Harlock - Column for 7/11

Why Fry's Can Bite Me

Fry's Electronics pisses me off. I've long held a vague disliking of the store, but that has recently blossomed into full-fledged loathing. I've never liked their policy of having people stationed at the exits who demand to check your receipt against the contents of your bag. As far as I know, they don't have a right to do that, and the people performing the task are always on power trips. I usually stalk past them if possible, walking behind other people until the other people get captured. The last time I was in Fry's, I did exactly that and the bag checker acted like he would have shot me to stop me from leaving the store with an unchecked bag. Now, the guy was the kind of overweight, bald, sweaty, pig-faced, potato-shaped person that you normally do everything in your power to avoid having to speak to, and he was drunk with power.

"Hey, where's your receipt?" he said as I walked by.

"Right here," I said, holding it up and continuing to walk out.

His response was a very nasty "Have a nice life!", as if I was the one being rude by not allowing Mr. Potato Body to paw through the items that I had just purchased not twenty feet away. Why the hell can't Fry's just have the less-intrusive tag detector equipment?*

I briefly considered going back and lodging a complaint, but the value of doing that compared to the time it would have taken to find the potato's manager, and then deal with that person, who being another Fry's employee was likely to have been another potato, plus just having to deal with potato #1...well, it just didn't seem worth the effort. Fry's does have something approaching a website, but it's dedicated to answering questions about Fry's ISP (www.frys.com has very little to do with the Fry's Electronics retail stores."). The concept of Fry's running an ISP just boggles the mind. I have visions of peoples' modems bursting into flames due to the sheer incompetence contained at the other end.

And where they do talk about their stores (as here: "Fry's services the Hi-Tech Professional by focusing on our motto of always providing each customer with fast, friendly, and courteous service. Fry's has become the place where a technical customer can shop with confidence and comfort for the latest in technology products."), they lie. Look at that test from their site. First, they capitalize "Hi-Tech Professional" in the multiple places where it's used, which just emphasizes the fact that "Hi-Tech" sounds like the skills practiced by a WalMart greeter. Second, except in one case, I have never had fast, friendly, and/or courteous service at Fry's. Certainly not competent service. Comfort, I suppose, is legitimate; their stores are air-conditioned. But I've had to return enough components bought at Fry's to have zero confidence in any product that they carry that I don't already know a great deal about, and I would never, ever buy anything from Fry's that has one of the little "returned" stickers on it (which might as well say "non-operational").

So, hell with 'em. There's nothing I need at Fry's that I can't find at other stores. Best Buy stores, for instance, are now popping up in my area, and they're website actually relates to the products that they sell. Plus, their door staff only spring into action (at least so far as I've seen) when the tag detectors go off, which is a bit more reasonable.

I'd end this with a call to Fry's to improve their customer service, and sack their odious, potato-shaped door guardians (sack...potato...), but with them being a bunch of illiterate morons, I'm not holding out much hope.

*Probably because their employees are just too stupid to be expected to remember to swipe each product across a magnetic tag deactivation pad. No, I don't have any qualms about claiming that Fry's employees are, by and large, a bunch of drooling cretins. I've dealt with one person at Fry's who actually knew about the products in the department that they worked in (Appliances); as for the rest, I just don't understand how they manage to dress themselves in the morning, or find their way to work. I swear, I've seen Fry's employees at the checkout look confused when handed cash ("Og no know what green paper for."). I sincerely hope that that one clueful employee found a more rewarding job elsewhere. Of course, "jobs more rewarding than working at Fry's" includes "Roman galley slave", so that's not saying much.