Aaaaaargh! Comet!!!!

Ralph1970

I am writing today to complain about the service I have received with regard to a simple repair to the door seal on my newly purchased Bosche washing machine. I initially placed a call to Comet on the 14th September 2008. I explained the problem and listed the serial number of my machine and the part that was required. An appointment was booked for the 17th September and my wife took a day off work to wait for the engineer. She waited from 8.am and at 3.00pm the engineer, Terry Black, called to say he would be arriving in ½ an hour. He did not arrive until 7pm that evening. When he did arrive he promptly informed me that he did not have the part required as he had only been told about the job at 11am. In his defence he showed me a piece of paper, where he had written that he needed to get the correct part and said that customers could not be relied on to correctly asses what was needed and that was why he had not arrived with the door seal. He then said he would have the part on the 25th. I took a day off work and waited. Nothing. I called and was told the part had not arrived and that it would arrive on the 26th. I took a day off work. Nothing, no engineer, no part. A new date was arranged for a visit on the 6th Oct. I took another day off work. The engineer, Trevor Mackenzie arrived and fitted a door seal. Before He left I asked to see the washing machine working. He told me that he could not do that as I would have to wait an hour for the door seal to set before I could use the machine, which I thought was absurd. At the time I was surprised to see that the door seal he had fitted looked wrong. After an hour I tried to use the machine, the door failed to close properly. I called Trevor as I had his number since he had called me on his mobile earlier that morning and told him of the problem. He said that the door mechanism needed to be adjusted and that he would return at 5pm later that day. At 4.45 I called him to check to see if he was still coming. He told be that he would definitely be there in 45minutes. He did not arrive and I called him again at 5.45, by which time he had turned off his phone. I tried calling him again the next morning; he was not answering and did not reply to a text I sent either. I called again later and when he answered he said that he had been in Ipswich the previous evening and was there again that morning. How then was he able to promise that he would return to repair his earlier bad job? Again I phoned to arrange for an engineer to come and repair the door seal. After a great deal of persuasion another was booked for the 7th between 8am and 1pm. I took a day off work. At 2pm the engineer still had not arrived. When he did arrive, the engineer, this time Tony March, informed me that Trevor Mackenzie had in fact fitted a completely incorrect door seal. And also that Trevor should have tested the machine after he fitted the seal and that it was nonsense that I had to wait an hour before I could have used the machine. It is obvious to me now that Trevor knew that he had fitted an incorrect part and needed that hour to get as far away from the job as possible, Ipswich in fact. I was staggered that he could have; a. fitted a wrong part, b. lied that he would return, c. switched his phone off, ignoring my calls and d. that fitting such a part may, if I had used it, damaged my machine which cost over £600. Surely if an engineer begins a job it is their responsibility to complete it, not to log the job completed when clearly it was not and, certainly not to begin a new day with its job list, in the vain hope that the previous days mistakes and poor workmanship work will somehow sort itself out. By this time I decided to call bosche to get them to repair it and would you believe it Comet have invalidated my warranty and I have to pay £80 for a bosche engineer to come out and do the repair. I then called Comet again and am assured that because of the problems they have caused they will be sending me a new machine. I wait in again call twice to check to see if it is on its way both time I am assured that it is, and yes you guessed it no machine turns up, that is the 7 day I have waited in. I call Comet again this time they tell me that I need to condemn the machine!!!!!! And that I need to get a SED number and take it to my nearest Comet to choose a new appliance. I guess I will then have to wait in for the 8th day for it to arrive.
Call me stupid but this is insane it is a brand new machine with a tiny leak in the door and they want me to bin it and get a new one. The world has gone mad. So in conclusion: DON’T WHAT EVER YOU DO HAVE ANYTHING WHATSOEVER TO DO WITH COMET THEY ARE A JOKE. KEEP AWAY. BE WARNED. For your own sanity I beg you keep away. I have just spent months selling my house and that was positively pleasant and easy compared to getting a bit of rubber from Comet.

Jakg

marks87 wrote: »

I think you'll find customers don't get their rights mixed up - if the fault is obvious, you must exchange it/give a refund there and then.

Actually, from my experience (not with comet), "Consumer Revenge" has made a lot of misinformed idiots.

A woman came to bring a PC back to PC World the other day - she had no recipt etc and lots of shops sell that model of PC, so she could literally of bought it anywhere and brought it back. They refused to take it, she then claimed she worked for trading standards and said it was the stores responsibility to prove she hadn't bought it from them :rolleyes:

FWIW a lot of places like Comet the staff are deliberately mis-informed about what they are doing, as the best liars are the ones that think they're telling the truth...

I know that people don't bring back working goods, but what if you turn it on and it's obviously a 2 second fix? Or if you turn it on and you suddenly see it's full of water or something?

glowy69 wrote: »

if you dont agree with the policy dont buty the item, but please dont come yelling that your 'contract' is with the retailer and that we are breaking the law when you (the customer) signed for the goods and agreed to the terms and conditions whether they have read them or not. I myelf do not try to wriggle out of anything.

You don't sign or agree to anything - the terms and conditions etc are in the box. If you cannot see these first (i.e. they won't take them out for you) they are totally unenforceable (same with software EULA's which appear after you buy something).

John_Cooke

Hi All, now that I have experienced the fantastic Comet Customer experience, I will never purchase another probuct from them. My sons Xbox 360 developed a fault in July this year, under advice (wish I had never listened) I returned the unit to Comet (including original receipt). They informed me as it was outside 28 days it would have to be sent for repair to Microsoft. After some debate with the Manager I agreed, and was informed it would take only 14-21 days max. I chased having not heard anything after 15 days to find out it was still in the store!!! MS had not collected was the excuse. Finally after trying to phone the Head Office (and either having the phone put down or diverted to Service Centre) we received our machine back - All fixed - NOT. The machine had the same fault, so again I this time tried to contact MS direct, to be informed that Comet had registered the machine in their name, as such I could not progress with a fault report - outraged!!!:mad:. I returned to the store again, and this time was allowed to speak to Customer Relations (joke) who stated they need to have it back at least 3 times before they will exchange the item. I asked for this in writing and she said they have a Service Level Agreement (which they would not divulge to me) and that was that. She was not prepared to discuss further, and either I take it or leave it. I asked if they also had a customer charter, and was told no, that was policy. When I asked for a specific person to address my formal complaint to over the handling of this, I was told no, just send it to Correspondents Department and someone will look at it.
For a high street shop and well known brand I think their customer care is appauling and non existant. Whilst I was waiting in the shop they were more than happy to take other mugs money, well appart from the couple I convinced not to spend £700 on a TV, go to Currys !! I even stated I would keep my fingers crossed that the machine would this time work as sold, but not holding my breath.

vyle

John_Cooke wrote: »

Hi All, now that I have experienced the fantastic Comet Customer experience, I will never purchase another probuct from them. My sons Xbox 360 developed a fault in July this year, under advice (wish I had never listened) I returned the unit to Comet (including original receipt). They informed me as it was outside 28 days it would have to be sent for repair to Microsoft. After some debate with the Manager I agreed, and was informed it would take only 14-21 days max. I chased having not heard anything after 15 days to find out it was still in the store!!! MS had not collected was the excuse. Finally after trying to phone the Head Office (and either having the phone put down or diverted to Service Centre) we received our machine back - All fixed - NOT. The machine had the same fault, so again I this time tried to contact MS direct, to be informed that Comet had registered the machine in their name, as such I could not progress with a fault report - outraged!!!:mad:. I returned to the store again, and this time was allowed to speak to Customer Relations (joke) who stated they need to have it back at least 3 times before they will exchange the item. I asked for this in writing and she said they have a Service Level Agreement (which they would not divulge to me) and that was that. She was not prepared to discuss further, and either I take it or leave it. I asked if they also had a customer charter, and was told no, that was policy. When I asked for a specific person to address my formal complaint to over the handling of this, I was told no, just send it to Correspondents Department and someone will look at it.
For a high street shop and well known brand I think their customer care is appauling and non existant. Whilst I was waiting in the shop they were more than happy to take other mugs money, well appart from the couple I convinced not to spend £700 on a TV, go to Currys !! I even stated I would keep my fingers crossed that the machine would this time work as sold, but not holding my breath.

Telling someone in comet to go to currys is like telling somebody if they want to get away from war, move to Iraq.

The customer service does sound really bad, but one thing to know about games consoles (And a lot of consumer electronics now) the best and fastest way to get something sorted is to contact the manufacturer directly.

For xbox 360s, MS will send out a courier next day to pick it up, as will sony. Nintendo will give you a prepaid postage label. Tom Tom and quite a few other manufacturers do the same.

I know that when it comes to SOGA the contract is with the retailer, but sometimes it's just not worth the hassle. Would you rather waste your time going to a shop to get somebody else to call the manufacturer as if they were the customer (when they have the time) and then have to go pick it up, or have the service go straight to your door?

Andy_Spoo_2

I worked for Comet for a while, as a repair engineer, and they are really awful when it comes to customer service.

I went to loads of customers, who had just had a brand new item which was faulty almost immediately and they were told on the phone (bullied I should say) that they had to have a repair engineer out. Off I went to the customers. Most of them said to me "But it's new. Surely I'm entitled to a replacement. I don't want a repair".

Being a good MSE citizen, I'd reply with "Yes, under UK law you are". But the service managers didn't like that and constantly had a go at me for it. I'm not going to lie for a bunch of money grabbing cowboys.

The company will always force a repair.

Some other things you should know about them (all dodgy):-

1. They get a big discount on there goods by agreeing to repair any faulty items themselves rather than using the manufactures service engineers. This means that the manufacturer has NO incentive to supply well tested products to Comet.

2. Don't expect them to use manufacturers original replacement parts. They will happily use 'generic' spares/parts. (example. I went to a Beko fridge freezer to replace a thermostat that 5 [yes 5 !] previous engineers had replaced. I know they were failing due to the fact they were GENERIC, because this happened to the same model when we tried generic parts at my previous employer. My Comet service manager refused to let me order an original part. Like I said, cowboys).

3. I was bullied (yes, they do it to there employees as well) into repairing gas appliances on numerous occasions, although I told them numerous times that I was not and have never been Corgi registered). I'm not an idiot. I can repair most things. But I could have gone to jail. They don't have enough gas engineers, because they're to stingy to pay the going rate for them. So they sometimes use untrained regular engineers. IF YOU EVER, EVER GET AN ENGINEER TO REPAIR A GAS ITEM FROM C O M E T THEN ASK TO SEE THERE (now) GASSAFE REGISTRATION (and also check it's code on the gassafe website to check it hasn't expired).

Scary huh!

Comet_company_representative

Pelican wrote: »

I am having an ongoing problem with Comet, and can tell you that they attitude they have is to assume all customers are "trying it on" (to quote the service engineer).

They refuse to replace my faulty appliance- in fact the engineer laughed when I suggested it. I did point out that I'm happy for it to be repaired rather than replaced, as it was a damn pain in the !!!! to get in the house in the first place (doors off etc), but after 6 "repairs" it is still faulty.

I am now taking legal action.

Hi Pelican,

My name’s Matt and I’m from Comet.

I was most concerned to read your comments and the behaviour of one of our engineers when he attended your property. Although we do attempt to repair where possible, we expect our qualified engineers to diagnose the faults that our customers report and attempt to repair them as quickly as possible . Under no circumstances would we assume our customers are calling for anything other than to have the problem that they are calling about rectified and I am sorry if our engineer led you to believe otherwise.

You mention that this is now the 6th repair and that it is still not sorted. Although I am limited with the information I have at this stage, this amount of repairs does not seem reasonable, therefore, could you please email me direct via the link below with the purchase information and any job reference number that you may have so that I can investigate this matter further for you and also investigate the engineers comments.

https://comet.custhelp.com

You will need to register a few details with us in order to be able to send your e-mail in.

Thanks

Matt

molerat

As Pelican posted that in 2006 I would assume it is sorted now. Comet customer services on the ball eh :rotfl:

molerat

Andy_Spoo wrote: »

1. They get a big discount on there goods by agreeing to repair any faulty items themselves rather than using the manufactures service engineers. This means that the manufacturer has NO incentive to supply well tested products to Comet. This is common with a lot of large retailers. I do not believe they supply defective products to Comet.

2. Don't expect them to use manufacturers original replacement parts. They will happily use 'generic' spares/parts. (example. I went to a Beko fridge freezer to replace a thermostat that 5 [yes 5 !] previous engineers had replaced. I know they were failing due to the fact they were GENERIC, because this happened to the same model when we tried generic parts at my previous employer. My Comet service manager refused to let me order an original part. Like I said, cowboys). I had a microwave repaired by a Comet engineer ? after several failed and abortive visits and it failed 6 months later. Comet were not interested. Panasonic agreed to have it repaired by their local independant. They said an inferior part had been fitted and was in fact fitted dangerouslyand could have caused a microwave leakage. They referred the poor practice back to Panasonic who said they would speak to Comet.

3. I was bullied (yes, they do it to there employees as well) into repairing gas appliances on numerous occasions, although I told them numerous times that I was not and have never been Corgi registered). I'm not an idiot. I can repair most things. But I could have gone to jail. They don't have enough gas engineers, because they're to stingy to pay the going rate for them. So they sometimes use untrained regular engineers. IF YOU EVER, EVER GET AN ENGINEER TO REPAIR A GAS ITEM FROM C O M E T THEN ASK TO SEE THERE (now) GASSAFE REGISTRATION (and also check it's code on the gassafe website to check it hasn't expired).Why did you not report them to Corgi

Scary huh!

Says it all about them really

5arahc

I would like your opinion on my problem with comet please.

I bought a pink samsung digital camera in feb 09 from comet. I also took out a 3year insurance (with comet) for damage and repairs.

The camera has broke 6 times since feb 09!!

Comet insist that they will keep fixing the camera until it is not worth them money wise too and will only then exchange it.

However, on taking the camera back for the 5th time the store manager stated that he would ensure that I got an exchange "if" (more like when) it broke again. Low and behold the camera has broke for a 6th time!

So....when i took it back today, the manager recognised me and instantly told me that the problem was that the battery was broke. I asked him how he had all of a sudden become an engenier and why, if it was the battery the problem hadnt been diagnosed on the previous 5 occasions. I reminded him that he promiced me an exchange but decided that because the problem was that the battery was dead (a rechargable battery) it wasnt a fault with the camera.

Whilst at the store, i rang trading standards who advised me to write a formal letter to comet as according to the sale of goods act, the camera is not fit for purpose and comet has 10 days to either give me a refund or exchange before being taken to court.

Surely common sense would say that there is a fundamental fault with this specific camera?!!!

Mr._Sausagehead

Made the mistake of buying a flatscreen HD TV from Comet yesterday. In the store the 32" looked about the right size for the room I had in mind and I thought I'd got a bit of a bargain.

When I got the TV home I unpacked it, plugged it in and tested that it worked, then I took it upstairs to stand in an alcove of a bedroom.

Disaster! The 32" was just too big for the space and would not sit comfortably anywhere else in the room. So I replaced ALL of the ORIGINAL packaging and returned it to the store, a mere 3 HOURS after purchase.

I was then told that I could not return the item because I had switched it on and tuned it in. I was also quoted at least five different versions of the Comet policy on returns by various assorted idiots from both the store and Comet head office!!!!!!:mad:

When I phoned the Comet head office myself, I was initially told that I could have a full refund, but this was quickly cancelled again when the man asked for someone elses opinion.

I am now stuck with a perfectly good, brand new TV which I no longer want, and am having to fork out another £250 to reliable old Argos for a TV that is right.

I HATE COMET!!!!!!!!!!:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad: