If you have ever been misfortunate enough to have to call Dell for product support in the last year and a bit you would have noticed the dramatic difference in how the calls are answered and obviously who is answering them.

I have nothing against the actual people taking the calls, in fact I think they are very nice people who go out of their way to do what ever they can for you.

The big problem is that they are bound by a strict scripted procedure from which they are not allowed to deviate.

In the past when you called Dell or the ever growing amount of IT companies sending their Call Centres to India, you would get someone who actually knew somwething about IT and were given a lot of latitude to use their brains to fix your problem.

When ever I call them now, I find I am forced to straight out lie to them just to get through their trouble shooting script so I can get my hardware fixed. I know what the problem is and how it needs to be fixed but these guys are forced to go through the entire trouble shooting procedure before they will send you a replacemnet part.