This one has us scratching our heads and looking up the number for Miss Marple. E. took his HP desktop in to Best Buy to have them check out some hardware issues he was having with it… and they “lost it”. It’s gone. No one there remembers seeing it. No one has any record of it. It is a mystery. E. writes:

The young man behind the counter told me that the techs weren’t in yet, but that he would take down my info by hand and the computer and that they would call me when they came in for the day. (I figured if it was more then a couple hundred I would just spring for a new one). Well, at noon today having not heard back I called over to find out the status, and the gentleman who I spoke to told me, and this is a quote “We dont have that computer”.

Uh. What? Read E’s entire email inside.

E. writes:

I’m a big fan of your site, after discovering it on a detour from Deadspin a while ago. I am consistently shocked by some of the horror stories that you post from people who have had bad customer service experiences and often find them hard to believe.

That was until yesterday.

I have (well, had) a two and a half year old HP desktop. I have a work laptop that I use for 90% of my computer usage, so the desktop is used mainly for storage for music, pictures and an occasional game of Civilization. It was hardly a valuable machine at this point, but it was incredibly useful to me to have, being that it had 120 gigs of room in the hard drive. So about 2 weeks ago I started having some issues with the computer. Some minor issues but definitely hardware, no software or virus related.

So yesterday I took it in first thing they opened (10am) to the store in Wheaton, Md on Georgia Ave. The young man behind the counter told me that the techs weren’t in yet, but that he would take down my info by hand and the computer and that they would call me when they came in for the day. (I figured if it was more then a couple hundred I would just spring for a new one). Well, at noon today having not heard back I called over to find out the status, and the gentleman who I spoke to told me, and this is a quote “We don’t have that computer”. Apparently they have no record or trace of my computer either physically or in their system. They asked me if I was sure that I was calling the correct store, and I confirmed with them I was. I then left work to go over there and prove to their disbelief that I was calling the same store I dropped the computer off at. They looked through the records again in front of me, and showed me all the computers waiting for work , and my machine was not there. It has a pretty distinctive case (a friend of mine is an artist type and did a really nice pattern on the outside) and they claim CLAIM not to recognize anything that looks like my description. Since I didn’t get the name of the gentleman who took my machine they said they cant help me unless they gave it to someone else by accident and its returned. They gave me the 1-800 number and told me there was nothing else they could to help.

Customer service says that there is nothing they can do either since they don’t have any proof that the computer actually existed. They did offer me a discount if I purchase a new machine.

Now, I was well prepared to buy a new computer going into this, but I had easily a couple hundred dollars worth of music and movies on that computer, along with some personal photos and software (though the pictures are all on DVD as well.). I just can’t believe that they can lose a computer and offer ZERO assistance in trying to recover it. My fault I guess for trusting someone who cant get out of the opening shift as a front desk jockey at a best buy.

Any suggestions of where to take this complaint internally next?

This doesn’t sound like a bad customer service issue, this sounds like a crime. We think you should stop dealing with Best Buy and file a police report, giving a description of the Best Buy employee who took down your information and accepted your computer on their behalf. As much as we give Best Buy our special brand of tough-love, it’s not Best Buy’s policy to steal your computer. They’ve got a bad apple working in one of their stores, and are obviously not equipped to deal with it until to take it to the next level. You really need to get the police involved.

We’d also suggest sending a copy of this email and a copy of the police report to info@geeksquad.com with the subject line “for robert.” We’re sure that Robert, the head of Geek Squad, will appreciate hearing from you, as it is unlikely that Best Buy or Geek Squad want thieves working for them.—MEGHANN MARCO

(Photo: cmorran123)

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