Support assist technician deleted my user profile

This week I contacted Dell from the UK for assistance when my fingerprint reader stopped working.

I was immediately connected to a technician in Bangalore who, accessing my XPS15 via Support Assist, updated the BIOS successfully. This solved the fingerprint reader problem. However, the OS was still requesting that I log in via PIN.

I thought this was a problem I could solve myself, however I agreed to let her continue to try and reinstate ‘fingerprint’ as the default sign in option.

While attempting this, astoundingly, the technician managed to delete my (non-Admin) user profile.

Then to rectify this using a convoluted workaround, and without asking me at all, she proceeded to begin copying all my documents (which amounts to well over 50GB  of data) from my deleted user profile to my Admin account.

As soon as I realised what she was doing, I intervened and paused the process.

I insisted that moving the files was not necessary to rectify what she had done, but she insisted it was.

She became flustered, and then transferred me to her manager.

The manager successfully rectified the problem and reinstated the account.

The overall time I was on the phone was 3 hours and 18 minutes.

Apart from shock and extreme frustration, the outcome of this was that:

• I had to re-install a number of programmes (apps) which seemed to simply disappear
• I had to Re-create my Adobe Lightroom library, re-sync 20GB of files with Lightroom mobile
• I lost my iTunes library (including ratings, play counts and playlists) and Firefox bookmarks
• I had to re-sync Lightroom Mobile (and re-build my Lightroom catalogue), Google Drive and Dropbox, re-mount my server drives; I lost all saved logins, cookies etc

…etc etc

My laptop is still not back the way I had it before… (Yes, the iTunes and Firefox issues could have been fixed via a more recent backup than the one I had)… However that notwithstanding, it still took the best part of a (long) day on the phone plus my time to get things back as they were.

None of these things (except maybe the iTunes library) was the end of the world, however none of theme should ever have happened. I am glad I am a moderately savvy user and (a) realised what was happening, and (b) I have enough knowledge to clean up the big mess she created.

Before I make a formal complaint to Dell, has anyone else experienced anything like this?

I am 18 months into a 3 year Premium Support deal on probably Dell’s top-end laptop.

I’m wondering what I can ask for (if anything) as compensation.

Any thoughts welcome.

Many thanks

Sashina