solarbird | Don't order appliances from Best Buy

So the washing machine at murksouth died for the third time two and a half weeks ago, which means it's time to order a new one. And that's fair enough, the broken one is a bit old at this point, and well past the "repair this/replace this" border as described by Consumer Reports, and all that.

I shopped around a bit and ended up ordering from Best Buy, for delivery last Wednesday, which was the soonest their online form would give me. Wednesday came and it didn't happen; I found email in my junk folder saying "we've cancelled your delivery, call to reschedule." An hour-fifteen or so later, I was finally off the phone with some idea of why delivery had been revoked - their computer system had somehow managed not to include sales tax, which put a stop on the order - and got delivery rescheduled for this Wednesday.

This morning I got mail saying they'd cancelled delivery AGAIN, and to call their support number to reschedule AGAIN, and when I did, after 15 minutes on hold, the person I got didn't know anything, couldn't tell me anything, couldn't transfer me to someone who would, and wouldn't take my case number from last time to see whether there was any relationship. The closest she could give me to an answer is that somehow the delivery date was "too close to" the order date, which is pretty laughable even if you consider it to have been ordered last week, because week-later delivery is not exactly a rush job.

And all she'd do was re-dispatch it for delivery to some delivery agent who would eventually send me email. Supposedly. Not being interested in playing this game a third time in order to still have no washing machine, I told them to cancel the order and refund my money.

So, 35 minutes on the phone later, it's no washer last week, no washer today, no washer tomorrow, and no idea why not. I'll be talking to Sears and Home Depot in a few minutes - they're not great, but they've managed to deliver appliances on time in the past with pleasant regularity. The moral of the story: don't order appliances for delivery from Best Buy. So noted.

eta: Oh, I think I get it.

I think I ordered last year's model and they don't actually have it anymore. And instead of saying that they were jerking me around because the replacement model costs more. Because finding the model I ordered isn't happening, but finding the new model ($50 more) is easy.

Fuckers.