Rant 1 – The Microsoft Support Saga
Episode 2 – The Maddening
A complete row of pixels of my Surface Book’s screen had perished in front of my eyes. Previous experience and general ignorance of LCDs suggested if you don’t have any wonky pixels in the first few hours of use, you are good to go for many eye searing years of use. With light computing over 6 months of ownership, a row went black, sometimes bright green, right in the middle of the 4k-ish display. Suffice to say this was a problem I knew would require a warranty claim.
I purchased this unit through Costco for its plush 1+1 manufacturer warranty extension plus another 2 years of coverage through Citi Bank’s Costco Card. As such, I went to Costco first to see if they could simply swap out my unit and send me on my way. In hindsight, I am not sure what Costco Concierge Services is supposed to do except provide unboxing instructions and 3 pronged plug insertion methodology to people that own too many cats. The Costco rep, Jason as he shall be known, as nice a guy as he was, did nothing but call the public MS Support on my behalf, with me on hold. It took the Jason three attempts to get a hold of someone, getting hung up on twice in the process. He then proceeded to stay on the line while I explained the obvious hardware defect to the MS rep in the same manner I just did to Jason (lesson learned, don’t bother with Costco while under a manufacturer’s warranty). Jason noted (and I experienced the same later on) that apparently, the Surface Book is in some other nether world of support services because, try as you might, you are never going to get the automated phone support to understand the Surface Book serial number. It is irritating enough to have issues with an automated service when you are the one punching the in the numbers, it adds a layer of special sauce when you are doing it through an intermediary who has no greater access to the goods than you.
Talking further to the human at MS, he seemed very much like a Chuckie in my memory, who did speak English on a phone that did not appear to be connected via Soviet era satellite, the troubleshooting tree led us to a factory reset to confirm this was not a software issue. By now, I was about an hour into this whole process and rapidly losing my typically tentative grip on patience. I asked if we could just skip the bullshit and recognize pixels don’t turn off and flicker because of a software issue and get my new computer in the mail. Chuckie wasn’t having it and insisted I perform the reset before he would authorize a repair or replacement. Before doing so, I needed to ensure I had my computer backed up so broke off our conversation to perform a factory reset on my own time with an assurance of a callback at 730PM EST the next day. Not trusting MS Support in any capacity, I had Chuckie confirm the callback number and time, twice. Later that evening, I performed the reset, which took an astoundingly long time as I opted for the deep scrub reinstall but required no input from me, then eagerly awaited Chuckie’s call back.
By 830PM EST the next day, no word from Chuckie meant I had to jump through the hoops of the MS Support’s automated phone system. Jesus Christ, that is the worst automated system I have ever encountered. The menus are nonsensical, it refused to recognize my Surface Book serial number, and worst of all, would not allow you to default to waiting in a generic queue to speak to a representative; progress had to be made through the automated menus. After a profanity laced conversation with the interior of my living room, I somehow short circuited the system through some combination of selections I will never be able to repeat and was able to speak to a person, who shall be called Jenny. While I was absolutely in a distraught state, I never yell at or disrespect a service personnel on the receiving end of my call (nor anywhere else, it’s not their fault the product is shit; that’s some engineer, cook, marketing guy, etc. who deserves the lashings). However, 30 seconds into explaining the pain and suffering endured thus far to get to talk to someone, Jenny hung up on me. This was not a dropped call, it was certainly a conscious disconnect presumably because Jenny could tell I was in a bad mood, didn’t want to deal with it, and there is no accountability for her actions.
I then threw a brief, but full intensity tantrum. Fortunately, the windows were closed and no one was home with me.
Now fueled by anger, I was going to get something resolved that night even if it meant an aneurism. Lacking the testicular fortitude to attempt the phone support again, I navigated the still baffling online menus to get to chat with another minion of the MS Support web. Florita (this is actually her presented name; our interaction was recent enough for my goldfish like memory to recall) would either be my saving grace or the recipient of my wrath. She walked a careful line between Todd’s overly apologetic communication patterns and the no bullshit approach I desired to stop wasting time and get my computer replaced. Mercifully, the troubleshooting tree had reached its end, and Florita was able to hook me up with a replacement. As I was leaving on a long weekend at the end of the following week, I opted for the “Advanced Exchange” option where I put down a credit card number and they shipped me a unit before I returned mine. Finally, resolution; a new computer was in the mail, and MS would take care of me.
Sadly, this is not the end of the rant.
The computer shows up on-time, as promised. As one not inclined to take a chance if I don’t have to, I inspected the unit immediately. The rear camera lens was cracked and grease smeared on the case. I went out of my way to spend the extra coin to get a new, not refurbished unit. I am then provided with this crap to replace a mint computer that failed 6 months into light use. I don’t think so. I snap off a blunt but pissy-ness free email to my main gal Florita. At 1am I received a response that she was escalating this issue, presumably to get Mr. T and the A-team on the case, and a shipping label promptly showed up in my inbox from yet another MS contact, Janno B. Because I missed a return shipping label attached to the exterior of the damaged replacement unit’s box (why the outside with no other return shipping instruction??), I now had two. I inquired with Florita and the A-team contact, Jaime, as to which of the two I should strap to the box to send the damaged unit back. It ultimately took 4 days to get confirmation of which to use. Mind you, the addresses, weights, and ship date on these labels were different so it was not immediately apparent which was right, and I sure as hell did not want this unit, for which they have my credit card number to cover, to get lost. However, on day 3 of no response from Florita or Jaime, I threw caution to the wind and informed both that I would return the unit with the label Janno B. sent me. After shipping the unit, yet another new contact, Max, thankfully confirmed either would work.
For those keeping count, I am at a tally of six different MS Support staff contacts trying to resolve a very straightforward hardware defect, and we have not yet reached the end…
To be continued...
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