PC World

m.j.w

This happened me a while ago and I ended up getting my money back for the laptop but I was just wandering now that I have come across this forum was I entitled to more.

Last March I bought a laptop from pc world. Got the free 1 years gurantee with it. It was working grand for about a month and then I just went to turn it on one day and nothing happened.

Took it to PC world in dundalk and they said they could not do anything with it and it had to be sent to England. Rang up the tech guys and they said they would collect it. They came and collected it about 10 days later and it was shipped to England to be fixed. About 3 days later another van came to collect it and I told them it had already been collected.

After this I heard nothing for about 3 weeks and then one morning I seen a van in the drive and thought that I was getting it back. Answered the door and the man asked me to give him the laptop. Could not believe it. I rung the tech guys and after being on hold for about 10 minutes asked them what the story was. They said they had the laptop and were waiting on a new motherboard.

Another month or so passed by, I was ringing them every 3-4 days and getting the same reply. After about 3 months I was really p****d of and was still getting the same responce. At one stage when I rang them I was told that the laptop had been fixed and had been shipped and was in Ireland. I then rang Pc World in Dundalk to complain and I was basically told there's nothing we can do. Tried ringing the Irish Pc World complaints line but could not get threw so I rang the Uk line. I explained everything that had happened and I was told straight away that if I had been without my laptop for over a month I was entitled to a full refund. This was the first time I had been told this!!

So I rang back Pc World in dundalk and spoke to the manager about this and he argued with me about this but I ended up getting him to check it out and he said leave it with him and he will look into getting the laptop back. At this point I was raging and wanted my money back. I rang the tech guys again after this and was told the laptop had been lost in shipping from uk to ireland even tho I had already been told it was in Ireland.

In the end up the manger found out that it was lost and said that he would give me my money back but thats it. I lost all files that were on my computer and had spent nearly 100 in phone credit ringing them. He then had the cheek to try and show me what deals they had at the time.

Sorry for such a lomg and messy post but was just intrested to see if I should have got anything else.

nicelives

not that I've any idea on the consumer law, about 8 years ago my sister left her laptop i to be repaired with PC World under warranty and like yourself it "disappeared".

After a lot of the same rubbish we eventually went in and picked out a new laptop and also a scanner which at the time were about £150, they tried to charge us the difference of value which was about £100. I stood my ground and said I'd prefer to have our old laptop back with all the info that we had left in their care. They backed down, not sure if they have too much ground to stand on or were just sick of the situation they had caused.

I think Gary Glitter's PC was the one of the few repairs that they didn't lose but that was probably a different branch.

mmurphy

As a lecture in Law, you are entitled to a replacement or your money back within the first 12 months of the purchase after that the manufacture must replace the parts for 3-5 years what make was the unit i.e. HP, Sony, Toshiba etc basically you were ****ed about

i purchased a Apple I book from their limerick store and brought it home turned it on and the screen failed to power up I phoned apple and they said that the store has to replace it so I went back to the store in Limerick that evening explained my case and got the usual ****e so I ask them to check had they another model in stock and funny enough they said no, so I got them to check had they one in Waterford and I would drive down and get a new unit which they had so I was delighted but annoyed having to drive down unless there giving away stuff now I refuse to shop there

there is alot to be said about buying local from local IT people

TerrorFirmer

I had a similar problem before in PC World. Being the overly nice guy that I am, I was prepared to leave it and just cut my losses. But when my father heard that, he went in himself, asked for the manager, and then told him he was going to ring up the local radio station quoting both the store and said managers name, to see if any others had similar problems with PC World.

Wasn't long being resolved after that. Think outside the box.

IamBeowulf

Dont blame the staff. I used to work for Dixons and Currys (same group) and the middle management (above branch) are utter w@nkers. I'd replace any faulty product ater 30 days of aiting for repair. They would find it necessary to bark at me for affecting Margin. I, in turn, would quote the law. I slept soundly. Do not let the company bully you, just please remember that the majority of staff are nice people under unkind control. Be assertive, but friendly, and trust me theyll do everythng possible...

Sully

PC World are well known to be the worst for this kinda stuff. Sending it away to the UK to get repaired when most local companies will have it done in a week (possibly less!) is just stupid.

As one poster said, best to buy locally. PC World is one company well known to have situations arrise like this.

gerryo

m.j.w wrote: »

Sorry for such a lomg and messy post but was just intrested to see if I should have got anything else.

You are not entitled to anything for loss of data or loss of income due to lack of said laptop. However, you were royally messed with by PC World.

At least you can now hopefully buy a better laptop for the same price as the old one. Not really adequate compensation for your troubles & the € spend ringing round the place. You should have gotten better service that this, I would have asked for a store voucher to cover my costs, maybe you still can.

m.j.w

gerryo wrote: »

You are not entitled to anything for loss of data or loss of income due to lack of said laptop. However, you were royally messed with by PC World.

At least you can now hopefully buy a better laptop for the same price as the old one. Not really adequate compensation for your troubles & the € spend ringing round the place. You should have gotten better service that this, I would have asked for a store voucher to cover my costs, maybe you still can.

Nah its all behind me now. Was just wandering what I was entitled to incase it ever happened again.

hellboy99

I can't speak for other PC World stores but the Dundalk store is a joke. The whole repair and return side of things in the store is run terribly, your not alone m.j.w, many a laptop and PC has gone missing in their Dundalk store. I'm not surprised as it's ran by muppets that know absolutely nothing about computers, one of their previous managers couldn't even work a PC.
Three people I know had really bad dealings with them, one left a PC in to be fixed, two months later he got someone else's PC back. Another PC was left in to be fixed, 3 weeks later it was still not fixed and she was charged €75, she left it with me and I had it fixed in 30 minutes.
Last was a laptop, it was left in the store to be repaired, a few days later she was told it was sent off to the UK for repair and could take up to 3 weeks max to be fixed. Just over 2 months go by she turns up in the store to find out whats going on, 20 minutes later they found her laptop out the back, it was never sent off !!

the_syco

Apologies for going off topic...

Sully wrote: »

Sending it away to the UK to get repaired when most local companies will have it done in a week (possibly less!) is just stupid.

Actually, it's not stupid. To cut down on costs, and thus the price of what you buy, I'd say the DSG Group only has one repair centre which everything goes to. They'd have all the parts, etc, for the PC. Now, you may say the local repair shop will have it, but they won't have the motherboards, which would be flashed so that the shops OEM version of Windows would run on it. Also, the local place may not have the particular roundy shaped façade for the DVD drive.

mmurphy wrote: »

As a lecture in Law, you are entitled to a replacement or your money back within the first 12 months of the purchase after that the manufacture must replace the parts for 3-5 years what make was the unit i.e. HP, Sony, Toshiba etc basically you were ****ed about

I'd love for you to state [for my benifit] the law which says that, as IIRC (from the PoV of the manufacture), it's a case of:

If the unit has a hardware fault within the first 28 days, you can get a replacement, but after the first 28 days, the manufacture has to be given a chance to repair it. If after a number of chances to repair it, and the same problem still happens, the manufacture may issue a RMA number, and the customer can get their money back.

I'm unsure where you got the "3-5 years" bit from, as I've never heard about it in my life, except for mechanical stuff like washing machines, etc, but as far as I can recall, it doesn't include PC, notebooks, etc.

hellboy99

the_syco wrote: »

I'm unsure where you got the "3-5 years" bit from, as I've never heard about it in my life, except for mechanical stuff like washing machines, etc, but as far as I can recall, it doesn't include PC, notebooks, etc.

Not a lot of people know about this but there can be upto a 3 year warranty on certain components inside a PC/Laptop, this warranty is not with the place of purchase or the manufacture of the PC ie. Dell, HP, etc.. but with the OEM of the component.

Under this Act the purchaser of goods has a number of rights - the main ones are

• Goods must be of merchantable quality – goods should be of reasonable quality taking into account what they are meant to do, their durability and their price
• Goods must be fit for their purpose – they must do what they are reasonably expected to do
• Goods must be as described - the buyer must not be mislead into buying something by the description of goods or services given orally by a salesperson or an advertisement.

When you buy goods in a sale you have the same rights as when you pay full price for the goods.
If you have a contract with a supplier of services you can expect that:

• The supplier has the necessary skill to provide the service
• The service will be provided with proper care and diligence
• The materials used will be sound and that goods supplied with the service will be of merchantable quality

You can read more about your rights when you buy a service here.
If things go wrong

If you have a problem with an item that you have bought it is always the seller who should put things right. As a general rule, the seller can either repair or replace the item. Alternatively, they can refund the costs of the item or service to the consumer.
If you are not satisfied with the quality of goods or services you can:

• Return the goods to the supplier who sold it to you (you should not return the goods to the manufacturer)
• Act as soon as you can – a delay can indicate that you have accepted faulty goods or services
• Do not attempt to repair the item yourself or give it to anyone else to repair it
• Make sure that you have a proof of purchase (a receipt, cheque stub, credit card statement or invoice)

You have no grounds for redress if

• You were told about the defect before you bought the item (for example, if the goods were marked 'shopsoiled')
• You examined the item before you bought it and should have seen the defect
• You bought the item knowing that it wasn’t fit for what you wanted it to do
• You broke or damaged the product
• You made a mistake when buying the item (for example, if you bought an item of clothing thinking it was black when it is actually navy)
• You change your mind

Retailers are not obliged to give refunds or credit notes under the above circumstances even if you show proof of purchase.

Nody

hellboy99 wrote: »

Not a lot of people know about this but there can be upto a 3 year warranty on certain components inside a PC/Laptop, this warranty is not with the place of purchase or the manufacture of the PC ie. Dell, HP, etc.. but with the OEM of the component.

And yet you have not shown any law to back up any part of your claim of 3 to 5 year warranty. What you have quoted below don't give you any such warranty at all.

Yes, the product has to be of merchantable quality and fit for their purpose but this only means that it has to last as long as such a product would be expected, i.e. 3 year if even that (for example I know Ericson and Nokia has argued in court that a mobile phone is expected to work only for one year). On top of that you would have to show that the fault was in the hardware from day 1 of the purchase and that you did not cause it.

In short you will be hard pressed to use your so called warranty with the manufacturer to get something fixed after three years, let alone five.

the_syco

hellboy99 wrote: »

Not a lot of people know about this but there can be upto a 3 year warranty on certain components inside a PC/Laptop, this warranty is not with the place of purchase or the manufacture of the PC ie. Dell, HP, etc.. but with the OEM of the component.

Ah, yes, "certain components". Always amazed that people don't realize that the warranty on a notebook battery is only about 6 months usually, as that's how long they are usually stable to.

Not 100% about Irish Law, but in UK law (I supported people over there for someone), the person has the contract with the shop. The manufacture can take as long as they deem fit to fix the PC/notebook. The "30 days or a refund" garbage is just that. Garbage. Sure, if they have it written down somewhere, sure, but other than that, tough titties.

You mention "the OEM of the component". Never heard that one before, but in the case of notebooks, it'd go pear-shape, as there are two main makers of notebooks, Quanta and Amira. Before you shout that HP makes notebooks, wrong, look at the sticker, it'll say "designed by HP" Dell, Gateway, HP, and a f**k load of others all get their notebooks made by two manufactures, and they alone know where the parts are from. But they mostly only deal with their clients, HP, Dell, etc, so the customer, unless they know the exact model number, I doubt they'll get a part 3 years down the line.

hellboy99

Nody wrote: »

And yet you have not shown any law to back up any part of your claim of 3 to 5 year warranty. What you have quoted below don't give you any such warranty at all.
In short you will be hard pressed to use your so called warranty with the manufacturer to get something fixed after three years, let alone five.

the_syco wrote: »

You mention "the OEM of the component". Never heard that one before, but in the case of notebooks, it'd go pear-shape, as there are two main makers of notebooks, Quanta and Amira. Before you shout that HP makes notebooks, wrong, look at the sticker, it'll say "designed by HP" Dell, Gateway, HP, and a f**k load of others all get their notebooks made by two manufactures, and they alone know where the parts are from. But they mostly only deal with their clients, HP, Dell, etc, so the customer, unless they know the exact model number, I doubt they'll get a part 3 years down the line.

I use to work for a computer company a few years back and this is how I know, for example Samsung HDD have a 3 - 5 year warranty on them depending on the drive.

Lets say you bought a PC from Dell with a 1 year warranty and the HDD was a Samsung and it failed the drive may still be under the OEM warranty. You are well within your rights to ask them to do a warranty check on the HDD or you can do it yourself online, I know Samsung have an online warranty check system.
I've had parts myself replaced this way with Compaq in the past on an out of warranty PC.

mcaul

The manufacturers warranty is a free add-on to your rights as a consumer under sale of goods act.

If a computer has a manufacturing fault after 15 months and the fault can be proved to be caused by poor manufacture, then it is covered for free full repair under sale of goods act. Similar to Washing machine, televisions, cars etc etc. - You basically take a reasonable estimate of how long a particular product should realistaclly last and if it occurs a manufacturing fault during this period, then it should be repaired free of charge.

Personal Example. 5 year old Isuzu Trooper blew its turbo. Out of warranty by 3 years. Replaced free of charge by Isuzu as it was caused by piece of metal coming unstuck within the turbo system.

craichoe

hellboy99 wrote: »

I use to work for a computer company a few years back and this is how I know, for example Samsung HDD have a 3 - 5 year warranty on them depending on the drive.

Lets say you bought a PC from Dell with a 1 year warranty and the HDD was a Samsung and it failed the drive may still be under the OEM warranty. You are well within your rights to ask them to do a warranty check on the HDD or you can do it yourself online, I know Samsung have an online warranty check system.
I've had parts myself replaced this way with Compaq in the past on an out of warranty PC.

An OEM parts warranty is not the same as an End User Warranty.

I think people are confusing the terminology a little bit.

A Guarantee is a money back guarantee with the place of puchase.
A Warranty is with the manufacturer of the product.
A Protection plan or what not is usually a purchasable 2-3 year addon you can purchase. IT IS NOT A WARRANTY or GUARANTEE.

Online purchases are usually 2 weeks for a returns period (moneyback with no fault)
28 Days usually for DOA (Dead on Arrival)
Outside this its usually warranty repairs, general practise is 3 repairs, same fault then you get a replacment.

Fenster

I worked for eight years in Currys, and I feel the need to point out a few things:

Yes, Mastercare are a shower of muppets.

Sending away computers to England saves both you and the company money in the long-run, as there's only one repair centre to deal with, but a lot of Mastercare staff with whom I've dealt are completely clueless about a lot of technical matters. I can't blame them; the source of a problem could be PEBKAC, or hardware, software, or any combination of the three.

What used to actually frustrate me was that they lost customer goods on a regular basis. TV's, laptops, cameras, etc.. It happened to me personally when my camera died. It was away for repair for more than 28 days, and I was issued a replacement without quibble after Mastercare were unable to account for it. The following day I received a separate letter from them informing me that my camera might be away for an "extended period." Six months, to the day, it was away.

When I contacted Mastercare afterwards to find out why it was away for so long, they were still unable to account for my camera, even though I was holding it at that moment.

Very often the left hand isn't talking to the right hand, and I know that relations between stores and Mastercare can be stressed at times (read: much screaming).

Management really can't do much to help unless the repair goes over the allowed period - when you sign an item in for repair, you sign an agreement allowing 28 days for repair if it's under the first year's warranty, and 42 days if it's under the extended warranty. After that point they will normally start to light fires under Mastercare to get the item back to you. If that fails, keep up the pressure and they will issue a replacement item.

haughj

mmurphy wrote: »

As a lecture in Law, you are entitled to a replacement or your money back within the first 12 months of the purchase after that the manufacture must replace the parts for 3-5 years what make was the unit i.e. HP, Sony, Toshiba etc basically you were ****ed about

i purchased a Apple I book from their limerick store and brought it home turned it on and the screen failed to power up I phoned apple and they said that the store has to replace it so I went back to the store in Limerick that evening explained my case and got the usual ****e so I ask them to check had they another model in stock and funny enough they said no, so I got them to check had they one in Waterford and I would drive down and get a new unit which they had so I was delighted but annoyed having to drive down unless there giving away stuff now I refuse to shop there

there is alot to be said about buying local from local IT people

Hi Mmurphy, just want to check the 12 months you mentioned above. I am doing some research in this whole area, and from reading some published information it stated 6 months in Ireland ( European Communities (Certain Aspects of the Sale of Consumer Goods and Associated Guarantees) Regulations 2003 (S.I No. 11/2003). I am not an expert in law but maybe we are at cross purposes and you are referencing a different piece of legislation. Which piece of legislation did you get the 12 months from?? Has the above statutory instrument been updated to 12 months? thanks..

IncredibleHulk

not that I've any idea on the consumer law,

http://www.consumerassociation.ie/rights.html

IncredibleHulk

Not a lot of people know about this but there can be upto a 3 year warranty on certain components inside a PC/Laptop,

hellboy99, have you a link to that? Is it under SOGSOS Act?

this warranty is not with the place of purchase or the manufacture of the PC ie. Dell, HP, etc.. but with the OEM of the component

So how do you invoke it, by returning to manufacturer?

And also regardless of warranty a PC or anything else has to last a reasonable time. If a PC with say a years warranty breaks after a year and a day it could still be argued it did not last a reasonable time.There is not to my knowledge a definition of reasonable

the_syco

Offtopic, not to do with PC World, but some other shops in the UK.

Something fun to chew on, and something I love telling the customers: they bought the goods from the shop.

This may seem bloody obvious, but when people ring up the manufacture (eg: Packard Bell, Acer, Gateway, etc) quoting X, Y and Z amounts of time, we tell them that we'll fix it within a reasonable amount of time. If they don't like it, we can send them the unit back unrepaired. The 28 days the shop told them is the shops own policy.

If the shop wishes to give the refund (off it's own back, and get nothing from the manufacture), that's grand, but they rarely do. They'll give a song and dance, demanding that the manufacture gives them the RMA code, so that they can give the customer their money back, and send the machine back to the manufacture to get a refund, so that the store looses no money, gains money from the sale, and the manufacture pays the shop.

But wait, if the manufacture doesn't want to hand out the code, the shop can give the money off it's own back. Not want to do that? Then quit quoting your f**king policy, and pi$$ off :cool:

hellboy99

IncredibleHulk wrote: »

hellboy99, have you a link to that? Is it under SOGSOS Act?
So how do you invoke it, by returning to manufacturer?

I'm not sure, but as for going about getting it checked when I had dealings with Compaq I asked customer service to do a warranty check on the HDD's as they could still be in warranty with the OEM.
First person I was talking to thought I was talking nonsense, I asked for his supervisor and she said that yes it could still be under warranty with the OEM and that she didn't get many calls like mine.

Sully

the_syco wrote: »

Actually, it's not stupid. To cut down on costs, and thus the price of what you buy, I'd say the DSG Group only has one repair centre which everything goes to. They'd have all the parts, etc, for the PC.

Not to sure what your saying.. cheaper to get it repaired in the UK and not Ireland? That depends on the repair job, but I cant see it being quicker then going to the locals.

Now, you may say the local repair shop will have it, but they won't have the motherboards, which would be flashed so that the shops OEM version of Windows would run on it. Also, the local place may not have the particular roundy shaped façade for the DVD drive.

Well.. it depends on the shop. We can get parts within the week, or sooner if required. Roundy shaped facade??

the_syco

Sully wrote:

the_syco wrote:

Actually, it's not stupid. To cut down on costs, and thus the price of what you buy, I'd say the DSG Group only has one repair centre which everything goes to. They'd have all the parts, etc, for the PC.

Not to sure what your saying.. cheaper to get it repaired in the UK and not Ireland? That depends on the repair job, but I cant see it being quicker then going to the locals.

If, for example, you have 10 PC's and 4 notebooks that need repairing. All of them are still in the manufactures warranty, so it's cheaper for them to be sent back (at the manufactures expense) to the repair centre in the UK.

In the repair centre, they'd have a reasonable stock of parts that seem to break the most, and a few motherboards, etc. As all the PC's have OEM versions of Windows, they'll only work on, for example, the Dell BIOS flashed on the motherboard.

Now, they'd be sending pretty much all the makes to this repair centre, as the one repair centre may multi task. Thus, said repair centre may be fixing PC's for HP, Dell, Gateway, etc. Also, they'd fix some PC's, as well. All shipping is paid for by the manufacture, and also, as the manufacture has links with that one repair centre, it'll pay them to fix all of their PC's.

Now, as the manufacture is taking care of all the costs, the store pays little, or nothing, as opposed to them sending it to a local repair centre, and paying for the repair themselves. The manufacture can say for them to ship it to their repair centre, or they won't pay for it, as they have no way of knowing how good the "local" repair shop is.

Sully wrote:

the_syco wrote:

Quote: Now, you may say the local repair shop will have it, but they won't have the motherboards, which would be flashed so that the shops OEM version of Windows would run on it. Also, the local place may not have the particular roundy shaped façade for the DVD drive.

Well.. it depends on the shop. We can get parts within the week, or sooner if required. Roundy shaped facade??

Yes, you heard correctly. Out Of Warranty, you can slap anything on, but within warranty, the part you replace will have to be the same colour and shape as the previous drive.

In one case, all the parts had to come from the manufactures HQ, which was based in the USA.

Also, can you get OEM motherboards shipped over from, say, the US, at a low cost, multiple times?