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From: mellon@mit-prep.ARPA (Ted Lemonmellon/.name)
Newsgroups: net.micro.pc
Subject: Re: Mail-order horror: PC Network.
Message-ID: <26@mit-prep.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 7-May-86 00:03:19 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-prep.26
Posted: Wed May  7 00:03:19 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 14-May-86 04:37:46 EDT
Organization: The MIT AI Lab, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 46


    I think that PC Network's problems are basically organizational.
    If they have a policy for something, such as your complaint, they
    can respond in a reasonable way.   If they don't have a policy for
    your problem, you're out of luck.   Let me describe my most recent
    encounted with them:

    In November of 1985, I ordered a ProDOS Assembler from them.   I
    was told that they had it in stock and would ship it immediately.
    When, in December, it still hadn't arrived, I called and asked
    what had happened.   They told me that they were out of stock, but
    would be shipping real soon.   When I got back from an extended
    Christmas vacation (1 week), I had a package from PC Network on my
    desk.   The package had arrived right after I left on vacation.
    Unfortunately, the package contained UNIX for the AT&T PC 7300, a
    $1k value.   I called them and asked to return it, and was given
    the run-around until I pointer out that I was about $950 ahead on
    the deal, and that we would both benefit by my returning the UNIX
    software.   At this point, I didn't want to wait any longer for
    the assembler, so I told them to cancel the order and send me a
    refund.   When they got the UNIX system back, they sent me a
    notice stating that they could not give me a full refund because I
    had not returned the product within 15 days.   They insisted on
    keeping a 20% restocking fee and a 20% evaluation fee.   I had
    several phone conversations with a person in customer service, all
    of which ended up with me talking to an answering machine.
    Leaving my name and number on the machine yielded no response.
    At this point, I sent a notice of dispute to American Express,
    whose charge card I had used to purchase the offending assembler.
    After about a month, I called PC Network to find out what was
    going on, and they told me that they had issued me a full credit
    several weeks before, which suggests that AmEx withheld payment.
    I don't think this problem stemmed from a desire to rip me off.
    Rather, I suspect that there just wasn't anyone there whose
    job it was to take responsibility for solving non-standard
    problems...

			       _MelloN_-- 
Ted Lemon
Project GNU of the Free Software Foundation

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