Sometimes a company seems to do everything it can to convince you it doesn't really want your business. Such was the experience one reader reports recently having with 3Com support.
"I had an experience with 3Com's tech support recently that has motivated me to never buy another 3Com product ever again," the reader wrote. "We had a pair of 3Com Wireless Bridges connecting two buildings slightly less than a half a mile apart. One of them was stolen off of the roof so we had to buy a replacement. After I installed the replacement it wouldn't work so I called 3Com's tech support. The date the new unit was manufactured was six months ago. Because their warranty is only 90 days I had to fax them the packing slip as proof that I hadn't had the wireless bridge for over 90 days. The first time I faxed it to them it got lost in their system so when I called them back I had to fax it over again before I could get tech support on a brand new product."
The reader's troubles were just beginning. "After I finally convinced 3Com that this was a brand new product and that it was covered under their 90-day warranty, I got to talk to someone from tech support who told me that their wireless building to building bridge is not supported where the two bridges aren't level with each other," the reader wrote. "If one bridge is 50 feet or so higher than the other one, which is my situation because of geography, they won't promise that it will work because it isn't designed to work that way. After talking with tech support I took the new bridge down and tried to use it face to face with the other one and found out that it was defective out of the box. I called tech support back -- taking the bridge down and driving to the other building took almost 45 minutes -- and they told me that they are going to replace the defective bridge and they transferred me to their RMA department."
Of course, before 3Com's RMA department would issue the replacement, the reader was required yet again to fax another copy of the packing slip to prove the defective bridge was brand new. "After I did that they told me that they'd try to get me the replacement the next day, but that they couldn't guarantee it," the reader wrote. "I pushed the gentleman on the phone and he said that they would make a 'best effort' to replace the expensive DOA product in one day but that he couldn't promise that they would replace it the next day."
The replacement bridge did arrive and I gather it is now functional. Increasing the reader's frustration throughout the ordeal was another communication problem. "I was told to register the bridge on 3Com's website three or four times by different people, and every time I told them that since I use a Macintosh I can't register it on line," the reader wrote. "Their website is designed so poorly that it won't allow a Macintosh user to register a brand new product there -- it won't allow a Linux user to register a product either."
3Com has struck out with this reader. "Strike one is the 90 day warranty for a $950 product which requires a second $950 purchase in order to work," the reader wrote. "Strike two was having to fax over the packing slip three different times in order to get a DOA product replaced. Strike three was them not promising to get me the replacement overnight. One of my major considerations when I select vendors is the quality of their tech support and 3Com's tech support policies have just lost them a customer forever. Having complained I have to say that everyone from 3Com was polite and professional. My complaint is with the policies and procedures that they have to follow, not them. If they had more freedom to take care of their customers they would be a great tech support team."
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