Reliability and Service: The Best Companies to Buy From

Will You Repeat That?

As with previous surveys, lots of readers gave us an earful about hard-to-understand tech reps. Dell customer Todd Garlick says that the few times he has phoned Dell for help with his son's Inspiron 1150 laptop, the support reps were "friendly and knowledgeable" but hard to communicate with. "I've had fouled-up orders on replacement parts. I've had to call back two or three times because I couldn't understand what the reps were saying," says Garlick, a dental technician in Boise, Idaho. "I probably won't buy a Dell again" because of such problems, he adds.

The accent issue is a sensitive topic for vendors, who invariably offer vague, carefully worded statements about how they're training tech reps to communicate better with callers. Some companies have responded by returning support centers to North America. For instance, Gateway, which bought eMachines in 2004, decided last year to use only U.S.-based support for many of its products, including desktops and notebooks. Toshiba reports that 80 percent of its North American support calls are handled by its Toronto center.

Both HP and Sony have call centers worldwide, although neither vendor lists specific locations. Smaller vendors have gone international, too. For example, Alienware, which makes high-end gaming PCs, has support operations in both Ireland and the United States. Peripheral makers, for the most part, keep support near the States. Printer companies Brother and Xerox, for instance, have call centers in Canada. (Brother also has a U.S. center.) And both PC maker Shuttle and digital camera vendor Vivitar have United States-based technical support reps.

Interestingly, an accented rep may be closer to home than you think. Toshiba's Toronto call center, for example, is in an area with a large Indian population, many of whom work for Toshiba. "People think our call center is in India because of the ethnic sound of a rep's voice, but it's in Canada," says David Norris, Toshiba vice president of service and support. Among Toshiba laptop owners who took our survey, 63 percent said their support reps spoke clearly and intelligibly, on a par with ratings from all survey respondents.

Accents aside, 67 percent of PC respondents reported that the information they received from a phone-based support rep was relevant and 56 percent said that the information solved their issue. Vendors consistently claim that they're always improving their techs' knowledge and training. Some also recognize the changing needs of their users and expand their support to cover new areas. HP, for one, is tackling increasing questions on connectivity with a new Wireless Solution Center lab. The lab is filled with different kinds of products, including routers and PCs, with which agents can re-create the problems that users experience. After correcting a customer's problem, an agent can then send out information on the fix to the rest of the support staff.

Dell's Tarnished Halo

Dell customers were particularly vocal this year about reps with thick accents: 43 percent of Dell desktop and notebook owners reported that the rep they talked to did not speak clearly and intelligibly, compared with an average of 34 percent for the whole survey group. Online forums, blogs, and other sites, including BuzzMachine, are gripe fests for the Dell disgruntled.

JoAn Easton Marchese, a mother of six in Kissimmee, Florida, has bought plenty of Dell PCs over the years for her family. But her frustrations with Dell's tech support may soon end her loyalty. "I get ticked off when I talk to people who don't understand me," says Marchese, who recently phoned Dell support because her Dimension desktop kept crashing. Much like Todd Garlick, she reports that during one call "the guy couldn't understand two words I was saying." She had better luck with a follow-up call: "I got a rep who was very good. She was from India and spoke good English."

Dell acknowledges such complaints but maintains that foreign accents don't necessarily translate into poor service. "If a customer can't understand a rep for whatever reason--whether it's an accent or telephony or solar flare--there's potential for a poor satisfaction rating," says Dell support chief Steve Young.

He notes that one of Dell's support centers in India has the "highest level of customer satisfaction," according to the vendor's internal customer surveys. Dell remains bullish on international support, having added four new call centers last year in Canada, El Salvador, India, and the United States. In addition, the company is establishing support teams to handle the growing PC security threats of spyware and viruses, Young says.