. I give her my work address and she schedules delivery for today.

I check Walsh Western’s website the following day and lo and behold the delivery address has been changed. Only now it’s been changed to a strange amalgam of my home address and work address. I hope that it’s just the website that’s screwy but email Dell asking them to check it’s correct. Two days later and they still haven’t acknowledged my email.

And so to today. I hoped I would get the package since the post code was at least correct and I’d given my mobile number so the driver could call me if he got to the right road but didn’t know which office to deliver to. I check the Walsh Western website all day and it shows my parcel out for delivery. Five o’clock rolls around and there’s no parcel. Check the website again and apparently they attempted delivery at 9am, no one was home and they left a card - this is a lie. We have a warehouse where the staff spend all day receiving and despatching parcels. They would have been there from 8.30 am at the latest. There’s no way that they could have attempted delivery and not found somebody to accept it.

So I come home half expecting to find a “while you were out card” after they came to the wrong address but no, nothing. Phone Walsh Western. This time I get an option to speak to someone except their office is closed. No mention of when it might reopen. I call Dell. Five million menu options later I get told that my order has been placed with the business sales department and they close at 4pm. The guy I’m talking to can’t help as he only deals with home customers.

Remember that this is a delivery service I’ve paid sixty quid for. It has now reached the point where it would have been cheaper, easier and quicker for me to book myself on Ryan Air and go and collect it from their factory in Limerick myself.

I’m so angry and frustrated with Dell I’d just cancel the order were it not for that fact that the laptop is (or was supposed to be) a Christmas present and I’ve already told the recipient it’s on its way. I’ve now got to wait until Monday until I can even contact anyone and then God knows how long until they can redeliver. It’s taken a month so far and, of course, they’ve already charged my credit card. If you’re thinking of ordering from Dell, don’t bother. Their uselessness and incompetence is matched only by their ineptitude in choosing a delivery company who can, you know, deliver a parcel.

Leaving The Day Job