Ripoff Report Needs Your Help!
X  |  CLOSE
Report: #407647

Complaint Review: Best Buy Geek Squad - Miami Florida

  • Submitted:
  • Updated:
  • Reported By: Miami Florida
  • Author Confirmed What's this?
  • Why?
  • Best Buy Geek Squad Cutler Ridge FL (Store 556) 19191 S Dixie Hwy Point Royale Plaza Miami, FL 33157 Miami, Florida U.S.A.

Best Buy Geek Squad Windows Vista Optimization or optimizer Miami Florida

*UPDATE EX-employee responds: you can request a refund on the optimization

Show customers why they should trust your business over your competitors...

Is this
Report about YOU
listed on other sites?
Those sites steal
Ripoff Report's
content.
We can get those
removed for you!
Find out more here.
How to fix
Ripoff Report
If your business is
willing to make a
commitment to
customer satisfaction
Click here now..

Traveled to Best Buy on 04/25/2008 after seeing a advertisement for a laptop/notebook computer for $499.99 but all 3 stores in the area had already optimized every single laptop offered for sale at this price for an additional $29.99 with no choice not to have this "optimization" done without any customers requesting such a thing be done. This simply is profit motive.

When asked what exactly is done a vague answer was given. Finally, because the price of $499.99 was well below normal sales for this laptop specifications and tired of traveling I bought it anyway knowing full well this was a ripoff. Other customers were also complaining and left. But I knew unfortunately Circuit City and CompUSA were up to the same scheme. If I bought it online I figure shipping would be the same.

So with $29.99 on every available system on sale and with three remaining I bought it.

WELCOME TO CORPORATE CONSPIRACY.

Ticket # 0556 053 0674 04/25/08 17:17 0859551

3984825 SYSTEM CUST $29.99

VAL# 0565-9198-2690-0635

Kobie f.
Miami, Florida
U.S.A.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 01/03/2009 03:32 PM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/best-buy-geek-squad/miami-florida-33157/best-buy-geek-squad-windows-vista-optimization-or-optimizer-miami-florida-407647. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

Search for additional reports

If you would like to see more Rip-off Reports on this company/individual, search here:

Report & Rebuttal
Respond to this report!
What's this?
Also a victim?
What's this?
Repair Your Reputation!
What's this?

Updates & Rebuttals

REBUTTALS & REPLIES:
0Author
1Consumer
0Employee/Owner

#1 UPDATE EX-employee responds

you can request a refund on the optimization

AUTHOR: Kristy - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Sunday, January 04, 2009

Just to clarify what Best Buy's official policy is on this..
because I think it's fair (if followed by store management)

Best Buy will typically offer a "door-buster" laptop deal in a weekly flyer in the $299-$599 price range, with a guaranteed minimum listed of say 10 units in the AD. If the store recieves 40 laptops. the first 10 will have nothing done to them.. 25 will have Geek Squad optimization ($39.99) done . and the remaining 5 will have some type of Antivirus/antispyware suite ($130)

this meets the legal requirment of having the 10 avail that are listed in the AD, The Game now is for the sales person to "sell" the optimization service benefits to the customer.. if the customer absolutely refuses and the only PC's left are the one's that have been 'pre-optimized" the store can't refuse to sell the Laptop to the customer under Best Buy Corporate policy..

they will either just give away the optimization for Free or if the local store manager wants to "punish" the customer for not giving his store the additional profit margin.. He can require the customer pay the normal price but wait up to 24hrs to pickup the PC so the store can Reinstall the OS.. to out of the box factory specs.. if this wasn't followed then a quick letter to Best Buy CEO, with a copy of your reciept & this posting should get you a refund of the Service... only you can decide if it's worth $39.99 of your time to do this - but forced bundling is a big NO NO.. and store managers can be Fired for this.. simply because Best Buy doesn't want hundreds of complaints to the Attorney General's office that forces them to take action. (Best Buy has over 1000 stores, so crazy things happen once in a while in each store.. it's consistant pattern of behavour that causes problems)


in answer to your question..
there are two types of Optimization Geek Squad offers ... Quick (or Pre-optimization) & complete.

Quick or PRE) Optimization..

they basically run a script that does about 100 registry changes to Vista that makes things like Menu's appears faster, network TCP/IP for peer-to-peer file transfers go faster etc. Each of these changes were Offically Reviewed by Microsoft and wont damage your PC.. The Registry keys are public on Microsoft website, but Geek Squad doesn't list them out.. just the benefits of the service
Some stores will install critical security updates as part of this, others set your OS to automatically install updates when you get home to save time

Complete optimization

in addition to the above, Install every windows update from microsoft, Java update, remove most games, all trialware (except antivirus trail for security reasons unless specifically requested by a customer) or whatever the customer requests be removed or not removed. this can take 3-4hrs


the reason the Quick optimization doesn't remove services like AOL, or 60day office trial.. is that some people actually use that stuff and get upset if it's removed, anyone getting a Pre-optimized PC can actually requested a complete optimization for no additional cost but may have to wait the 3-4hrs (or next business day) -vs- the "grab-n-go"

Respond to this report!
What's this?
Featured Reports

Advertisers above have met our
strict standards for business conduct.

X
What do hackers,
questionable attorneys and
fake court orders have in common?
...Dishonest Reputation Management Investigates Reputation Repair
Free speech rights compromised

WATCH News
Segment Now