Vodafone - In breach of the Sale of Goods Act?

hauxter

Never before have I felt the need to vent on a forum (usually I find them useful for information gathering as *someone* has experienced the same issues...) but Vodafone - with whom I've been a loyal customer for several years and paid an awful lot of money out to - have recently driven me to distraction with extremely unhelpful customer service (wait, "customer service") being downright ignorant of my pleas for resolution.

Background:

* Pay Monthly customer (for many years), last upgraded to iPhone 3GS 16GB in Feb '09 on an 18 month contract.
* Device worked like a charm until last week (14 months into contract)
when it wouldn't power up.
* Sent to repair centre via Voda shop.
* Called by shop rep several days later saying that it was out of Apple warranty (1 year) - this I could have told them in the first place...
* Many minutes spent on the phone / chat function with customer service (wait, "customer service") reps detailing the problem and stating that as a contract customer I would fully expect Voda to repair/replace as per the Sale of Goods Act.
* Fobbed off saying that I would have to pay £150 for repair
* Repeat e-mails stating I would be unwilling to pay for this service as per Sale of Goods Act
* E-mail stating that I would take legal action if problem not resolved and cancel contract as per T&C's Para 11b
* Received e-mail saying cancellation would cost me £124.46 (!) - not addressing my request/complaint
* Another e-mail sent restating my complaint and request for resolution or legal action to be taken with a claim for damages as per Sale of Goods Act

A quick search on MSE Forums makes me realise that many, MANY people have experienced the awful level of customer service (wait...) that I have and I am by no means alone. The next step is to e-mail the CEO (thanks to the forums for this gem!) attaching all communication and a link to this post if my complaint isn't dealt with satisfactorily, and I'm more than willing to engage the services of a legal professional to take this further, if necessary.

Vodafone rely on people being put off 'chasing' for the sake of a 'mere' £150 (or sums similar) - and a few years ago (being young and impatient) I would have just paid up without a fuss - by making it extremely difficult to find satisfactory resolution to matters such as these.

I fully intend to highlight these problems in as many public forums as possible to dissuade the unsuspecting consumer from tying into a contract with Vodafone, a company that simply refuses to properly handle any problems presented to them by a large, and hugely profitable customer base. Maybe this is why people are leaving in droves for competitor companies (I've heard 3 is quite good and already have a data plan for iPad with them - another loss for Vodafone as their ordering process was T.E.R.R.I.B.L.E!)

VODAFONE - CUSTOMER SERVICES FAIL

Tony :mad:

Techhead_2

Whilst Vodafone's Customer Service IS poor; I believe your understanding of the Sale of Goods Act is incorrect. At 14 months you would need to prove to the retailer that the handset was inherently faulty at purchase in order to claim a refund/repair/or exchange.

Hammyman

Seconded. You only have a cast iron guarantee of replacement or repair (assuming no damage) for 6 months under SOGA. After that, the onus is on you to prove it is a manufacturing fault.

Your choices are:
1) Commission an engineer to carry out fault finding and produce a report and if it proves to be a manufacturing fault then claim under SOGA.
2) Pay £150 for the repair
3) Pay £126.46 to buy yourself out of your contract
4) Buy another phone.

Yolina

I know VF are dire where CS is concerned (I'm speaking from personal experience!), however this is from their site so I'm not sure where you stand unless you have the Apple Care plan or you somehow manage to extract a goodwill gesture out of them:

When I buy something from Vodafone, how long is the warranty?

Except for Apple's iPhone, all devices have our standard warranty as below.

Your device warranty will be the same as your contract period.
If there is no term contract (the Vodafone Sure Signal or 30-day Mobile Broadband for example), then the device warranty is 12 months from date of purchase.

Apple iPhone
Apple's limited hardware warranty on iPhone is 12 months from date of purchase. The only way to extend this is to buy the AppleCare Protection Plan for iPhone.

hauxter

Thanks all, I do feel that since I did nothing to the handset for it to 'fail' that it WOULD be a manufacturing fault, though as you rightly point out that after 14 months this might be difficult to prove and would also involved an independant examination by an engineer. This would probably be too costly considering the length of time I've had the device and how much a repair would cost, with an outcome which is far from certain...

Fortunately, I do have mobile phone insurance with my bank (!) but didn't want to go down this route as I wrongly assumed that as a 'valued customer' Vodafone would maybe repair/replace as a gesture of goodwill. As this isn't the case I feel that this isn't the kind of company I feel comfortable pouring money into every month and fully intend to cancel at the earliest opportunity (roll on July!).

In the meantime, I guess I'll get it fixed for the £30 excess through my insurance...

Thanks all for your input, I knew that in the end I'd probably have to use my own means / insurance for the repair but was so frustrated by the way I have been treated by customer services I felt the need to express my anger in the forum. (I feel much better now, btw!)

Tony :-)

stugib

hauxter wrote: »

* Pay Monthly customer (for many years), last upgraded to iPhone 3GS 16GB in Feb '09 on an 18 month contract.
* Device worked like a charm until last week (14 months into contract)
when it wouldn't power up.

Feb'09 + 18 months = October 10?

hauxter wrote: »

Fortunately, I do have mobile phone insurance with my bank (!)

Are you sure that covers breakdown or just loss/theft/accidental damage?

hauxter

Sorry, I did mean February '10 -mistake on the year... However it still stands that 18 months from Feb would work out to be August! Feb '10 + 18 months = Aug '11 by anybody's reckoning?

And my insurance does cover breakdown - otherwise it would have been reported as 'accidental damage' anyway! ;-)

ioscorpio

When I took my daughter's Nokia 5800 for repair to the local Vodafone shop, I was told that they will repair the phone for the length of your contract, I informed them that Nokia phones were guaranteed for 2 years. The thing was, she had since upgraded her contract early to an iphone, so they did not regard the Nokia as in contract. Anyway it was sent off for repair twice and on the 3rd time a replacement phone was issued. so we received a new phone except for the back cover and battery.

Vodafone

Hi hauxter,

I’m sorry to see the difficulty you’ve experienced here and I’d like to clarify this.

Apple iPhones have a 12 month warranty period which can be extended to 2 years by taking out the AppleCare Protection Plan.

As Yolina pointed out, except for Apple's iPhone, all devices have our standard warranty.

Any repairs that are required once out of warranty will have a charge associated with them, as they’re no longer covered within the warranty period.

Kind regards,

Jenny
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK

Guys_Dad

I think that phones should last longer than 14 months too, but there was nothing hidden about the length of the warranty, which is standard across networks as far as Iphones go.

I would just like to say to hauxter that I can see why you may want to take out your wrath on your current network, which happens to be Vodafone. But ask yourself this - would any other network have given you a better service or repaired the out of warranty phone free? (I believe that all Iphones need to go back to Apple for repair anyway, so I guess their answer would be the same regardless of network).

Now, just count to 10 and if I am right about the networks all being the same in that situation, when it comes to renewal, go for the best deal, including Vodafone if theirs comes out on top.

If not, then it is just cutting your nose off to spite your face.