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101 Comments
- Baloo, on 10/12/2007, -3/+78pure genius
- geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -1/+64"Or was it just a case of "it'll be easier for me to hassle this little small-business owner than the main/corporate Dell"?"
The Kiosks are owned by Dell, not "this small-business owner". If they were owned by "this small-business owner", he couldn't have served his papers there; papers have to be served /to the company/ or one of its owners or represenatives, but what is not specified is at what location within that company. That's what makes this tactic genius. Too bad it will only work once. - pauleric, on 10/12/2007, -0/+62A little googling shows what actually happened: they lost his laptop! For five months. And it took him 16 calls just to talk to a person in the US (not that foreigners are stupid, but they likely have no authority beyond routine stuff). As dfick says, definitely not frivolous.
- LordLucless, on 10/12/2007, -3/+54America: Where you have to sue to get customer service?
- RedbeardUH, on 10/12/2007, -4/+44That's awesome! I am generally against frivolous lawsuits but this is just great.
- rickcarson, on 10/12/2007, -1/+39The worker tried to notify his superiors, but apparently the only phone numbers they had were answered by people in India...
- solidcube, on 10/12/2007, -4/+33@duke:
1. Go to charm school
2. Read Dale Carnegie.
3. ?????
4. End up getting your point across without looking like an arrogant, sneering ass: Priceless. - Bhima, on 10/12/2007, -8/+33You know that old lady that sued McDonald's and won really was injured and they really did have a policy of serving the coffee really, really hot to hide the bad taste.
- Pyrogen, on 10/12/2007, -4/+23According to TFA, duke, it worked. He was given a summary judgement.
- davidlow, on 10/12/2007, -1/+20So was the case settled in court or out of court? And did the guy get $3K or some other amount?
1. "Dori winning a $3,000 default judgment"
2. "Dell has now settled the case out of court for undisclosed terms" - Baloo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15He didnt take advantage of the legal system...
he used it to good effect... and by serving on some poor moron in a kiosk was a touch of class...
These companies get away with murder and it is great to see the little man get a good win.... - UncleCrapper, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15How would Dell have won? THEY LOST THE CUSTOMER'S LAPTOP. Dell had pretty much told the customer to go screw themselves as they hadn't resolved the situation in five months. FIVE MONTHS. There is no way Dell would have won as they are completely in the wrong.
I've been to small claims court before and had papers served on a business. Because my business relationship was with the store and not their district office, I had the papers served at the actual store location where I bought the item at issue. Seemed logical to me. Corporate sent the DSM or whomever it was to deal with the problem in court and the judge never found fault with me server papers on the store. The story is sketchy on that detail and it may depend on the state in question as to the legality of serving papers at a retail location. If that is where the customer bought the laptop, well, I don't see a problem with that. - DrStephanHeimer, on 10/12/2007, -1/+13I wouldn't exactly call this frivolous, he was getting the shaft from Dell.
- rusty0101, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11As I read the article, both 1 and 2 are true. The court declared that Dell owed Dori $3000 by defaulting on appearing in court, and rather than going through the appeal process Dori settled with Dell for an undisclosed amount.
- Pyrogen, on 10/12/2007, -4/+15duke should learn to read about lawsuits before commenting on them. Especially the McDonalds one.
- teknotant, on 10/12/2007, -2/+13I don't know, if those poor schmucks didn't know to contact corporate about the situation they are just as responsible. Besides, they could just go work for geek squad now.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -15/+25So america should be loved based on the appalling customer service of a computer maker/retailer or the inadequacies of its legal system?
Sorry, but I just can't see the link, no matter how hard I try. - m3mn0n, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11What the hell do you mean more detailed? You see no real information on the 1st page and you need to register for the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th page.
Lame. Ad farm. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -7/+15another good reason why to Love America
- techie4life, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9I generally have have good customer service when i'm speaking to someone in America.
its when the call is routed to India that speaking with someone who just learned the language last month that makes support call infuriating.
That and the miles of voice menus that id rather use the touch tone version of because i have to repeat myself every third time and being on hold for an hour to be told they want $50 to tell me what wrong and then more to fix it when i know whats wrong. - waynejkruse10, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8He is certainly a smart one. Good work :)
- centicon, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8Here's the full text of the article without the ads
Mad as 'Dell hell' and not going to take it anymore
Sunday, December 03, 2006
BY KEVIN COUGHLIN
Star-Ledger Staff
This is a story for anyone who's ever languished on hold trying to reach a live human being from tech support.
It's a story for anyone who's finally gotten through, only to repeat the details, from the very beginning, again, to a distant person whose English is spotty.
It's a story for anyone who's been handed off more times than an old football, and been given more case ID numbers than a city homicide squad.
Pat Dori wants you to know he feels your pain. And you can fight back.
That's what the Hackensack businessman did when Dell Inc. lost his laptop computer, which he had sent for repairs in July.
Dori, 49, sued one of the world's biggest computer makers in small claims court.
There's a twist.
Fed up by what he described as a colossal runaround, and inspired by an old college textbook and an episode of "The People's Court," Dori found a way to make the Texas-based mail-order giant pay attention.
He had the legal papers served to a Dell kiosk -- a counter where blue-shirted Dell reps sell laptops and HDTVs -- in the Garden State Plaza mall in Paramus.
"If you try to speak to a human being on the phone, you're stuck on hold forever. I am sick of it! If they have kiosks, you can sue them, you can make their life miserable!" Dori said last week.
When court officers visited the kiosk in October to collect a $3,000 default judgment -- awarded to Dori after Dell failed to show in court -- the company turned to one of New Jersey's most high-powered law firms, Riker Danzig of Morristown. An appeal hearing is set for Dec. 14 in small claims court in Bergen County.
Dori said it's not about money anymore. Or even, really, about his lost computer. He contends Dell misled him about its shipping policy, and strung him along as he tried to sort things out.
He spent countless hours on the phone, mostly to call centers in India and the Philippines, he said. He spoke to Talia and Pravin. And Usha and Amy. And Mike and Renee, Sonny and Raj, Deepak and Brecca.
Dori said it took 16 calls and numerous disconnects to reach someone in the United States -- on "Michael Dell's Personal Escalation Team."
Dell spokesman Dwayne Cox said that while the Round Rock, Texas, company is "committed to providing an outstanding customer experience," corporate policy bars discussion of pending cases such as Dori's.
Cox said Dell is spending more than $150 million to revamp customer service and tech support, sore spots that have spurred countless online rants about "Dell hell."
"Our number one priority is to get better at problem resolution," declared a corporate blog Dell launched in July -- during the same week Dori's telephone odyssey began.
Dell's blog has conceded many customer service calls took more than 30 minutes to answer -- when the phone numbers worked at all. Readers of Computer Reports gave Dell's laptop support low marks in a recent survey.
Jeff Jarvis, who has blasted Dell on his blog BuzzMachine.com, said Dell is improving but has a long way to go. "To this day, if you go to my blog, you will see Dell comments -- responding to posts from a year ago," Jarvis said.
Dori's legal battle is about insurance.
When he first arranged to send his laptop to Dell for repairs, he says, he offered to personally insure the shipment for the full $2,000 price he paid for the machine in 1999. But he said a Dell representative assured him the full replacement value was covered, via an arrangement with Dell's shipper, DHL.
So, when the Inspiron laptop was lost and Dell offered only to replace it with a refurbished model -- backed by a skimpy 90-day warranty -- he was miffed.
"I don't want someone else's dirty computer," Dori said.
Dell even refused to sell him an extended warranty for the replacement unit. Dori recorded that telephone exchange.
"It's insane what they put you through. They grind you through until you're so fed up, you take what they give you. It's a meat grinder," said Dori, whose company sells advertising knick-knacks.
Weeks before his problems with Dell began, Dori saw a consumer win a similar insurance case, involving a wristwatch repair, on "The People's Court."
Dori got the idea to sue the Dell kiosk when he saw one while shopping.
He mistakenly thought targeting a local franchise was the only way to sue an out-of-state company in small claims court.
Even so, the ploy has practical advantages, said Robert Pitt of the state Administrative Office of the Courts.
"If you succeed in getting a judgment, at least there are some physical assets to go after to satisfy the judgment," Pitt explained. Court officers can seize and auction merchandise, and even padlock a kiosk or store, he said.
Seton Hall law professor Jon Romberg praised Dori's "creativity and tenacity," but said it will be tough beating Dell's legal team. Targeting the kiosk may not constitute proper notification of Dell, said Howard Erichson, another Seton Hall law professor.
"Even Goliath needs protection of due-process rights," said Erichson, adding that questions of legal jurisdiction "get hard with mail-order companies and, particularly, in cyberspace."
Paul Bland of the Trial Lawyers for Public Justice, in Washington, said many aggrieved consumers shy away from confrontation, or don't realize they can sue big companies and win.
"I say, hats off to this guy," Bland said of Dori. "He's gone way beyond what most consumers would do. It's a very effective way to send a message. Companies should get the point that they shouldn't treat consumers this way."
Dell tried to have the case tossed on a technicality, Dori said, by claiming he had gotten the company's name wrong in his suit. But he beat lawyers to the punch, amending his complaint to replace "Dell Computer" with "Dell Inc."
This isn't Dori's first trip to small claims court. Years ago, as a business student at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dori represented his father, an ironworker from Italy who spoke broken English, in a case over shoddy car repairs.
Dori said he won that one using "The Principles of Business Law," the same dog-eared college text guiding him now.
The Englewood resident beamed at the memory of his college triumph during an interview at his office last week. And, moments later, he roared when the postman delivered a special offer -- a discount coupon from Dell.
"Can you believe the irony?" Dori said. - nicktripp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7How do you know the kiosk employee(s) lost their job(s)? I didn't see that in the article anywhere.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7God I hate those voice activated menu system things. Do companies that use those things actually WANT to piss off their customers??
- bloobloo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8Is that legal in the US? In the UK every company has a registered office that must be used for service of papers, and this address must be shown everywhere the company does business.
- rheaume, on 10/12/2007, -13/+19junkmail02
No you see, he uses his computer for more than downloading his paychecks worth of itunes every month, cruising the Desperate Housewives forum and uhm, getting junkmail everyday, so an Apply just wont cut it. - Greatroarer, on 10/12/2007, -6/+12Well, I love this story till I realized the only people that really suffered was the poor schmucks working at that kiosk. Dell will go on, the disgruntled guy got some money, and whoever ran that Kiosk lost their jobs...goes to show the small potatoes are usually the losers in the big picture.
- pauleric, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7I think you're both right. IANAL, but it wasn't the right person to serve papers on. Still, it's small claims court, and you can get away with a lot in small claims court. Especially when the other side doesn't show up (even through no fault of their own). So, it's very believable.
- techie4life, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6@geminitojanus
Correction, the Kiosk was owned by a franchisee:
http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-10/1165131517175630.xml&coll=1&thispag
"He mistakenly thought targeting a local franchise was the only way to sue an out-of-state company in small claims court." - Baloo, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8uhhm obviously it is....
- purplegrog, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6IANAL, but I would say if the guy at the Kiosk lost his job, it would be because he did not notify someone in charge that he had been served with papers suing the company. Essentially, someone sat on their hands and didn't deliver the information correctly up through the proper channels.
- senormouse, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Good for Dori! The real harm to Dell (undisclosed settlement amount circa $3000 notwithstanding) is in the PR kick in the balls from having this story on or near Digg Page One. I was considering buying a Dell desktop. Now I think I'll just get a clone. Or a Mac...
- diggdugg42, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9No, it's usually not. I have a hard time believing that this article is accurate. Most corporations have a registered agent for acceptance of service in each jurisdiction where they do business. If you want to sue Wal-Mart you can't just walk up to any cashier in any Wal-mart, you have to serve process on the registered agent in the jurisdiction where you are filing suit.
- emblym, on 10/12/2007, -24/+29Or hate it.
- nazadus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5If you seriously think the McDonalds lawsuit was friv, then I'm going to respond with "what URL's did you get your information from?". If you respond with "slashdot community" or simply from comments from a website, you need to do your homework and stop looking like a lazy moron.
- Owange, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Pauleric, you're right. In all my dealings with Dell support (and there have been a few), the foreigners I've dealt with are certainly not stupid, but they ARE reading from a script. It's infuriating when they tell you a mechanical problem is a software one (when you know otherwise and it takes 14 calls to prove it to them). Once you hassle them enough, you get put through to their 2nd tier support and those folks (whether in the US, India, or wherever) generally know what they're talking about. Takes a bunch of grief to get to them though.
- nazadus, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5zip code: 77069
dob: 1938
sex: female
ads? what ads?
Firefox + adblock. - ModernGeek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5@djosch
I am not a lawyer, but I am almost certain you are wrong. They would have no solid justification for countersuing for a breach of contract, and as far as damages, you cannot ask to be reimbursed for legal fees/lawyer fees in a civil lawsuit. - underweargnome, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I just checked the small claims process for BC and Ontario. In both cases, you can personally serve the documents at any place of business OR mail the claims to the registered address. When serving the documents you must hand them to the person who appears to be in charge. If they refuse to accept them, you may drop them at their feet.
I think it is a great way to deal with these massive centralized legal departments.
If you do decide to do this, you must keep accurate records including time, date, the name of the person you served, whether they accepted the documents etc. That information will probably be useful if the other party does actually show up. Also, if the manager is "on his break" or "will be in tomorrow." that makes after-school-Eddie the man in charge.
To throw a question to the lawyers in the crowd: what are the limits: suppose you wanted to serve McDonalds or MS. Also, who runs those Sony stores? - ChildeRoland420, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4This is SMALL CLAIMS COURT. The guy didn't have or need a lawyer.
- amk29j, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4IANAL, BAABR. WTH CYTOA?!?! IFR!
Translation: I am not a laywer, but acronyms are becoming ridiculous. Why the hell can't you type out acronyms?!? It's ***** ridiculous!
I'm sorry, but there are so many acronyms that have I've only seen on digg.com. Just because you and your buddies know what they mean, doesn't mean the rest of the world does. it's not hard to type them out.
(You can digg me down now.) - videomeister, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@zbych
Oh man i love voice activated menus, usually all you have to say is "Customer Service" and it will recognize that and take you to a real person right away, or keep saying it and it will think you don't know how to use voice navigation and send you directly to a person after a few "I'm sorry, I didn't understand, could you repeat that"s anyways
always works - h0dg3s, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3verlynmerlyn above me is posting spam, don't bother going to the link, it has flowers and gay pr0n
- jhshukla, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4but if the worker saw papers, he should have notified his supervisor and so on up the chain.
- nazadus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3So, why didn't the dude at the kiosk hand over the papers to the dude above him?
I mean, their is a chain of command probably... - fasdfa, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2He did not sue a small business. It's not like he tried to sue HP and served the papers to CompUSA. He tried to sue Dell and served a Dell store. The Dell store is an extension of Dell.
When the Dell store was served, I'm sure the Dell store contacted Dell HQ. If the papers were improperly served, Dell HQ would have told the Dell store to show up in court and state so. But, instead they chose to ignore it and the plaintiff won by default.
It's all legit. The serving and the case. If serving of the papers were wrong, then why didn't the Dell store show up in court? If the case wasn't legit, why would Dell settle and admit they have done wrong? - diggdugg42, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5I think it's actually the judge that needs to be inept in this case. He never should have been awarded a default judgement without correct service of process. Dell was going to appeal this, and most likely would have won on appeal, but it looks like this was getting some play in the local newspapers so they probably figured it wasn't worth it.
- Brasky, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Maybe it was also an attempt at illustrating how inept their company is all the way to the top. If a little guy in the company gets those papers, shouldn't he be able to give them to his manager and the manager makes a call to legal and that should have been the end of it. But for whatever reason, that didn't happen and they screwed up a simple but rather important task. While the judge probably wouldn't like the method, I think he/she would understand this point and could definitely help with the case.
- itdood, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Service of process (letting the defendant know you are suing them) is geared to make sure the defendant finds out properly and is not abused. Every state is different but I do believe that it's commonly accepted that an officer of a company must be served the papers either by person or certified mail. Sometimes someone other than an officer of the company can be served but the procedures are rather intense and involves an officer knowing anyway. I think serving a mall Kiosk would hardly qualify as accepted Service of Process and instead would make the plaintiff look like they were trying to abuse the process, in the end it might even hurt their case.
- Gemini25RB, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I think, on the whole, Digg users already had a bad impression of Dell.
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