Wednesday, December 06, 2006

The End Result

Wow. Well I wasn't prepared for the story to hit the front page of Digg and I certainly wasn't prepared for the comments from childish fifth-graders who just learned to tpye on there l33t new compruters.

In any event it didn't do any good for me personally. OfficeMax is still not going to do anything and stands by it's policy of not filling orders if it cuts into their bottom line. The laptop does look like it's being discontinued. Is that my fault? No. Is it Office Max's fault? No. Should they make a better faith gesture than a $50 gift card? I think so. Saving money on their bottom line doesn't do them any good if you can't sell ANY of their products. Companies should learn that if they aren't willing to keep their customers happy then they won't have any customers at all.

This is, of course, hampered by people who think that a company has no obligation to you as a customer at all. I can never really understand why individuals would opt to take the side or perspective of a large business. I more readily identify with the role of consumer because, well, I am one. Granted, there needs to be a fair balance struck between the two but I don't feel that OfficeMax has done so.

To all of those leaving comments to the effect "you should have been in line at 4 am if you really wanted it" I would direct you to one of the comments in my original post

I was the second person in line at 4AM. I waited in the cold for an hour, only to be told that they did not have the Averatec 2370 in stock. "How could that be possible, I said, you just opened, and I am the second person in line!" Turns out the store, like many others, NEVER GOT THE LAPTOP IN STOCK. I was told, "Don't worry, just fill out this Ordermax, and you'll get in two days." It is now 10 days later; no laptop, no end in sight. As a matter of fact, I was told by "customer service" (and do I ever use the term loosley) that the laptop is indefinetely backordered, and might come as late as January!

This comment is echoed in several different forums. While this is a different situation, obviously OfficeMax was not prepared on either front, brick and mortar or online, to deal with ANY demand for this laptop.

I would also echo the sentiments of the same commenter:
What really burns me up, though, is that there were FIVE other retailers within a two mile radius advertising great deals on laptops, but, seeing as though they all opened at the same time, I made a choice. And I got screwed.

I'm still trying to find a laptop that is comparable and a reasonable price. Obviously there are no $600 dual core 12" laptops with a gig of ram anywhere else.

The most I can hope from this debacle is that people won't patronize OfficeMax.

To all the flamers posting comments: I find it somewhat ironic that there's so many comments about moving on and getting a life yet these people seem to have the time to expel their poorly spelled and grammatically incorrect "thoughts" on a story they haven't read and really don't understand. Maybe I'm not the only one who should move on...

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Office Max says "Bah humbug" to Black Friday orders

I am writing this in hopes that it will draw attention to the dubious practices and shoddy "customer service" I and many like me received this past week.

As part of their Black Friday special Office Max made their sale items available online. On the night before Thanksgiving, I and many others (possibly up to 1,100) ordered the Averatec 2370 12" laptop for the sale price of $599. For the next week I checked the Office Max website and my order was listed as "Shipping in 6-9 days". On Thursday, i received an email stating that my order had been backordered. I called Office Max customer service to confirm that, yes my order had been backordered and it would be back in stock in 10 business days. Finally, yesterday, I got yet another email telling me that my order had be cancelled. This is where things turned very sour.

Office Max is now, or has already, cancelled all of the orders received from their website for this laptop that exceeded their initial supply. When I called customer service again I asked why my order was cancelled and was told that they can no longer get the laptop and that's it. Subsequently, later in the evening I was contacted by someone from Office Max offering a $50 gift card for the "inconvenience" of ordering a laptop at a $300 savings and having the company cancel my order.

I find it very hard to believe that this laptop is no longer being made. It is still a new model and less than two months ago this model was upgraded by Averatec ( http://www.engadget.com/2006/10/17/averatec-goes-dual-core-with-ultraportable-2300/ ). I will be contactin Averatec on Monday to confirm that this model is still in production.

Office Max is able to get these laptops but would rather disappoint a possibly large number of their customers than take a loss on filling the orders that they willing took. I placed my order. Office Max took my money. Cancelling orders simply because it is inconvenient for them to fill is one of the poorest examples of customer service I have ever seen. It is false advertising at best and outright fraud at worst.

I'm listing several links below for anyone who is in the same situation as I and would like to let the crooks at Office Max know how you feel. These were gathered by the folks on the forums at Slickdeals.net. I've also listed relevant links to forums that are discussing this topic. If I'm missing any forums please email me or post links in the comments. I would love to have everyone who has had their order cancelled flood the number listed below with their complaint

TO HELP PLEASE DIGG THIS STORY!!! If we can draw attention to this then Office Max will have to pay attention and not be able to sweep us under the rug.

Contact information at Office Max
Phone # 630-438-7800 Ask for Kim or any of the people listed below
CEO - Sam Duncan - samduncan@officemax.com
CFO - Don Civgin - doncivgin@officemax.com
VP Marketing - Bob Thacker - bobthacker@officemax.com

Forums:
http://www.averatecforums.com/showthread.php?t=5694
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=378333&highlight=officemax
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/messageview.php?start=0&catid=18&threadid=674753