Microsoft Store Customer Support Is Awful

79482 hours 58 minutes 17 seconds. This is the amount of time I have now waited for the Microsoft Store to contact me regarding the $2600 order I placed on their online store. The one in which there are recorded chat logs of their service representatives unequivocally lying to me, several times, resulting in my purchase being cancelled and then delayed by several months.  I have read many stories online where others are having the same issues. This is status quo for the Microsoft Store.

In dealing with their antics, I had multiple service representatives tell me they would “personally” be contacting me with information and solutions to the errors they had made. Last I heard, my issue had been “escalated to a higher department” and they would be contacting me within 24 hours. The timer at the top of this page is how long I have now waited, patiently.

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The long story.

I excitedly preordered the new Surface Book laptop from the Microsoft Store on October 14. My order was scheduled to “Ship by October 26”, the day the product launched. I elected to order straight from Microsoft because I trusted them more than local retailers. That was naïve.

Monday, October 26th rolled by. I saw that most people online had their Surface Books at this point, and I was still waiting for it to even ship.

I contacted the Microsoft Store Customer Support on Monday night via their chat service to ask why my device hadn’t shipped. The support person said:

I can see here that tracking number has been generated, We just need to wait for the UPS to update the shipping details.

I asked if I could have the tracking number, and he said:

The tracking number is not yet available but rest assured that it will be generated as soon as possible.

With my very first inquiry, this service representative was contradicting himself and lying to me. Then he told me he would issue a refund for the express shipping due to the late shipment; that was good. The full chat log can be found here. Note that this was a 25 minute conversation.

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I contacted Microsoft again on Tuesday. The first person never even bothered to look into my account. Notably, though, they exposed or fabricated more lies. I mentioned how I paid extra for express shipping, and that my product was supposed to ship by October 26. This person said:

Apparently for pre orders express shipping does not work since its a pre order.

I asked why the Store would even have that option then; was it just a scam?

If the product won’t get delivered this week we will process the refund for the shipping fee.

So I paid extra for faster shipping that “does not work” for my order. And if it did not ship, I’d get a refund. But I was already told the shipping would be refunded by the previous rep. Just more bullshit. The full chat log for that can be found here. Note that this was another 12 minute chat.

Assuming that service rep was just a bad apple in the batch, I tried again with another one. What this one said was very bizarre, and very hard to believe.

Upon checking your order here, it seems like there was a problem with the item’s weight and UPS is not able to ship it. What we can do here is cancel this order and make a new order. I will be providing you a free shipping. How’s that sound?.

A problem with the items weight? What? The Microsoft Store is shipping out thousands of these exact devices, and there was a problem with this items weight? And they couldn’t just fix that before shipping it? What the fuck?

After politely asking for more info, the person repeated:

As of now, it is still with us. However, this will not be processed anymore since there was a problem with it’s weight and we are unable to ship it out. My sincere apologies for the inconvenience.

I said this sounded “odd and scary”. I said “I don’t want to end up having to wait several weeks for this”. The person assured me though:

If we place an order now and I added a free Express shipping, you will get your device within the next 1-2 business days.

So after contemplation of my options (zero options) I decided to listen to this person. They placed the new order for me, which I had to assume was different from if I were to re-order the fucking thing myself (which would mean I’d be on a back-order list and be waiting until December). The full chat for this conversation can be found here. Note that this chat took over 1 hour.

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Tuesday evening I received the new order confirmation. “Back ordered”, “Ships by December 4”. What the fuck. And I still had not received any emails from the service rep, which she assured me she would send. I contacted another rep via chat. I was not happy. This service rep was very, very slow at getting information on my orders. The only thing he could end up determining, after speaking with a supervisor, was that

Both of your orders are still in process and either or both can go through

and

The issue was about the invalid product weight which was strange in a way that we have not encountered that issue before and the decision to cancel and process a new order with an expedited delivery , to me is unpopular.

So again. What the fuck. This service rep took 1 hour and 10 minutes to tell me that either, or both, of the orders could ship. There was no way to know until I observed the orders being cancelled or shipped, like Schrödinger’s fucking cat. What kind of service is that?

At the end of the conversation he assured me that he would “make a followup as soon as [he] heard from [his] manager”. Well guess what. I never heard from this person again. Surprise. The full chat can be found here.

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Wednesday morning rolled around, and I received a cancellation email for my first order. Guess the fucking cat died. Status on the new order was still “back ordered”. Oh, and no one had “followed up” either.

So I said fuck it, maybe their chat support just sucks and I need to speak to someone in person to get this straightened out. I called up the 800 number and, to my surprise, sat on hold for only a minute or two. After repeating my first order number, my second order number, my case number, my phone number, my full name, my email address, and then an authentication number immediately sent to my email, I think the lady on the other end had enough information. By this point I was a disgruntled fuck, but I think I still managed to be polite. She went to her supervisor a few times, meanwhile not saying anything to me, and I just sat their in dead silence. I assumed moves were being made and solutions arranged. Then she piped up:

Did the confirmation email say anything about when it would ship?

“Yes, it said it would ship by December 4, like I said to you earlier.”

Yes, that’s what I see, it looks like it will ship by December 4th.

Holy. Fucking. Shit balls. I sat on the call this whole time, 52 minutes, and that’s all she had to tell me? How about shipping the device that I was told I would have within 1-2 days? Or how about the device that would ship by October 26? The level of ineptitude cannot be understated here. I’m not trying to be an asshole, it’s just too obvious. These service representatives can cancel orders, place new orders, tell me shit I already know, waste my time, and lie. They cannot, however, provide solutions to problems they have created by lying.

So I politely asked to speak to a supervisor. The supervisor said he read the chat logs, and in regards to cancelling my order and having a new one within 2 days, that person “lied”.

At this point I had spent roughly 3 hours and 40 minutes communicating with 6 different Microsoft representatives, and not a single one of them provided “service” to resolve my issue. Three of them directly lied to me. One of them lied to me and also fucked me over. One of them was so useless they couldn’t even lie to me. And the other one… Oh yeah I guess he’s next.

The supervisor finished by saying they are “investigating the issue”, and that he has “escalated” it to a “higher department”. He said I will hear from them “within 24 hours” and they will be able to find a resolution. I then confirmed twice that they had my correct phone number. I asked him to repeat how long it would take to hear back from them, and again he said “within 24 hours, sir”.

79482 hours 58 minutes 17 seconds.

Edit: At the 170 hour mark I gave up and requested a cancellation on the order. I expect I will never hear from Microsoft with so much as an apology.