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Dear Sir or Madam:

I had one of the worst experiences of my life with Kinko's today and yesterday. I am

complaining and hopefully you will hear my complaints because you have just lost a

customer for good.

I was out of the country and returned on Monday evening. Early Tuesday morning, I called

into the nearest Kinko's (600 W. 116th St., New York City) to try to get a poster printed

for a very important Columbia University Medical Center poster presentation. I was told

that you were able to print it for me by the next morning.

I went to the store to give my file on a flash drive to the store clerk, and then

proceeded to wait about 45 minutes without being told what was happening. Over time,

after asking many questions, I deduced that the poster was not being printed at 116th

St., but was instead being emailed to 72nd St. and then delivered back to 116th. Then I

was informed that my file was unable to be sent to the 72nd St. Kinko's because the two

clerks working at 116th St. were "computer illiterate and unable to attach the file". I

was told to trust them and that someone who knew how to attach the file would arrive

later in the day to send the email. At this point, I have to admit my confidence in

Kinko's was waning. I asked for my flash drive back so I could go to 72nd St. myself to

handle the matter, but was told that they would handle this, and that I could leave and

come back to look at the sample after it was printed. However, the sample was being

delivered from 72nd St, which made no sense to me. I had to ask for my flash drive back

multiple times, and then after wasting time begging for my things back, I was finally

given my flash drive, and I took off for 72nd St.

I went to 72nd St. and was shown the file in the correct format for a 4' by 6' poster

printed on bond paper, and I signed a form saying that the correct format and directions

were repeated to me by the clerk. Everything he said was correct, so I left the Kinko's

at 72nd St. feeling reassured. I returned as instructed at 4pm to proof my poster

sample, and everything looked perfect. I left at 4.15pm, and was told that my poster

would not be ready until tomorrow morning at 8am. This was pushing it already since the

presentation started at 9am, but I was told that it took 24hrs to print at least, and

they were already rushing the job for me.

So I returned at 7.30am to pick up my poster, and was greeted with the horrible sight of

just the bottom half of my poster and no top half. Apparently someone had took it upon

themself to print the poster on a 3' by 6' piece of paper, and completely cut off the

top. As the sample the day before had been perfect, I have NO IDEA how someone could

print out something that looked so drastically different from the original.

Unfortunately, I was informed by the store clerks that the machine printing the poster

was not working anymore, and that they could print the poster again, but not before 9am.

Since my presentation was at 9am, this was completely useless to me. In addition, I

noticed that the poster had a time stamp of 21.45pm from the day before, indicating that

there was plenty of time to reprint the poster if only I been allowed to see it prior to

8am the day of (or if only one of the clerks noticed that just the bottom half of the

poster was printed -- but no one noticed).

This presentation was incredibly important, and I am aghast at the poor customer service,

the shoddy quality, and the lack of internal checks at Kinko's. I am disgusted with

myself for trusting Kinko's to be able to get the job done.

Another co-presenter also commiserated with me. He had his poster printed on Monday as

well, and he unfortunately went to the 116th store. He was told that his sample would be

ready at 4pm to be proofed, and when he arrived at 4pm, he was informed that the printer

for the sample was broken. The next day, at 9am, he looked at the sample and gave the

ok. That night, when he was supposed to pick up the poster, he was told that it was

printed but "not ready yet". Then, he was asked for the specifications of the poster

again (size, colour or not?, laminated?), despite the fact that he was told the poster

was already printed. He was told the poster would be delivered to him the next morning,

in time for the presentation at 9am.

Unfortunately, he was woken up at 1am with a phone call, with Kinko's employees asking

for his address again. He had given it to them multiple times, but repeated it once

more. The poster was delivered to him at 6am. Again, unfortunately, the poster was too

small and not correctly formatted (again, the sample that he proofed looked nothing like

the actual poster). He was lucky in the fact that he received a whole poster, albeit a

small one, as opposed to me, who only had half a poster.

Thank you Kinko's for wasting my time, my tears, and my energy. I understand that this

email is slightly vitriolic, and for that I apologise. However, I also understand that

Kinko's is supposed to provide a service, and I was not given that service. I also had

to deal with rude and incompetent staff, and in the end, I wish I had never set foot in

any Kinko's in Manhattan.

When a service provider makes a customer feel like she would pay to NEVER encounter the

service provided, there is a deep-seated problem within the system.

Thank you for your time. You have wasted enough of mine.

Sincerely Yours,

A former Kinko's customer

Monetary Loss: $200.

Location: New York, New York

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Guest

Fed Ex Kinkos in Atlanta, GA operates the same way. There are other places to get things printed. I'm a former customer as well.

Guest

There are two women working week days at the East Houston Street Kinkos in NYC. They are belligerent, lazy, ***, racist and angry.

It is impossible to get anything done. The prices fluctuate depending on there level of anger and hatred.

When I go there on the weekends the young men I have worked with are amazing- super helpful.

I am always satisfied. Go on the weekend!

Guest

I have been in Kuwait for over eight years and during the past 10 months, the service provided has been very bad. Poster Printing for example was messed up and i asked for their managers number and i came down to Kinkoรขโ‚ฌโ„ขs spoke to a person called Malik (arabian) but could he not understand my english, So i was really upset because i could not communicate with this person, i asked him can you understand my problem and he was like with muscle and yelling out to me his words were รขโ‚ฌล“we have this only if you want do it or goรขโ‚ฌย then i had some a4 and a3 color print outs to be made, so i asked the filipino staff if Malik is his manager he said no no sir and he pointed out for another person just behind him, i met a person called Darwin, i really appreciated his help and he got everything done for me even the posterรขโ‚ฌโ„ขs which Malik ignored doing it for me.

This can only be if the management is unqualified, hiring arabian with bad attitude or poor salary satisfaction. In my passed experience with Kinkoรขโ‚ฌโ„ขs Kuwait about 3 year ago, it was so helpful and experienced people in but i see all uneducated employees now (e.g Egyptians) like they donรขโ‚ฌโ„ขt even know how to operate a computer. Even the working staff are not satisfied, can not provide quatity service because as some have commented to me that their hands are tied and they are only with one color machine in such a big onestop printing offices. Morale is on the donwside and getting worse.

I donรขโ‚ฌโ„ขt know who else has filed a complaint similar to mine,, but surely I am not the only one complaining about such substandard service. you have my email address and I will be more than happy to provide you with details.

Guest

Houston, TX

local user - 03/24/11

My experience was with two employees (Oct 2010, Meyerland, Houston TX)) - Nancy and Dupree, in store they were INCREDIBLY rude. I was shipping three items and he acted like I was interrupting him and was very rude (in his tone) when I asked him questions. When I asked to borrow the calculator the girl who was sitting on the floor sorting things got up, walked over and tossed it on the counter! The manager Melanie was there and seemed oblivious to how her staff was behaving, in addition to this when I asked about the computers ,(several were not working), she replied: "How much you wanna bet it's user error?" I know she was joking however in the context of everything that was happening it just made it worse. And it was an inappropriate joke. I now go the the Fed-ex just off shepherd and 59. I called corporate to complain however I never got a response. This is definitely the worst customer service experience.

Guest

I had a similar nightmare with the Fed Ex Kinkos in Park Ridge. My posters did not match my originals either, although they claim they printed the file I provided them.

It ruined a special occasion for my dad and his twin sister's 75th birthday. To make matters worse, the clerk and store manager seemed completely indifferent about what had happened.

I have repeatedly called to complain at 1800GOFEDEX and their district manager never called me back either time. I will no longer patronize any FED EX KINKOS Kinkos again either.

Guest

I do not think your web site is user friendly. I called the Kinko store 4 times trying to get the right web site.

Then my picture would not load. I gave up. It was not worth the fight. The store personal need to give accurate info.

The web site is not user friendly for banners.

However the young man Tom, ext. #54, was very helpful, but not enough to get it done.

Guest

Bunch of New York ***

Guest

I agree, go to OfficeMax next time, we will print it while you wait, and it usually takes anywhere from 5 minutes if you have the file set up correctly to at most 1 hour. which is only if we are extremely busy and there is alot to fix for the set up.

Guest

Dear God - go to OfficeMax next time. They'd do it right in the store in a matter of minutes, unless the large format machine is down.

It's summary policy that employees there be trained in doing things such as what you're talking about, and most do it well since it's a fairly simple task to do. The only advice I'd give you is to ensure your original document is at least 600dpi to ensure a good quality print.