Stores, Electronics - Best Buy, Fairfax, Virginia unable to repair CD player under service repair agreement

Complaints.com received the following e-message on February 2, 2001:

From: Email User

Re: Best Buy, Fair Lakes Shopping Center, Fairfax, Virginia I would like to let you know about a serious problem I have been having

with the Best Buy store in Fair Lakes Shopping Center in Fairfax, Virginia.

The problem regards their service contract on a 50 CD player. We paid for an

extended service contract so that repairs would be taken care of on this

expensive product. However, our CD player has now been nonfunctioning for

over a year and a half, even though we have taken it in for repairs on at

least four occasions.

In July 1999, I brought the CD player in for repairs. (It plays about

ten seconds of a song, then jumps to the next CD.) I am sure of this date

because we moved in July and I brought in for repairs before the move so I

wouldn't have to pack it. I could just pick it up after the move and bring

it to the new house. Several weeks later, I picked the machine up from Best

Buy, signed for it, and brought it home. I unwittingly assumed it had been

repaired, and did not think to save the receipt. The CD player played a few

CD's, then went back to the old problem the first day we set it up.

On August 8, 1999, I returned the machine for repairs. I was told it

would be sent in to the factory to be fixed. I have a receipt for this work

order. I also have a receipt for a work order dated Aug. 24, 1999, but Best

Buy tells me that both receipts are for only one repair because they have the

same work order number on them, even though the dates on the receipts are

different. I was called on October 3, 1999, to pick up the repaired CD

player. Once again, when I brought it home, it worked for only an hour or so

before it began skipping again.

On December 9, 2000, I again brought the CD player in for repairs. I

explained that I was not happy with the fact that it kept being returned

without repairs and asked if it could be replaced under their "lemon" policy.

The clerk informed that by checking his computer, he could see that the CD

player had NEVER been in for any repairs. I disagreed. He told me that

there is a serial number on the player, and they track them that way. I

showed him all of my previous repair paperwork and he said it would be taken

care of. He took the player, and promised to call when it was ready.

When I received the "repaired" CD player, it played one CD, and then

skipped through all 50. I returned to Best Buy on December 29, 2000, I said

I wanted a new CD player as this one obviously could not be repaired. He

said that the records showed that it had only been repaired twice, so I

showed this clerk all the same paperwork I had showed the previous one and he

made copies. He took the player and said it would be repaired.

Several weeks later, I picked up the player, asked if he could assure me

it was repaired, and took it home. Guess what? It doesn't work.

Best Buy service contracts are sold to customers at the check out counter

and printed with your receipt. Everyone is asked if they want to purchase

one when they buy anything electronic.

I do not know if this service contract is run as a scam or simply incompetence,

but I am fed up with driving all the way to Best Buy, standing in long lines with

my children, and then dealing with clerks who tell me I've never been there before.

I now trying to receive either my money back or a new 50 CD player.