Has anyone Used prepaymania.co.uk before? Are They Legit?

d.m_3

Sh*t... misread that one completely. LOL

keet83

crazy_fool wrote: »

Don't what ever you do order a mobile phone or anything else from a website called prepaymania .co.uk before you read the small print - you have 7 days to return the product if incorrect after 7 days they will not take back the products- I got caught out on this! avoid these guys & buy from a shop!

with the standard rules of purchases on line, you have 14 days satisfaction returns, if you do not want the item during that time you can return it as long as you pay for the P&P.

you should report them about this to office of fair trades and see if they've had any other complaints about them

keet83

bellyfester wrote: »

Well i thought that I had a good legal case too!- one woman at consumer direct was very helpful told me what to state but after no results I then rang consumer direct again where another woman essentially said I was stuffed pretty much due to the length of time that had passed and the difficulty proving my case. She was very pessimistic. Its so late now that I can't do anything legal so I may as well just advise people to learn from my mistake!

I would be interesting to get a proper legal opinion on this matter on this forum because I had a similar opinion as you OneaDay regarding my rights and this has really shocked me.

here is some of the correspondance...

Repair can take up to 4 weeks - depending on the problem.
Regards

I still have not received my phone and it has been 6 weeks since it was received by yourselves by recorded delivery. I was informed it would take upto 4 weeks.
Please return my phone or provide me with a replacement asap.

Your service has been unacceptable, from falsly selling me a phone that was not in warrenty and faulty, and now not returning it after delivery 6 weeks ago.
If this situation is not rectified I will take this matter further.


Hi,
Apologies that this is how you feel. We did not sell you a handset that was out of warranty - if we had then we would not be able to get it repaired - we do not have our own repair centre's - we send the handsets off to an independent repairer. It was just an easier process to return it back to us than proving it to Carphone Warehouse. As with any repair - the amount of time it takes to repair it - depends on the fault with the handset. As you are aware, the handset was not faulty when you received it - therefore, you were not sold a faulty handset. It unfortunately developed a fault - which is not common but this is why all handsets are covered by a 12 month manufacturers warranty - just in case.

I have asked our returns team to contact the repair centre & see what the problem/hold up is & I will come back to you tomorrow.
Regards

2009-08-07 Thank you for your response however, 9 days later I have still not received a follow up email.
I have now had to take matters further and would like to reiterate the situation using the official advice I have received. Your service has been unacceptable on 3 levels:
1)Firstly You are in breach of contract.The phone was sold with the description that it was was covered by a 12 month manufacturers warrenty. Despite what you have said in your prior email, the handset was not covered by the manufacturers warrenty. I had tried to take it to 2 different official Nokia repair centres both of which stated that it was not in warrenty. Photocopied documentation was provided with the phone when I posted it to yourselves by recorded delivery. The item is therefore not as described.
2) The phone can be considered faulty as the OFT states that 'If the goods develop a fault in the first six months, it will be assumed that the fault
was there when you bought them unless the
trader can show otherwise.'The phone developed a fault in under 4 months.
c)By law you have to remedy the situation/repair the item within a 'reasonable' time. The phone was sent to you over 7 weeks ago. This is not a reasonable time. Additionally the phone has not been returned by the time frame that you yourselves stated it should- 4 weeks.
The phone was faulty, not as described and not repaired within the agreed time frame. I am therefore entitled to a refund for the phone and the cost of returning it by 1st class recorded delivery. I will be reasonable and give you 5 working days to provide a Full refund before I take this matter to the next level.

Regards

# 8.Support Team2009-08-10 Hi,
Your handset is due back with this weeks repairs.
Regards#

9.2009-08-11 Unfortunately given the excessive timescale in getting the repair done I have had to purchase a new phone. I require a full refund, including postage, as requested in the previous email to offset the cost.

I am entitled to this refund by law and I require this refund asap. I gave you 5 working days from the date of the last email so you now have until friday to refund me the cost of the handset.

If what you say is correct and the handset is due back to yourselves this week I would only get it by next next week and 2 months is a very unreasonable time period to wait for a repair. I have also been advised not accept this phone back as it would not be covered by the manufacturers warrenty.

10.Support Team2009-08-11 The handset's warranty is for repair & not refund I am sorry. When the handset is returned we will return it back to you.
Regards

this is when they then refused to repair the phone and I was told I essentially had no rights...
Also if there ever was any customer damage internally it would not be from me but from the fact that it was a reconditioned phone. Interesting that other people seem to have had a similar problem.

do you know that in fact due to EU laws that were brought in a while ago, if an item is sold as new then it has to carry a 2 year warranty. it is a bit confusing as the retailer can bend this rule a bit.

if the fault occurred within 6 months the retailer needs to prove it was the customers fault, however after the 6 months you need to prove it was not your fault. even if you just bring this EU rule up to them it could scare them a little and make them change their mind, also check out this site for more info

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/bargains-and-rip-offs/tips-and-guides/article.html?in_article_id=487339&in_page_id=53954&in_advicepage_id=131

theres also a way you can put in a standard complaint to the government, and if there are several complaints about one consumer then they are investigated into.

http://www.oft.gov.uk/

shelton

I felt i had to register on this site to add my voice to the growing number of bad reviews for prepaymania.I usually check review sites before ordering from unknown sites but on this occasion i was in a rush and didn't....BIG mistake.

I ordered a htc wildfire at 11am the product said "in stock" and would be dispatched the same day, 2 days later it still wasn't dispatched so had to ring them up to be told they're systems were down and it would be dispatched the next day. My status was promptly updated to dispatched by "normal courier" with no tracking number. I'm still waiting for the phone to arrive (2 weeks later) and in the meantime i ordered the same phone from another retailer that delivered it the next working day. When/if i do ever recieve this phone it will get sent straight back for a full refund.

I'll never order anything again from prepaymania and have warned all my friends to do the same. Atrocious service throughout and no doubt this will continue when i persue my refund. After reading other reviews around the net I haven't been surprised to see the word fraudulent used on more than one occasion. Please stay away from these people. The extra money you might spend getting stuff from different sites will prove money well spent in the long run.

savvyshopper76

As the member above, i felt i should also join to share my experiences with prepaymania.
My son wanted a nokia X3 for christmas and as money is a bit tight i thought i'd shop around a bit, the cheapest i had seen the phone on pay as you go was £135.00 so i decided to search for a cheaper deal on the internet. I came across prepaymania and they were offering the phone for £69.89, a huge saving! As many people do i usually research companys before i buy but as stock was running low i decicided just to go for it. I ordered the phone at around 11pm saturday 30 October (the money was taken from my debit card 15 mins later) so i was expecting the handset to be despatched on the monday, nothing. I decided to email the help center after 5 days asking where my order was, i recieved a very short sharp reply saying the phone was out of stock and would be delivered in 7/14 days, not a problem if they had just let me know but put my back up a bit as i had to email them to find this out! I waited the 14 days still with no contact from them and still no handset, i sent 2 further emails but got no reply. Last friday i decided enough was enough and emailed prepaymania asking for a full refund, low and behold i recieved an email back from them saying the phone was now in stock and would be sent later that day, it was eventually sent yesterday after lodging a complaint with google checkout and i've recieved it this morning. I have no complaints about the phone, it is brand new and was eventually delivered. I don't think i would bother to order from them again as their customer service stinks!! I don't think they are a dodgy outfit, just very unprofessional

Prepaymania_Support

Hi Savvyshopper76

I am pleased to hear that you eventually! received your X3, I am however rather disappointed to hear that a) it took so long and b) that you were not kept informed of the delay.

The handset I believe that is in question is the X3 on O2 and I know we have had some rather disappointing and unexpected delays on O2 stock recently which would have given the knock on effect of our delivery being delayed. I would however of expected that you would have been given notification of any delay and of course any subsequent further delay after this.

Procedures are in place for this to happen and I will be reviewing these in the coming days to ensure that this does not happen again. I can only apologise for the delay that you incurred and the lack of information that was shared with you during this delay.

Thank you for bringing this to my attention.

Prepaymania_Support

Hi Shelton,

I would be interested to know if the HTC Wildfire turned up please? you can contact me through our usual ticket system on our site if you quote MSE-Support in the ticket body then I will receive the ticket myself...

Thank you

saty11

I have had an extremely poor quality of service from Prepaymania who seem to think that it is ok to shave a cut off the refund they were due to me. They sent this package in a cheap envelope which of course did not protect the item when it arrived. I returned it in a protective jiffy bag only to have them accuse me of damaging it and then to add insult to injury they take £5 off the refund due for this accusation. Be warned if you return anything to them they appear quite happy to take a cut.

mcalli2008

I ordered a Google Nexus S from these 2 days ago, received confirmation of shipping this morning, so hoping for it to be delivered tomorrow.. I've never dealt with them before, but their prices seem to beat everybody elses! I hope everything goes smoothly, as their prices are almost better than getting a phone on upgrade where i am!

I'll let you know the outcome when/if it arrives

grumbler

Just a warning: Warranty on Mobile not Valid!
Not that this is the case for all the phones they sell, but worth checking.