Archived from groups: alt.sys.pc-clone.dell (
More info?)
My experience with BancTec was different. First I contacted Dell for service
under warranty, with service tag #, express service code, owner name, address
and phone number. The usual drill. Dell, in turn put me in touch with BancTec,
after setting up a trouble ticket or whatever they call it.
I called BancTec to set up when a service tech would arrive with a replacement
power supply (I had already diagnosed the problem to that extent). The first
date I was given turned out to be a Saturday, over a week away. When I pointed
out that the day was a Saturday, I was given an earlier date, and a time, 10am.
By 11am on the appointed day, nothing had happened. Nobody showed up. I called
BancTec and I was told that they could tell me nothing because their computers
were down. I persisted a couple of more times that day, finally gave up and
called Dell again. I told the Dell support person to cancel the BancTec service
call and to simply send me a replacement power supply. Fortunately, I had a
similar model of Dell here in stock, so I removed the power supply (identical
wattage and model), put it into my client's computer, tested it, and got the
computer back into the client's hands as quickly as I could. When the
replacement power supply arrived from Dell, I put it into the computer from
which I had stolen the power supply. I called BancTec back again, and told them
to ah heck off, but in very pleasant terms.
About 10 days later, a BancTec service person called wanting to set up an
appointment. I told him to ah heck off too, albeit in my most pleasant manner.
I wish I could say that I made all this up, but it is accurate, factual and
honest. By the way, I (and my client) live west of Boston about 25 miles, and
maybe the same distance northeast of Worcester, MA. So neither Dell nor BancTec
could make the excuse that I am in a service area with sparse coverage and long
travel times to get here.
And this is how Dell is supposed to provide service to its customers under
warranty? If my client had tried to do this, she would still be waiting for a
tech to show up to verify the cause of the problem, then she would wait some
more for a replacement power supply and service tech to converge at the same
time in the same place. Yep, she paid, and willingly, for my time, 'cause it
meant getting the computer back into service in a timely manner.
No way on earth would I be caught working for BancTec at no more than $25 per
service call. This helps me understand why the level of service from BancTec
was so atrocious. It's another example of you get what you pay for.
Spoken like the true Dellbot I am (referring cunningly to another thread in this
newsgroup). I wonder if I'll now lose votes in the contest for Dellbot of the
year? ... Ben Myers
On Sun, 10 Jul 2005 15:30:09 -0400, Dan <jasdfosd@asjedfoi.com> wrote:
>I'm sorry that your experience was bad. But most BancTec CE's are
>paid much less than $25 per call (company-paid benefits? good one.
>healthcare & dental was $400 a month extra out of your pay...but its
>PRE-TAX, oooo that makes it all worthwhile ;P ). And from what I hear
>the pay keeps going lower every year. Most techs only get about 4
>calls per day, which averages out to about $25,000 per year, not
>including the monstrous gas, vehicle wear/tear and cel-phone expenses
>CE's must cover with their own personal finances. BancTec gets what
>they pay for.
>
>As far as parts not arriving, if the Dell CSR places a service call
>_after_ 4pm, the part will NOT arrive the next business day. The Dell
>CSR then _promises_ that the tech will be out the next day, and of
>course the tech can't do anything, and therefore takes all the heat
>for the Dell CSR screw-up. The Dell CSR promises the moon just to get
>the customer off the phone while they're still moderately happy.
>
>Some Dell CSR's also promise that the tech will stay for the entire
>re-installation of Windows XP and complete re-installation of
>applications when a hard drive is replaced. A tech is not going to
>spend 4 hours at a location for $25, $22, or whatever it is now.
>
>As a final note, the Dell phone-CSR is the one that's ultimately
>accountable for things that are beyond the on-site tech's control.
>Granted, you had a bad tech, but if the CSR keeps sending motherboards
>(or other broken-refurbished parts) when the problem is clearly
>somewhere else, the tech should not be held responsible. With some
>calls I had to go out 3 or even 4 times before Dell finally got it
>right or replaced the system entirely.
>
>
>On Sat, 9 Jul 2005 12:43:12 -0400, "Robert R Kircher, Jr."
><rrkircher@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>
>><ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers)> wrote in message
>>news:42cfcc1d.1066793@nntp.charter.net...
>>
>>>
>>> I've had at least one memorable experience with BancTec, the contracted
>>> Dell
>>> service provider here in central Massachusetts. Memorable in terms of so
>>> awful
>>> I never want to speak to them again. Both BancTec and Dell rely too
>>> heavily on
>>> people who are not too fluent in American English, which is to my
>>> advantage as a
>>> service provider. (I've lived nearly 6 years overseas, so I am accustomed
>>> to
>>> dealing with people who do not speak English well.)
>>
>>Had a bad PE2650 one time that would randomly reboot. After some
>>discussion with Dell Support it was decided to replace the MOBO under the
>>Next Day Service plan. Waited all day on site... No Show. Get a call late
>>from BancTec guy feeding me some BS about not having the parts. The parts
>>were shipped to the site over night and were already in my hands. So he's
>>going to come out tomorrow to fix the thing. So much for Next Day.
>>
>>Tomorrow arrives and the tech shows up as promised but it quickly became
>>obvious that he was clueless at least with rackmount systems. First he had
>>no idea how to get the server out of the rack. I had to show him that and
>>how to get into the unit after it was out. I had to go for a couple of
>>hours and figured by the time I got back he'd have the mobo swapped. Well
>>you guessed it. I get back in 1 1/2 hours and this rube is standing there
>>scratching his head.
>>
>>"I just can't get this mobo to release from the case", while he's pulling up
>>on one end and flexing the damn thing.
>>
>>"Well did you try the release knob here in the middle?" at which time I
>>pulled the knob and the mobo came out with ease.
>>
>>No comment from the Tech of course. So he puts in the new mobo and snaps in
>>all the fans processors etc (breaking a processor mounting clip in the
>>process) and we get the server backup and running 3 + hours after he
>>arrives. I suspect it would have take me 1/2 hour at most. Needless to say
>>I had a very unhappy set of users waiting.
>>
>>The real pisser was that the server ran fine for about 24 hours and then
>>started rebooting again. Arrgggg. Well this time I transferred its role
>>over to another server and pulled the unit out of service and brought it
>>back to my shop. Called Dell again and when they suggested having the tech
>>back out I said absolute not just send me the parts... Turned out to be a
>>bad processor.
>>
>>From that point on, I've NEVER had a dell tech come out to repair anything.
>>The productivity time lost by the customer was more then my hourly rate
>>would have been had I just done the work myself.
>
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