Windows

My Home Office Depot Problem

Posted by on Jan 22, 2007 | 24 Comments

It’s bad enough I’m still migrating my life from Windows XP to Windows Vista… it’s bad enough I’m still migrating my data from Outlook 2000 to Outlook 2007… I’ve gotta fight with Office Depot, too? You might remember a few weeks ago, I was trying to figure out what kind of furniture I’d need for my home office. I walked into a local store, drew them a picture of my room (with dimensions), then placed an order for seemingly appropriate furniture. So, here’s where I stand today:

  • Had to refuse three single bookcases and a storage cabinet. Wouldn’t fit in the room.
  • Asked for 2 “Demi” bookcases, and 2 Corner Bookcases were delivered and assembled instead. Must be returned, as they’re also too large for my office.
  • Configured primary area incorrectly; two 71″ desks are fine, though used in different ways.
  • Keyboard shelf was delivered but not assembled.
  • The hutch was brought on the truck, but not delivered.
  • The Right L-bow Desk was brought on the truck but also not delivered – would not have fit. Plus, it should have been a Right Corner module in the first place. Using one 71″ in its place.
  • Opted for Premium installation for everything, which according to printed documentation, would mean that the furniture would come fully assembled – and it was not.
  • Need to place the order for a 48″ Return Bridge, as this was what I thought I was getting in the second 71″ desk.
  • In new configuration, an additional 71″ hutch needs to be ordered.

And if you think you’re confused, imagine the chaos here. I’ve had to move the gigantic corner bookcases into the hallway for the time being. I’ve been on the phone with Office Depot, and they tell me that this whole mess will be straightened out. How’s a geek supposed to operate if his fortress of solitude is in a shambles?

[tags]office, home office, office depot, office furniture[/tags]

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  • Denis DellaLoggia

    Ahha, I may be enlisting another boycotter.
    I myself refuse to shop at either Home Depot or Office Depot.
    Home Depot has refused to honor a $250 warranty plan I opted for
    from them on a lawn tractor at the time of sale. They say their only authorized repair shop here in Wilmington, DE is one that refuses to honor their warranties, because they fail to pay the repair shop. The repair shop says I would never get my tractor back without the money.. It sits in the shed now for 18 months.
    Office Depot REFUSED to CANCEL an order for some tech products I intended to install for a client. I do some VAR/repair work.
    Initially, the website said the components were instock and the order was being shipped. Instead I receiving the items the next day, I got an email stating that the components were out-of-stock and would take 2+ weeks to arrive. I had ordered them for next-day delivery. I immediately tried to cancel the order. The website would not let me. I contacted supervisors by phone and they said the order COULD NOT BE CANCELLED. I ate the loss.
    Time is precious to me, otherwise I’d sue both their asses.
    And the CEO just made off with the second largest severance pay ever—over $230 million.
    What, do I hate them?
    Enough to drive an extra 11 miles to shop at Lowe’s.

  • Jeff Brown

    I suggest you return all of what was delivered, get a refund, and go to another store to pick out what you want.

    If your sale ticket has on it what you ordered and paid for, then they messed up and should give you a refund.

    Jeff

  • Dale May

    Dear Chris,
    I feel your pain!
    My experience was with Staples. I bought a dest for my wife and the installation (me) went wrong. I messed up the installation bad.
    Dale

  • MS2BU

    Chris, did u try asking in Spanish? Just wondering because we all had to learn ‘indian-ese’ to get tech help and construction is now spoken in Mexican. FYI, Home Depot just announced that all signage would also be printed in Mexican… err Spanish.

    You could ask an immigration officer for some help; they’re bi-lingual and easy to find. They will be at Home Depot after they finish rounding up illegals at meat packing plants and pizza joints that take pesos.

    Sorry about your HD experience; only thing that helps pre-sale is to use your cell phone to call the contractor desk and in a gruff voice say, “Pasillo viente uno mucho caca. Por favor, rapido. Me estoy ahogando.” Ask the cleanup person that comes to clean it up for help.

  • Connie Devine

    Hi Chris,
    I am sorry you are having all of these problems with Office Depot. The problems with their furniture began when they absorbed “Furniture at Work”. This was part of Office Depot, but a seperate store. It only dealt with furniture and accessories. The people that worked for these outlets were very qualified in the products they were selling. My housemate worked for them and it is how I purchased all of my office furniture.
    Not onl does the furniture “work” here in my new place in NC, but it was moved into two different homes in CA and adapted each time.
    Unfortunately the same people that sell you printer paper at Office Depot are now also selling the furniture.
    I recommend that no matter how much of a hassle that you stay on their *** until you get exactly what you wanted.
    Good Luck my friend
    Connie

  • Phillip Brackman

    “My Home Office Deopt Problem,” do you use spell check?

  • John M Miesionczek

    My Home Office Deopt Problem – Check Your Spelling

    This reminds me of when I ordered a Solid Oak Desk with a Hutch & Bookcase. I ordered according to the specs but when I it was delivered I was only able to get it into my living room instead of my office. I had to either remove the complete door & frame in order to get it to fit in or Remove the Solid Oak top (Not Easy as I had to Remove some supports & a shelf, Screws etc. and it was a little heavy for 1 person. It took 3 Men to Deliver it. This Desk is huge 72″ Long and 72″ high with the Hutch but it was something that I wanted to get for a long time. I’ve had other desks but they were not real wood so they did not last long enough. I’m sure you will get your office set up the way you want it. Office Depot sure has problems. Goo Luck on Your Journey,
    John

  • Jim Reuter

    Good luck with Office Depot. They have the worst delivery service and customer service on the planet. It took us about three weeks, dozens of phone calls, and 7 or so delivery attempts to get our order filled. We had measured everything ourselves, so there was no problem with fit, we just could not get all the stuff we ordered delivered.

    The only good news is that every time something went wrong, we called and complained and got the price reduced. I think we ended up paying about half price.

  • http://tomawesome.blogspot.com tomawesome

    I like your freudian typo: “deopt” seems quite appropo

  • http://? Courtenay Smith

    Glad to read that the departing CEO earned his severance package. It should be payed by local owner stores. It appears that one no longer gets what one pays for. C

  • Buck

    Sounds like you need to get a tape measure and some graph paper, measure your floor/room, and then create a layout of your space. Then you can see what will fit and what won’t – before you go and buy anything. While the intraocular test (using your eyeballs) can sometimes be trusted, in matters like this it needs to be supplemented by hard numbers.

  • Joe Lane

    Shame on you!

    Not Deopt but Depot!

  • BILL MacGregor

    Hi again Chris,

    I wont bother LOLing at you VISTA problems, like I said before If you Love Spyware and Have The Fast processor and the 2 to 4G`s of Ram Use Vista.
    M$ says vista will stop spyware, the only problem is everything you do on your computer will be sent to M$ and others every hour. Vista is the Spyware I am talking about.

    On to more important things:

    If Vista will let you install Seamonkey Your Outlook Problems will go away!

    Hey Chris,
    Us Old Farts that new the Kids that wanted to rip a part Mozilla and try to write 3 programs would end up with huge security problems, Have Been Back For A While With
    SEAMONKEY

    [firefox has about 12 holes for every 1 that Mozilla/Seamonkey does] Mozilla patches are always available with in 24 to 48 hours!! Have Fun with M$ and IE 7.0. Try uninstalling it, LOL.

    The SeaMonkey Project

    http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/

    The SeaMonkey project is a community effort to deliver production-quality releases of code derived from the application formerly known as “Mozilla Application Suite”. Whereas the main focus of the Mozilla Foundation is on Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Thunderbird, our group of dedicated volunteers works to ensure that you can have “everything but the kitchen sink” — and have it stable enough for corporate use.

    Dont forget Mozilla/Seamonkey has around 800 plugins / extentions TOO.

    The First to get is
    NOSCRIPT
    https://addons.mozilla.org/mozilla/722/

    http://spellbound.sourceforge.net/
    SpellBound 0.7.3
    Spellchecker for Firefox and the Mozilla Suite

    I SEE THAT Brandon Watts IS ADVERTIZING
    JOTT LOL WAIST OF TIME TRY THESE SITES

    http://webdesigns.ms11.net/chromeditp.html

    SeaNotes 2.6.1 SeaNotes
    For SeaMonkey 1.0 – 1.5
    Inspired by “QuickNote”, I built this to MY needs in a notepad. Features below:
    Choose to always “Open In A Tab” through a checkbox in the options window.
    Or… Open in a floating window with left click, in a tab with a middle click.
    Upgraded to ten tabs, start with Note 1 – 6 with the ability to add notes 7 – 10.
    Available buttons on each note… “Save”, “Save As…” and a “Clear” button.
    The “Options” button is on the first note only. Right click on other notes for access.
    For *spell check, open SeaNotes in a tab. Copy & paste to “Save” off the web.
    Opens from the “Tools” menu or supplied toolbar button.
    There is also a keyboard shortcut – Ctrl+F8 – to open SeaNotes.

    AND

    http://www.softpedia.com/get/Office-tools/Other-Office-Tools/Stickies.shtml

    Stickies 6.0a

    Here are some key features of “Stickies”:

    · Once on screen, stickies will remain where placed until closed, even through reboots
    · Stickies appearance can be customised; fonts, colours and buttons may be changed, and styles saved. Stickies can be resized.
    · Stickies can snap to each others edges to keep them lined up
    · Stickies can be transferred from one machine to another either over a TCP/IP network connection, or by using an SMTP mail server or MAPI client:

    ——————-

    If this link does not give you enough spell checling you need help, LOL

    https://addons.mozilla.org/search.php?q=Spell+Check&app=mozilla

    https://addons.mozilla.org/mozilla/1449/

    This should tell you IE Is DooDoo

    Xinha Here!

    Xinha Here! 0.10.0, by Hypercubed, released on Oct 16, 2006

    Portable WYSIWYG editor! No matter what site you’re visiting you can launch a WYSIWYG right in your browser.

    Have FUN

    BILL MacGregor

    Ps
    Everything above is FREEEEEEEEEEEEEE

  • http://n/a Tom S.

    I was redoing my kitchen and ordered all new applinances from a local store. I gave them all the necessary dimensions of where the refrigerator would go and ordered one of the appropriate size, style and which side the door would open on.

    Well after delivery of 6, repeat SIX, refrigerators I finally got what I wanted. Either they were to wide, to tall, wrong make, wrong model and with the door opening on the wrong side.

    DUH!! Its only a refrigerator. Whats not to understand? And you wonder why we are fast becoming a 3rd world economy?

  • Carl O. Borr

    Ya gotta wonder how Home Depot and Office Depot stay in business. I’ve stopped dealing with either one for several years because of experiences similar to your current dilemna.

    Sometimes it seems that they don’t know how to do anything but shoot themselves in the foot.

  • jeff

    Ah yes, you’ve run up against the Retail Idiot Problem. Unfortunately it’s not specific to one store. It’s the culmination of YEARS of bean counters hiring the lowest common denominator to stand in the general vicinity of cash registers.

    Had you gone to a competitor, they would’ve screwed up the entire shebang also; just in a slightly different manner.

    Just to brighten your day, it’s only getting worse over the years.
    Yet another reason not to go anywhere near a fast food restaurant.

    [insert wayback music] My grandmother used to tell me stories about going to a major department store in downtown Philly. The salespeople knew her name, greeted her personally, hovered around, carried things, were ridiculously helpful, and when it was all over, they asked if she wanted it delivered. She simply signed and left the store.

    In any case, I wish you luck in your furnituring efforts.

    -jeff

  • http://wp3.lockergnome.com/nexus/chrisshort/ oaf357

    I got some great words of advice from a very, very wise man while I was in Honduras dealing with a severe shoulder injury, “Drink heavily.”

    Seems to be good advice here too.

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  • Allen Webb

    Nice article. But you need to be a bit more careful — even as a geek.

    The least you could do would be to be certain that the name of your article is CORRECTLY SPELLED. An error in the title completely destroys the credibility of even the best of news items — and even pushes that of its author!

  • Reinier

    I hear you man. I recently installed laminate flooring in my office. To protect the floor a bit more I ordered a clear chair mat from staples that fits nicely in my office where I move my chair a lot. I had to order it sine the stores dont’ carry it.
    Yesterday I came home and noticed the mat was at my front door. When I Walked up to grab it I noticed;
    there was no packaging. IT was just the mat. As a result the mat was completely scratched up, very dirty (mud?) and they had stuck a sticker on it that for the life of me I couldn’t peel off of it. Didn’t want to use goof off since it will probably eat awat the mat and make it look like cr*p even more. IT almost seemed like they picked it out of the trash and dumped it at my door. I called Staples to pick the garbage up. They promised to bring a new one, and package it up. We will see !

  • Cazy

    I would feel sorry for your Office Depot experience had you been able to spell Depot correctly but I think maybe that is but an indication of your ability to order things correctly when you can’t even spell correctly.

  • terri

    check your spelling

    My Home Office Deopt Problem

  • http://woodworking-books.org Best Woodworking Plans

    The Right L-bow Desk was brought on the truck but also not delivered.