Occasionally I look at Hot Deals Club for nifty stuff that's way cheap. The best things are those that are free after rebates. As long as you're careful about sending all the forms it can be great to get something for nothing.
So the other day I noticed CompUSA had a bunch of networking stuff free after store and manufacturer rebates. They were all available at a store in Portland I was going to be driving near, so I had them put them all on hold.
When I got to the store the customer service drones told me that in fact my stuff hadn't been set aside. So one of them ran off to try and find the items. He returned after a while and started having these secretive whispered conversations with his coworker.
Finally he came over to me and said that the computer had told me it had items they actually didn't have in stock.
He could have left it at that, and me being non-argumentative probably would have left without a fuss, despite having gone somewhat out of my way to pick them up.
But he offered up replacements for the two items they didn't have. I told him that wouldn't do me any good since the rebates were for specific items; not the ones he was giving me.
Then he told me that since it was their fault the store was going to match the rebates for me.
"So you're just giving them too me for free?" I asked. Yes indeedy. No fussing with annoying rebate forms. So I got a USB wireless adapter and a PCI wireless adapter handed to me, along with the wireless router I had rebates for.
So score one for CompuUSA's customer service. They were great in this time of shitty customer service.
