sorry that you’re having to rebuild your blog.
here’s a new story about how much future shop sucks. and there’s a good
lesson that should help folks in the future.
a few years ago, i bought a 5-disc CD/DVD spinner. i didn’t buy their
extended ‘warranty’. after about 6 months, the unit starting crapping
out, not spinning properly or something. at any rate, the model i bought
had been already discontinued. it was still under the 1 year parts and
labour so they exchanged it for a comparable model. i was mildly shocked
but pleased.
so no matter how much i hate future shop, when i know what i’m buying,
how to know if it’s broken and how to return it, i’m confident to shop
there if the price is best.
so last october i bought a DVD recorded. it worked well for about 6
months, then started intermittently not saving tv shows it taped. i
tried various -R, -RW, +RW discs. new ones i’d buy and older ones from
last fall would unpredictably not record. so much so that it stopped
being reliable.
so i package it all up [like i did with the spinner a few years ago],
take the receipt with time left on the 1 year parts and labour warranty
and take it in to the WEST BROADWAY FUTURE SHOP in vancouver. sales dude
says they’ll only send it in for repairs and he can’t exchange it unless
i bought the future shop extended bullshit plan. and since there’s no
commission for him, he walks me over to the dull-eyed customer service
woman who tells me the same thing.
i told her about the cd spinner and she says with some products like
DVD-Rs, they can’t do that. so it’ll be 4+ weeks in the shop. where’s
the shop, i ask. if it is in the lower mainland i’d consider dealing
with them directly. she gets even more dull eyed [a good trait for
customer 'service' clerk trained to say no] and she says it’s on the
east side. i ask, of vancouver or of canada. she says canada she thinks.
lame.
so i come home and phone the future shop on granville in downtown
vancouver. after 10 minutes in voice mail hell, the customer service
woman listens to my whole story then asks for various transaction codes
on my receipt and my name and phone number. she says my model of DVD-R
is one where they’ll just do an in store exchange with the most
comparable model.
bliss.
the moral?
when first you don’t get the answer you want, phone another store. also.
if you are returning something and someone says no, ask them to get on
the fucking computer, look up the transaction codes on your receipt and
prove to you that their store policy says what the idiotic person says
it does. don’t take no for an answer. they, i think, are trained to say
no. and they’re lazy. saying no is infinitely easier.
Mailed in sorry for the delay getting it posted
I got an MP3 player for Christmas from my parents, about 2 months later it stopped working. I went to future shop and was told that I had to send it to the manufacturer, after my parents were told if there were any problems to return it to the store. A year later I am still having problems with this stupid thing. I have had it just over a year and am still having problems with it, the manufacturer will not respond to my emails, adn future shop keeps giving me the blow off. I went in almost everyday of a week trying to speak to different managers, I was given a 1800 number for complaints, I got an automated voice, theres another complaint. This is not the first time this has happened, I bought a DVD burner and after about 4 months stopped working, again I was told to send it to the manufacturer. The manufacturer was great, they couldn’t fix mine and in a matter of days sent me their latest model. I was impressed!! I write future shop once a week, and told them I will do so until the end of march, or until I get some resolve. Where the future shop ( and best buy) are located is near a large shopping are in my city, so when I go shopping I make sure to go into the store and ask about the warranty on their products, and if they tell me I can return it in the store, I raise my voice and call them liars and that they should be ashamed to work for a company that treats customers the way they do. So I guess in a week we will see what happens. I am a student about to graduate so I don’t have the money to keep spending it on failed products from future shop. But if this is not resolved I will make sure that I find 2 hours every saturday to stand outside their store with a sign about how the make money by selling crap products and then lie to the customers. A guy in my town did that to a computer store and he ended up getting his problem solved rather quickly. If anyone else is frustrated another little trick I did, I went in a grabbed one of their flyers, and made a new one on my computer, then printed some at home and placed them back in the bins with the flyers. I wish I had seen their faces when they found them, next time I will wait around. I do suggest to take action when you are wronged by a company. By no means does this mean I support violence or damage to property, if you are going to retaliate, be smart, think clever, a damaged reputation from the truth is better than anything violence will ever solve. Be smart and be informed. Thanks all for listening.
Left by aski on March 23rd, 2007