Cash Generator Vs Good Service

Give an opinionated introvert with basic writing skills a public forum such as this and you should be expecting... opinions! Particularly when something makes a real impression, whether that impression be great, or rubbish.

On Friday, among other things (and far more important things at that) that happened, I was also privy to service at complete opposite ends of the scale. For me 'n' the wife's wedding night, after everyone else had buggered off home we stayed in the Dragon Hotel in the centre of Swansea and in general it was an excellent experience. The staff were very helpful, nothing was too much trouble, the room was nice, clean and everything that was required and I acquired quite nice shower gel etc from the room (ahem). They did ID me (29 and lets face it pretty damn weather beaten) and Brandy (28, yes... petite, but still doesn't look young) at the bar, which I suppose is a compliment, or an annoyance!

The taxi that took us to the service was from Yellow Cabs and was fabulous, and to show service gets repeat custom, thanks to that 1 good journey, we booked 3 of them to get from the registry office to TGIs for the grub. If she'd been crap or shitty, the bookings would have gone elsewhere! If you're ever in Jackland for any reason and need a taxi, I heartily recommend Yellow Cabs.

On the other end of the scale was Cash Generator Merthyr Tydfil. Yes I know Cash Generator is probably the pikiest 'shop' around, designed to sell broken second hand stuff to chavs, morons and skint people (which I know now technically would include me) at a huge mark up than the 45p they paid Bob for his 32" flatscreen TV. I knew all this but they had a copy of Kinect Sports I wanted and they were like a tenner cheaper than anywhere else I could find.

I got the disk home and due to my newfound fandom of all things Call of Duty I didn't play it from purchase date (2/7) to the pre wedding Thursday (8/7). I stuck it in and, chug chug, nothing... hmmm try again, same, check disk and believe me this thing has had a hard life, more scratches than a Merthyr girl bitch fight and more burn than a bald bloke with fair skin on his holidays.

So, receipt in hand I marched in the following day, prior to departure for Swansea obviously, and asked for my cash back. The none-too-quick shop assistant looked at it, admitted it was proverbially shagged to buggery and phoned her manager (who was a full 12 yards away, so the call was necessary) and declined the refund as 'media' items must be returned within 48 hours. I pointed out that firstly I wasn't made aware of this and 2 I'm pretty sure that encroaches on an odd consumer right. She essentially said, "Tough"

I asked to speak to the hidden distant manager who trundled across, being sure to bring something with her, to give herself focus on apart from me, who essentially repeated "Tough" and confirmed they feel that their self created company rules take precedence over consumer rights. She said all this without ever staying still to address me or indeed looking me in the eye. Shocker. I asked who owns the franchise, they declined to tell me. (Didn't take a genius to find out it was Dave Elwood, I love the quote, "Cash Generator has allowed me to purchase a yacht and sail around the world in my spare time – a hobby not many business men are privileged to do.") yeah - allowed by exploiting whoever you can!

Riled by this, but holding in the language as little Gracie was with me, I left and called Consumer Direct who pretty much said their actions were shady and I should complain to the store. So back I rang complete with advice on the 1979 Sale of Goods Act (as amended) ringing in my ears, and was once again told, "Tough" and worst of all the advice that Cash Generator feel their goods do not need to be of satisfactory quality as they are 2nd hand. Manager Sarah's words not mine!

I actually wanted to play the damn thing so I took it to gamestation a few days later and had a disk repair done. Once again top notch service received, the guy behind the counter actually seemed to know about Cash Generator from other customers and didn't think it was legit either. This spurred me on.

So in line with the Consumer Direct advice, I complained in writing saying:

From: yeah - I'm going to leave my email address here... d'uh

Sent: 11 July 2011 12:14

To: 'customerenquiries@cashgenerator.co.uk'

Subject: Customer Complaint

Dear Sir/Madam,

Sale of Goods Act 1979 (as amended)

On 02/07/11, I bought a second hand XBOX 360 game - Kinect Sports from your Merthyr Tydfil franchise for £25.00 which is not of satisfactory quality.

The problems are:

·       The disk damaged beyond possible use, both scratches and disk burn was present. This rendered the disk unusable.

I attempted to return this faulty item on 09/07/11 (after first attempting to use it on 08/07/11) complete with original proof of purchase, but this was rejected, despite the staff present agreeing the item was faulty, as your company own rules dictate you may only return ‘media’ products within 48 hours.

The Sale of Goods Act 1979 makes it an implied term of the contract that goods be as described, fit for purpose and of satisfactory quality, which this item was not. It also states you need to give reasonable time to allow such returns, which I believe 48 hours is not. Also, at the point of purchase this extreme limitation was not mentioned to me and I was unaware of this until I attempted to return the item, otherwise I clearly would have tested the item much sooner.

I have since had the disk repaired (10/07/11) at my own cost and am seeking a return of this outlay, plus reasonable costs for this inconvenience.

Please respond to my complaint within 7 days from receipt of this email.

Yours faithfully

Andrew Driscoll

It's not even I care about the pitiful amount it cost me to fix, but through being sarcastic, rude and the like to me in the shop, they made it into a big issue, and one I've decided to follow up. Plus you never know, maybe I'll save some kid from blowing his birthday money in there and being bent over in the same way. Since last week I've heard horror stories of TVs blowing up and them washing their hands of it, defective products being happily sold.

It's not on.

Merthyr Tydfil

Well it's taken a while but I've got to 50 posts on here, including a rather lengthy break in postings. Hooray! You can't see this but I'm sat here with a party hat and about to pull a party popper... on way own. It's a sad sight...

Anyway...

I thought I'd dedicate this 50th entry to my home town of Merthyr Tydfil. For a small town in South Wales, the town has a large reputation, and it's not a good one. Through some media outlets (stand up sky news) the town has been vilified as one of the worst places in the country.

The town has problems don't get me wrong, stats don't lie and it somehow has managed to earn the titles of such things as teenage pregnancy capital of the UK (lost that one now), benefits capital of the UK. But it's not quite the hellhole of disrpute some people would have you think. First up, news companies love stereotypes, so typically if Merthyr is to be shown on TV, or people used for any purpose, they are portrayed in the image that already exists.

If you believe the many news articles you'd think nobody here works, nobody knows how to get to Cardiff, everyone lives in a council house and commits petty crime to fund various habits and support their 6 kids. While areas could conform roughly to some of that, there are many more that don't, nice areas. One thing you'd notice that even in the 'less desirable' places, which lets face it every town or city has, there's usually strong senses of community even here. Meaning they may not be so bad anyway.

I'm not denying there are gulfs between areas locally, I like to think I live in one of the nicer ones, but within a mile or two you'd find potentially the least desirable area of all.

Don't me wrong there are plenty of workshy gobshites round happy to pick up whatever they can get and not work. But equally there are people who go out and work hard. There are people, such as myself, who spend time on the disaster area of a train system or bus system commuting to Cardiff to work. Please don't tar the whole town with the sky-news-desperate-need-for-a-story brush.

I have no doubt the town will continue to have it's flaws blazed over the TV at every convinient opportunity for years to come. Yes unemployment is high, we lost factories by the bucketload. Those workers can't magic up new jobs. Many of them lost industries which has been all they've ever known.

Nobody speaks about the reneavations to the town centre, the decent leisure centre and facilities, the extensions and improvements to the hospital, but a borded up house on the gurnos has 6 cameras camped outside while some smug Londoner stands outside reporting every time new unemployment stats are released.

Maybe that's a part of the problem. Organisations such as sky news need somewhere to make an example of, but the people in many parts of England wouldn't stand for it being them. So they need somewhere out of the way... somewhere in Wales, somewhere with some bad stats going on. Bingo!

Merthyr may be many things, and a shithole may be one, by it's also home.

Voting!

Right now, there are thousands of people all over the world fighting for the right to live in a democracy, to vote. I like to think we're very lucky in the UK that we already live in one. Yes democracy relies on the people and people do indeed make mistakes, but at least they're our mistakes. I don't feel anyone should be rules by a self appointed leader who they may not approve of. So, why oh why oh why when Brits (us Welshies in this instance) get a chance to vote, do we not bother.

Yesterday, Wales had a referendum on giving our assembly more law making powers. All cool, it's a yes or it's a no, you've hardly even got to worry about which box to tick! However a massive 64.8% of people waived their hard earned vote and decided to sit on their arses instead. In my locality of Merthyr Tydfil, we were the 4th worst turned out area with 30.1% of our proud 55k contributing. But why?

In my opinion, both campaigns were poor, partially thanks to the 'no' campaigners not taking up 'lead' status, meaning no funding and no allowance for a 'yes' campaign, meaning lower visibility of the points from either side. In all honesty except one leaflet through the post, you had to go look for any information yourself. Not ideal for reaching those people not typically all that interested in politics. On the other hand, it did save some public cash.

Maybe people haven't realised that this'll affect them. No doubt if there had been a line in there saying, 'vote yes and benefits will rise in wales' turnout in Merthyr would have been 90%, with another 5% turned away for being to drunk. But as we can't even get to 60% for a general election laziness may be a factor. (I mean honestly people, a little difference last time and Merthyr would have been under Conservative rule now, via Cleggs brown nosing.)

I'm all for compulsory voting (go Australia), obviously if you have a valid excuse, fair enough, but I'd imagine the majority of no shows wouldn't. Yes making people vote may be unpopular, or seem like forcing an opinion where there is none, but people can always abstain. At least their voice is then heard. Would any winner really accept a seat if their votes were superseded by abstentions?

Overall, I think the 35% who did show made the right choice, I'm not 100% sure the assembly members themselves are altogether ready for more power, but we'll now have a great chance to find out. It'll just always stick in the mind that the decision was ratified by only 20-odd% of those available to vote.

Mainly I'm gutted that the no campaign was called true wales, not the same as in '97.

Just Say No...

Just like Zammo