Phones4You Returns - Any Advice

skattykatty

Brought phone end of Jan. 2011. Within 4 weeks it had totally packed up. Returned it to Phones4You. Was told no longer eligible for exchange, so they sent it to repair centre to be fixed. It was 'fixed' and it was working. Within a couple of weeks it started playing up again and cutting out, turning itself off. Now it's turning itself off once or twice a day.

I want to return it to Phones4You for a new one OR an equivalent in exchange and not have to go through rigmarole of sending it back to repairs centre again, as it is clearly faulty. What do you think my chances are of getting what I want??? Any advice on how to go about it?

Many thanks.

grumbler

Try dealing directly with the manufacturer?
Neither the retailer nor the manufacture is obliged to give replace it with the new one though.

tootiemac

Having just spent the weekend dealing with P4U, I must say I don't find the majority of their staff very helpful though I have found a few who defo go the extra mile. To cut a long story short I bought a Samsung galaxy Europa for my bf on the 25/2 returned it within the 14 days allowed (11/3) and agreed to an exchange, it then developed the same faults as b4 so attempted a return for refund on Friday at the branch I bought it from and got no where. But I had taken out my own contract with them (dif branch) just last w/e so we went there for advice and the girl couldn't have been more helpful she spent 2 hours on the phone on fFriday trying to help us sort it bcoz the ppl at the other branch had messed up the original exchange. Anyway we got our refund in the end, but what she did tell us is that P4U is trying to fix the number of unhappy customers and that if we had any problems at all we should just phone the customer services and press our point. So that my Advice to you call and press you point and what you want to happen to make you happy. She also said customer services pay more attention if you say you use it for business and have missed a few VERY important calls. Sorry its so long.

skattykatty

Wow! Thank you so much. Not long at all. Helps to put your advice in context. Would press the shop to call customer service as I have to pay for premium rate numbers and not losing out on more money due to Phones4U!

Funnily enough, had a look on their website and the forum is littered with comments about how rubbish their customer service is!

tootiemac

I just wasnt happy with the original response I got. As you said the thought of having to pay premium rate is not a nice thing, I would most likely have gone back in if it hadn't of been for the fact that the other store was literally just the other side of the retail park (part of a curry's). I plan on using their live chat function on their website to let them know what I thought of their staff I plan on telling them to send their staff across the road to learn how to treat customers. But defo push for what you want and if the 1st staff member wont do it ask for their manager and demand they help you work it out. I believe that I may not like the 1st store but I will be sending people to the 2nd 1 they were brill and couldn't have done anything more for us she worked for 3 days to get refund through due to the original guy locking it out of the system "somehow". I honestly was disgusted with them originally but now I would return to her. Hoping you get what you want i personally have learned that we as Brits don't complain enough about the things we should, so complain and demand til you get a reasonable answer that suits your needs

MisterBrico

Unfortunately with phones that are getting more and more like tiny computers it isn't really economical for them to just replace it if you say it is faulty.

If it has only been off once what is to say it's not a different fault or a user error.

Without even having chance to look at it would be unfair to just expect them to fork out.

Usually where I work a phone has to go off 3 times before we can get it exchanged.

Either way good luck getting it sorted, but kicking up a fuss in your local shop is unlikely to do much help, I know for a fact even if I wanted to refund or exchange a phone outside the 14/28 days the tilling system wouldn't let me. I would just have to open it up with keys and hand your cash then patiently wait my p45 lol.

Be nice to the people in store, trust me you're more likely to get a result.

tootiemac

I wasn't nasty / rude to the person instore I just didn't like response I got the minute I asked him to help me all I got back was "theres nothing I can do" then he claimed that my phone was out of it 14 day return because it only applied to the original handset which is rubbish because I had been told when it got replaced 1st time that the 14 day faulty guarantee starts again. So when I asked for him to atleast try he phoned up head office/ customer services and said " i have a customer who wants to return a phone out with its 14 day fault policy" never mentioned that it was faulty to head office and lied that it was out of policy. So all I was recommending is that if they wont help you resolve it ask for his manager and that they help you to call customer services.

Parva

grumbler wrote: »

Try dealing directly with the manufacturer?
Neither the retailer nor the manufacture is obliged to give replace it with the new one though.

I wouldn't recommend this. As soon as you start dealing direct with the manufacturer then you take the shop out of the loop and absolve them of any responsibility to deal with your issues. No shop is going to begin dealing with a warranty issue when you have shortcutted them by going direct to the manufacturer. It is the shops responsibility to deal with these issues for the first 12 months and taking them out of the loop removes this obligation for them.

grumbler

Well, I don't have a personal experience in this, but for many other people here this worked much better than dealing with the retailer. Apple and HTC spring to mind.

MisterBrico

tootiemac wrote: »

I wasn't nasty / rude to the person instore I just didn't like response I got the minute I asked him to help me all I got back was "theres nothing I can do" then he claimed that my phone was out of it 14 day return because it only applied to the original handset which is rubbish because I had been told when it got replaced 1st time that the 14 day faulty guarantee starts again. So when I asked for him to atleast try he phoned up head office/ customer services and said " i have a customer who wants to return a phone out with its 14 day fault policy" never mentioned that it was faulty to head office and lied that it was out of policy. So all I was recommending is that if they wont help you resolve it ask for his manager and that they help you to call customer services.

Would seem strange to reset the 14 days on an exchange, for example i could swap my phone every 2 weeks forever if that was the policy

It's just like if you get a replacement under a warranty, the warranty dosnt restart or else you could be in a position where if it keeps failing under say it's 2 year warranty you might have to replace them forever.

Like I say the guy may have come across as / being a !!!!!! but I'm confident in saying even if he wanted to refund he couldn't, the tilling system just wont let you.

In the second store it sounds like they managed to escalate it to sort it out, but it's nit something that is easy to be done

tootiemac

From what i was told by their customer services it does restart after all it would be silly to give you a brand new phone at say 11 months into the older phones life and then say but we're only going to cover it for 1 more month would it not. After all they only exchange like for like and why would any normal person want to have to re-setup their phone every 2 weeks its not fun even if you have backed it up. This has happened to me before when I had to send my sidekick away for repair 4 times I finally asked consumer advice about it and they said that 3 times was more than sufficient to have it repaired before they had to replace. So I got a replacement like for like.