Dell home support - inefficiency at the customer's expense

I have only good words when it comes to Dell business support and would not hesitate to recommend Dell business products not only because they are good products but because it is backed by good support. However, the same can't be said for their home products not because their products are bad but because the support for home products seriously can piss you off.

I bought an Inspiron Desktop 20 3000 Series All-in-One a few months back and noticed an issue a few days later. So I contacted Dell and after a series of standard email that request me to perform some updates etc, an appointment for an onsite engineer was set as issue was not resolved.

I then received another call from a Dell representative who wants to set an appointment to have some parts sent down. I was confused because I just had an appointment set earlier but was told that this call was from the logistics team and they are only in charge of sending the parts over. I asked if the parts can be sent on the same day but was told that it was not possible and so someone had to be at home on two separate days.

The onsite engineer came clueless as to what the issue was and his instructions was to simply replace the parts. After the replacement was completed, I noticed that the screen was not the right fit and the engineer agreed with me. Although I was not exactly happy with that, I will not mind if the issue is resolved. It was not. So I got him to revert back to the original display which he kindly did.

I then asked him what is to happen to the unused parts and was told that another appointment will be arranged to collect the parts. He said that engineers are on public transport so they are not able to bring parts along.

So Dell home support needs 3 separate appointments if an onsite service requires parts to be replaced in which you will also need to take similar number of days leave.

I do not mind taking a day's leave for the engineer to be onsite but I absolutely find it ridiculous to waste an additional 2 days of leave just to be home to receive the parts and then wait for the parts to be collected on another day. It is even worse when the timing is from 9 am - 5 pm, which practically means the whole day when the process itself probably takes less than a minute.

For my case, the issue is still not resolved and another appointment is being arranged but this time, no way I will waste another 2 days for such an inefficient process.