I wanted to receive a new music laptop in time for Xmas – specifically, for use on a Xmas trip planned to start Dec 21.

Mid-November, I spoke with an engineer, Pete, at Scan Computers International Ltd (UK) about the spec. Very helpful, knowledgeable and friendly.

Since I started dealing with the business folks at Scan, however, things have soured.

Day 0 (Nov 22) : ordered PC from Scan by phone; payment accepted; was told on phone delivery estimated on Day 7; no mention made that any components were out of stock

Day 1: as no documentation of the spec or sale had arrived, I had to call and remind them to send this. Eventually received that day, as well as email a) confirming estimated delivery date of Day 7, and b) stating that if this date could not be met, I’d be contacted

Day 7: no delivery, no contact

Day 11: still no delivery or contact. I called and was told the delay was due to the CPU being out of stock. Was told to expect delivery by Day 15.

Day 15: no delivery, no contact. I called. Twice, after giving my order #, there was an awkward silence, and I was transferred to someone else. The third person told me the CPU still wasn’t in stock. Was told to possibly expect delivery by Day 29 (Dec 21), though no guarantees.



If an item is out of stock, customers should be told this at the outset, before payment is made.

The communication failures, my having to chase them, and delivery date morphing from Day 7 to Day 29 – maybe -- are very uncool.

I can appreciate your frustration. Pete is a frequent contributor to this forum and hopefully he will be able to shed some light on what has happened here...

hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Upate: Pete has contacted me and is on the case. I feel slightly bad for him, as he's apologising for his colleagues' error.

They could use a few more like him...

I had a not dissimilar experience when buying my PC from Scan in 2010...
The technical quality is brilliant, but the adherence to dates was a little tenuous...

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~~~ A weasel hath not such a deal of spleen as you are tossed with! www.feline1.co.uk ~~~

Quote lingyai:

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Upate: Pete has contacted me and is on the case. I feel slightly bad for him, as he's apologising for his colleagues' error.

They could use a few more like him...

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Agreed, Peter gives excellent service.

I'll add my story. I've always built my own computers. I treated myself to a Scan machine last year. Communication was not good. I had a deadline (I wanted to settle in on a new machine before starting a big project) and messages from me during the (delayed) construction stage were overlooked.

It's a nicely-made computer. But it's overclocked by design, and is the only PC I have owned since the days of Windows 98 that wasn't absolutely stable. I suspect these two facts are related. Peter has been very helpful in suggesting less aggressive settings, and the system now crashes only rarely. Which isn't QUITE good enough, as Sod's Law guarantees those rare occasions are usually when a client is watching :-)

With hindsight, I feel there was little added value from getting Scan to put this computer together. I should have saved the money and built it myself. Sorry, Peter. But I'd still recommend Scan to anyone who wasn't competent to build their own computer, when the alternative is some heap from PC World.

Scan, though pretty excellent mostly but their complaints, returns and reorder post seems to be manned by someone who goes in once a week and sets an answering autobot to give out drivel to anyone atimorous enough to complain or reorder or return goods.
I find a (real) letter to the MD pretty effective.

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Success is round the corner. It's also round the bend.

I agree, it's enough to make anyone atimorous :-)

Quote lingyai:

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Upate: Pete has contacted me and is on the case. I feel slightly bad for him, as he's apologising for his colleagues' error.

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Already gone into this heavily over on KVR but the crux is our supplier has been waiting on a run of mobile chips from Intel which got delayed, but have now shipped to us from euroland. I've talked to purchasing about not keeping sales up to date and build for not keeping lingyai in the loop in this regard.

None of it is an acceptable excuse, its just what has transpired and I'm furious for it not being kept on top of internally. All I can do at this point is try and push it through as quickly as we can from this point in.

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ScanProAudio & 3XS Audio Systems
ScanProAudio Blog

In some instances, an unhappy customer can enhance a company's reputation by seeing how the company responds to the complaint, and it seems in this case, the employee of the company, Pete in this case, has shown the case has been prioritised. Some other companies will just fob you off with any old tosh, hoping the customer gets to the point where they simply give up and they put it all down to experience