Office Depot

Besides a few grunts and head nods, I’m not sure if the staff here knows how to communicate. I came in on a Tuesday, but you would’ve thought they just got through a Black Friday rush. Very disorganized and not helpful, stick with Staples or ordering online.

I was looking for notebooks and page inserts on this visit. Two employees went out of their way to help look up items online and in the store. There isn’t a lot of variety in merchandise, but I was able to get help. Kudos to the attention.

I was looking to bulk buy a few dollar sharpeners ASAP and 2 day shipping was a little too slow for me (I needed them PRONTO). Office depot happens to sell these nifty, highly rated sharpeners for 1.20 a piece and the website indicates 200+ in stock at the NH Ave location, so I decided it was more convenient to just show up in person and grab them off the shelf because it actually tends to be more inconvenient to order online than to shop in person sometimes. This place is a good 20 – 30 minute drive from my house so you bet I want my sharpeners when I get there.
I show up, and there’s none in the shelves. I chase down a salesperson, says it’s in aisle blahblahbalh, which I remark I couldn’t find them. He saunters over there, and sees it’s true and I said that the internet said they were available. He gives me some half-​assed response about «back to school» wiping out all their supplies and those sharpeners are popular (note, this in Oct, not Sept). His lackadaisical response to my inquiry told me not to ask him to «check the back» because I’ll become «that person» so I leave, go home and order them online for pick up. MIRACULOUSLY this store births 20 of these babies overnight and I drive back to pick em up the next morning because you can’t bother a clerk to do anything but saunter around the store looking busy/​hiding here!

Once again, #2 tries harder. After hitting a number of Staples trying to find a refill for a favorite pen, I found it here at a reasonable price. Cordial staff, a couple of reserved very short term parking spaces at the front door. Access can be a bit of a nuisance due to New Hampshire Ave being divided and the rush hour traffic from the FDA nearby.

Be aware they charge sales tax on gift cards which is essentially double taxation. Left without purchasing.

The service here is the only good thing. The location is awful and the parking is even worse. I only stop by here due to the convenience of it being close to my apartment. other than that, this place is not worth the headache.

I read the reviews AND still came in. Although I found a box of copying paper on sale, I found nothing else I needed. This is the most basic office depot. You can find paper, pens, pencils, folders, and other general office items. Don’t come here for anything extra like me because you be sadly disappointed. The place gets an extra star for the friendly staff.
Just avoid this place.

What a pathetic experience. ALL employees standing around talking and ignoring customers. Some woman sitting on the floor by the registers. No wonder Staples is taking their market share. This store is an embarrassment to the entire retail community!

Every time I have used this location, my experience has been terrible. In contrast to the downtown Silver Spring location, where the customer service representatives are friendly, knowledgeable, and eager to assist, the precise opposite is true of the White Oak location.
Three major complaints:
1) Not enough staff — I have never seen more than one person working at the copy center, nor are there reps available on the floor. There is always a backlog of frustrated people trying to get help.
2) The staff are not knowledgeable or friendly — The staff seem annoyed to be working there and irritated that you have come in to bother them with questions about their products/​services.
3) Botched copy/​print jobs — Both times I have used this location for a major print job, the job has been botched. What’s worse, the staff person both times has refused to do anything to remedy the mistake.
Avoid this location.

Ummm. NO! This place is consistent in that it always disappoints. My first experience? I visit this location to purchase an ink cartridge for my printer. I bring my empty cartridge with me to be sure I am buying the right one. I go to the check-​out, where I am met with this war-​torn foreign woman, who has the abrasive personality of sandpaper. She rudely rings up my ink cartridge and suspiciously asks if my empty cartridge belongs to the store. STRIKE ONE. My next visit, I go to find Vue cups for my Keurig coffee machine. The Vue cups are out-​of-​stock for the most part, but I see two packages of them sitting on the shelf. I inspect the packages. One package is opened, so I immediately put it back. The other package has so much dust on the top, I decide to inspect the expiration date. Sure enough, this coffee pack has a BEST USED BY date of July 2013. Today is January 18, 2014. STRIKE TWO. I don’t need a STRIKE THREE experience to know I won’t be patronizing this store again. It is small and cluttered. It looks dank and dim. The customer service is just.substandard. Do yourself a favor and drive the extra few miles to the Columbia location, because that’s what I’m doing from here on out.

The people that work at this store are very nice. They seem to want to give good service. Nevertheless, I wonder if the pay is not good enough to retain workers. I wonder about this because of the staff’s lack of knowledge of the Office Depot insurance plan and lack of knowledge of customers’ needs as they relate to products, specifically, printers. I have bought two printers at this store. Both lost their scanning function within two years. After the first printer, I bought insurance for the second printer. This was a bad choice.
Before you buy a printer or any other product for which insurance is offered, think about this: You will not get cash back if the product breaks down. You will get a coupon enabling you to purchase another like product at the same price. You will need to acquire a box to mail the product back to a centralized Office Depot location before you will get the coupon. You may be told that Office Depot will «send you a box,» but don’t believe it. Lastly, the coupon may not arrive in a timely manner.
Also, be aware that if you use a Mac, the USB port on your printer may not be a standard USB port. So, some printers at Office Depot will not work with your computer. You will need to look at the box regarding this issue. Don’t expect anyone at this store to draw your attention to it. (Printers that require a standard USB port may be usable with a Mac if you have wifi.)
I found a printer that satisfied my needs at a better price with knowledgeable staff at the Apple Store in Bethesda.

I can clearly see why this EFFIN place has merely a star rating. I don’t have a problem w/​rules. What I do have a problem w/​are inconsistencies to the rules. If I’ve been afforded a service once, call me spoiled, but I expect that same service EVERYTIME I step foot in your establishment.
I go into this place to print something from my email, and was told…
employee: we don’t do that…
ME: what… you don’t do what??? *insert screw-​face here*
employee: We don’t print from emails.
ME: Ok. Since when?
employee: we never have. There’s the store manager if you wanna talk to her.
_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​_​
ME: I’m asking to print something from my email, and your associate is tellin me ya’ll «don’t do that»???
store mgr: We don’t print from email
ME: since when?
store mgr: since about a year ago
ME: No ma’am! I was in here a little over a month ago on more than one occassion and logged into that computer and printed what I needed to print from my email.
store mgr: *insert stupid a*s look here*…Oh, well we usually only print if you have it on a flash drive, but we don’t print from email.
ME: Ok, well I’m gonna need you to do your job and make sure ALL of your
employees are trained on the same policies, and not just the one’s that work when you’re working…
store mgr: *walks of w/​another associate*
I WIN!!! ;-D

Today I went there to get spiral binding to my tax documents. The guy in the downstairs did a very lousy job and did not punch holes properly. to cover that up, he copied those pages and forgot to add the plastic covers on top.
secondly he mixed the pages and not sure what the original order they are in and came back and asking me to re arrange all those. I got frustrated and took them back and went to the manager who offered me free service. I emailed them the documents again and called 4 times and they keep me on hold for 15 minutes and still nothing happend. they do not know what to do, how to do, no knowledge in their job, no customer service, no punctuality, no proper phone response, no delivery time, nothing !!!
Please please avoid this place! I would never make this mistake of coming to this place again!

I called ahead to see if they had a product in stock. The girl on the phone gave me a definitive yes saying there were 5 in stock. I drove 20 mins to find that in fact they did NOT have the product in stock. None of the employees even really seemed to care.
Seriously sub par. This place is a dump.

This place just refused to help me when the Gaithesburg location gladly offered to bring my printer so I can match the ink in error.
I came in and spoke to the tall guy dark skin/​heavy set at the computer repair area as you come in to the left. I told him G’burg offered but I was in White Oak, not in G’burg. I said I have my printer and netbook in my car… he gave me a blank stare and said we do not fix printers. I wasn’t asking to fix my printer do-​do, my printer is 3 months old! The Epson ink I bought from Office Depot was not compatible so I just needed one that could work with my printer… was that too much to ask? not like the store was packed… in fact there was only one cashier on duty, hardly anyone in the store and he could not even help! I told him Gaithersburg location offered me to bring it in and check it out… but without words he pretty much said get your ARSE to G’burg then, I’m not moving my fat fingers…
His attitude was just awful. I later returned to the same location and returned the ink. Let his store deal with an opened item!
Later last night I heard a commercial on Best Buy Kodak printers if you bring your old printer they hand you a $ 50 gift card… so because of this guy’s useless attitude I am buying a new printer, new ink… and will never return to this location!
Where is the NO star rating?

I came here for a long time until a Staples opened up closer to me. But I trudged here this afternoon to bind some papers together, so downstairs I went to the copy center. There were three frustrated people in line in front of me with their heads buried in their hands, so I knew I was in for a treat.
After about 7 minutes, an employee asked what I needed. I had 8 pieces of cardstock paper in my hands, and I simply said, «I just want to get this bound with the cheapest binding possible.» He took my papers, gave them to another girl and told her to do it. She took the papers, brought them over to the binding machine, put the papers down, then started complaining about the management of the store outloud. She didn’t seem to be talking to anyone in particular, but she went on for about 2 minutes about how there needs to be more staff behind the counter. I couldn’t agree more.
Once the other guy working with her acknowledged what she was saying, she picked up my papers and fiddled with them a bit. She shuffled them around like cards, and I noticed that the two pink papers I had on the front and back of the pile were now not in the right place. «Um, excuse me. I wanted the pink papers on either side of the packet.» She nodded as if to say, «Of course! Puh!» She punched holes in my papers, then got a whole stack of regular paper and punched holes in them too. She put them on the same pile and left them on the binding machine and walked away.
The other guy who took my order originally walked over there about 3 minutes later and saw that the job wasn’t done. So he took what was there and bound it all together in about 30 seconds. He gave me the packet, but I saw that he had put the cardstock papers I wanted AND other regular paper that I didn’t want all together in a bound book. NO. I told him this, and he took the binding out and started again.
I finally get the finished product, and I stand in the growing line just on the other side of the counter to pay. Lucky for me, the same girl that was complaining about the management was running the register and apparently didn’t know how a line works. She took people out of order and each simple transaction took forever.
It took me friggin 20 minutes at Office Depot to get my 8 pages bound.
Even if it weren’t for this incident, I do prefer Staples over Office Depot because this place seems like it’s just falling apart. Kinda like McCain making fun of himself on SNL the weekend before the election, this office supply store seems to know that the race against Staples is already lost.