Warning - Dixon's refurbished rubbish

Bonzodog

A word of warning to anyone intending to purchase "Refurbished" items (especially PC's and Laptops and other electronic goods) from Dixons stores and Dixons Online.

My experience will hopefully serve as a cautionary tale to others.

Last week I ordered a refurbished laptop from Dixons online. As an IT consultant of over 20 years before retirement, I'm pretty well clued in when it comes to PC hardware and software.

I received the machine last week. On switching on and going thro the set-up procedure, it was evident from the outset that there was something drastically wrong with the laptop in that it would crash and shut down after a few minutes. It also seemed incapable of configuring the Windows7 operating system installed on the machine.

After repeated attempts at re-starting the machine with the same result, I resorted to the built-in self-diagnostics routines to establish what was wrong with the machine. With only 4% of the test completed, the laptop crashed yet again (and this is highly unusual during a self-diagnostic test), shut down and would not even switch on again.

Now one could say that any machine as complex as a laptop could not/would not malfunction, and anyway, the machine was a refurbished model. But my point is this:

If the unit had genuinely been refurbished, it would have been evident to anyone but a complete idiot that the machine suffered a serious malfunction because the fault manifested itself from the outset on being switched on. I can confirm from past experience that part of the test carried out during refurbishment is the so-called 'burn test' when the machine is left switched on for at least 24 hours.

The only possible conclusion therefore is that the laptop had been returned as faulty by a previous customer and Dixon's had simply re-packed the item (not even in it's original packaging) and palmed it off on the next customer. There simply could not be any other explanation. I can confirm that this was common practice at their stores 10-12 years ago when a relative worked there. One would have hoped that they'd have turned a new leaf by now, but it seems not.

I've purchased any number of refurbished goods, including laptops, from Ebay and Amazon all of which have given years of faultless service.

So why you may ask should there be such a difference between these outlets and Dixons?

For the simple reason that providing one takes a few elementary precautions and pays through Paypal, no trader worth his salt on Amazon and Ebay would dare try such dishonest tactics as fear of negative feedback would spell the deathknell to them as a trader. Unfortunately, other than sites such as this, dissatisfied Dixon's customers have no such power and Dixons make full use of it. For them, it's a case of "What the market will bear".

My advice?

:mad: Avoid "Refurbished" goods from Dixons like the plague. :mad:

TommyLee

A WARNING about this ''warning"!!!


Firstly - whilst anyone and their grandmother can claim to be an IT Expert (and since the advent OF the PC the world is now littered with them/us) anyone that buys a product that is faulty simply sends or takes it back - simple! :huh:

Next whilst Mr Angry :mad: may have a problem with Dixons - why no mention of contacting them and passing on how they dealt with his problem - strange I think but not that uncommon in this Modern Day-And-Age (I blame the FAST food culture we now expect of EVERYTHING). :wall:

So without going into one and ranting and raving about this post I will just say this - IF something is delivered to you and it does not work - send it back. And whilst mentioning ''DELIVERY'' we all know about the Care & Attention the average delivery person gives to their packages through the many stages of it's shipment - where PC's & Laptops are concerned they can very easily become damaged in transit thus rendering the unit inoperable. :sad:

Now on to my own experience of Dixons and their Refurbished products.

At the beginning of December 2011 I bought my wife a cheap laptop - £315 for a Refurb, Second Generation i3 Acer - 4GB Ram, 500GB HD, Win7 (64Bit) ...... etc and I have to say it is just perfect, not a mark or scratch on it and if anything looks BRAND NEW.

It arrived as promised - next day, well packaged (though a little sparse of anything other than the laptop and a mains supply) and worked just fine from the off. As with all PC's these days it had lots of pre-loaded programmes which I removed straight away, made a Rescue Disk, loaded Bitdefender Internet Security and then handed it over to her (the wife ) to ''play with'' and it has suited her just great.

If and it's a big IF, the laptop had been faulty then my first port of call would have been the selling agent (Dixons) but as I say it's been just fine and now some two months on the Laptop is working just as well as it did on day one, it runs all of the software I've loaded - even old programmes originally written for XP and it still looks Brand New.

From my own personal experience I have to say everything went just fine with my purchase of a refurbished laptop from Dixons - but I do realise that things can go wrong - with ANYTHING we buy and/or the people we deal with in the course of an average day. So whilst Mr Angry above may feel justified to rant at Dixons, surely his years of experience B]as an IT EXPERT? [/B would have told him there was a major fault (if there was?) with his purchase and his first port of call was with the supplying dealer(?) .................... But then perhaps he was NOT that good an IT Expert as he gave himself credit for?

Jakg

I bought a refurbed Acer 4820T from Dixons - at the time the going rate for a new one was ~£480. I paid £260!

It turned up in a generic brown box but the unit inside looked brand new - all stickers present, protective clear plastic ones etc. Literally no marks on the unit at all - it was manufactured a year ago so I can only assume it was brand new but the box was damaged or something as theres no way the thing had ever been used.

I think occasionally a few faulty units will slip through the net - but normally they are very good value for money. And it's not as if you can't send it back if it's faulty!

Oh, and I'm an IT expert - been building PC's for years, and am currently studying for a degree in Computer Science...

mattyprice4004

Rather than ramble on the Internet, why not give them a call to see what they can sort out for you?

Steer73

I doubt they would be interested in an 18 month old complaint!