Posted by volvoman
I have just bought a new P800 from Phones4u. I only bought it from them as they were willing to price match a price I had seen on the internet. I bought the phone for £199.99 on Orange talk 200 + 120 texts. First off they took 1 whole hour to conect the phone, and this after they told me I could not have it on my account, because I already had three phones on my account. This I have found to be not true today from Orange them selves. Second, They have caused no end of problems today, because when they regerstered the handset, they did it in my wifes name as a new account, but used my date of birth and proffesion.. Third I requested to have Orange care added to the account, only to discover that they have not done so nor have they activated international roaming which was also requested,nor Orange access which was also requested. But the two salesmen had a long argument about whether their insurance covered the P800 and I told them several times that I did not want their insurance, but this did not seem to have any effect. So at the end of this I have saved between £30 and £70 on the price of the handset, only to spend most of today on the phone trying to sort out their mess.
The moral of this story is, that as long as I have breath in my lungs, I will never go back to Phones4u for so much as a topup card for my sons PAYG phone.
Anyone else had an experience like this from Phones4u.
Posted by pachy
They are awfull, also go to Carphone warehouse if getting o2 or Voda contracts because phones 4 u have hidden minimum call charges & other "gems" to take more of your money, for EG get the EXACT same tariff at Phones4U as you would at CPW & on a monthly basis it will cost you MORE for the same calls,they also tell utter lies & the insurance conversation was probably staged to sell you their insurance which they get more money from than the phone contract they sell you ! a favourite ploy of theirs is to put hand written unbelievabley good offers in their window only to be "out of stock" for the entire period of the offer, they just wanted you in the Replacement window showroom......SORRY i mean PHONEY shop. oops should that be PHONE shop.
Posted by ewap8
Phones4 U is crap, indeed!
Posted by sunjivas
dont talk 2 me bout phones4u...had numerous problems wiv them...neva agen. Was planning on getting it from the link (my T68m last august) but they didnt have it in stock so Phones4u price matched it 4 me - also got me 2 get insurance sumhow...think im gonna stop it now coz aint worth it at all and i gotta payt £50 excess newayz if i make a claim
Posted by sunnychad
They were trying to sell me a T610 on Voda for free on a £46 per month tariff. The manager said it will be £30 on a 200 min tariff and £100 for a lower tariff. Then some smart arse commission-led salesBOY said it will be £200 on the 200 min tariff. I said I'll go to Vodaphone because they know what they are doing and you guys don't. Has anyone noticed all their saleBOYS are Ali G impersonators Init, wicked etc. Also T-Mobile are trying to stop selling through phones4u as they get 90% of their bad debt customers from phones4u.
Posted by Eleventy7
one word: cowboys
Posted by gadgetboytom
Come and see me i work in CPW
we will sort you out
just go to the eltham store and ask for tom.
[ This Message was edited by: gadgetboytom on 2003-05-31 13:26 ]
Posted by jalu
I've only been in there once - I went in and the two 'salesmen' were sat on their desks. It was the time of the first Matrix film and I wanted a 7110 - they were playing with one and took great pleasure in showing me, but laughed when I said I wanted one.
"You won't be able to get one for ages, yet."
Gits, I've never been in since
Jalu
Posted by gemini
I went in there once wanting a t68m on Orange, the man said do O2, exactly the same tariff but I'll give the phone for free (was £70) I said no cos everyone I ever speak to is on Orange so when I go over my minutes it'll be cheaper. He then goes well have the O2 and I'll give you Insurance on it (at the time Orange Care was automatically included on any new contract) I told him this and he was sayin thats a load of crap. Walked out went next door to the Orange shop, they said they didn't have any and when I asked about the Orange Care she said I was right. I then went back next door and left a small explosive device at the front of the door.
Posted by jalu
I wish I had, except thinking about it blowing the shop up would cover the entire centre with their crap
Jalu
Posted by pachy
And every time they lie to a customer who has done his homework (i'm sure they are trained to lie) they LOSE a customer for ever,
BTW back in January i showed the phones4U staff my P8 one afternoon, one of the clammy handed little tykes tried to touch it, but i said it was too expensive & didn't let him, hows that for a taste of their own medicine. he reminded me of a crying little schoolboy watching another boy enjoy a big jam filled hot doughnut.
Posted by volvoman
Keep it coming I love this, they really do have to be the most small minded child like idiots I have ever come across. I am just glad that I am not the only one to have had such a bad experience with them. Maybe it is time to have a list of the worst and best phone shops and internet sites. Anyone used Cyren communications to purchase a handset. I think these lot use ex phones4u staff to work for them. Had a very bad experience when I bought my wife a Motorola T720 from them, thank god Orange have some excellent staff who managed to sort it all out and arrange me getting it from Mobileshop.com.
Posted by jalu
Thinking about it, I haven't had a whole lot of fun buying phones from any high street shop.
Phones4u (as already stated) were crap, so now its time for my t68 story!
I was sold the t68 by Carphone Warehouse in the Trafford Centre - it was pretty soon after the phone came out and I was desperate for one. Perhaps the salesman could tell that when I went in - he didn't seem overly interested in me but was sure to sell me his insurance and replacement policy.
Later on (less than a year later) I decided to get my phone software upgraded to t68i software. I went into the shop who said they would need to send away to do it (I didn't realise there was an SP near Manchester then) and they would give me a replacement phone.
What phone did they offer? A TRIUM MARS!
Now for those of you who don't know what one of those are, check out the Mitsubishi Trium site. Basically, they are ugly ancient phones with no functions at all. I asked the guy if he actually knew what a Trium Mars was and with a smirk he told me he did.
Well, I wasn't happy with that. I stood in the shop and refused to leave until he gave me a better phone. The poor guy had a very bad day - he was phoning lots of different departments, none of which wanted to give me a t68i for the replacement.
Meanwhile, I saw a salesman tell someone to buy a new phone (£100 ish) to fix a problem that a new sim (£10) would fix just as well. As I was feeling malicious, I went over and explained this to them - they walked out without a phone.
Eventually CPW told me they weren't going to get one that day but would phone me as soon as they did.
In the end, they did phone me - however by that time I had already dropped my phone in a field and lost it!
So I tend to buy direct from networks now
Jalu
Posted by suicidebob
I don't regularly upgrade my phones as often as some of the other Esato users, but on the occassions that I do pop into Phones 4 U or CPW, I have found them generally to be (select any of the following that are applicable):
- incompetent
- useless
- not knowing their products/services
- uninformative/unknowledgable
- unresponsive
- unhelpful
- rude
- arrogant
- insensitive - not understanding the priciples of good customer service
- incapable
- in need of remedial training
- out of their depth
- indifferent
This is more so of Phones 4 U staff, but granted there must be some staff there that do not have their heads up their own arses (asses for the Americans out there) and are trying to provide a decent service - though I have yet to see one.
I know a few people that have actually worked for them in the past, they all quit within two weeks of starting because they said that it was terrible - maybe they just couldn't hack it? You would have expected commission based employees would try to learn to about the products they sell, but the staff are all there trying to out do one another for a customers signature.
But, CPW should not feel all smug. I went there to buy a T68i offline and a PAYT tariff separately, asked all the usual questions and queries you ask about when you buy etc, signed up for their insurance, happy with the price, happy with the service.... or so I thought! The insurance I was told was by "Direct Debit", when the form said "Standing Order Mandate"... obviously I questioned this, they told me that they use the same forms to complete a direct debit transaction as they do with standing orders. Having never made a standing order, I thought there was nothing wrong with this (my bad).
Within 14 days, found my handset to be faulty, the battery was not charging properly and would only last a day or so at most. So I returned it for a new one... they said they didn't have any separate batteries so I would have to take a completely new package and need to change the details on my insurance to cover the new handset. One would have thought this would be an easy procedure. It couldn't have been further from the truth... somehow the salewoman started a second insurance package, whilst keeping the first one going, so I was paying for 2 insurance premiums on the same handset
I didn't realise till the statements came through, to which I rang CPW and went to their store to sort this out. More grief ensued for the next 8 months in getting my refund 
They wouldn't accept their fault blaming the bank for the error!?! I got my money back in the end when I said I was going to bring in the legal eagles - they couldn't have been more helpful then
On a side note, I asked the bitch who served me during the exchange about
, can't remember the question exactly but she couldn't answer it so went to another salesperson. She came back with an answer which I know was wrong and when I said so, she replied "No, my colleague should know, he is the "Data Technician!" - like thats gonna make me think... omg! you're so right how could I have been so wrong! Another case of arrogance perhaps??
SuicideBob
PS. forgot to say, this is my first post, sorry for it being so long.
[ This Message was edited by: suicidebob on 2003-06-01 03:35 ]
Posted by lightboy
Well it seems that if you really want to struggle with getting a refund you should try l8shop.com... Go on I dare ya...
Posted by suicidebob
Surely they couldn't take a refund procedure more than 8 months
Their website looks all decent and professional, damn, maybe thats what they want you to think. I guess I am lucky not to have dealth with them.
SuicideBob
Posted by dave_uk
@suicidebob
Welcome to Esato. It's good to see from your first post that you're not into sweeping generalisations. I don't think, for all their sins, CPW deserve to be bracketed with Phones4U for customer service. Whilst the idiot salesman obviously didn't understand the standing order/direct debit procedure properly, he wasn't signing it with his bank details on it! Whose responsibility do you imagine it might be to check and understand what YOU sign?! It would also seem pretty obvious to me, a lowly CPW employee (No, I make no pretence!) that if you sign two standing order mandates, you will be charged twice - the point being that a standing order, unlike a direct debit, is an agreement between you and the bank, so the beneficiary cannot cancel it or alter the amount.
Interestingly, I do not feel I possess any of your beautifully bullet-pointed characteristics and, it would seem, even know some things you don't.
So cheers.... to all those who work in retail and aren't retarded!
Dave
Posted by Miss UK
ive not had probs with emm :-) there fairly cheap betta than cpw maybe
Posted by suicidebob
@dave_uk
You are correct that CPW staff should not be tarnished with the same brush as those of Phones4U and I apologise if you think I was doing such as this was not my intention.
The issue about the standing order mandate however was that I was partly to blame as I said in my earlier post because I was unfamiliar with these banking procedures. When I purchased the insurance, I asked for it to be via direct debit, and when the standing order form came, I did clarify this with the salesperson before signing. I asked them for the direct debit form instead, and they said that the same form was used for direct debit. I asked them to ask another senior member of staff if this was correct and they said yes, and that was the only reason why I signed.
As for the second standing order mandate, this was started because the IMEI number on the original insurance was different to the one of the new handset. She said the procedure was that I needed to sign this new form to set the insurance in place, in which case I asked her specifically whether the original one had was being transferred to this rather than starting a new one. She said that this was correct, and upon checking my receipt this looked correct, old insurance transfered to new one and no additional charges were made.
When I got my statements, I was being charged twice, so I called went to the store and explained the situation, I called CPW Lifeline from the store, and explained the situation to the person over the phone.
My frustration was the fact that they initially said that they had made the mistake and I would receive a refund in 7-14 days, which came and passed - no refund. I went to the store again, explained the situation to the store, they put me through to Lifeline and they apologised for the fact that I was not refunded. They said 7 days... again it didn't arrive.
Third time lucky down at the store and calling lifeline... This time they said it was a banking error and that the bank gave the money and I should go to the bank to organise an indemnity claim which would work. Bank filed a claim, but because there was 2 mandates in force, it wouldn't go through. All this while time passed and I was still being billed every quarter for two insurances policies (remember I was told the first was transferred to the second which would have meant only one policy running). I tried to cancel one of the policies but they were having none of it.
After several more attempts I thought I'd try one last go at another store, and this time I spent about an hour on the phone explaining the whole situation blow by blow but very calmly. The Lifeline rep said he understood my situation but it was the banks fault and that the bank should call their admin department to sort this out. That was when I said I was going to bring in the solicitors to sort this out, he went to the admin department, they then said that they would refund me and I would receive it in 3 days.
Well the refund came, although the 3 days were optimistic, was more like 28 days but then I didn't care much as it was finally sorted out. Had it all been sorted out much sooner without them dragging it on, I wouldn't have been so annoyed but to take 8 months overall was too long for most people to not get angry.
I have found the staff to be apologetic at CPW for mistakes made by other staff members at the other store. If only all staff were like this, it would be good, unfortunately this would never happen as much as we all wish for it. Would I shop in CPW again? Yes, I probably would, but this time I will ask at least 2 members of staff for clarification and a call to head office.
Would I go to Phones4U??? You must be having a laugh... I may have been stupid, but I'm not insane.
SuicideBob
(Sorry for this long post about my situation, and I hope its not taken as hijacking someone elses thread I felt I needed to clarify the situation)
Posted by pbwuk1234
I went to phones4u on Saturday.. fair enough they guy I was dealing with was a traditional salesman using all the usual ploys etc., but he did only try and sell me what I wanted and in the end after saying a couple of times I'm gonna have to go and think about it, I did get a steal of a bargain - t610 for free on cheap vodafone tariff! We'll see what he's like when I go back and tell him it hisses
I'm gonna ring Sony first and see what they say, just in case he denies all knowledge. Cos from what you're saying and lets face it we've all been there before with other companies (PC World are the worst so far in my books), their aftersales care isnt too hot.
Peter
Posted by simon69c
A lot of the problem with Phones 4 U (as several posters have pointed out) is that they try and push customers onto o2 and Vodafone tariffs. Why? Because Phones4U connect o2 and Vodafone customers onto Singlepoint as the service provider. Now Singlepoint is owned by the Cauldwell group. The Cauldwell group also owns a chain of high street mobile phone shops - anyone guess which chain that is?
[Edit] Oh and in case you didn't know - Singlepoint can be about a bad as P4U themselves - some people have no problems with them at all but there are plenty of people out there who have had some nightmare experiences with them!
High street mobile phone chains are typically staffed by people simply wanting to make a bit of easy money - the shops will hire people based on their salesman abilities rather than their specific phone knowledge (makes sense if you are trying to make as much money as possible I suppose!).
OTOH local independent phone shops and independent online retailers are usually set-up and run by people with specific industry knowledge (they need it to be able to flourish in a market with high buying power competitors like CPW/Link/Phones4U etc.) So chances are you will be able to speak to someone who knows what they are talking about, is genuinely interested in making sure you are a happy customer (word of mouth is a crucial means of gaining new customers for them), and can actually help you make the right choice about your mobile. Online indenpendent resellers will also typically be cheaper than high street stores but don't be tempted to use high street store pricematches as these just squeeze the independents even more and eventually they will dissappear - besides you would probably get far better customer service from an online independent than you would from a high street chain anyway!
[ This Message was edited by: simon69c on 2003-06-10 08:34 ]
Posted by duncanb99
The main problem with Phones4u is their guvnor - Mr. Caudwell.
He seems to think he is a business genius, and delights in telling any journalist who will listen how he is better than the "corporate tossers" who populate most companies.
Well, if timeshare sales is the business model he is trying to copy then maybe he is a genius. With high pressure and misleading sales techniques he is building a customer base, sure. But the crap service offered by his second-hand car salesmen will quickly erode this.
And as for his pathetic rip-off of The Gadget Shop which is found in some P4U branches - it looks like a hippy stall at festival.
Pathetic.
Go to CPW, they may have their faults but they know about phones and have good customer service. And no, I don't work for them - just a satisfied customer.
Dunc
Posted by dave_uk
@suicidebob - Ok, I sympathise. I spent 3 hours on the phone to Lifeline today! They are shite - almost shite enough to be on the Pony4U payroll! I appreciate your plight and your clarification
@pbwuk1234 - Sounds like you're about to find out why it was such a good deal!
I just object to the Caudwell Clan because I don't like being given the hard sell when I shop. Maybe when buying a car you expect it, but a mobile?! CPW pay is, obviously, commission-based, but structured such that we are genuinely able to give independent advice without being financially swayed one way or the other. With places like 4U, it's all about getting you to take out their dodgy insurance policy and how much they can milk you for.
The reason for this:
If they don't hit their monthly targets, they get NO commission. Go some way to explaining anything??!!
Posted by impy78
Although the lack of competance at phones 4 u worked in my favour...I went in a few weeks after the T68i came out, as they said that all phones were free on all networks, and got his new woman (obviously in her first week) and convinced her not only that this should include the t68i (which it didn't) and also that as orange phones came with Orange care, there would be no point in taking their insurance, and she gave me the phone no probs! hahahaha!
They phoned me up a couple of months ago about upgrades, and were most upset to find Orange had given me a free t610, 2 months before the old contract ran out.
"Oh, we were offering an upgrade to a t68i......." (how I can be upgraded to the same handset i already had, I have yet to understand).
And CPW gave me a couple of right old laughs in the past couple of weeks. Firstly I went in with the purpose of buying a bluetooth dongle - which I refused to as they were £80. The guy seemed to tkae real offence at this and asked why. I explained that I could get one for £40 online. At this point he told me that it would be no good to have a dongle which slotted into the port with no lead because... "Bluetooth can't go round corners" -
"really i thought it was an RF "
"a what?"
"a radio frequency"
"no it's a beam of light".
"Bye"
Then I went into the huge new CPW in leeds, and asked to upgrade the firmware as they have an SE centre in there. At this point I was given a ticking off, for trying to confuse them, as CPW calls firmware "software"...so i told them to stick it where the sun don't shine, and bought a ticket to london....
And don't even get me started on CPW insurance.....
[ This Message was edited by: impy78 on 2003-09-28 14:56 ]
Posted by phil84
>Later on (less than a year later) I decided to get my phone software
>upgraded to t68i software. I went into the shop who said they would
>need to send away to do it (I didn't realise there was an SP near
>Manchester then) and they would give me a replacement phone.
hey jalu, can you tell me where the service centre near manchester is (saves me calling sony ericsson!)?
cheers
Posted by Miss UK
Phones4U aint dat bad I Bought a new T68i from them fri just gone I wanted a o2 enn but they didnt have any so ahh asked where I Could get the PAYG T-MOBILE enn unlocked, and they gave me directions didnt think theyd do that btw lol
Posted by wapchimp
I had a conversation at work with a colleague in our upgrade dept who said p4u are cowboys!
Posted by macki_c
Use the high street stores to test new phones and see which one you really want then go online and order it from mobileshop.com for contracts or expansys.com or mobilefun.co.uk for sim free.
[ This Message was edited by: macki_c on 2003-09-29 11:51 ]