Mobile Phone Woes (long and ranty!)
Bought a Samsung D900i about 3 weeks ago. Really nice phone and huge improvement on my old phone (4 year old Ericsson) apart from the fact that the alarm keeps resetting itself! Been late for work twice since I got the phone (and by late I mean over an hour late!!) because the stupid thing keeps losing its settings.
Basically if you change the time of the alarm the 'Auto Power Up' setting resets itself to OFF without telling you. Nice feature! - so you go to bed thinking you've set the alarm but next morning the phone doesn't turn itself on. Bearing in mind that I live on my own (and no-one else around to wake me up) having an alarm that works is quite a high priority!
Soooooooooo *takes deep breath*....firstly they offered to send it for repair to which I had to explain that it was a bug in the phone's software. Then after demonstrating the problem to the retail gimp I was told 'oh thats just how the phone works'. Yeah right so the phone is supposed to loose all its alarm settings when you change the time then? I don't think so!
I was then told that they couldn't swap the phone because I had brought it back after 14 days and the 14 day limit was clearly stated on the receipt. To which I replied that Vodafone could put what they liked on their receipts but under the Sale of Goods Act 1979 it states that if an item is not fit for purpose than it can be returned 'within a reasonable time'. And that 14 days was not a reasonable amount of time as I had only reset the alarm time twice since getting the phone. At this point the gimp trudged off to get the Manager and I was ushered into a corner and asked to wait!
So when the manager was finally free about 20 minutes later I had go through the whole problem again AND demonstrate it on the phone. Finally I was told I could swap it for another phone but they couldn't give me a refund. So I went to look at the phones and picked out a Sony Ericsson only to be told that they had been sold out of that model for quite a while. 'Can you not give me a credit note and let me know when it comes back in stock?' I asked. 'No we don't do credit notes' I was told. Wonderful!
So I picked out a different Ericsson that I didn't particularly want. Finally we are getting somewhere I thought. I was then told that they needed the same credit card that I bought the phone with in order to do a refund. Except I didn't have the credit card with me. 'In that case we can't do a refund - it must be the same credit card'. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By this point I was about to turn to violence. 'But the Ericsson is the same price as the Samsung so why do you need to do a refund!?' I asked. Retail gimp went to get the manager again...
Cut a long story short I finally got the phone swapped for an Ericsson I don't really want after about an hour of being in the store! Shame about the Samsung as it was a nice phone but I need an alarm that works.
So the moral of the story - know your rights, stick to your guns and dont buy Samsung phones...
Basically if you change the time of the alarm the 'Auto Power Up' setting resets itself to OFF without telling you. Nice feature! - so you go to bed thinking you've set the alarm but next morning the phone doesn't turn itself on. Bearing in mind that I live on my own (and no-one else around to wake me up) having an alarm that works is quite a high priority!
Soooooooooo *takes deep breath*....firstly they offered to send it for repair to which I had to explain that it was a bug in the phone's software. Then after demonstrating the problem to the retail gimp I was told 'oh thats just how the phone works'. Yeah right so the phone is supposed to loose all its alarm settings when you change the time then? I don't think so!
I was then told that they couldn't swap the phone because I had brought it back after 14 days and the 14 day limit was clearly stated on the receipt. To which I replied that Vodafone could put what they liked on their receipts but under the Sale of Goods Act 1979 it states that if an item is not fit for purpose than it can be returned 'within a reasonable time'. And that 14 days was not a reasonable amount of time as I had only reset the alarm time twice since getting the phone. At this point the gimp trudged off to get the Manager and I was ushered into a corner and asked to wait!
So when the manager was finally free about 20 minutes later I had go through the whole problem again AND demonstrate it on the phone. Finally I was told I could swap it for another phone but they couldn't give me a refund. So I went to look at the phones and picked out a Sony Ericsson only to be told that they had been sold out of that model for quite a while. 'Can you not give me a credit note and let me know when it comes back in stock?' I asked. 'No we don't do credit notes' I was told. Wonderful!
So I picked out a different Ericsson that I didn't particularly want. Finally we are getting somewhere I thought. I was then told that they needed the same credit card that I bought the phone with in order to do a refund. Except I didn't have the credit card with me. 'In that case we can't do a refund - it must be the same credit card'. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By this point I was about to turn to violence. 'But the Ericsson is the same price as the Samsung so why do you need to do a refund!?' I asked. Retail gimp went to get the manager again...
Cut a long story short I finally got the phone swapped for an Ericsson I don't really want after about an hour of being in the store! Shame about the Samsung as it was a nice phone but I need an alarm that works.
So the moral of the story - know your rights, stick to your guns and dont buy Samsung phones...