Comment by Telaneo
Sounds like Dells chargers are garbage. Yet another reason to stay away from Dell in that case. Never had this issue with any charger in my life.
Everything USB should still take normal 5 volts, which any charger should provide without needing negotiation, and anything larger that actually needs more juice also should have the appropriate electronics to handle that (i.e. it's a phone or a laptop or a tablet or similarly expensive device). If you have devices that don't fall into either of those categories, so they don't take normal 5 volts, or they need more juice but are picky about USB, I'd consider them faulty from the get-go, as it's clear they haven't actually implemented USB-PD in any meaningful way. And if your charger doesn't provide 5 volts without asking, it too is faulty.
It's hard to go wrong with charging cables when it comes to USB-C. I agree there's a mess on the data side, but the USB Forum can't even get its head straight with what it should even be called, so it's no wonder nobody there has the balls to mandate colour coding or something similarly helpful.
In this context I am talking about laptops and chargers, which are far less interchangeable. Phones are generally easy, but I would not trust my crappy dell charger to charge my phone without damaging it. What is the saying? In theory, theory and practice are the same, in practice, they are not.