Phone Advice Please

I hate Best Buy. Let me say it again...I hate Best Buy (and panasonic)
Don't ever buy an extended warranty or product replacement plan from Best Buy.

A year ago, Amanda and I bought a new Panasonic cordless phone set. 2 handsets, expandable to 3, with an answering machine. We also bought a product replacement plan to go with it just in case. Well, we didn't even have the phones for 6 months before we started having problems with one of the handsets cutting out on calls. The other one was fine and still is fine. We lived with it for a while until the battery also died and won't keep a charge. We haven't even had the phone for a year, and already one of the handsets is dead. They have also been interfering with our wireless internet since they use the same frequency.

In January, I tried to use the product replacement plan to replace our phone. I find out that you cannot return the phone to the store. You have to call an 800 number and they mail you a prepaid mailing label and RMA slip so you can ship the product to some claim center. Once they receive the product and check it out, they then send you a voucher for the original purchase price that you can take into a Best Buy store and use it like cash for anything in the store. Well, our problems started when we never received the prepaid mailing label and RMA slip in the mail. After 4 or 5 weeks, I call back and say I never received anything in the mail. They verify my address (they were missing the unit # of my condo the first time, but that has never stopped mail from being delivered to me), and say they are going to resend the RMA label and I should receive it within 14 business days. Another 3-4 weeks go by with nothing arriving in the mail. I call a third time, they supposedly resend the label, again it never arrives.

I call a 4th time, this time I'm really PO'd at the process. I really just want to take my phone back to the store and deal with it there. The lady on the phone is apologetic and offers to send the voucher in the mail right away so that I can get my new phone and not have to worry about waiting to send my old one back first because of the problems. The voucher never arrives. I called last week after waiting 3-4 weeks to find out about the missing voucher. The person on the phone this time looked at the status and it showed that there was "an error" processing the voucher.... I wonder of there was also "an error" processing all the previous things they supposedly sent me. This person asked me to hold while he looked into the error. He came back on the line and said the error was fixed (without explaining what the error was) and my voucher was on its way and that I should receive it within 14 days. 2 days later the voucher finally arrived in the mail 4 months and 5 calls after my original attempt to redeem the product replacement plan.

So now I have a voucher for $136 to use at Best Buy and I'm not sure what kind of phone to get now. Definately not panasonic again because of our problems, and Amanda knows someone from work who also has a panasonic phone with problems. Problem over half the phones Best Buy sells are Panasonic. We bought a Motorola phone after our wedding, and that lasted less than 2 years before the phone was completely dead. It was a crappy phone that we didn't like anyway - so motorola is out. Since 2.4GHz was possibly interfering with our wireless internet, that leaves the 5.4 Ghz phones. With panasonic and motorola out of the picture, the only remaining brands that Best Buy carries are AT&T, VTECH, and Uniden - and they have to support multiple handsets. Which one to get?

I long for my old phone back. I had a Toshiba cordless phone that was a rock. It lasted me over 12 years from 8th grade through high school, college, apartment life, and our first year of marriage before it finally died. Why can't I find another phone that will last us like that? Best Boy doesn't sell Toshiba, and I don't even know if they make cordless phones anymore. Whatever happened to quality craftsmanship these days?

I am never ever buying another product replacement plan from Best Buy. Possibly never shopping at Best Buy again either.