Argos Laptop - break seal no return policy !!

Donnakou

Hi there, my 20 year old daughter, who has completed a BTEC Computer Studies.. has studied software and all things hardware etc. has been saving for a long time to buy a good spec laptop. She bought a Lenovo IdeaPad 330 15.6 Inch Pentium 4GB 1TB Laptop for £350 from Argos, this was a better spec than her previous laptop. When she paid for it at the checkout, she made sure that she would be able to return it if she wasn't happy with it. Yes, she was told by the boy on the checkout. She started it up at home but it was very slow and not able to run the first program she had downloaded onto the laptop. She was really unhappy, this wasn't what the spec ... and advertised hype, had promised. So she cleared it down re-packed it and went back to Argos to get her money back. She was told she couldn't have a refund as 'she had broken the seal on the laptop' !! how are you able to understand the laptop works adequately for your needs if you cannot try it out ? She has tried speaking to the Manager at the Branch, telephoning the Head Office and no, they will not allow a refund for the laptop. Should Argos not have pointed out to my daughter on purchase that she could not return the laptop if the seal was broken? If the items did not adequately perform to expectation, is this not a reason to return it for a refund? If anyone has any guidance, would be much appreciated. My daughter is obviously very upset, she can't afford to buy another laptop and is left with one which is not very useful to her now..

davidmcn

Has she checked there isn't something fixable to improve performance? New PCs tend to come bloated with unnecessary apps, or start downloading updates etc, so initial impressions might have been misleading.

If it's actually faulty or doesn't correspond to the advertised spec then yes she has rights to get it fixed/replaced/refunded.

binao

davidmcn wrote: »

Has she checked there isn't something fixable to improve performance? New PCs tend to come bloated with unnecessary apps, or start downloading updates etc, so initial impressions might have been misleading.

If it's actually faulty or doesn't correspond to the advertised spec then yes she has rights to get it fixed/replaced/refunded.

As above, but can be very hard to prove.

It may be contentious, but buying a comp from Argos is like buying a comp from Curry or PCW.

A blue screen of death may well be inherent and would justify return.:eek::D:D

If you purchase a comp from an Argos store you choose from a catalogue and a box appears.

If you use Argus online, at least you have the DSRs protection.

I always use JL, in store, you can try before you buy. Also I had no quibble when I returned an item

Good luck.:beer:

RichardD1970

This one?

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8890762

To be fair it is a pretty basic spec laptop at the budget end of the market.

If there is nothing actually wrong with it then Argos don't have to refund as a change of mind purchase.

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

Donnakou wrote: »

Hi there, my 20 year old daughter, who has completed a BTEC Computer Studies.. has studied software and all things hardware etc. has been saving for a long time to buy a good spec laptop. She bought a Lenovo IdeaPad 330 15.6 Inch Pentium 4GB 1TB Laptop for £350 from Argos, this was a better spec than her previous laptop. When she paid for it at the checkout, she made sure that she would be able to return it if she wasn't happy with it. Yes, she was told by the boy on the checkout. She started it up at home but it was very slow and not able to run the first program she had downloaded onto the laptop. She was really unhappy, this wasn't what the spec ... and advertised hype, had promised. So she cleared it down re-packed it and went back to Argos to get her money back. She was told she couldn't have a refund as 'she had broken the seal on the laptop' !! how are you able to understand the laptop works adequately for your needs if you cannot try it out ? She has tried speaking to the Manager at the Branch, telephoning the Head Office and no, they will not allow a refund for the laptop. Should Argos not have pointed out to my daughter on purchase that she could not return the laptop if the seal was broken? If the items did not adequately perform to expectation, is this not a reason to return it for a refund? If anyone has any guidance, would be much appreciated. My daughter is obviously very upset, she can't afford to buy another laptop and is left with one which is not very useful to her now..

At £350 it is a low spec laptop. it can do the basics like word processing and such. For anything graphical, I am afraid I would ask that BTEC take away her piece of paper saying she is a computer expert.


https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8437589

mattyprice4004

4GB RAM and a 1TB hard drive isn't high spec - the hard drive won't even be an SSD at £350.
I think you're expecting too much for the price point - ideally you'll want something with 8GB RAM running on an SSD.

Willing to bet her older one was running older software, hence it being quicker - things move on, and if you want a new machine to be snappy you need to shell out a little more I'm afraid.

RichardD1970

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth wrote: »

At £350 it is a low spec laptop. it can do the basics like word processing and such. For anything graphical, I am afraid I would ask that BTEC take away her piece of paper saying she is a computer expert.


https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8437589

No not that one, this one.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8890762

Which appears to be slightly slower on the CPU side of things.

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

RichardD1970 wrote: »

No not that one, this one.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8890762

Which appears to be slightly slower on the CPU side of things.

Double the reason for BTEC to rip up her piece of paper!

Takmon

Donnakou wrote: »

Hi there, my 20 year old daughter, who has completed a BTEC Computer Studies.. has studied software and all things hardware etc. has been saving for a long time to buy a good spec laptop. She bought a Lenovo IdeaPad 330 15.6 Inch Pentium 4GB 1TB Laptop for £350 from Argos,

So she saved up to buy a good spec laptop then decided to go with an average one if i'm being very generous. Even doing some basic research would show this laptop isn't good spec in any sense of the word. Just look at the CPU alone compared to other:

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Pentium+Silver+N5000+%40+1.10GHz&id=3204


Her expectations were way too high if she expected this to be a good performing machine and she could have got a better spec for that price if she looked online. She will just have to take this as a lesson to do research before she buys something.

Potbellypig

I'm sure you could get £200 from someone for the laptop though. That's a start to saving up for a better one.

Gary123456790

To get the best out of what she has do a fresh install of windows, then install antivirus and only the things she needs. Out of the box it will come bundled with things which lenovo are paid to install to encourage people to use them.

It will run a lot faster with only the minimum of what is needed, tho with a 1.1Ghz processor you arent going to be amazed i'm afraid.