I previously described my experience with Computers and Parts Land (CPL) [1] who gave me a product that didn’t do what I wanted (because they thought that they knew better than me) and then gave me attitude when I returned it.
As it’s almost a year since that incident I had to buy something else from them to use the credit note as I decided that it’s not worth making a Trade Practices Act (TPA) [2] issue out of it. Thanks Tim for the suggestion though.
Firstly I went to their new store that is advertised on their web site. The people at the new store refused to honor the credit note (they probably hoped that I would just let it go and give them an extra $60 in profit). Claiming that I need to take a credit note back to the store it came from is bogus.
Anyway I went back to the original store and bought a new 1.5TB SATA hard drive which seems to work well enough. The service was really slow, I was the only customer in the store and there were several employees not doing much but it still took them ages to print a receipt and give me the hard drive.
It will be the last CPL purchase I ever make. In the unlikely situation that there is ever any new gear that is only sold by CPL then I will wait a year and buy it on ebay.
It would be good if someone started working as a TPA complainant. They would take donations from dis-satisfied customers who want to pay for an investigation of a shonky company (I’d pay $10 for an investigation of CPL). When enough donations were collected they would buy some stuff and make a video of every interaction with the employees and then launch a private legal action under the TPA if they do anything wrong. The TPA complainant would get to keep everything that they buy, any excess donation money after proving the case, and any money offered by the company to settle law suits. While it’s not a good use of my time and money to go after CPL directly it would be good to give some money to someone who would then see them dealt with properly.
Bugger. I bought a drive from them this week. If I’d known about your story I’d have gone somewhere else. They always gave me a bad vibe.
CPL sucks big time, brand new top model Corsair DDR3 ram, 4gig set, bought late December, shat itself 3 weeks ago and was taken straight in to them, they could have stuck it into a machine and tested it but no has to be sent back to corsair, 3 weeks and nothing, no help on the phone, totally useless. The PC was bought 18 months ago brand new with kingston DDR2 (dual MB) and gave trouble in the first 3 months, refusing to boot, disc error all the time, all components were A grade and chosen for reliability. I wouldnt trust them as far as I could throw them, never will go back there again except to get my ram back if it ever turns up. If they give me no answers tomorrow I will be onto the ACCC on Monday.
Computer Parts and Land (CPL) are rubbish. I bought a computer from them less than three months ago and it recently developed a fault (well within the 1 year warranty period). When I took it back to them for repair they (ass)ured me it would be fixed in a couple of days. When i rang them the other day for more information they told me that the graphics card was faulty and I would have to wait at least two weeks for them to send it back to the manufacturer. I told them that I couldn’t do without my PC for that amount of time and they suggested that I buy another graphics card to use in the meantime! The fact that I have been a loyal customer of theirs for years means absolutely nothing to them which is why I’ll never spend another cent of my hard earned money in their crummy store.
Michael: That really sucks. I’ve had a remarkably similar experience with buying a white-box PC from another company – before I started blogging and I can’t remember the name.
http://etbe.coker.com.au/2010/02/15/new-thinkpad-lenovo-web-site-sucks/
In recent times I’ve been buying most of my stuff from http://www.graysonline.com/ as described in the above blog post about my new Thinkpad. Grays sell a lot of good gear, their prices are often good (but like all auctions you need to stop bidding when it gets insane). Grays never sell stuff from people, it’s all corporate stuff, ex-lease and refurbished. They sell a lot of name-brand stuff with warranty at good prices. I’ve got Lenovo, IBM, and HP gear from them on many occasions for my own use, for relatives, and for clients (I would have spent about $20,000 there).
Often the name-brand desktop systems are cheaper than white-box.
Also try polling the Dell web site. Dell’s prices on desktop systems are usually OK, but they occasionally have really great deals.
I formely worked for CPL for years and most TPA action brought against them failed because the plaintiff doesn’t think it through.
In the previous case you can’t claim the item didn’t match the description as the “description” is what is written on the box or any advertising material for the card.
If it said PCIe x16 on the box and it was a PCIe x16 then you can’t claim a misleading advertising. Also CPL would only be responsible for the card not fitting if you payed the store to install it for you. If you are installing parts by yourself then “due care” is on you. A credit note or even a restocking fee in this case is perfectly legal.
If you want to avoid this type of situation get the sales person to write a note on the invoice that says “Customer wanted PCIe x8 but CPL recommended PCIe x16”. That way you are better covered.
Simon: Thanks a lot for that suggestion, I’ll get such a note if I get such a recommendation in future!