"I bought my Advent laptop from PC World about 5 years ago for £450 and took the cover/repair plan, approx £400 extra over the 4 years. After various serious problems over the years, the laptop finally caught fire yesterday in the room next to my daughter's bedroom!! (literally a flames out the side job!).
As I had bought a PC World own-brand product with a PCW cover plan, from a PCW store, I thought it reasonable to take it in and ask if they could tell me why it nearly burnt my house down! As with several posts I've read on PCW, I had to literally hunt down a sales staff, to then wait for a manager to appear only to be told "absolutely nothing we can do, you can try calling customer service and they may do something" - this is from the store manager, Bury St Edmunds branch.
I then phoned CS to be told the same, and that as it was out of warranty they could not even look at it or make it safe for my family. When I asked him what their stance on corporate responsibility was towards dangerous products I was told "I don't know". I asked to speak to a supervisor but strangely none were available. After a polite argument he put me through to the 'dangerous products' department (surely he should have done this first?) where I spoke to perhaps the rudest telephone operator I've ever encountered. (Shaz - ext. 25259 apparently!). When I asked what PCW were going to do about this clearly dangerous product, please read this quoted response: "it's not a dangerous product cos it was on fire yesterday, not today...it's not on fire now is it." When I asked her what her point was, she simply repeated the above quote! She proceeded to chastise me for not taking time off work to bring the fault to their attention yesterday, but when I asked her what she would have done differently yesterday the response was: "we would have told you to turn it off". So apparently I should have called and gone through the automated options system whilst my PC was on fire. A strange approach to dangerous products it would seem...
She offered me 2 paying options and got cross when I said I shouldn't have to pay...All very surreal indeed that PCW were angry with me for their product catching fire! She got even more incensed when I claimed PCW were washing their hands of the issue, and angrily denied they were doing this. I said I would like to speak to the complaints department and hilariously she said they were it! leaving me in the bizarre predicament of having to make a complaint about the complaints dept! Every member of staff I spoke to in store and on the phone were badly trained, unhelpful, plain ignorant and very, very rude.
Many thanks PCW for all your support and concern with this potentially life-threatening product!
I had always wondered why there were such a huge number of complaints about PCW online...now I know why :)"
"This is my first review online! I thought I'd start writing this because I had a really good experience rather than a bad one.
I visited my local PC World store in Finnieston in Glasgow looking for a lap top. I was seen quite quickly, I explained the what I was after and was shown about 5 different models that all met my specification.
I'd an idea of what they should cost before going in although I hadn't decided which to get.
I chose a TOSHIBA Satellite Pro C660 in the end as it was on special offer.
It was a thursday late afternoon and they didn't have one in stock, as it was a holiday weekend they said it might be the Tuesday or Wednesday of the following week before I got it.
In actual fact it was delivered on the Friday morning.
The computer has been great and overall I was very happy with them and would go back again."
"Absolutely terrible service. Arrived late, two of four products didn't work. I returned items promptly yet only recieved a refund for one of them. No information about the other item, it has been over a month now. NEVER respond to emails. No phone number to call, only a PO Box and and an email as method of contact. Appaling!"
"The online component centre at pc world is quite simply the worst customer support I have ever had the misfortune of encountering.
1. no telephone support
2. when you ring the main PC world customer support line they deny they are anything to do the component centre despite having a link and loads of logos emblazened on their website
3. The email support line does not reply in good time (more than 48 hours
4. are dishonest
It basically took them more than 3 weeks to get back to me about an enquiry by email delivered short. despite repeated reminders they failed to come up with an answer until eventually they advised me that the courier had attempted to deliver to my door several times. This was not the case at all as I had already spoken to the courier who had no knolege of the item ever reaching the local dispatch. furthermore I'm sure they would have left a card to say an attempt had been made.
The component centre also put futher flames to the fire by asking me the status of the order half way through this process!!!
AVOID THIS OPERATION AT ALL COSTS"