I live in Chesterfield, MO and I live 5 miles away from a BestBuy/Geek Squad location. As a 15 year old, it wasn't hard for me to buy a desktop PC for school-related work during my course of middle school and high school. So I purchased a brand new desktop PC (not from best buy) and found that a year later started encountering problems with it. It wasnt booting correctly and froze halfway into the booting process, which made it difficult to understand the problem. I was in the middle of my 9th grade school year and I was trying to concentrate on my schoolwork, almost using my PC everyday considoring the high expectations of my teachers.
In a sense of urgency, I tried to find a reliable company to register my PC at and potentially fix it for a low cost (due to the school year still going on and that i was all out of $$). Since I'm in MO, there really isnt too many places where I would be able to trust to repair my newly bought PC. Then I came to the conclusion to take my PC to GeekSquad. As they claimed, they are "professionals" and know computers inside and out, which I learned later wasn't true. Anyways, I registered my PC into GeekSquad and paid for a $60 diagnostic to figure out the problem, PROMISING to call me and tell me what was wrong with the PC.
Almost 2 weeks went by and the NO call from GeekSquad convinced me that they merely forgot to phone me and tell me what the problem was. So I called and they said that my PC was already diagnosed right after I dropped it off (so much for promises). By my own will, I had to go to the store and figure out the problem with the PC, thankfully being within a short distance of my home. I went to the GeekSquad counter(after waiting an hour)and finally found out what was wrong.
My motherboard was fried due to a potential power surge at my house (though the PC was connected into a power surge protector bar). They urged me to buy a new motherboard from them which would cost an extra anount on top of the cost of labor and the diagnostic. Since they didnt have one in stock, I had to find my own motherboard and bring it back to the store myself. After a week, I came up with the motherboard, going back to the store and dropping it off so they could repair my PC.
After a LONG 3 weeks I finally recieved a phone call from them telling me that I had to come to the store AGAIN! (unbelieveable considoring that it was about the 6th time I went) Almost frustrated with GeekSquad, I came to find out that it was supposedly the WRONG MOTHERBOARD!! I had bought it from an out-of-state dealer who reassured me that it would work on my PC, stating that this expensive piece was absolutely compatible to my PC. And as a liscensed professional, I became to doubt GeekSquad's statements. Infuriated to the point of unimaginable rage, I took my PC back to where it was built (in Minnesota) and had it repaired for $20, versus the $300 GeekSquad charged me.
The real professionals fixed my computer, finding out that the motherboard I bought was compatible with my PC. So now GeekSquad not only ripped me off with their expensive prices but they are using the unexperienced workers to do the more experience type of job, making it a living hell for the other people trying to repair their PCs too. Later I came to realise that there were many complaints with Geeksquad and the particular store I was dealing with.
I have made numerous calls to that particular store, stating that I wanted a refund of the WRONG diagnostic and miscalleneous services which were completely pointless. 'Til this day (which is a year from when I had my PC repaired) I havent gotten any customer satisfaction for spending my well earned money on something as pointless as GeekSquad.
James
Chesterfield, Missouri
U.S.A.