Cex

Deahva

Hi folks, i am new to this, but lets paint the picture clearly. CEX (of which i used to have a part time job). having worked in the retail industry for over 10 years as a manager, in gaming, electronics and mobile phones, felt CEX was a perfect place to have a part time job whilst doing my degree. HOW WRONG COULD I BE!!!.

3 months in, no training, no support and the branch is on its 3rd manager since it opened at xmas.

Stick with this it gets better ok.

Jun 08, Staff receive there wages in their accounts on a friday or saturday before payday, start using said funds, monday morning all staff wages that have been paid are then taken back out leaving many extensively over their overdraft limits or creating an unauthorised one (and we all know how much that costs). 2 weeks for staff to get paid, how is it paid, by not buying in for cash, offering discounts to encourage cash purchases and the staff are paid from cash that the store has taken in. following month all stores instructed to bank cash to a debt recovery account ^^!!. 80% of staff paid on time.

Stick with it, it gets better

Staff receive letters from banks re charges for previous month, CEX tells managers to go with staff member to bank or listen in on telephone conversation and listen as they ask (yep thats right, they have to go with them) if the charges can be wiped or if this is not possible, get a letter from them saying charges still need to be paid.

Yep there is still more to tell you

Now having left CEX (and am so glad, yet still not paid properly) in a wake of unproffesionalism and victimisation and to what seems very underhanded going ons. i am more than happy to answer all your questions you may have regarding CEX policies.

"the post regarding stolen phones, i have to back the member of staff concerned, she is right, they do check the phone to make sure it has not been stolen, and if in the future the customer comes back and the phone has been blocked we then mark that sellers card. They should not be allowed to sell to CEX again, and those that are, are breaking their contracts".

Where is CEX at now Oct 08. not buying in goods for cash unless it is under £20..... So what does that tell you...

They are struggling financially, yes we are in a difficult time with current economies UK and globally, but surely if this is the business that you operate and people decide that to raise a bit of cash they will get rid of stuff they dont need then pop along to the local CEX and sell some things.

A VOUCHER WON'T PUT FOOD ON THE TABLE OR HELP PAY THAT BILL WILL IT!!!!

Not much more to go

So as you can tell i am a disgruntelled fromer part time employee of CEX. but to give you one example of how ripping off the public they are here is the example....

I take (still an employee at this point) a Belkin N1 wireless desktop Card (£49.99) new. used it for one month then decided to go wired. CEX staff email buying department who tell them to buy it in as a generic for.......... £3.00. Now that is a !!!!take and a half, because you can bet your bollox that by the following day they would have then changed the system as they do every night and it would have gone up to about £30-£35. how do i know this because i have watched it happen.

so if you have questions you would like answered then please feel free to ask me. No point looking at the CEX handbook because they dont use it themselves, it would be better sticking it in the toilet and they could save money on bog roll.

please dont think i am a bitter person, here was a great chance for a company to become an excellent business and they have thrown it all away. not long till Game and Gamestation dont need to say we will beat their price as i dont think they will be around long enough.

And to finish with

And yes i feel better for letting you all know what CEX is really like.

Deahva

mcwildcard wrote: »

I'm currently having a bit of a nightmare with them, thankfully it's not leaving me out of pocket, but it's still woefully frustrating when they don't answer the simplest of emails. Web customer services can work fine if they do their jobs properly, but when a query that could be sorted with a 30sec phone call takes them days to reply to (if they bother at all), then it's a bit of a joke really.
Used to be a great company, but they've clearly decided that cost saving > proper customer service.

I especially like that the only way to complain is via the same route, as if they're ever going to answer emailed complaints about themselves!

I'm going to post a link to this thread in their forum, although I won't hold my breath for a response of any sort.

Ok just to put you in the picture, the compnay emails are dealt with by a member of staff sitting on their !!!!!! in a store, sometime getting up to use their supervisor card or to reach for another biscuit. there is no DEPARTMENT, there is no phone line, COSTS TO MUCH. so basicly you have an untrained member of CEX staff answering emails from disgruntled customers.

If any of you have them then please post them on here as i would love to see a few of them.

Deahva

jimgee wrote: »

Fine, but this would be a lot more reassuring to people who hold CeX credit if it was backed up with a copy of the inevitable apology from your bank.

Sorry to burst the bubble again folks, CEX banking have not made clerical errors. CEX failed to pay their Inland revenue bill and they had all their bank accounts frozen, hence the reason 700 staff members did not get paid for 2 weeks. this was just one of the lies that the staff were told.

manicmouse86

Ok just to put you in the picture, the compnay emails are dealt with by a member of staff sitting on their !!!!!! in a store, sometime getting up to use their supervisor card or to reach for another biscuit. there is no DEPARTMENT, there is no phone line, COSTS TO MUCH. so basicly you have an untrained member of CEX staff answering emails from disgruntled customers.

Umm.. Cex still do have a customer services department, It is run by Rich M, not untrained members of staff. To deal with the large volume of emails they took on several volunteers from around the company who all attended a training course and are much better equipped to help than the old phone team who had no experience of working in the stores

following month all stores instructed to bank cash to a debt recovery account ^^!!. 80% of staff paid on time.

It was not a debt collector's account, but the accounts of many of the company debtors, and all staff were paid on time (at the latest 5pm monday)or early.

Staff receive letters from banks re charges for previous month, CEX tells managers to go with staff member to bank or listen in on telephone conversation and listen as they ask (yep thats right, they have to go with them) if the charges can be wiped or if this is not possible, get a letter from them saying charges still need to be paid.

simple security to be certain that staff were'nt trying to get more than they were due out of the company - and most banks refunded the full amount anyway - I myself was charged £128 all of which was refunded

Where is CEX at now Oct 08. not buying in goods for cash unless it is under £20..... So what does that tell you...

How come I've bought in 4 laptops and several consoles this week alone? Yes we may not have cash in the mornings due to banking, but by the afternoon most stores are buying at full capacity

I take (still an employee at this point) a Belkin N1 wireless desktop Card (£49.99) new. used it for one month then decided to go wired. CEX staff email buying department who tell them to buy it in as a generic for.......... £3.00. Now that is a !!!!take and a half, because you can bet your bollox that by the following day they would have then changed the system as they do every night and it would have gone up to about £30-£35. how do i know this because i have watched it happen.

As you should know from working in CeX we do not differentiate between brands (except for some linksys which i think have been changed to generic)
Had you looked properly you would have found SNETHEGMU44A is the code to buy that in under which is worth £6 cash, £10 exchange and sells for £16. If you can point out any incident where we have actually ripped off someone in that way then please do tell us.

hollydays

What kind of a company doesn'tget enough cash in,in the morning...duh!
What do you mean "due to banking "?
You mean due to the Company not arranging to get more cash-don't try to put it onto the banking system.

Deahva

As you should know from working in CeX we do not differentiate between brands (except for some linksys which i think have been changed to generic)
Had you looked properly you would have found SNETHEGMU44A is the code to buy that in under which is worth £6 cash, £10 exchange and sells for £16. If you can point out any incident where we have actually ripped off someone in that way then please do tell us.

Yes you do differentiate between brands, the system shows a huge difference between a sony, kodak, mp3 players etc etc, so unless you have changed this within the last month or so, my point is valid.

I think the point you are missing out on is that CEX have blatantly lied to their staff and customers, the reputation of CEX is so low now. yes you will still get the customers who have been offered very low prices from there local Cash Converter or second hand shop coming to sell their DVD's.or CD's, so CEX can make their 300% mark up on it. And that you cannot deny, as it is their in black and white.

simple security to be certain that staff were'nt trying to get more than they were due out of the company - and most banks refunded the full amount anyway - I myself was charged £128 all of which was refunded

Again you miss the point, its blatantly obvious that they had that amount of charges as it said it on the letter they handed in. It was just another show that CEX didn't trust their staff, which was a huge slap inthe face seeing as they had just spent 2 weeks telling one lie after another to the staff. And well done to you on getting your charges refunded, because no one in our branch was able to ge tthat done, you must be some kind of superstar when it comes to banking.

At the end of the day i am away from a company that does not care about its staff, lies to its staff, fails to support its staff. I have a lot of experience in retail, many of them as a manager and i have never been so disgusted by the way some stores have treated their staff like !!!! of their shoes. But hey ho, you work for them still, of course you will protect them,

best quote i can give you is this.

"Reputaions take years to build, it takes seconds to lose it"

They have lost there good reputation, they have lied to customers and to staff. If you think that that is a good working enviroment then you are either a senior manager. a store manager (hope you have had some training) or you really cannot see the bigger picture.

manicmouse86

Yes you do differentiate between brands, the system shows a huge difference between a sony, kodak, mp3 players etc etc, so unless you have changed this within the last month or so, my point is valid.

I was referring to you particular incident of the USB network adaptor, which in the entire SNETWIFI and SNETWLAN we DO NOT differenciate between brands

. yes you will still get the customers who have been offered very low prices from there local Cash Converter or second hand shop coming to sell their DVD's.or CD's, so CEX can make their 300% mark up on it.

Please - find me one item where we have a 300% markup

And well done to you on getting your charges refunded, because no one in our branch was able to ge tthat done, you must be some kind of superstar when it comes to banking.

Well all but one in our branch got their charges back, as did most of the staff in the company


Finally I wouldn't defend CeX if they were treating me like !!!! - I've worked many a !!!!!! job and have no problem telling how bad they are, yes CeX have !!!!ed up - and !!!!ed up royally - but they have turned around and admitted that, and everything is almost back to normal now



And yes you are correct - I am a store manager - I took over two weeks before the incident in July. I have had plenty of training - and even out of my probation I am still recieving training. TBH I would blame your store manager if you didn't ecieve adequate training - which i could well believe because some of the stores I have worked in have been quite poorly run.

Deahva

Please - find me one item where we have a 300% markup

Ok thats easy, you buy in a CD for 30 pence you sell it a £1:00

Next questions ?????

Deahva

And yes you are correct - I am a store manager - I took over two weeks before the incident in July. I have had plenty of training - and even out of my probation I am still recieving training. TBH I would blame your store manager if you didn't ecieve adequate training - which i could well believe because some of the stores I have worked in have been quite poorly run.

Thats mostly where the blame is tbh, bullying and personal issues really dont make for good management, But it doesn't stop there though lol, when you put ina greiviance you expect to be heard, NOPE not this lot.

Well good luck to you, i hope you are a better boss than the one i had.

Ms-Pacman

I went into Cex in Bedford on saturday afternoon . It was quite busy but there was not a lot of new choice as of the previous sunday. There was a huge queue with only two people operating at tills,
About 5 lads were standing about chatting, and were not doing enaything else like labeling or staking shelves which is normal.

I used to really like the Bedford store, the staff are friendly and were always busy doing something whether at tills or not.

All I saw on saturday was a huge queue of grumbling customers, a messy store, quite a lot of empty shelves and loads of same games spread about in areas to make the store look stocked. Half the staff looked bored and miserable with only two people on tills which equally looked harrassed.

I looked around and saw a few bits I was going to buy, saw the state of the tills area and though forget it. CEX lost my purchase which was for £26.00
Not a lot I know but how many more did they lose on that day too?