future shop in vancouver complaint

future shop in vancouver complaint

October 15, 2006

here's a new story about how much future shop sucks. and there's a good lesson that should help folks in the future. a few years ago, i bought a 5-disc CD/DVD spinner. i didn't buy their extended 'warranty'. after about 6 months, the unit starting crapping out, not spinning properly or something. at any rate, the model i bought had been already discontinued. it was still under the 1 year parts and labour so they exchanged it for a comparable model. i was mildly shocked but pleased. so no matter how much i hate future shop, when i know what i'm buying, how to know if it's broken and how to return it, i'm confident to shop there if the price is best. so last october i bought a DVD recorded. it worked well for about 6 months, then started intermittently not saving tv shows it taped. i tried various -R, -RW, +RW discs. new ones i'd buy and older ones from

last fall would unpredictably not record. so much so that it stopped being reliable. so i package it all up [like i did with the spinner a few years ago], take the receipt with time left on the 1 year parts and labour warranty and take it in to the WEST BROADWAY FUTURE SHOP in vancouver. sales dude says they'll only send it in for repairs and he can't exchange it unless

i bought the future shop extended bullshit plan. and since there's no commission for him, he walks me over to the dull-eyed customer service woman who tells me the same thing. i told her about the cd spinner and she says with some products like DVD-Rs, they can't do that. so it'll be 4+ weeks in the shop. where's the shop, i ask. if it is in the lower mainland i'd consider dealing

with them directly. she gets even more dull eyed [a good trait for customer 'service' clerk trained to say no] and she says it's on the east side. i ask, of vancouver or of canada. she says canada she thinks. lame. so i come home and phone the future shop on granville in downtown vancouver. after 10 minutes in voice mail hell, the customer service woman listens to my whole story then asks for various transaction codes on my receipt and my name and phone number. she says my model of DVD-R is one where they'll just do an in store exchange with the most comparable model. bliss. the moral? when first you don't get the answer you want, phone another store. also. if you are returning something and someone says no, ask them to get on the fucking computer, look up the transaction codes on your receipt and prove to you that their store policy says what the idiotic person says it does. don't take no for an answer. they, i think, are trained to say no. and they're lazy. saying no is infinitely easier.