Currys coverplan/whateverhappens - AVOID

**Matt D** · 28-09-2009, 13:33

I bought a Samsung LE26R73BDX HD Ready LCD TV from the "Currys" store in Cambridge’s Retail Park back in December 2006.

At the time of purchase, I gave in to the salesman and also purchased Currys' extended warranty scheme, called "Coverplan" (it has since been rebranded as "Whateverhappens").

A few weeks ago, I thought I finally had justification for taking out the extended warranty, as my trusty Samsung developed a rather annoying fault

I first noticed it on Tuesday 1st September: a dark vertical line on the right hand side of the screen, running all the way from the top to the bottom. The line wasn't perfectly straight, and had a curve in it at the top. It appeared on all channels and inputs. How noticeable the line was depended on what was being watched, on the colour, the brightness, etc. On some things, you had to look for it. On other things, you could not help but see it and be distracted by it.

I phoned the Currys' "Coverplan" ("Whateverhappens") phone line (an 0844 number!) on Thursday 3rd September, and explained the problem to the woman who eventually answered.

She told me they aim to resolve things within 21 days, and that if the TV could not be repaired (or was beyond economical repair) then I would be issued with Currys vouchers to purchase a replacement. She booked an engineer visit for Monday 7th September, and from what I recall she said that if the engineer confirmed that the TV was faulty, he or she would then take it back to the service centre.

So I used a day out of my little remaining annual leave to take the 7th off work.

Monday 7th came, and the engineer phoned me in the morning, to say he'd be here "between 12:00 and 15:00".

So I waited… he finally phoned back shortly after 2pm, and said he’d parked at the Grafton and needed directions.

"The Grafton? Erm, that’s a bit far to be carrying my TV back to your van," I said to him.

"Oh no, I'm not taking the TV. I’m just coming to give it a look," replied the engineer.

He turned up a while later, after I acted as a human SatNav and gave him turn by turn directions over the phone.

The engineer checked the TV out, and agreed that there was a fault. He phoned his supervisor, who told him that they wouldn’t have the parts for that sort of fault on a TV of that age.

He then phoned to arrange the "Uplift" of the TV, and was told by a different person that they would actually have parts for this TV.

"Uplift" was finally agreed for Monday 14th September, as any earlier date they offered was too short notice for me to take yet another day off work.

So, I used yet another day's annual leave, for the following Monday.

Monday 14th September came, and I phoned the 0844 number to find out if they could give me any kind of time window for the "Uplift".

"Between 11:30 and 15:30," I was told. And so I waited…

Two guys from the Currys Home Delivery service turned up in the afternoon, gave me the paperwork, and took away my TV

In its place, I temporarily set up the little 14″ portable from the bedroom

Better than nothing…

After giving Currys a week, I phoned the 0844 number on Monday 21st September. After navigating the menus, and waiting on hold, I finally got through to someone.

The man I spoke to said that my TV had been assigned an engineer that same day, and that it would be assessed later that day. He advised me to phone back on Wednesday. Why on Earth did it take a whole week before they even had a look at it?

So, anyway. I phoned back on Wednesday 23rd September. The man I spoke to today looked up my details, and said that the system said… "No fault found". No fault found? NO FAULT FOUND? WTF?

I explained that there definitely was a fault, and that their own call-out engineer had seen it and confirmed its existence.

The man said that perhaps the system had not been updated, and that I should phone back again on Friday. He also said that the TV would still need "bench testing" anyway before being sent back.

So, I got home on Wednesday 23rd, feeling rather annoyed with Currys' service so far, only to find a letter from them sitting there waiting for me.

Opened it up… it alleged that my TV had actually been repaired already, and said that re-delivery had been scheduled for Tuesday 29th September (after they allegedly failed to contact me to arrange a convenient date: Strange… No message on the landline, no message on my mobile. I did have a missed call on my mobile on Tuesday, but it was from a blocked number, and no voicemail was left, so if that was actually someone from Currys, they didn’t put much effort into contacting me).

"Further to your flat panel television being repaired in our workshop…"

Hmm. Now, if I hadn’t talked to anyone on Currys’ expensive phoneline, that letter would have cheered me up, and made me feel impressed at what would appear to have been their speedy repair service.

But, the thing is, seeing as someone told me that it had been deemed that there was "No fault found", I have to wonder whether they’ve actually done anything at all with it! My current assumption is that the "engineer" somehow failed to notice the fault, marked it up as "No fault found", and just flagged it for re-delivery, generating a standard "your TV has been repaired and will be returned" letter.

[OK, maybe I’m wrong, maybe they somehow managed to fix my nearly three year old TV really quickly, without needing to order parts for a TV that is no longer actually made, and it's actually just their communication (both internal and with customers) that sucks.]

Anyway. I phoned the Currys/DSGi support line again last Thursday 24th, to find out just what was going on.

They told me that it was still down as "no fault found", and a that return had been actioned (explaining the letter… well, apart from the part of the letter saying "Further to your flat panel television being repaired in our workshop").

I then phoned their delivery centre (another expensive 0844 number), and asked for the delivery date to be changed from Tuesday 29th September to Monday 28th September.

The 28th (today) is my birthday, and I’m off work today anyway, and, well, I want my bloody TV back ASAP (especially as if it’s still faulty - as I expect - I then need to get back onto them for yet another engineer visit).

The person I spoke to on Thursday confirmed the change to the re-delivery date. He confirmed that it was now set for Monday 28th September.

So, today, instead of having a lay in on my birthday, I got up early (early for a day off), as I had to wait around for the delivery people…

I had tried to phone the automated line on Sunday night, to find out the 4 hour delivery window, but it didn’t work... so I phoned again this morning and spoke to someone instead.

I was told "Between 8 and 12".

And so I waited, and waited, and waited…

It hit 12 noon, with no sign of the delivery people, and so I phoned up the delivery centre again…

I gave my details again, to a different guy than before, explained the situation again, and he told me he’d transfer me to someone else and I got put on hold again…

Finally, someone else answered, and they told me… the TV had not been sent to the delivery centre, and was still at the service centre.

WTF?

So why was I given a delivery window of between 8 and 12?

"Sorry sir, I don’t know. You should phone the service centre."

So, I phone the service centre (0844). Explain it all again, get put on hold again… the guy comes back, and tells me he doesn't know what is going on. He says he will phone around to investigate, and will call me back.

I wait a while, and he phones me back… They still don't know what is going on, and have escalated the issue, but it appears that for the moment they have actually LOST MY BLOODY TV. It’s not gone out for delivery, nor is it at the delivery centre, but the people at the service centre can’t find it there either.

So now I have to wait for a callback. Possibly today. Possibly tomorrow.

If I'm lucky, I might get my TV back in "a couple of days".

Great. So I have to take another day off work. But I don’t know when. And I can’t take Thursday or Friday off this week, or Monday off next week, as my supervisor is off on those days, and I'll be covering for him. And I just bloody know that when it does eventually come back, it will have the exact same fault as before, because the service centre people seem to be blind and couldn't find it.

Utter farce.

**Damien** · 28-09-2009, 13:38

List of Crappy Stores:

Dixons
Currys
PC World

I hate them all.

**Russ** · 28-09-2009, 13:40

There's incompetence - and then there's Currys.

---------- Post added at 13:40 ---------- Previous post was at 13:38 ----------

found this - http://www.threebandits.co.uk/currys.htm

Any help?

**Kymmy** · 28-09-2009, 13:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Damien

List of Crappy Stores:

Dixons
Currys
PC World

I hate them all.

Why not say you hate the DSG International group as they own all three of them brands

**Damien** · 28-09-2009, 14:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kymmy

Why not say you hate the DSG International group as they own all three of them brands

I knew PC World and Dixons were. God it's like Hell has manifested in the form of a group of chain stores

Why I hate them so much is the really, really shoddy customer service. In addition to Matt's story I once attempted to take a router back to the store (Dixons) as it was not working. The power was just dead. I took it to the store I brought it from, Oxford Street, and was told it could not be replaced as it was opened. The guy behind getting quite uptight and angry as he went though the box and saw all the 'used' parts

I did eventually get it done by going to the Dixons in Lakeside but still.

PC World's adverts are terrible as well, and treat all consumers as dumb, illiterate morons. They also emphasise pointless specs as if they impressive with some dumb actor being impressed because you should be too. Example:

PC WORLD ADVERT GUY: "Best of all it comes with a 250gb hard drive"

Moron:, generic, "IT guy": "Sweet Specs! That's excellent! I can store all my photos!"

AGHHHH SHUT UP.

---------- Post added at 14:14 ---------- Previous post was at 14:06 ----------

Or when they were advertising the Penitum Hyper Threading processors. They, again the form of a salesman talking to a customer, went:

"Oh, It means you can do more than one thing at once. Like surf the net while listening the music!"

REALLY!!! WOW!!! I COULD NEVER DO THAT BEFORE!!!

**Maggy J** · 28-09-2009, 14:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matt D

I bought a Samsung LE26R73BDX HD Ready LCD TV from the "Currys" store in Cambridge’s Retail Park back in December 2006.

At the time of purchase, I gave in to the salesman and also purchased Currys' extended warranty scheme, called "Coverplan" (it has since been rebranded as "Whateverhappens").

A few weeks ago, I thought I finally had justification for taking out the extended warranty, as my trusty Samsung developed a rather annoying fault

I first noticed it on Tuesday 1st September: a dark vertical line on the right hand side of the screen, running all the way from the top to the bottom. The line wasn't perfectly straight, and had a curve in it at the top. It appeared on all channels and inputs. How noticeable the line was depended on what was being watched, on the colour, the brightness, etc. On some things, you had to look for it. On other things, you could not help but see it and be distracted by it.

I phoned the Currys' "Coverplan" ("Whateverhappens") phone line (an 0844 number!) on Thursday 3rd September, and explained the problem to the woman who eventually answered.

She told me they aim to resolve things within 21 days, and that if the TV could not be repaired (or was beyond economical repair) then I would be issued with Currys vouchers to purchase a replacement. She booked an engineer visit for Monday 7th September, and from what I recall she said that if the engineer confirmed that the TV was faulty, he or she would then take it back to the service centre.

So I used a day out of my little remaining annual leave to take the 7th off work.

Monday 7th came, and the engineer phoned me in the morning, to say he'd be here "between 12:00 and 15:00".

So I waited… he finally phoned back shortly after 2pm, and said he’d parked at the Grafton and needed directions.

"The Grafton? Erm, that’s a bit far to be carrying my TV back to your van," I said to him.

"Oh no, I'm not taking the TV. I’m just coming to give it a look," replied the engineer.

He turned up a while later, after I acted as a human SatNav and gave him turn by turn directions over the phone.

The engineer checked the TV out, and agreed that there was a fault. He phoned his supervisor, who told him that they wouldn’t have the parts for that sort of fault on a TV of that age.

He then phoned to arrange the "Uplift" of the TV, and was told by a different person that they would actually have parts for this TV.

"Uplift" was finally agreed for Monday 14th September, as any earlier date they offered was too short notice for me to take yet another day off work.

So, I used yet another day's annual leave, for the following Monday.

Monday 14th September came, and I phoned the 0844 number to find out if they could give me any kind of time window for the "Uplift".

"Between 11:30 and 15:30," I was told. And so I waited…

Two guys from the Currys Home Delivery service turned up in the afternoon, gave me the paperwork, and took away my TV

In its place, I temporarily set up the little 14″ portable from the bedroom

Better than nothing…

After giving Currys a week, I phoned the 0844 number on Monday 21st September. After navigating the menus, and waiting on hold, I finally got through to someone.

The man I spoke to said that my TV had been assigned an engineer that same day, and that it would be assessed later that day. He advised me to phone back on Wednesday. Why on Earth did it take a whole week before they even had a look at it?

So, anyway. I phoned back on Wednesday 23rd September. The man I spoke to today looked up my details, and said that the system said… "No fault found". No fault found? NO FAULT FOUND? WTF?

I explained that there definitely was a fault, and that their own call-out engineer had seen it and confirmed its existence.

The man said that perhaps the system had not been updated, and that I should phone back again on Friday. He also said that the TV would still need "bench testing" anyway before being sent back.

So, I got home on Wednesday 23rd, feeling rather annoyed with Currys' service so far, only to find a letter from them sitting there waiting for me.

Opened it up… it alleged that my TV had actually been repaired already, and said that re-delivery had been scheduled for Tuesday 29th September (after they allegedly failed to contact me to arrange a convenient date: Strange… No message on the landline, no message on my mobile. I did have a missed call on my mobile on Tuesday, but it was from a blocked number, and no voicemail was left, so if that was actually someone from Currys, they didn’t put much effort into contacting me).

"Further to your flat panel television being repaired in our workshop…"

Hmm. Now, if I hadn’t talked to anyone on Currys’ expensive phoneline, that letter would have cheered me up, and made me feel impressed at what would appear to have been their speedy repair service.

But, the thing is, seeing as someone told me that it had been deemed that there was "No fault found", I have to wonder whether they’ve actually done anything at all with it! My current assumption is that the "engineer" somehow failed to notice the fault, marked it up as "No fault found", and just flagged it for re-delivery, generating a standard "your TV has been repaired and will be returned" letter.

[OK, maybe I’m wrong, maybe they somehow managed to fix my nearly three year old TV really quickly, without needing to order parts for a TV that is no longer actually made, and it's actually just their communication (both internal and with customers) that sucks.]

Anyway. I phoned the Currys/DSGi support line again last Thursday 24th, to find out just what was going on.

They told me that it was still down as "no fault found", and a that return had been actioned (explaining the letter… well, apart from the part of the letter saying "Further to your flat panel television being repaired in our workshop").

I then phoned their delivery centre (another expensive 0844 number), and asked for the delivery date to be changed from Tuesday 29th September to Monday 28th September.

The 28th (today) is my birthday, and I’m off work today anyway, and, well, I want my bloody TV back ASAP (especially as if it’s still faulty - as I expect - I then need to get back onto them for yet another engineer visit).

The person I spoke to on Thursday confirmed the change to the re-delivery date. He confirmed that it was now set for Monday 28th September.

So, today, instead of having a lay in on my birthday, I got up early (early for a day off), as I had to wait around for the delivery people…

I had tried to phone the automated line on Sunday night, to find out the 4 hour delivery window, but it didn’t work... so I phoned again this morning and spoke to someone instead.

I was told "Between 8 and 12".

And so I waited, and waited, and waited…

It hit 12 noon, with no sign of the delivery people, and so I phoned up the delivery centre again…

I gave my details again, to a different guy than before, explained the situation again, and he told me he’d transfer me to someone else and I got put on hold again…

Finally, someone else answered, and they told me… the TV had not been sent to the delivery centre, and was still at the service centre.

WTF?

So why was I given a delivery window of between 8 and 12?

"Sorry sir, I don’t know. You should phone the service centre."

So, I phone the service centre (0844). Explain it all again, get put on hold again… the guy comes back, and tells me he doesn't know what is going on. He says he will phone around to investigate, and will call me back.

I wait a while, and he phones me back… They still don't know what is going on, and have escalated the issue, but it appears that for the moment they have actually LOST MY BLOODY TV. It’s not gone out for delivery, nor is it at the delivery centre, but the people at the service centre can’t find it there either.

So now I have to wait for a callback. Possibly today. Possibly tomorrow.

If I'm lucky, I might get my TV back in "a couple of days".

Great. So I have to take another day off work. But I don’t know when. And I can’t take Thursday or Friday off this week, or Monday off next week, as my supervisor is off on those days, and I'll be covering for him. And I just bloody know that when it does eventually come back, it will have the exact same fault as before, because the service centre people seem to be blind and couldn't find it.

Utter farce.

Well let us hope it stays lost..because then you will be getting either a new TV OR some financial recompense.

**Damien** · 28-09-2009, 14:24

Exactly. Sue them into oblivion.

**Matt D** · 28-09-2009, 20:32

I gave up waiting for the callback, and phoned again, choosing the "Complaint" option.

It seemed to give them a nudge, as I was told I'd now get a call back within an hour, which I did.

The guy who called back, however, seemed to know nothing about what was going on or what had actually happened. I had to go over the whole story with him again.

Their internal communication really is horrendous

He said he would chase it up, find out where the TV is, blah blah blah.

I told him that I want to use the "21 day rule", which is something various call agents had mentioned previously (including the one I first spoke to over 21 days ago): If it is not sorted by 21 days after the original fault report, it gets referred to the insurance company side of it (also owned by DSGi AFAIK) to be written off & the customer gets issued with vouchers to buy a replacement of "equivalent specification".

He said OK, that's fine, seeing as it's 21 days since the engineer's visit, & 25 days since I first phoned them.

Apparently, he is going to phone me back on Tuesday...

So, fingers crossed, I should be getting the cost of a replacement.

Although, of course, I fully expect them to screw me around some more.

"Oh no Mr Dodd. 21 day rule? No, it's 28 days / 6 weeks / 8 weeks".

"Oh, we have no record of that being actioned..."

"Here are your vouchers for 1/4 what you originally paid, ha ha ha".

Charlie_Bubble · 28-09-2009, 20:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matt D

I gave up waiting for the callback, and phoned again, choosing the "Complaint" option.

It seemed to give them a nudge, as I was told I'd now get a call back within an hour, which I did.

The guy who called back, however, seemed to know nothing about what was going on or what had actually happened. I had to go over the whole story with him again.

Their internal communication really is horrendous

He said he would chase it up, find out where the TV is, blah blah blah.

I told him that I want to use the "21 day rule", which is something various call agents had mentioned previously (including the one I first spoke to over 21 days ago): If it is not sorted by 21 days after the original fault report, it gets referred to the insurance company side of it (also owned by DSGi AFAIK) to be written off & the customer gets issued with vouchers to buy a replacement of "equivalent specification".

He said OK, that's fine, seeing as it's 21 days since the engineer's visit, & 25 days since I first phoned them.

Apparently, he is going to phone me back on Tuesday...

So, fingers crossed, I should be getting the cost of a replacement.

Although, of course, I fully expect them to screw me around some more.

"Oh no Mr Dodd. 21 day rule? No, it's 28 days / 6 weeks / 8 weeks".

"Oh, we have no record of that being actioned..."

"Here are your vouchers for 1/4 what you originally paid, ha ha ha".

Hope you get it sorted tomorrow, but I must say you were a bit daft giving in to any DSG group 'insurance' option!

**Matt D** · 28-09-2009, 21:02

I know.

But if I hadn't given in, then I'd be even more screwed, given that the TV is nearly three years old.

**Damien** · 28-09-2009, 21:05

If they give you the money back will you be trying a different store?

Charlie_Bubble · 28-09-2009, 21:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Damien

If they give you the money back will you be trying a different store?

They'll probably give him £x voucher to spend in their own stores. Hopefully, no DSG insurance will be taken this time!

**Damien** · 28-09-2009, 21:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlie_Bubble

They'll probably give him £x voucher to spend in their own stores. Hopefully, no DSG insurance will be taken this time!

Aghh they so evil. They are probably taping his calls to teach their staff how best to screw with customers.

martyh · 28-09-2009, 21:16

i cancelled all my ext warranties with pc world 3months after getting them they aren't worth the paper they are printed on and pc world/curries will always try and get a 2 month old electrical item repaired on the ext warranty instead of the manufactures which is a con imo because usually they charge you a "admin fee"

Hom3r · 28-09-2009, 21:20

They will proberly give a voucher to use a DSG