Criticism

In the 1990s, Dell switched from using primarily ATX motherboards and PSU to using boards and power supplies with mechanically identical but differently wired connectors. This meant customers wishing to upgrade their hardware would have to replace parts with scarce Dell-compatible parts instead of commonly available parts. While motherboard power connections reverted to the industry standard in 2003, Dell remains secretive about their motherboard pin-outs for peripherals (such as MMC readers and power on/off switches and LEDs).

In 2005, complaints about Dell more than doubled to 1,533, after earnings grew 52% that year.

In 2006, Dell acknowledged that it had problems with customer service. Issues included call transfers of more than 45% of calls and long wait times. Dell's blog detailed the response: "We're spending more than a $100 million—and a lot of blood, sweat, and tears of talented people—to fix this." Later in the year, the company increased its spending on customer service to $150 million. Since 2018, Dell has seen significant increase in consumer satisfaction. Moreover, their customer service has been praised for its prompt and accurate answers to most questions, especially those directed to their social media support.

On August 17, 2007, Dell Inc. announced that after an internal investigation into its accounting practices it would restate and reduce earnings from 2003 through to the first quarter of 2007 by a total amount of between $50 million and $150 million, or 2 cents to 7 cents per share. The investigation, begun in November 2006, resulted from concerns raised by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over some documents and information that Dell Inc. had submitted. It was alleged that Dell had not disclosed large exclusivity payments received from Intel for agreeing not to buy processors from rival manufacturer AMD. In 2010 Dell finally paid $100 million to settle the SEC's charges of fraud. Michael Dell and other executives also paid penalties and suffered other sanctions, without admitting or denying the charges.

In July 2009, Dell apologized after drawing the ire of the Taiwanese Consumer Protection Commission for twice refusing to honor a flood of orders against unusually low prices offered on its Taiwanese website. In the first instance, Dell offered a 19" LCD panel for $15. In the second instance, Dell offered its Latitude E4300 notebook at NT$18,558 (US$580), 70% lower than the usual price of NT$60,900 (US$1900). Concerning the E4300, rather than honor the discount taking a significant loss, the firm withdrew orders and offered a voucher of up to NT$20,000 (US$625) a customer in compensation. The consumer rights authorities in Taiwan fined Dell NT$1 million (US$31250) for customer rights infringements. Many consumers sued the firm for unfair compensation. A court in southern Taiwan ordered the firm to deliver 18 laptops and 76 flat-panel monitors to 31 consumers for NT$490,000 (US$15,120), less than a third of the normal price. The court said the event could hardly be regarded as mistakes, as the prestigious firm said the company mispriced its products twice in Taiwanese website within 3 weeks.

After Michael Dell made a $24.4 billion buyout bid in August 2013, activist shareholder Carl Icahn sued the company and its board in an attempt to derail the bid and promote his own forthcoming offer.