Data Doctors Deceptive Advertising and overpriced services ripoff Fountain Hills Arizona

Why did you bring your computer to us in the first place? Sounds like you know how to fix it yourself. Perhaps you have a thriving computer repair business in Fountain Hills as well. Or maybe you consulted with the neighborhood high school under-graduate that charges $30 per hour to screw up computers. Or perhaps you went to see the Geek Squad (since they charge you $100 just to turn your computer on and nearly $350 to perform the same service that we charge $239 for). I challenge you to contact me personally and if we did not improve the performance of your computer or solve the issues which caused you to come in, then I will re-do the service or refund your money. There is no practice of bait and switch. We spend 15 - 20 minutes at the counter with each customer at no charge while we go through a standard checklist to evaluate the performance of the system. The checklist leaves no guesswork, the system either needs service or it doesn't. We see many computers where no service is recommended. We offer many customers free advice, even those seeking to 'do it themselves'. We don't always know exactly what is wrong with a computer when we go through this evaluation, but we always give the customer the price upfront before we do any work. We always try to give the customer as much information as we can during this process and try to educate them on the maintenance and security of their system. We guarantee our service and if our comprehensive clean-up service did not solve the issues or greatly improve the performance of a computer, we do a complete format and re-install of the system, saving all important data at no charge to the customer. Mike, your post is just a copy of one posted by Larry of Rockford, Illinois. No sense debating most of his comments because they don't represent all that we do within our service and they are ignorant points at best. I don't think Larry was ever a customer of ours and I have my doubts that you were either. If you were, I hope to hear from you.

From your reponse it sounds like you are either an idiot or a nym/alias.
I was a customer just like I stated I was and like the other gentleman I got suckered into a huge repair bill for a "pc cleanup," just like the one on the list.
As the ol' general once said...Once is hapstance,twice is enemy action."

Your biggest "complaint" is that you feel that a lot of their services could be done for free by a person at home. You are correct. However, not everyone is a computer expert. There are people who don't know how or even want to know how to do any of these things. So they pay a business to do this for them.

A good analogy to this would be car maintenance. Even something as simple as an oil change people can do themselves. But a lot of people choose to pay 2 or more times what it would cost them because they either a)don't know how to do it, or b) don't want to take the time. So are you saying that every place that does oil changes is ripping a person off?

Some of what they do(and your comments) are really a matter of opinion. Several things you said that are "unnecessary" may not be "required", but is good procedure.

Also, some that you say are a no-brainer or easy enough. To a lot of people it is not. I guarantee that if you asked 100 people at random to show you how to run the Anti-Virus Scan of their computer at least 50 of them will either not know how to do it or will not even have any AV software.

From your report it sounds like you were never a customer, you had to get the list of what they do from another person. Nothing you have written indicates anything close to a Rip Off.

The rebuttal is a joke.
These people really do what the filer of this complaint states.
I should know because I got suckered in as well.

I own a Data Doctors franchise and would like to clarify a few points made by "Lawrence".

1. I use expensive industry tools that you won't find "free" on the internet. Ultra-X products, commercial password recovery tools, commercial adware/spyware removal tools.

2. 1.5 to 2 hours is a joke. Here's the real deal (in no particular order), all depending on size and space used on hard drive.
a. 30 minutes to an hour or more for full drive image
b. 20-40 minutes for each of 3 anti-malware tools in Safe-mode then again in Normal mode.
c. 20-40 minutes for each of a minimum of 2 antivirus tools (Commercial, not free)
d. 20-90 minutes for defrag
e. 30-90 minutes for scandisk
f. 1.5 hours - XP service pack 2 and all subsequent updates (as necessary)
g. 30 minutes - General system optimization

3. This doesn't cost $300. At our store it's $249, and it's GUARENTEED. If you get the computer home and its not quite right, we'll make it right.

Most large stores charge $69 for the diagnostics and $100 to do a full backup. Thats $169 before they even start fixing it!

This is just a partial list of the things that happen on every system serviced. This does not take into account that we will repartition a hard drive (frequently found on Sony computers) to better use the drive space (using PAID FOR commercial software), low-level hardware diagnostics (again, commercial products) frequently taking many hours to do a sector-by-sector scan of a "flaky" hard drive. We do a minimum of 3 passes on all hard drives and all memory. All at no extra charge, when necessary to verify integrity of hardware on unstable systems.

This also doesn't take into account that the many scans we do frequently don't completely "clean" up a computer. For instance a rootkit, which is able to completely hide itself, can take a couple hours to track down and remove. Then there is self-replicating malware than can prove difficult to completely remove from a system...and we won't let a computer out the door without being 100% certain it is clean.

Are some computers "easier" than others? Of course, but the steps we take to get them serviced are the same.

Anybody can learn to do anything. I can change my own oil, paint my own house and wash my own car! I can pay $39 for an oil change or do it myself for $10. Whats your point, Larry Boy? We provide a valuable service to those who don't wish to do it themselves.

* Let me make a few other points:
* Windows updates are free...yet we frequently see computers still running XP SP1
* Disabling malware if MSCONFIG doesn't fix the problem
* Anybody can fix errors in the Device Manger, yet we see computers with missing drivers
* There are plenty of "free" malware scanners but we are constantly seeing computers loaded up with malware.
* Defrag is built into Windows yet we regularly see computers that have probably never had it run.

So I have to ask, what is your point? Are we to tell all of our customers to go home and fix it themselves? Or should we keep doing what we do, but do it free of charge? I'm a little confused.

And finally, WE DO put a computer maintenance manual on the desktop of the computers we service so the users CAN perform their own routine maintenance. And you would be amazed at how many computers come back 6 months later because they DIDN'T DO IT. And thats fine. People are busy. If they wanted to be computer techs they wouldn't bring it to us in the first place.

I'll make you a deal Larry, come to work for me. For every computer you service in 2 hours or less, I'll let you keep the service fee. Every one that takes longer than two hours, you do for free. Hows that sound?