PC Repair Rip-Off!

People have been grousing about how much it costs to fix their PCs since the first Altair rolled out of a storefront in Albuquerque, New Mexico, more than 20 years ago. Misleading estimates, rude and occasionally dishonest technicians, and big repair bills seem to be alarmingly typical these days. But are the horror stories just isolated cases?

To find out, PC World conducted a detailed investigation of service stores. Posing as unsophisticated customers, PC World reporters in six cities tested 20 branches of four giant computer chains. After reading this article, you'll never view computer service the same way again.

Best Buy, CompUSA, Computer City, and RadioShack all have bold slogans: "You Have Questions, We Have Answers," trumpets RadioShack. "World Class Customer Service," boasts Computer City. The others are similarly self-assured. Do they live up to their billing? The answer affects a lot of you: These four chains are the biggest companies that repair a wide range of major-brand PCs. Each of them has a strong national presence, repairs computers not purchased in its own stores, and advertises widely. In short, each represents a primary choice for most consumers. According to the trade magazine Computer Retail Week, these chains collectively account for more than one-third of the $29 billion earned last year by the top 100 computer retailers.

And the big four provided a far greater percentage of repair services because many of the top retailers are direct-mail companies (such as Micro Warehouse) or discount houses (such as Costco) that do not repair the machines they sell.

That turns out to be bad news for consumers. Take RadioShack. In our tests, it properly fixed only two PCs in five tries; one store took 25 days to complete work and even then didn't detect the source of the problem. Because RadioShack offers no phone support--for free or fee--perhaps it should change its slogan to the more apt "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

Unfortunately, RadioShack's dismal performance was far from unique. Stores from every chain wanted to sell us a new hard drive or motherboard (or both) to fix a problem caused by a faulty $7 cable. The common urge to prescribe costly, unneeded parts suggests that naive consumers pay dearly at thousands of stores across the country every day. And few ever realize that they are wasting their money.

Service isn't much good unless your computer gets fixed. But the fix itself is only part of good service. We evaluated five stores from each major chain based on a combination of the key factors in the consumer experience--accuracy, quality, cost, efficiency, and helpfulness.