Beast Buy
So about that iPod I mentioned yesterday: I actually got it by exchanging a PDA that I received as a gift. It was a really neat PDA, with lots of cool bells and whistles, but I'm just not a PDA person. So I grabbed my gift receipt and waded into the throng of holiday shoppers at Best Buy. The person at the returns desk took a look at my receipt and PDA box and then said "I need to get a manager involved." I wondered: Were my papers not in order? The box was sealed, but maybe there was a restocking fee.
A few minutes later, another Best Buy employee who had been hanging around the returns desk approached me. He started quizzing me about why I was returning the PDA. He told me it was a great machine, lots of features, could really do anything and everything. Sort of a medium-pressure pitch for why anyone in their right mind would cling to this PDA like a druggie to his smack stash. I knew that I had to take drastic measures, so I said "I'm not sure this'll work with Linux." That did the trick, and after some final discussion about whether Linux runs on a laptop, he let me go. He said something to the cashier like "OK, he can go ahead" and 15 seconds later I had a Best Buy gift card for the amount of the return.
What I'd like to know is whether it's Best Buy's horrible, soul-sucking policy to interrogate customers that make non-Best-Buy-approved choices. If it is, this will be just one more example of how Best Buy hates its customers.