Where in the world? Not PC World [RPT]

PC World has reported grim times in their gaudily lit tat outlets. Sales fell 15% in the UK, apparently due to - who'd have thought? - " significantly lower sales". That'd do it, every fucking time.

How on earth has this happened? After all, PC World offer a range of shiny PC's and laptops. Everybody wants a laptop. You can just pop in, grab a new laptop and off you go, can't you?

Err, no. There are laptops aplenty on display, but none you can take to the till. The laptop you want to take away is securely stored around the back somewhere.

Someone has to fetch it for you. So you have to wait, and wait, and fucking wait, for that someone to be free. To stop answering inane questions from the elderly couple who just want to send email but are being upsold to a massive quad-CPU system with a 24 inch monitor.

And when the 13 year old Asian boy (actually, thats not fair: sometimes its a 19 year old Polish girl) is finally ready, can you have your laptop?

No, not yet. First you'll have to suffer a lengthy monologue about the importance of virus checking software and the happy co-incidence that PC World happens to have the worst product on the market available to you for 29.99. 

Then you have to use all of your rhetorical skills to avoid being persuaded to pay 10 pounds a month for the privilege  - one you thought you already had - of having your computer repaired if it goes wrong next week.

Then, and only then, will you be given the box containing the computer you came in 40 fucking minutes ago to buy.

But it's not just about the goods. PC World also offer a number of helpful services.

Among them is a repair and upgrade service. If you're too old, dense or idle to install a new hard disk, or if your computer has suddenly ceased to function after you shared your wine with it, take the box down to PC World, they'll sort it for you!

No they fucking won't. They'll cheerfully tell you, as you stand there sweating from the effort of lugging in a big box from the far end of the car park, a box that has been lurching about on the back seat of your car all fucking day, specifically so you could bring it in, that you need "a ticket".

A ticket? A fucking ticket? Yes. You can't just turn up with your computer and have it repaired you know. Oh no. Even though most of the staff are either picking their noses, downloading porn or playing on the consoles, they can't be expected to just drop everything and repair stuff at the drop of a hat.

What you have to do, mate, is lug that box back to your car, go home, look up PC world on the Internet (on your fucking dead computer) then ring the number given there.

After you've listened to a couple of hours of Enya, you'll be given a ticket number, which will entitle you to bring that box - that one there, on the counter - all the way back here, at which point one of the lads will stop picking his nose and start trawling your disk for pictures of your wife in a bikini.

Another advantage of buying new from a real, physical shop is that you can go back there when - inevitably - your new purchase makes a hideous grinding noise and stops working. They'll give you a new one, won't they?

Again, no. No. Not with PC fucking World. Although they sold that laptop 12 days ago, they want nothing to do with it. They don't even recognise it. They don't want to touch it. Ugh. Take it away, takeitaway!!

No, what you've gotta do, chum, is take that laptop, with all the boxes and packing material you dug out of the bin, back to your car, and go home.

Then you've got to look up PC World on the Internet (on your dead laptop) and 'phone the number given.

Will they help? No they won't. They will take you through a fucking immense labyrinth of menu options and computer generated voices, asking you to type in every serial number on every item in your entire fucking house, before  eventually deducing, like a moronic Miss Marples, that your computer was made by Advent (yes, it was; it says it on the fucking lid) and warmly recommending that you call them.

PC world, you've utterly fucked up. In your ceaseless drive to minimise what you actually do, and your endless quest to have fewer staff, each with less ability, you've actually sunk well below the minimal standard of service that any half-normal person would tolerate.

CF would like to tell you all that in person, but he's never going to set foot in one of your stores again.

[Repeated while CF enjoys his holiday]

19 comments:

Beware of Geeks bearing GIFs said...

Hope the skiing is fine!

You are right - I don't even get my cables or peripherals from there. Gave up years ago. It's easier and cheaper to order online and saves interacting with the tards and their pitiful attempt to sell you unecessary extras.

Even got my whole family ordering from Dell, eBuyer and my preferred, Scan.co.uk.

AndrewSouthLondon said...

Yes we've all done it, youve been "PCWorlded". Even worse, if you buy anything online from PC World, they wont even let you go back to a store with the 9 year old nose-picker, i'ts put everything in an envelope and post it back to a workshop in the Midlands somewhere. Absolutely vile organisation, surviving only because if you buy your IT from Tesco instead, they will send someone round to your home to fix it for free - haaaha - not

Costello said...

God yes. I've bitched many a time about this worthless shop and it's an absolute fucking mystery to me how it survives. With the exception of old biddies you mention i don't see why anyone vaguely acquainted with the internet would go to PC World when absofuckinglutely everything they sell is grotesquely overpriced. I can understand people popping in if they need a bit of hardware or software urgently and don't have time to order online or shop around but surely these kind of purchases cannot be enough to keep an entire chain of stores going? I honestly do not understand how PC World did not go out of business during the early, or at the very latest the mid, 2000s.

PT Barnum said...

My "favourite" PCWorldism is the invisible product, the one on display which isn't in stock and therefore you can't have it.

My local store seems to be staffed largely by former estate agents (men in their 30s with paunches and funky ties) who take it as a personal affront when you start quizzing them about RAM and decline to listen to their preprogrammed hardsell sales pitch for some shite system with free shite included.

Cold Steel Rain said...

I have a Paperweight I bought from PC Bastards 14 months ago..

It's called an Acer. Will they replace it? Will they fuck. It's out of warranty innit..

marksany said...

I avoid PC world normally, but sometimes you need something mediately and they are the only choice. What I discovered is that they price match anybody, but they don't shout about it. For PCs in five minutes though, go to Argos.

JohnRS said...

I echo the other comments. How this company hasnt gone bust is beyond me.

Anyone with a modicum of knowledge about what they've come to buy is so far ahead of the "sales staff" in PCW there really isnt any point in having a conversation with anyone in a PCW sweatshirt. Even totally non-tech friends of mine have run things around the idiots in the shop.

StaceyUK said...

"I have a Paperweight I bought from PC Bastards 14 months ago..

It's called an Acer. Will they replace it? Will they fuck. It's out of warranty innit.."

Similar experience here. Mine's also an Acer. The monitor packed up after 13 months and I had to buy an external screen from a local computer business instead.

The local guys are going to build me a desktop once my laptop finally gives up.

Anonymous said...

I gave up on this bunch of clowns and Dell some years ago and found PCSPECIALIST on the net.
Phone is answered by techies, computer is about half price and the specs are superb.

Joe Public said...

Or buy a Mac?

Angry Exile said...

When it comes to laptops I've come to the conclusion that nobody can make a decent one anymore. Like going to the moon this was something we used to be able to do but can't anymore. What we can make is something that is too bloody powerful by half and therefore gets so fucking hot that actually attempting to use it on your lap will end up making your crotch look like that of an incompetent Nigerian plane bomber. At the very least you can expect them to be prone to dry cracks on the circuit boards, which is probably why I'm the less than proud owner of an HP Compaq that cooked its own mobo at the ripe old age of 15 months.

For Joe Public's benefit, I replaced the cunting thing with a MacBook Pro for more than AU$2000 and not only is the fucker not much better dealing with Apple's highly inflated opinion of themselves and their product is sickening after a while. 'Can't replicate the fault' became 'nobody else has reported this' (Google searches said otherwise, you lying cunts) became 'we've replaced X, Y and Z' (but not M - the bit of ribbon cable that is the likely fault and probably costs less than a dollar) and finally 'it needs a new logic board but we think it's customer damage so it $1200' (the fucking ribbon cable's fucking still in there you witless twats). Well, fuck that and fuck Apple squarely in the face. It works if I dismantle it every couple of months and reseat the iffy cable, but if Apple's quality control was anything like as good as the walk on water cunts think it is I wouldn't fucking have to. In that respect it's better than the HP Compaq was, and in fairness the Apple desktop machines are moderately awesome. But having to deal with Apple's arrogance makes me want to wash afterwards.

Uncle Marvo said...

All true. Buy the biggest Dell you can afford and get you data from Tesco. There, I said it.

Anonymous said...

I go past the place most days. There are always people waiting at the desk that is ment to solve problems.
John Gibson

matthew hopkins said...

If bored with shopping go in and ask a few questions just to make them run around. 1st ask "do you know anything about these laptops?" when they say they do ask them a reasonable question and refuse to let them go get help.. marvellous fun!

Anonymous said...

As Joe Public says, buy a Mac and NOT from PC World. If you are near a Mac shop go in and talk to one of their staff - it's real treat after having spoken to the utter retards at PC World.

Macs might cost a bit more to start with, but you'll save a fortune in time and effort in the long term.

Anonymous said...

I buy my Laptops from John Lewis. Free guarantee, 2 years. Excellent customer service. Relatively.

the man who fell back to bed said...

@ CSR - they may have to - have a look at this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/victoriaderbyshire/2009/05/that_piece_of_eu_legislation_y.html

anything sold in the EU now has a two year guarantee. it's law.

'EU Directive (1999/44/EC) and it states that "a two-year guarantee applies for the sale of all consumer goods everywhere in the EU. In some countries, this may be more, and some manufacturers also choose to offer a longer warranty period." '

Anonymous said...

I feel sorry for the people who know no better than to shop in PC world, but I also hate them for helping the place survive.

Their usb cables have to be the most overpriced item, Belkin A-B 3.5m £25.99.

5m version of same cable on ebuyer £4.99

I once went in there with a friend to buy a laptop he had seen advertised on a bank holiday offer. It had everything necessary including a wireless card, when I asked for it I was asked what it was required for, I told them internet and email and they replied that it wasn't powerful enough for such a tasking job! If a computer can't do that easiest job known to computing like surfing for porn WTF was it meant to be used for, fucking Notepad?

Cold Steel Rain said...

@ the man who fell back to bed.

You Sir are the thing of legends.. I am going to pop down to PC World this weekend with broken Laptop in one hand and EU paperwork in the other!!

It is my sole intention to cause the biggest scene I can! Thank you