Circuit City 24/24 ad

[furrycute]

Anyone here has tried to get that $24 gift card? I did, and the experience was NOT pretty.

Circuity City has this rule that if you order online and choose local pickup, and within 24 minutes of your receiving a confirmation e-mail from Circuit City, your item is not ready for you at the counter, Circuit City will give a $24 gift card.


How naive I was to actually test Circuit City on their ad. Well, by the time my merchandize was ready, it was WAY beyond 24 minutes. The lady at the customer service desk tried to weazel it out, the floor manager tried to weazel it out, the store manager tried to weazel it out. I ended up having to call the corporate office. The first lady I spoke with tried to weazel it out. And after a couple of transfers and lost connections, a gentlemen at the customer complaint escalation department finally gave the nod to send me that $24 gift card. God bless him.


The whole thing took about an hour and half. I can't believe those people at the store can lie through their teeth like that. A regular sales person I can understand, but a floor manager and a store manager? I didn't count on that.



Will I shop at Circuity City ever again? Well, I do like Circuit City better than Best Buy. Maybe from now on I'll just stick to ordering stuff online.

 

[mikeyj92]

This post compelled me to put forth my first post here after being a lurker for sometime.

This Circuit City ad is a fraud. Flat out. I tried this out 2 times, both times I gave up after recieving flack for requesting my $24 card.

Both of my orders were made online and then I proceeded to drive to CC after receiving the email confirmation. The Circuit City I go to is about a 40+ minute drive from my townhouse apartment.

Both times my merchandise was NOT at the counter, one time they had to search for it and it wasn't ready within even 20 minutes of me being at the store. When I broached the subject of the 24/24 policy, one guy told me that they don't really honor that. Straight out TOLD me that. I was dumbfounded. The second time, upon the asst store manager "helping" me, I was told some phone calls would have to be made in order to fulfill this $24 card, which I simply did not have the patience to wait for.

I told them it is pathetic that their website strongly advertises this "service" but that the stores fall WAY short of enforcing/honoring it. They apologized and I said "don't bother, I know you are all full of **** and will laugh about this as soon as I leave this store."

Customer Service is just a term in today's world. Very few times do I find myself actually pleased with the "customer service" I received from the companies with whom I've chosen to do business.

Pathetic.

 

[furrycute]

If you encounter any type of customer service problems, I often find that if you have the patience and the time, the best way to resolve those issues it to go straight up through the corporate ladder.

Sales person
Floor manager
Store manager
Corporate customer service
Corporate customer service escalation
etc.
All the way up to the corporate CEO


I was so mad that day at being lied, shouted at, and even vaguely threatened, I was fully prepared to go all the way up to Circuit City's corporate CEO.


There is this one short southeast asian (not Indian) lady I guess is a floor manager (wearing a black shirt) that was particularly nasty to me. I really would have liked to see her expression when I finally got the nod from the corporate office that they would send me that gift card.

 

[MDS]

I was so mad that day at being lied, shouted at, and even vaguely threatened, I was fully prepared to go all the way up to Circuit City's corporate CEO.

If you feel strongly about it (I would feel that way too) then you should do exactly that. Write a letter to the CEO, file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, send a letter to the Attorney General of your state, etc. That's the only way to force companies to honor their 'promotions'. Circuit City and Best Buy are two peas in a pod when it comes to bait and switch tactics and not honoring rebates and other sales promotions. The common excuse is 'the website does not reflect actual store policies'.

Just as an aside, Best Buy had a new HP slimline computer that caught my eye because it may be suitable for someone I know that wants a very small computer for a tight space. They 'advertise' it as $499. The fine print in the store actually lists the price as $899 with of course numerous 'rebates'. In my experience you have about a 50% chance of actually getting your rebate money. The real kicker is that I went to the HP website and they sell the same machine directly from the website for less than the BB advertised price and no bull**** rebate scheme.

 

[Sheep]

Did I mention I was fired from Best Buy for telling the truth?

SheepStar

 

[masak_aer]

Did I mention I was fired from Best Buy for telling the truth?

SheepStar

Too bad you worked for BB..if you worked for Enron and be the whistle-blower..u'd be sooo famous by now.

 

[jcsprankle]

Did I mention I was fired from Best Buy for telling the truth?

SheepStar

I didn't know you got fired. I've been reading your BB stories for more than a month now. Is it because you wouldn't sell Bose to anyone or because you wouldn't sell Monster to anyone ?

 

[Johnd]

This post compelled me to put forth my first post here after being a lurker for sometime.

I forgive your lurking because of the classy avatar. Robin Yount was/is a class act.

 

[Sheep]

I didn't know you got fired. I've been reading your BB stories for more than a month now. Is it because you wouldn't sell Bose to anyone or because you wouldn't sell Monster to anyone ?

That and I wouldn't force any sales.

If someone comes in not knowing what they want, I would guide them to this website so they can make an imformed desicion.

Also, not Selling PSP's is a bad thing.

SheepStar

 

[mikeyj92]

I forgive your lurking because of the classy avatar. Robin Yount was/is a class act.

He is my favorite pro athlete of all time. Loyal, humble and great.

I am just educating myself as I get closer and closer to pulling the trigger and buying a nice HDTV and A/V equipment to surround it with. I'll be coming into some money, but I am leaning towards upgrading my PC again (last upgrade was 4 years ago everything and 2 years ago video card) and putting off anything High Def related for another 10-14 months...though the "itch" has taken hold of my brain and it is not an easy thing to overcome.

This site is excellent, by the way.

 

[jcsprankle]

That and I wouldn't force any sales.

If someone comes in not knowing what they want, I would guide them to this website so they can make an imformed desicion.

Also, not Selling PSP's is a bad thing.

SheepStar

That's a shame. Getting fired for doing what's right for consumers (and for your own morality) is all too common in today's society. *sigh*

 

[furrycute]

Sorry Sheep about your being fired from Worst Buy. Seriously, with dishonest practices like those, I don't know how Circuit City and Worst Buy can survive in the consumer electronics market.

 

[jcsprankle]

I know how they stay in business...because for every one person that educates themselves about quality audio, what to purchase and what is snake-oil cr@p, there are about 10,000 people that don't. They believe that CC and BB are the end-all for audio/video gear and believe what the salespeople tell them (wish more people believed what Sheep told them ).

It just means that when people come over to my house to watch a movie (after my upgrade...not now), they'll be even more blown away by the experience. If everyone had kick-@ss HT setup, it would make each less special.

 

[Bryguy]

Best way to get back at Store Manager

The best way to get back at the store manager for bad adds like the 24/24 is call the BBB right in front of him/her and tell them you have a complaint about false advertising and while the store manager is there listening just say, " I have the store manager here, would you like to discuss this with him." I guarantee this will put a nice piece of cr@p in his pants.

Bryon

 

[Sheep]

The best way to get back at the store manager for bad adds like the 24/24 is call the BBB right in front of him/her and tell them you have a complaint about false advertising and while the store manager is there listening just say, " I have the store manager here, would you like to discuss this with him." I guarantee this will put a nice piece of cr@p in his pants.

Bryon

Its a shame Khellandros66 was banned, he had a great story involving Best Buy.

SheepStar

 

[racquetman]

He is my favorite pro athlete of all time. Loyal, humble and great.

You picked a good one. Robin Yount, Paul Molitor, Jim Gantner, Cecil Cooper - ahhhh, the good old days (back when Milwaukee had a chance of winning a title). I watch a ton of sports, and I would have to say that Robin Yount was one of the classiest guys in the entire sports world.

Anyway, back to the thread. Just another case of a corporation being too big and out of touch with their customers. Some idiot high up in management comes up with a brilliant idea, but has no idea how to incorporate it or make it work correctly. All it ends up doing is getting people pissed off. If they would just focus on providing quality products at competitive prices with solid customer service, they would be much better off.

 

[sjdgpt]

Great idea, implementation is the problem. Company security requires some sort of screening process to keep people, like me, from falsely claiming the gift certificate.

I work about 4-5 minutes from CC, but live about 45 minutes from CC. Get the confirmation email at work, jump in the car, and I can be inside the store in under 6 minutes ... stand around for a few minutes making myself obnoxiously visible. And then claim that I have been waiting 10 minutes and it takes me nearly a whole hour to get to CC.

Some sort of screening process needs to be in place for people like me. Unfortantely CC failed to implement the policy very well.

 

[majorloser]

Its a shame Khellandros66 was banned, he had a great story involving Best Buy.

SheepStar

???????

The member list still shows him here.

What he get banned for.......suggesting to make you a moderator?

 

[furrycute]

What's that supposed to mean? Now the consumer is at fault for asking Circuit City to stick to their corporate policy and give them the promised $24 gift card when Circuit City cannot have the purchased item ready for pickup within 24 minutes?

All I did was asking Circuit City to stick to their advertised corporate policy, nothing more, nothing less. Everything is written in plain English. If Circuit City fails to have the merchandize ready in 24 minutes, then Circuit City should pay up the $24 gift card. I fail to see how a consumer is at fault here.



Back to your story. So you waited 24 minutes in the store. If when you walk up to the customer service desk to pick up the merchandize, and it is not there ready for pickup, then Circuit City did not live up to its promise, and should pay up the $24 gift card.

If on the other hand the item was there ready for pickup the minute you walked up to the customer service desk, regardless of how long you waited in the store, then of course the customer had no right to claim the gift card. But if the merchandize is not there as promised in the ad, then Circuit City should pay up.

Great idea, implementation is the problem. Company security requires some sort of screening process to keep people, like me, from falsely claiming the gift certificate.

I work about 4-5 minutes from CC, but live about 45 minutes from CC. Get the confirmation email at work, jump in the car, and I can be inside the store in under 6 minutes ... stand around for a few minutes making myself obnoxiously visible. And then claim that I have been waiting 10 minutes and it takes me nearly a whole hour to get to CC.

Some sort of screening process needs to be in place for people like me. Unfortantely CC failed to implement the policy very well.

 

[CaliHwyPatrol]

Lame.

I work at CC (until Monday), and we have NEVER not honored the 24/24 deal. A lot of times people don't even know about the 24/24 deal and we give it to them anyway. Hell, sometimes I give customers discounts because they've been waiting, or we don't have something in stock, etc. Losing a good customer over something as trivial as a $24 gift card is rediculous, and would never happen in my store!!

~Chuck