If you’ve been following the news for the last several months, you’ve probably heard about the Geek Squad and employees stealing data and porn off of customer’s computers. If you haven’t, head over to The Consumerist and catch up. I worked at Best Buy for several years, with the majority of them in the Geek Squad. I thought that I’d share my thoughts and experiences that I had with the Geek Squad and try to explain to you that, at one point, the Geek Squad was actually a good idea and a reputable company despite the “geek” gimmick.
I worked at Best Buy prior to the debut of the Geek Squad. Before the Geek Squad we were just called “Best Buy Techs.” We dressed exactly like the other Best Buy employees except with the exception of a black polo instead of a blue one. It was a fun and easy job. I got to hang out with my friends and fix computers. We were really good. Best Buy didn’t provide any software for us so we were forced to develop utilities that helped us clean up computers. Our collection of software largely consisted of illegal versions of commercial software. We used software that was “free for personal use” but if they were used in a commercial setting, were supposed to be paid for. We didn’t have a choice though, we were expected to charge people money to remove viruses, spyware, and to fix any other operating system issue. Best Buy gave us nothing except some old DOS diagnostic software.
We were looked at as the redheaded step-child of Best Buy. If you worked at Best Buy and you were not a tech you hated us. We got paid more than you and we didn’t have to sell service plans or push MSN and AOL dialup service. We never had to stay late and help setup the store for next morning. When the computers were scanning for viruses or we were installing an OS, we got to stand around and talk with each other. On top of all of that we never had to deal with any of the managers. This was mainly because they didn’t have a clue about what we were doing. As long as we hit our revenue goals for the day they left us alone.
The “tech bench” (as it was known in Best Buy) consisted of a variety of people with a variety of different skills. Most of us though were in college getting paid $10-12 an hour working part time. But we all had one thing in common and that was we enjoyed fixing computers. Then Best Buy acquired the Geek Squad from Minnesota and it started heading down hill from there.
For the first six or so months it wasn’t really any different than it was before the Geek Squad came. The main difference is that we sat in a big orange hole in the wall and had to wear an embarrassing uniform. We took some crap for the first week or so over our new uniform but the jokes slowly faded because in the end, we still had the best job in the store. I feel that the actual “launch” of the Geek Squad was probably the most uncoordinated event that I’ve ever been a part of. Most of the employees received only parts of the full uniform. We were required to go out and spend our own money on whatever part of the uniform was missing, never be reimbursed. We never received the necessary documentation to sell our services. We never got any legal software solutions while they were raising the prices of our services and adding additional services. Even as the Geek Squad rolled out we were never provided any type of software. The only thing “new” we got from them was a CD of utilities we already had though missing anything that wasn’t free (I think they still call it MRI).
Slowly the quality of the work started to slip. The philosophy of what a Best Buy Tech (now called an Agent) was dramatically changed. Managers started pulling us from working on computers to selling computers and then would yell at us when our turntime went up. The problem with making us sell was that the a large portion of those who were hired as a Best Buy Tech had no sales experience. So what did Best Buy do? They slowly fired or moved those people to other departments in the store (usually in the back room to do stock) which was intended to force them to quit though it sometimes backfired because they were still required to pay them at the highest rate and it messed up the budget scheduling for the warehouse. They were then replaced with people off the sales floor who didn’t even know how to turn on a computer but were thought as someone who could sell. We were forced to teach these people the basics of computer repair. In turn, the work piled up and our turntime dropped. To compensate we started rushing the work which caused the quality of the work to drop. We started to see a large increase of people who came back after picking up their computer because something was missed.
The part that amazed me the most was that Best Buy expected us to sell services but never provided any software to perform these services with. It was amazing the catalog of illegal software we had because we had to our job. It was like a real life Mininova (a popular site to get software from). We used expensive data recovery software and diagnostic software. We used illegal versions of bootable operating systems. We had a case of illegal versions of Windows and anti-virus software. As for stealing customer data off of the computers we worked on, that rarely (if ever) happened that I was aware of. We would do data recovery and keep the data on the main computer for a month or two. This wasn’t an official policy since one wasn’t available but too often customers would come back saying they lost the DVD of data. If a customer had a good music collection, we’d use the music that we recovered and play it while we worked. The majority of the music we recovered was illegal anyway. We ran across the occasional porn and naked pictures of customers and I’d be lying if we said we didn’t take a peek and laugh, but I never saw anyone actually take any of it.
I recall one time a customer came in and claimed that we didn’t fix his computer. We remembered his computer because it was full of viruses and porn. I kindly explained to the customer that we did fix it but that someone had used the computer and downloaded spyware and porn again. At first he didn’t believe me until I opened up his browser history and showed him. He looked at his son as if to blame him (his wife and daughter were also there) and his son said, “But Dad, you have a password on the computer, I can’t get on.” He turned bright red, took his computer and quickly left. The stories go on and on.
The Geek Squad started to become one big joke, especially to those in the IT field. You can’t blame them though because after a year or two it was a big joke. When I became a DA (Double Agent, the people you see driving the cars and making the in-home service calls) I thought I could step away from all that. It was just as bad, if not worse. Take all of the items I’ve mentioned already and add on the following: We were expected to bring back a certain amount of money each day. Most of the time you were scheduled to do work that another store sold so many days we’d come back empty handed (hard to sell someone something when it has already been sold). This then was looked down on your performance. Admittly I’d do free service for people because I couldn’t bring myself to charge a 75 year old woman $129 to install AOL. They never took into consideration, when scheduling appointments, the distance between each appointment. It wasn’t uncommon to have your first appointment and second appointment 2 hours away from each other (with traffic) and they would give you 30 minutes to get there. It was very rare that we were ever on-time for an appointment because of the horrible scheduling. I remember one instance where I was leaving my second call and when I looked to see where my third call was, it was two blocks away from my first call.
In the end, when I left the Geek Squad it felt like it had already jumped the shark. With the novelty worn off we were nothing but the ass end of a joke in faded black pants and a off-white shirt. This isn’t to say that every single person in the Geek Squad is incompetent. Probably some of the most technical people I ever met (online and offline) worked for the Geek Squad at one point. Usually the best people were the ones who were around before Geek Squad. Now when you read about the Geek Squad all you find are negative comments especially since that one Geek Squad employee was caught recording a customer in the shower. I do want to say however that the Geek Squad didn’t kill the Geek Squad. Best Buy killed the Geek Squad. If it would have remained a standalone company I believe it would have become a large reputable company (as it was already reputable in Minnesota). This is what happens I guess when a large corporation who is in the business of retail gets involved in something it doesn’t understand.
Thanks for listening to my rant. It’s been on my chest for sometime now. 
interesting post… thanks for sharing.
Great story, thanks for for sharing.
In the last 2 years I went to a tech school and now work in the IT field. Before I went to school though, I had thought it was be so awesome to work at Best Buy doing IT suff. I even applied but they never called me. Kinda amazing to think what bad conditions I would’ve endured had they called and give me the job.
geek squad blows dogs for quarters. total ripoff
Great article! You’re points are right on. I think BB is trying to sell off all major components of its business. It has sold off credit, financing, returns, warrenties, video games and the GS was just a way of selling off tech support. They just want to be a type of holding company, responsible for nothing. Like a giagantic ATM machine.
Kmuzu
I work for a major material handling company and I commissioned the new central hub for Geek Squad in Brooks, KY. They centralized their operations there. Basically, if you take your machine into a Best Buy for anything, they will send it to the new facility via UPS for a guaranteed 72 hour turn around time. The stores are simply shipping depots now.
The sad thing is they still make the “agents” wear the full garb to, at and from work. Sadly for the blog’s author, they now supply all of the uniform (shirt pants, shoes etc.) gratis. They don’t do any house calls, just the work in the repair center. It’s so embarrassing, my emphatic streak makes my testicles ache. What’s really hilarious is the fact that some of these people seem to dig the whole uniform. Sad. Brooks Kentucky is located about 15 miles south of Louisville right in the middle of Deliverance country. There exists not a sight or notion funnier than a hillbilly geek.
HATofTIN wrote:
When I left, they were in the process of testing a new pilot to allow remote computer fixing. It would work where someone dropped their PC off at the store, we hooked it up and installed some sort of remote desktop software, and then they took over. I left before much came of it, but the idea was horrible.
Thanks for the update on how things are. I only have one contact left in the Best Buy who provides me with whats going on, but that’s about it. I have more stories of the craziness of the company and the steps that I feel caused it’s fall.
I went from in-store part time CIA, to fulltime, to DA, to supervisor.. I was exposed it to all.
I remember, many years ago, how good Best Buy’s technical support was. When I went away to college I was actually confident in telling my parents to bring their computers to Best Buy if anything went wrong. And for a couple years that worked just fine.
Now I am working at a local computer shop, doing similar work to what Best Buy’s techs used to. We have tons of customers who up at our door after they’ve been to Best Buy, frequently with their computers in worse shape than before.
These days I hate to even shop at Best Buy. I certainly wouldn’t recommend anyone try to use their technical support.
I’ve made fun of those people since day one. The “Dork” squad! You can take a brand spankin’ new computer right out of the box, call the dork squad, and they will come over to your house and tell you that your system is full of viruses, spyware, and whatever else they want to make up to get your money from you. I know they do that, cause that’s exactly what they did to me when I purchased a new computer from best buy. I did as an experiment for a college essay demonstrating the incompetence of n00b techs working for comp ussr and best buy. Best buy didn’t used to be like this though. They were a great place to take your broken computer.
BB was never “the best buy”, ever, for anything other than a phony front. in fact, BB is all about fakeness. as to tech support, it’s better off to just ask your next door kid to do it for a 10 spot. how could the anon ranter not see his scheduled call #3 is next door to call #1? what idiot does not check the day’s schedule to begin with? just call it in, stupid, or if you are too afraid use your street smarts and just change it door to door, with spontaneous internal fortitude. hey, geeks have balls too, don’t they? well, excluding this guy.
Alaalas, stfu. “Spontaneous internal fortitude”? LOL.
By the way, it’s not written by an “anon ranter”. If you weren’t so busy worrying about how much better you are over everyone else then you might have noticed this article is posted in a blog belonging to Mark Wagner.
Thanks for sharing Mark.
Alaalas wrote:
And when I called the #3 client, and they weren’t home, or couldn’t adjust their schedule, then what?
Had nothing to do with me not noticing. Also, depending who you got at the call center, they wouldn’t always do it for you.
I’ve been working for GS for 2years now, and still am. You’re spot on with what it is like having to watch BB take over a great idea. Everything sounds exactlly the condition at my store a.t.m. It’s sad really
Anyone remember when best buy first started out and they swore no sales ppl would approach you? It was like a dream come true. HUGE music and movie selection. I mean they had everything. I bought so many cds from there that I then bought a 200 disc cd changer. I bought an open box PC 233mhz Packard Bell there and when the cd drive took a dump the best buy techs fixed it up within the hour. I referred to the local best buy as *MY* best buy, because it was the biggest of all of them in my area.
Then I started noticing changes… Sales people would approach me. I shoot them a look that said ‘why are you talking to me.’ but they wouldnt go away. Then I noticed the comedy section of the cd isles was gone. And sales ppl approached me each time I entered a new department. Then someone I know when in to buy a box of cat5 and was told they dont make it anymore and that they should buy a shiny box of cat6. Then they started asking me for my phone number at the register (now they only ask for you zip). I couldnt imagine taking my computer with all its drives there. They would either steal my data or destroy it. And no, I dont want a service plan on a device that is going to be obsolete in a year!
Where I used to go there to browse their wares now I only go there when a flier has a deal that beats newegg+shipping. For a while I would still browse after I found what I wanted, but no longer. I get in and I get out out. I repress the desire to throttle sales weenies who approach me and play with the idea of formulating an elaborate question that will leave with that blank soulless expression you can find on any teenager when they have no clue. But that would just prolong my forced interaction with them. ‘No, I dont need any help.’ shoos them away.
I’ve noticed the same thing at my local Microcenter also… Techs that are idiot and aggressive sales people who cant answer my questions.
Cool post — thanks for sharing.
Increasing shareholder value means decreasing human value. State sponsored capitalism ain’t pretty. In any corporation that competes on price, you don’t matter, you’ll never matter.
You’re clever guys. Look into banding together and incorporating — the laws that Congress writes, regulators don’t regulate, and the Courts do bless — favor the rich.
You don’t have to be rich to get their tax benefits — your good tech services can and will drive out the bad — there’s plenty of free advice on creating a solid business plan.
1st-circle
when i finished networking school i was looking for a job in the computer field and went to a few interviews with the geek squad but never got the job a friend of mine did and hated it with a passion. now i’m a network administrator and thank god i didnt get the job.
I’m 20, no noteworthy college education, no papers to prove what I know… yet I still do professional web development. I also delve around in some fairly advanced programming concepts because I get bored at night. I would bet money I’m better than most of the people at Geek Squad. Not that it’s a real highlight, but I’ve already proven I’m better than the Comcast support. I’m the guy my friends call if they have computer problems. They don’t give a rat’s ass about paperwork, and neither did my boss. Experience is key. If you know what you’re doing and can actively prove it, you’re better than any punk with a college degree. Geek Squad may sound techie, but you could make a much better living doing freelance computer work any day of the week, guaranteed.
Interesting post. I almost wanted to start working at GS, because I have a good sense of computer skills. I have come to realize though that the prices for what they are charging are OUTRAGEOUS! I’m surprised for the fact that they don’t provide the software. Isn’t it illegal for them to do that?
Interesting post. My step-brother just graduated from college (with a major in History or something) and applied for a Geek Squad job. He keeps going on and on about it, so maybe I should show him this to knock his ego down a few.
Anyway, I don’t really trust Geek Squad, or Best Buy for that matter. I take my laptop to a local repair shop when I have problems.
In my area if you apply for geeksquad and are very qualified they WON’T hire you! If you know very little about pc’s your a shoe in!
Office Depot host the Geek Squad, too. Same fine young guys and gals, struggling towards competency in the face of corporate greed, and managerial in-eptitude.
Then, the lawsuits from the major computer troubleshooting software vendors hit. Technicians tend to be intelligent and thoughtful, and take it personally, though they are usually innocent pawns caught between stupid users and pointed haired bosses.
I go into the local stores, boot the demo systems into Mepis Linux, and give them a laugh, and a few different distros and tools to ease their work.
Most Geek Squad agents like Linux, and find that it saves the customer, though official rules are that they will be fired for using license free, totally FREE Open Source Software!
Hey, Sam’s Club already fired me, for doing a demo to 5 business clients, in their store, with the FOSS they use in their businesses, and who also left to buy 60 complete computers, elsewhere, for even less money.
David wrote:
David,
I could definitely guarantee that you would be majorly OVER-qualified for the GS!! Don’t take this personally….but I think my 10-year-old son has more computer knowledge in his little toe than most of the GS crew. I took my laptop in to have them fix it and the guy who waited on me couldn’t even figure out how to open it, much less turn it on. Needless to say, I RAN, not walked to the nearest exit with my beloved laptop under my arm and I figured out how to fix it myself. Since then, I have been not only fixing computers, but building and selling them as well. So far I have built a few for friends and have had no problems or complaints. I realize that’s small numbers compared to some, but I’m a newbie and I’m still learning. At least MY track record is 100%. That’s more than I can say for BB or GS.
Dopleganger wrote:
That’s very, very true!!!! I had a very close friend of mine that applied for a job with BB as a comp tech well before GS was even heard of. He was, in reality, overqualified for the job but they told him he didn’t know enough and hired some moron that couldn’t even tie his shoelace instead.
I wouldn’t even consider taking any of my puters to BB to even have them cleaned, much less fixed. 
Paul wrote:
Computer Renaisssance is much worse for their prices! They charge $100/hour just to look at it. That doesn’t include what they charge for labor & parts. And to add insult to injury, you find out that these so-called “computer repair” stores that offer in-store tech support are using pirated software that probably has more bugs & viruses than the persons computer that they’re trying to fix! It’s just unreal. Using hacked software is fine for personal use (I do it myself), but it looks really bad to do it on what is supposed to be a “professional” level.
When the Geek Squad was initially launched, it was hard to find a bad tech. You used to have previous experience, A+ cert, etc. to get the job.
But like mentioned in my post, eventually all those techs were replaced by cheaper replacement with no skills and previous experience.
While we used illegal programs, none of them were “out of the norm” nor did they contain any viruses and software. We did good work and worked well. In the end of 2005 going into 2006 was when I saw a sudden and dramatic shift, across all the stores in my district, when they started sacrificing quality of work with quantity of work.
We used pirated software because we were expected to fix a computer right the first time, remove all viruses and spyware, tune it up, with no software provided legally through Best Buy. We had a CD called the “MRI CD” but it contained some old DOS apps, and various virus scanners that scanned for the more popular viruses. They put us in a horrible position. A few of us actually programmed our own “fix CDs” with various pieces of software, bootable OS, and a GUI to do it with.
1st-circle wrote:
or you can throw one together from scratch, just know that every hour not spent planning ahead is two hours playing “catch-up” later (I found this out the hard way), also plan on the start-up roller coaster ride (everything’s going great, nothing’s moving…) for at least 6 months, so, don’t quit your day-job on day one.
Your mileage WILL vary.
also, this is not an isolated incident, most of the big names in low prices have resorted to these tactics. So much for people being first
GOD!!!! I wish I had read this before taking my pc there,where it has been for a week having a “diagnostic”run on it.Just how long does it take to run a diagnostic anyway.
Soo glad I came across this blog. I have been thinking of starting a computer repair business part time and wondering if the new Blister Buy’s Greek Squat would offer too much competition. Now I am not so worried. I really need to figure out the pricing for my work, I do not need to make a living out of this, just want to have something to do I love doing to compensate for I job I don’t. Any suggestions?
I just want to clear up some things which were either in the original article or in the comments here…first off, currently Geek Squad has all of the tools they needs including legal versions of software apps to remove viruses and fix other problems.
The person that wrote about the Kentucky service center is mostly false - Geek Squad sends a lot of laptops to this service center to perform more advanced work like replacing LCDs and motherboards - rarely are desktops sent there unless it’s a motherboard replacement under a service plan - if the customer’s computer is not under a current service plan or warranty, it will NOT be shipped to Kentucky. Most repairs are done in the store, since most repairs are software issues (the Kentucky service center doesn’t mess with software issues).
Agents DO go to your home to do network setups, computer repair, etc…whoever said that is just lying.
Geek Squad agents are very good at their jobs, at least the ones that I know. Your 10 year old neighbor/son/etc. is the one that typically broke your computer in the first place. If they know how to do some basic computer repair, good for them but they don’t have the tools nor the experience that GS agents have to fix your computer correctly and not make it even worse - most people think that you can buy an anti-virus program (i.e. Norton or McAfee) to remove a virus already on your system - it won’t do any good.
The prices are not that high - there are no hourly fees, so if you take your computer to a local shop they will typically charge a minimum of $50/hr to repair it - what if it takes 10 hours to fix?? Then you are paying $500. If you bring it to Geek Squad for say, virus removal, there’s one flat fee $199 — if it takes 2 hours or 10 hours it’s the same price.