Quality Checks by Humans - Dell IdeaStorm

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Quality Checks by Humans

1000 points posted to Service and Support, Desktops and Laptops by lambchops468 08/31/07

I ordered a Inspiron 1520 and I am fed up with the issues:

crashed hard drive (first 6 days) (I will forgive this one, happens on every manufacturer, its just luck)
vibrating optical drive (shakes entire notebook, abnormal, new one fixed it)
Grainy Screen
Headphone Noise
Casing Defect (bulge in case seam, can see inside notebook)

I think that dell should instute a quality check system on the computers they ship out. Not just tests that can be run on the computer automatically, but a actual person physically inspecting/testing the function of the notebook such as:
- Grainy Screen/backlight bleed (go get a HP laptop and see the difference, go to the store)
- Headphone Noise
- Casing Defects
- Optical Drives that make too much noise
- squeaky keys
- and other issues that cannot be detected by a hardware check running on a CPU

If you do not have the finances to create such a program, then you can add the service as part of the warranty, with a garuntee that the devices that are checked will not have problems on arrival. (So therefore the QC is optional)

This will actually make/save money because people like me won't have to send their laptops back and forth wasting your shipping money/technician fee replacing parts that would be replaced anyway at the quailty check program.

you could also send a special survey to early-adopters to identify the biggest problems in a new computer line and check those at quailty check, certifying those parts free of defects.

kalstolyn 08/31/07	I will agree that running a software-based diagnostic on the processor will not diagnose any of the problems you are describing. I'm pretty sure they test more than the CPU.
exul182 09/01/07	Having a human check every laptop means wasting a lot of time..due to their large requests..they will never implement such an idea..because they won't want to lose that much money for it. Better quality checks never harm..but having them done by robots is faster...and cheaper..even though its not perfect...its close...you were just plain unlucky...transportation also presents more destructive potential than the build itself...
sophins 09/01/07	if they have human checking it, just make sure it not the chinese. Because they we'll let everything pass QC ie.. lead paint. Worst yet they'll try to copy it and made a crappy version of it. We want the Japanese back..!
rpricket 09/02/07	my vostro was made in Malaysia....hrm...
doctor 09/03/07	someone could think that something is ok and someone else will think that it is a problem, even with strict guidelines.
stormrider451 Apr 18	PLEASE DO THIS!!! My new M1730 arrived with part of its glossy finish UNGLOSSY (the resin that gives it a glossy finish had either pealed off or it never got to that spot and thus it looks as if a sticker had just been pulled out and glue is sticking there.. but it aint glue, its the rough material under). I couldnt have been caused by bad shipping handling because its on the hand resting surface of the laptop, thus its protected by the folding screen. This is a very SIMPLE mistake that could be avoided if someone actually looked at the comp before putting it in the box.
laxboy10 Jun 9	Merged Idea originally posted Apr 24 Better Quality Control and Quality Save yourself money in the long run and keep customers. Put out some money for quality control and better parts. Then you will save money b/c less laptops will need parts replaced or some type of service. Also, more people will be inclined to buy dells if the quality increases.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 25 If you allow me, I suggest you have a look at the following ideas: http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/10087719/Show_Quality_Control_Video_of_... http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/10079071/Check_laptops_before_they_leav... http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/73662/Quality_Checks_by_Humans http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/10079084/Check_all_of_your_products_bef... ;)
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Idea originally posted Mar 16 Check laptops before they leave the factory! I understand, one thing is making it as cheap as possible to produce and sell the laptops. But checking them (this requires a human being, yes) before they leave the factory takes maybe 30 seconds per laptop! You are just losing so much money for having to take back defective laptops from unsatisfied customers. Some of them dare to order another one, hoping it will not have the same defects, but many just go to their local retailer, where they can see the laptop and be sure that it will not have: - a back light that makes the bottom of your screen bright, and the top of your screen dark - bumps in the plastic - scratches in the plastic - pieces of plastic not holding tight as they should - etc. Just have a look at your laptops before you box them, and you will have much less laptops returned. PS: this idea mainly concerns the Limerick and Lodz factories. I am not able of judging if other factories across the world have the same rate of faults...
winoffice Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 16 They do not necessarily ship from the factory. The factory is not necessarily the same building as the shipping center. Perhaps it would be correct to say "Check before the leave the shipping center". And why only laptops? Other products also may be defective or damaged (maybe not as often, but it still does happen). I think that this should apply to all Dell products, and not just laptops. But still I get your point, and I agree.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 16 Well, if the product is in the shipping center, it's already too late I believe. It should be checked earlier (i.e: before it leaves the factory, I suppose). Yes, I guess this would apply to any product but: - I guess it's too late coz I don't see the "edit" button anymore... - I've noticed far too many complaints on faulty XPS laptops (M1330 & M1530). Even people who had sent back in their first faulty laptop, and received and new one... with obvious faults still!
winoffice Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 16 That is right. You are correct that the products should be checked at the factory. Anyway this should apply to all products and not just laptops. Hopefully the Dell moderators will brink back the edit button soon.
sugarbear Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 16 What happened to Dell`s quality control!
ah1f Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 20 ALL products should be checked for quality and function BEFORE they ship. I agree, but wouldn't have the 3 systems that I currently own if Dell did quality testing, since I purchased 2 of 3 from the Dell Outlet refurbished. Saved over 60% on each. Thanks Dell your helping the poor with your lack of quality control.
stormrider451 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 PLEASE DO THIS!!! I have a fine example of why this should be implemented! My new M1730 arrived with part of its glossy finish UNGLOSSY (the resin that gives it a glossy finish had either pealed off or it never got to that spot and thus it looks as if a sticker had just been pulled out and glue is sticking there.. but it aint glue, its the rough material under). I couldnt have been caused by bad shipping handling because its on the hand resting surface of the laptop, thus its protected by the folding screen. This is a very SIMPLE mistake that could be avoided if someone actually looked at the comp before putting it in the box. Its simple things like these that get costumers off on the wrong foot with dell. Why? Why give reason to the costumers to get mad at dell from DAY 1? It is a horrible feeling to be waiting so anxiously for your new toy (comp) and for it to have a defect right out of the box.. Thankfully this defect can be fixed without me sending the comp back, the tech guy can come and just replace that surface.. But imagine all the other defects that people go through that require them to send a brand new, just arrived comp back to dell? Thats simply one of the worse feelings a customer can get, having to send back right out the box a brand new comp you have been dying to get already. Fix this dell. It makes you look so bad!
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 Thanks for your feedback stormrider451, and I totally agree with your comments. Plus, Taking 30 seconds to check the laptop before shipping would have saved Dell the need to send you a tech guy at your place...
stormrider451 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 Exactly..
winoffice Jun 9	Merged Idea originally posted Mar 16 Check all of your products before sending them to the shipping center (before they leave the factories). (Note that I took the concept for this idea from this one, but I decided to generalize it to all products.) Anyway here is the idea. I understand that you (Dell) want to keep prices low. But I think that it would be much better if you checked your products (all of your products) before sending them to the shipping center. Many people have complaints that their new products are defective. Check the products and send them only if they are not defective, and you might have significantly less returns, and your customers would be more satisfied with you. Some of your customers (sometimes myself, sometimes not) just request a replacement, hoping that at least it would not have problems, perhaps only to find out later that the replacement also is defective! Many people however just go to another manufacturer, hoping that they will have better customer service and fewer defective products. I think that you should try to lower the amount of defective products that you sell by checking all of your products before shipping, and selling only those products that are not defective. Yes this might make prices higher, but then you will have better customer service, more happy customers, and probably more sales (your customers might not go to other manfacturers so much, due to your current customer service). And best of all, it might take only a few minutes or less! Possible things that you might check are scratches, plastic or metal that is not holding tightly enough, problems with screens, and making sure that products turn on properly, among other things.
bbr Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 Duplicate? : http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/10079071/Check_laptops_before_they_leav...
mkmaster78 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 @winoffice: I think your hearts in the right place, but this would be an unmanageable nightmare. Checking each and every product coming off the lines is beyond unfeasable, not the least of the reasons being the pure amount of workforce/manhours increase that would be required. Nice thought, but completely unrealistic, sorry, but I have to demote.
winoffice Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 @bbr: This is not a duplicate. That idea talks only about laptops, whereas this idea talks about all products.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 @bbr: winoffice had actually explained that in the very first line of this very idea...
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 mkmaster78: how long does it take to check a laptop, screen or tower? 30 seconds to one minute maximum! Within one minute you can check that the product doesn't have a big bump in the plastic (there was one XPS with a bump going around youtube last week I think), or a big scratch. That might mean recruit 1 employee, yes. But just think what a person might think when they paid $1000, and the next week they receive their laptop with a bump in the plastic??? I would personnally think: ok, that company is making fun of me. (Thankfully, I didn't buy an XPS but a Latitude, and it's great :) )
mkmaster78 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 17 @cestuila: I've worked QA, properly done QA will take at least ten minutes per unit, which equivalates quite a lot of man hours to check every unit.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 18 so let's just keep selling $1000 laptops with obvious bumps... and what? cross fingers to hope these customers will buy Dell again when they need another laptop? In this business world, NOTHING should be left to chance or hope! Sorry, I'm afraid we don't have the same point of view.
mkmaster78 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 18 @cestuila: sample testing, done properly is a very cost effictive and just plain effective way of performing QA. I would support improvements in their sample testing, but never the wholesale testing of every unit, it would drive Dell into bankruptcy
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Mar 18 Well, given the number of faulty products (expecially XPS Laptops), it seems the sampling ratio is way too low at the moment...
joyscant1980 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 6 "Well, given the number of faulty products (expecially XPS Laptops), it seems the sampling ratio is way too low at the moment... " How can you be sure that you know what the ratio of faulty products to the good ones is? There maybe several hundreds of thousands DELL customers who are very happy with the build and quality of their product and do not feel the need to go online and post about their laptop. For all of the products that DELL ships worldwide, there will be some bad batches, bad products. These products are being made by humans and like every human, mistakes will be made. It is impossible for every company making any product in the quantites that DELL does to guarantee that the every single product it produces is as perfect as it can be because it is too time-consuming and costly. IF and that is a big IF, DELL decides that they will decide to implement this idea, you do realise that the time between placing and receiving your order will increase? This will also incur cost to them which will be transferred to you the customer, maybe not in its entirety but there will be an increase in the price. As bad as this may sound, the customers who do not call and complain about their products, who are quite happy with their product may just outweigh the ones that complain about having issues with their products and return them and DELL should not have to change their policies to change to please a few customers who are dissatisfied. Yes, I am quite aware that some people might not even contact customer service with their issues but might go to an outside source but DELL will work with the figures they have and if the majority of their customers appear to be happy, then there is no need to change policies. DELL is a money making organisation (obviously) and it have to take a large percentage of their customers complaining of poor build and instability of their products for them to make a change. If you were DELL and 5% of your customers were dissatisfied and 95% were quite happy and content with their purchases, would you change your policies and increase the cost of the way you do things to please the 5% and increase the cost to all including the 95% that are quite happy with the way you do business? The answer is quite simply no. I honestly feel for those who have received bad products and have experienced horrible customer care service but a company CANNOT make everyone happy so they must happy as much people happy as they can. I sincerely apologise for my long post but I just felt like had to say something
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 6 I didn't write that I know the ratio. I wrote that it was probably too low, given the amount of complaints concerning Dell laptops, including the $1000+ laptops. There is a difference between shipping a PERFECT laptop as you mention, and not shipping a laptop with an big obvious bump in the plastic in the palmrest (see youtube video) Yes, the time to receive my order will increase... probably by 1 or 2 minutes. I am ready to wait 1 or 2 minutes extra if this means that someone has checked that my laptop doesn't have a big bump before passing it on to UPS/DHL... Yes, there is an increase in cost. Maybe $1 or $2 per laptop. I am ready to pay that extra if this means that someone has checked that my laptop doesn't have a big bump before passing it on to UPS/DHL... By the way, that cost wouldn't necessarily need to be reflected in the price. Dell could use their margin for that, and little loss in margin would easily be compensated by increase in sales thanks to higher customer satisfaction and more recommendations to friends, etc. It's not a CHANGE in policy. Dell already has a quality policy. The suggestion is just: check that your policy is correctly applied. And if insufficiant, strengthen it a little bit (higher ckecking rates). "DELL is a money making organisation (obviously) and it have to take a large percentage of their customers complaining of poor build and instability of their products for them to make a change." LoL That one is good. Yeah, they were 1st, now they're 3rd. And you're suggesting they should wait to rank 8 or 9 before starting taking some action??? To finish, I have the feeling you took your CRM courses a bit too seriously...
joyscant1980 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 7 Well, if you feel that way, why not offer an option for each customer to pay have their computer to be thoroughly inspected before shipping.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 7 because when anyone buys a product more than $500, he/she expects it not to have any awful bumps in the plastic!
bilbo_248 Jun 9	Merged Idea originally posted Apr 18 Show Quality Control Video of M1530/M1330 English : I think the quality control on M1530 is bad and I need to see quality control of my and yours pc to be secure (a little). French : Pour les français, simplement j'aimerais bien voir le controle qualité des dell XPS M1530.. ( Cet étape existe t-elle chez dell ??!!)
jackie_c Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 @bilbo_248: By quality control, do you mean you wish to see a video of someone at the factory testing the system?
okroger104 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 I'm demoting this idea as silly. Dell can post any video showing them in their best light as any company would. It would only fool the very naive.
cestuila Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 As far as I understand, the purpose is not to have a made-up video, bat rather to get to know how quality control is done so far, because as bilbo_248 points out, there have been many faulty M1530 among those delivered to customers... I believe this suggestion is somehow related to the following suggestion i had posted: http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/10079071/Check_laptops_before_they_leav...
lonewolf_nw08 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 I would agree with a video showing the qualtiy control process. But albeit to Dell to show it in the best possible light. If it came from a reputable testing/evaluation source, i.e. Consumer Reports, etc. then I might be a bit more inclined to trust that it is non-biased.
bilbo_248 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 I think when you received a very bad laptop as this french man http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/xps%2B1530/video/x4jvfk_xps-1530_... We could ask where is the quality control or finish control... and if this control exist... (J'ai pas fait trop de faute?)
okroger104 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 Not to be confrontational but even if an independent firm came in to evaluate their quality standards, it'll be done voluntarily by Dell and by appointment which means it'll be done according to Dell's parameters. All of which in the end makes this idea practically worthless. I received a bad component on a Dell lappy and their customer service cross-shipped me the new part. Been working fine ever since. Would a quality control video have effected that? No. Since Dell only in part assembles the units. You'll need quality control cameras at each of their component manufactures and their ODM. Even then, it's still worthless. Statistics suggest you have a 10-15% chance of getting a bad computer. It's how customer service deals with is what matters. BTW, I think Dell does subscribe to a quality standard like ISO 9001.
leolonewolf_nw08 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 @ okroger104: The point I was trying to make is that if a customer would like to see the process of quality control then perhaps an independent firm would be the best case for providing that information. Your right in that it's not a real neccessity and could still be influenced by Dell, but you do have alot of people out there that aren't familiar with the industry standards and probably don't have a clue as to what ISO 9001 is or could begin to comprehend it if they tried to self educate on it.
okroger104 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 Random checks would have value. But since quality control is not mandated by a government body, all checks would be done by appointment. No value in that as it paints a rosy and unrealistic picture. Think of it this way. You probably work for a company and they may have said at one time that on such and such a date the CEO is coming for a visit. Notice how everyone scrambles and is on their best behavior? Well, does that really represent how things normally are? Nope. Or take Mercedes Benz. You can visit the factory before taking delivery in Germany. So? Things still breakdown. And reviews tell you this. Anyway, not seeing the connection between receiving a bad laptop and wanting to see a quality control video. Especially when there's reviews on the web and websites that discuss the quality (a subjective measure) of a particular brand. See notebookreview. Excellent resource.
sugarbear Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 The point is, a quality control video would only show what any company wanted it to. The complaints of faulty laptops are rising drastically this year. If there were any overseas quality control, these things would not get shipped out. The other aspect is, is the poor quality control deliberate or not. There are many countries that do not like the US, just our money.
leolonewolf_nw08 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 But if a company's product is plagued with quality issues then they will be more likely to spend the extra dollars to relocate to a plant that is capable of quality, hopefully back to "MADE IN THE USA".
sugarbear Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 18 @ leolonewolf_nw08, In a perfect world yes, now days: highly unlikely.
bilbo_248 Jun 9	Merged Comment originally posted Apr 21 I have search video of dell workshop.. I don't have found it.. Sorry for my bad english..
laxboy10 Jul 5	The headphone noise is because of a bad motherboard, call them and they will replace it. I had the problem with the headphone noise and they sent me another one with the same problem. When the dell repairman came to fix it, be broke my computer and i eventually returned the 1520 and I got a xps m1530. When I got the laptop, it was physically bent, they needed to replace the case.

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