• Best Buy took my hard drive out of my laptop, without permission, and wouldn’t give it back.  They claimed it failed a stress test.
• I took Best Buy to court, the judge made them return my hard drive.

Now, the update:  the hard drive they claimed did not work, works fine.  However, my touchpad no longer works.  It seems that when they put in a new motherboard, they forgot to hook the touchpad up again. I could take it back, but letting the Geek Squad touch my computer again seems like a bad idea.

• Best Buy pulled a perfectly functional hard drive out of my laptop, without ever mentioning it to me.
• They returned my laptop, without bothering to put an operating system on the new drive.  Or mentioning that they had taken the old one out.
• Inexplicably, they then refused to return my old hard drive, with all my stuff.  The store manager was unable to see the difference between a full hard drive and a car battery.  I don’t think he knows much about computers.
• The judge in small claims court managed to clarify the concept of property law to the clueless Best Buy people.

I had most of my paperwork done, and the woman was very helpful, and now I have a court date.  My major goal is that, somehow, Best Buy will learn something.  Like, my hard drive is important to me.  It’s my property.  You can’t just take it.  My fear is that, even if they lose, they won’t learn.

We also work hard to immediately fix problems that put our
customers at risk. For example, in calendar 2006, we learned
that the hard drives of several customers’ computers were not
destroyed, as promised, but instead resold. These hard drives
contained sensitive information belonging to their original owners.
We jeopardized the trust of those customers – something we
regret. However, the incidents led to a comprehensive audit of
how we handle customer computers and hard drives. Today,
whenever possible, we return upgraded or replaced storage
devices – like computers and hard drives – directly to our
customers, giving them the maximum amount of control over
their personal data.

This is from the Best Buy Co., Inc. – 2007 Corporate Social Responsibility Report 

I’m kind of looking forward to it.  Not in a “gotcha” kind of way, but in the way I looked forward to Grand Jury duty.  I’ll get to see one more part of the American landscape.  Not a pleasant, pretty part of the picture, but something that is there, that is part of how we live, and something that I feel I should know more about.

Add another $54 to money I spent somewhere other than Best Buy because of this: A copy of Unreal Tournament III, and a WoW playing guide.

I would also list people who I’ve discouraged from using Best Buy with my story, except that everyone I talk to says they have already learned not to trust the Geek Squad.

“I can give you their number,” she says.  I wait.  Then she asks which store.  I tell her: Pentagon City.  “Is that spelled Penti?”  No, I spell it out.  She can’t find it.  I go online, look up the store locator, find the store, and give her the zip so she can find it herself.  She thanks me for the info and hangs up.  Anything I can do help the Geek Squad educate employees.

I call the store.  “Sure, it’s ready.”

I ask what’s been done to it.  They have to call me back.

A few minutes later, I get a call.  Turns out nothing has been done.  Well, they tried to find an operating system, but failed.  So they hoped I would just come pick it up and be happy?