When I’ve heard people complain about Dell’s rebate runaround in the past, I never took them very seriously. Then last July I bought my son a Dell Inspiron laptop. If I’d followed Dell's procedure, I’d still be waiting for my $250 rebate. 

Am I picking on Dell? I don't think so. Unlike CompUSA, from which I recently bought a monitor with rebate, Dell and I have a direct relationship. Dell took my order, built the computer, shipped the computer and knows it arrived. Dell Financial knows I paid for the computer. So why do I need to prove I deserve the rebate by sending Dell all sorts of materials? And why does Dell bring in a third party, RebateStatus.com, to handle rebate processing?

When I asked Dell spokesperson Venancio Figueroa these questions, he said, "This is just a process in place. The vast majority of customers, when they follow the processes and do them properly, get their rebates."

That didn’t answer my question, so I tried some others. How many rebates are never redeemed? “We can't give company specific information,” he said. Why do you need a packing slip to receive the rebate? “I don't have that data,” he said.

Linda Kelly, another spokesperson and executive support representative from "Michael Dell's office," took a harder line. “It’s the customer's responsibility and obligation to follow through, not the vendor or the rebate facility,” she said. However, she did fill out some internal form that helped get me my money, which I received on Dec. 22, nearly five months after submission.

On Dell’s customer care forum, I found others unhappy with Dell’s rebate processing. DM said, "I buy systems five at a time. In the beginning, I was getting rebates back for only one system. Now I write post-it notes on the rebate forms, stating clearly the number of systems on the order, and the rebate amount per order, and request the name the rebate check be made out to. I have drastically minimized problems this way and generally get my rebate checks in 4 to 6 weeks." DM also said sometimes 12 weeks would pass before he’d be told he needed to supply extra documentation not requested on the rebate form, which would then bump the request to the back of the line for another 12 weeks.

Another customer, HD, distrusts RebateStatus.com. "Every two out of three checks that are supposedly mailed to me have either never mailed or mailed a month or more after the indicated date. When I ask for a new check, they call it a rebate resubmission and put you back in the queue for processing." HD also wonders why one rebate check for $50 was handled within 25 days, but another for $750 was lost in the mail twice before it finally arrived.