Bad Day AT Best Buy (1 Viewer)

[billyzuko57]

Had the worst day at BB today. Went there early Tuesday morning to get Magical Mystery Tour and Little Shop Of Horrors on Blu-Ray. First I had to walk around the store to find them, found MMT in the music CD section(!?) , but I couldn't find LSOH . Then a lady came over and asked if I needed help finding something and I told her what I was looking for and she walked all over looking for it, then she went in the back and came over to tell me that BB will not be carrying LSOH in their stores, only online. Well, I asked her who's decision this was, and she said that it was Corporate's Decision and that she couldn't do anything about it. I went on to tell her this didn't make any sense and she told me to call BB Customer Service # and complain to them. Does anyone know why BB is not selling LSOH in their stores? Then I went over to Customer Service(?) to trade in the DVD I brought from home for my $5 coupon to use to pay for MMT. I also had two BB Reward coupons for $5 each. Well after waiting in line for the one CS person, who seemed to be doing double duty, he had on a Geek Squad shirt, I finally got waited on. Before I turned in my DVD for the exchange, I made sure that I could use all three of my coupons and he said I could. But after he rang it up I noticed that the DVD exchange coupon wasn't taken off, so I had to get back in line and wait even longer because there was even more people this time. Well, he had to call someone else for help and they finally got it sorted out and I got back my $5. I just wanted to let everyone know, if you do the DVD exchange for the $5 coupon, double check BEFORE you get out of line! Also, I wanted to know which is better to order online from; Amazon.com has Little Shop Of Horrors for $23.99, and so does Walmart.com's Site To Store. Which one is better to use? I'm new at ordering online, I prefer to buy from a store. Thanks for the help!

 

[Colby]

My Best Buy didn't have Little Shop of Horrors or the two Hitchcock titles today.

 

[Carlo_M]

Best Buy has been doing less stocking of non-A-list big seller titles over the last few years. They were never great at stocking a comprehensive catalog, but they're getting worse now. We love LSoH and Hitch, but there is no way those titles will sell as many copies as Prometheus, Transformers, etc. So they won't get the shelf space in a BB (and the shelf space they have for media is shrinking overall).
Don't get me started on the "blue shirts" or whatever they're called. I found out after the fact that not all BB employees are equal. They hire people who only stock or remove items, but not actually perform customer service or even have any idea of the store layout or customer service procedures. A few weeks ago I saw two stocking items and asked about a second-tier new release that I knew they had because the online site said they had it in stock. I didn't realize that these two were just stockers because neither showed any interest in looking for my item. So I flat out asked "should I just get it from Amazon?" and one of them just said "yeah I would."
Luckily on my way out I ran into a "yellow shirt" supervisor type and reported the two. He said he'd take action immediately on those two, and also looked up my title and fetched a copy out of the back.

 

[daddymention]

Best Buy doesn't even stock the movies and music. It is run by a third party, Anderson Merchandisers...they come in and do the displays, stock, and price the merchandise. That's why BB employees know nothing. They don't have to deal with anything in that department. I've learned a long time ago that it's worthless to ask a BB employee anything.

 

[schan1269]

Best Buy doesn't even stock the movies and music. It is run by a third party, Anderson Merchandisers...they come in and do the displays, stock, and price the merchandise. That's why BB employees know nothing. They don't have to deal with anything in that department. I've learned a long time ago that it's worthless to ask a BB employee anything.

Learned that myself ages ago wondering why BB didn't have a separate area for SACD/DVD-A.
After having to convince 3 separate employees that "such formats even existed"...
I went and found a NIN disc that was hybrid. If stores would separate the "standard CD" from the HiRes, Hi Res might actually sell...

 

[MarkA]

I've had trouble with the Upgrade and Save and movies ringing up for the sticker price almost EVERY time I've gone into Best Buy. My last visit I checked the receipt before I left (as I always do) and found out one of my Blu-rays rang up for $24.99 instead of $9.99. They fixed it and I left. I was half way home when I checked the receipt and found that my Upgrade and Save coupon didn't register and I had to drive all the way back. Once they've done an adjustment to a price the coupon doesn't work. I knew something was wrong. I told them that every time I buy something I have to go to customer service to have it corrected. The sales manager asked how long this has been going on. I said about 6 months and he said that a third party was in charge of the movies for about that length of time. I'm a premier my rewards member and this is getting ridiculous!

 

[Carlo_M]

Huh interesting about Anderson merch doing DVDs. I'm betting it was the Anderson guys who were loathe/unwilling to help me (I think they actually had black shirts on) and it was an actual BB employee who did help me. For sure they were the guys (actually one girl and one guy) who were doing the actual stocking of DVDs, which is why I at first thought they could help me.
To avoid a further black eye, BB need to train those Anderson slouches to refer product questions to regular BB employees or supervisors who are willing to help, instead of just saying "yeah you should buy it from Amazon".

 

[Todd Erwin]

IMHO, it is Anderson that is causing most of the headaches at BB regarding catalog releases. Although, they may have been put on notice after the Jaws debacle, since my local BB had plenty of copies of ET, both digibook and standard retail packaging.

When I was doing installs as part of the Geek Squad team last year, it was really frustrating when the Anderson employees wouldn't show up until after 9am on Tuesdays to put the new titles out on display, which meant we couldn't stock our van with new Blu-ray releases until Wednesday, since we had to roll out at 8am.

 

[Carlo_M]

Interesting - I've also noticed that on New Release Tuesdays, non "A-List" new releases were often not available when the Best Buy opened at 10AM. When the situation I noted above happened I think I was in the store closer to noon.
Meanwhile a City Target just opened up nearby, and while I wouldn't expect them to have early-morning stock (since electronics is just one small part of their business model), they actually had all new titles I was looking for stocked when I went there last Tuesday at 8AM . Now that's customer service. If price is the same, I'm going to City Target from now on!

 

[Malcolm R]

Best Buy doesn't even stock the movies and music. It is run by a third party, Anderson Merchandisers...they come in and do the displays, stock, and price the merchandise. That's why BB employees know nothing. They don't have to deal with anything in that department. I've learned a long time ago that it's worthless to ask a BB employee anything.

This, then, makes me wonder why anytime I'm browsing in the movie section, I'm continually harassed by blue shirts asking, "Can I help you?" or "Can I help you find anything?"
This is a general peeve of mine at most any retail store. You cannot simply walk in and browse anymore. No sooner do you walk though the door than you're accosted by someone who thinks you need "help." There is a difference between good customer service and unsolicited harassment.

 

[schan1269]

Last time I was in BB actually buying something, which was a router(the Netgear WNDR4500) I actually said, loud enough for "quite a few of them to hear me"...
"Get the 'F' away from me, I know more about this 'S' than you do...but when I get to printers I'll have a couple of questions"...
The question(s) I had about printers...
1. Is there one that can accept more than 1 network at a time(nobody knew...)
2. Is there one that has a DLNA interface to "direct print"* from a scrolling picture frame (that one is a feature that I apparently thought would be out by now)
*The Panasonic network TV(because it is DLNA) can see the printer. I've had people want pictures, printed out or sent to their phone, that appeared on the TV. I "thought" there might be an interface to "pause the TV, and print/send". Apparently that ability isn't out there...yet.

 

[Carlo_M]

This, then, makes me wonder why anytime I'm browsing in the movie section, I'm continually harassed by blue shirts asking, "Can I help you?" or "Can I help you find anything?"
This is a general peeve of mine at most any retail store. You cannot simply walk in and browse anymore. No sooner do you walk though the door than you're accosted by someone who thinks you need "help." There is a difference between good customer service and unsolicited harassment.

Haha, this is 180 degrees opposite from my local store experience. As I noted earlier, when I'm looking for new releases, they're often not out there and finding customer service to help you is extremely difficult. All of the blue shirts are deployed at more "revenue generating" stations like cell phones and when you ask them for help they say "not my department look for someone in a blue shirt in that area" and there are none.
When I did find shelf stockers, they were in black shirts, clearly now from Anderson (I didn't know that then) and I received extremely poor service from them.

 

[BobO'Link]

...Also, I wanted to know which is better to order online from; Amazon.com has Little Shop Of Horrors for $23.99, and so does Walmart.com's Site To Store. Which one is better to use? I'm new at ordering online, I prefer to buy from a store. Thanks for the help!

IMHO Amazon is better simply because you *don't* have to buy from a store. Quick purchase and it's sent to your house. No driving or hassling with CS/Checkout and, depending on your location, no sales tax.
But as you indicated you prefer to buy from a store than I'd have to say WM Site-to-Store. Just be aware that it can be a pain as the pickup location is in the back where they do layaway. You will often be waiting several minutes for someone to show up and help you after which it can take several minutes for them to actually locate your purchase in the back storage. This is assuming the person who shows up actually does the site-to-store process. I've had a few times when the associate who shows up knows nothing about it and has to hunt down the person who does. I only use that when the item is significantly less expensive via WM or I'm not 100% sure I really want it. Returns are easy as they're treated just like something that was purchased off the shelf.
Shipping speed? Amazon wins hands down. Most WM orders take 2 weeks to arrive.