Those cock gobblers at Future Shop finally did something right

[gravitas]

Tried their order online and pick up in store option today and by crikey it worked. Selected the items I wanted, signed in and went through the checkout, an email about 45 min later that they had everything ready, go to the store and managed to avoid their greasy sales weasels, paid for my shit and tipped out the door. No fuss, no muss.

 

[Randy Whorewald]

That part's easy Gravi - just try and get someone to even pretend to help you if there's a problem. Friend of mine took over a month to settle a hard drive warranty claim.

 

[hitrack]

Went into Best Buy the other day and the security stationed at the front door gave me a look as if I had already stolen something

I was thinking this place better get good fast or it's back to futureshop. My overall experience is unless there is some absolute special reason I need to go to BB, I'll stick with F-shop.

 

[Randy Whorewald]

Best Buy and Future Shop are now owned by the same people.

 

[wolverine]

Went into Best Buy the other day and the security stationed at the front door gave me a look as if I had already stolen something

Most security guards are low-paying dead-end McJobbers who operate under delusions of authority, so fuck em.

 

[BC visitor]

Had a funny experience at Best Buy about a month ago. Went in looking for several things & could not find one of them. Asked and was told they did not stock it. At the check out I was asked "did you find everything?" I replied "no" and the checkout guy did not even react. He just said "oh, that will be $156.24 please"

WTF?

Have to say it is most likely not the kids fault; his supervisor is responsible for training and I think they get trained on how to run the register and thats about it.

This goes back to the lumberyard theft thread.

 

[Gentleman First]

Most security guards are low-paying dead-end McJobbers who operate under delusions of authority, so fuck em.

That is very true Wolverine.
A few, either think they are tough, and/or have a chip on their shoulder.

But most likely they are not even qualified to work at Burger King, or Timmy's , so they end up as a security guard.
If one ever pisses you off, just smile and invite him out to the parking lot to discuss it further.
I bet he will not take you up on the offer, these guys that think they are tough, generally cry to mommy if you stand up to them.
Do not kick his ass in the store, they usually have surveillance cameras.
Break his legs outside.

 

[BouBou]

Hmmm.....Future Shop The only place that I have ever complained about an employee to management (Victoria store on Blanshard). They have the most pathetic checkout and customer service that I have ever seen or experienced.

On the other hand, the Future Shop store in Langford had one of the best customer support that I've seen in any store (not just FS....sounds dirty when you abbreviate Future Shop). I guess a lot depends on the staff.

Good experiences with Best Buy customer service in store, but lousy service over the phone and absolutely no reply when inquiring with CS on line.

Moral of the story....shop at A&B Sound.

BB (abbreviation for BouBou, not Best Buy)

 

[wolverine]

shop at A&B Sound.

I remember a time when A&B had the biggest inventory of CDs and DVDs, and reasonably-priced too. Now they're no better than your average HMV mall outlet.

 

[Randy Whorewald]

They (A&B), also went bankrupt over a year ago and are now owned by Seanix (Richmond).

 

[Bakermn]

The thing i can't get over in Future Shop is their sales and check out screens.

Jeesus Murphy "FUTURE" shop and they are still in hte dark ages with green text!

Take some of your rip off profits from your "extended insurance" (ie we gotta sell this stuff to bring the price up to what we really need to charge), and update your instore sytems.......

 

[BouBou]

They (A&B), also went bankrupt over a year ago and are now owned by Seanix (Richmond).

I did not know that !!

 

[gravitas]

Jeesus Murphy "FUTURE" shop and they are still in hte dark ages with green text

Can't remember if it was Fry's or CompUSA I was in a couple of months ago and they had a similar set up. Dumb terminal with what I assume is an AS400 in the back running things. There's a lot of retail applications that simply don't warrant pushing out GUI or other rich text/info. Its more about reducing the transactional time.

update your instore sytems

As much as I hate shopping at Future Shop their systems infrastructure has always been fairly robust in what it delivers to staff or customers. In high tech inventory management is paramount as the goods have a fast churn rate and you don't want stale or previous versions on you shelves. Future Shop is actually very good that way in have a lot of inventory and its usually current. The other application that FS was one of the first to allow customer's to check store stock via the internet. Pretty simple concept but fairly hard to deploy given it means your data needs to be close to real time accurate.

 

[hitrack]

When I was into buying CD's...oh say back in the 80's-90's A&B was thee place to go. Now I don't believe I've bought anything at A&B since then.

Virgin was O.K. but I ain't running downtown for a fukkin CD. All those other little record shit holes in the malls..HMV, etc.... fukk that. Bought a CD that had to special ordered from HMV, when I got it; it looked second hand and well used.

F-shop was the last place I bought a CD or DVD. Now I don't buy either.

 

[gravitas]

When I was into buying CD's...oh say back in the 80's-90's A&B was thee place to go. Now I don't believe I've bought anything at A&B since then.

Yup....the A&B in downtown Edmonton was, at least at that time, fucking massive and way better then HIV (typo intended) or Sam's

Virgin was O.K. but I ain't running downtown for a fukkin CD.

The Virgin Store (which is now sadly an HMV) is a dangerous fucking place....hotel I stay at is just down the street and was way too easy to wander over at night and drop a couple of hundred bucks on DVD's and CD

 

[smackyo]

fuck i really miss the virgin megastore. hmv sucks. all it is a giant cd and dvd section. virgin was a treat for all your senses . video games, vinyl, cool toys, cool books. it was kind of a fun hip place, a great place to kill some time in while waiting to meet up with someone. now everything in there just seems so stale and corporate boring.

however i don't know if there was too much that could beat sam the record man back in toronto in its hayday. i loved that place. that whole building should be considered a canadian cultural land mark.

 

[smackyo]

oh just one more thing. i suggest you hold off on the name calling of retail employees unless you have done that line of work yourselves. i used to work retail in my teen years and let me tell you it sucked more then you could ever know. keep in mind that retail or service employees do nothing except catch shit all day from you, from management and ultimitely thier pay check.

working retail sucked shit and i thank god everyday that i don't do it anymore. but having worked it i am a little more patient with people because i know what that environment is like. i have a very long fuse which is a good thing cause i think if i didn't, just being the size i am i would have murdered someone. i'd say about three out of five customers is an asshole or bitch and treats retail and service employees like shit cause it makes them feel high and mighty or something.

you try and stay motivated when you work for 8 or 9 bucks an hour. you work everyday full time and have nothing to show for it when payday comes all you do is pay the bills you can and get deeper in debt with the ones you can't. the managers don't give a shit about anything but the bottom line and it is hard to keep a positive attitude and work hard when you see the managers don't even care.

i genuinely tried to help people to the best of my ability with the little training i did receive, i actually ended up being quite a good sales person and door security but it wasn't cause of managers training me thats for sure. it was because i am naturally good with people. however i've been told to fuck off, that i'm incompetent as well as a slew of other things right to my face. most of these people were just angry little troll fucks and there is no way they would get away with doing that to me outside of work.

so next time you feel the need to spout off at some poor minimum wage employee for trying their best to do a job that they probibly received minimal training for and are not paid very well to do, i hope you think twice and put yourself in their shoes. stores like future shop, best buy and other corporate stores are often chronically understaffed and yeah they know you have been waiting for 15 minutes so don't take it out them, take it to the managers and shit all over them for not staffing adequetly. at least they get paid for it.

to get a better insight into what retail employees go through check out www.bestbuysux.org i'm not really saying best buy sucks cause of all the places like this i have been to i think best buy is one of the better places and most of these are u.s. stores in these stories but it will give you an idea of what you do to these employees and how there corporate assholes exploit these employees by paying them just enough to keep off the streets.

as a former retail/service employee i felt i had to get that off my back lol, i'm still a little bitter from the whole experience, i guess cause i only quit it about 11 years ago. its still kinda fresh in my mind

 

[gravitas]

i suggest you hold off on the name calling of retail employees unless you have done that line of work yourselves.

During high school and university I spent 6 years in retail thank you very much.

employees do nothing except catch shit all day from you, from management

If its that bad then quit and move on. Sure I had shitty days or weeks but its retail what the fuck did you expect? No one should ever be abused but this false sense of entitlement pisses me off. There's a continuum of jobs and their inherent value and benefits and retail is close to the bottom. Why because thats what our free market economy feels they're worth.

i'd say about three out of five customers is an asshole or bitch and treats retail and service employees like shit cause it makes them feel high and mighty or something.

Hate to break it to you but its not just retail where you have asshole customers. Don't you think the asshole who nickel and dimes the clerk is the same way in business? Pricks and assholes never shut themselves off.

however i've been told to fuck off, that i'm incompetent as well as a slew of other things right to my face. most of these people were just angry little troll fucks and there is no way they would get away with doing that to me outside of work.

Like you said, they're trolls. Fuck em.....they're the ones with the problem. When I had customers like that I did one of two things. Usually patronize the ever loving fuck out of them, when possible with other customers around, and make them look like the slug they were. Or if there weren't any other customers around I'd tell them in no uncertain terms to fuck off and get out of the store. They'd usually make a big flap about that, get all pissy and demand to speak with the manager. If they were around I'd call them into the situation and let them know the customer had an issue and IMO would be far happier if he spent his/her money elsewhere. And if the customer started to rat me out about telling them to fuck off I'd deny it.....who's the manager going to believe. Some dink of a customer who's beaking off or me

i hope you think twice and put yourself in their shoes.

I can honestly say that I'm a great customer when it comes to dealing with staff. I'm more than happy to be patient with a clerk as long as they show that they're trying regularly write emails or letters of thanks.

other corporate stores are often chronically understaffed

That argument only goes so far. Second last time I was in future shop I was standing by the mp3 players waiting for service. Three clerks were working in that island and none of them were with another customer. They were all just gabbing away and not interested in serving a customer. I waited for 5 minutes, during which they all made eye contact with me but still didn't come over to see if I wanted anything. Finally a Bell rep asked if I needed anything and I said yes. When the clerk finally did come over she was rude and insisted they didn't carry the product I wanted (even though I could see it in the cage behind her). That sort of behavior has squat to do with management understaffing, rather its management either not training people well enough or not setting certain standards and enforcing them.

exploit these employees by paying them just enough to keep off the streets

Again, bullshit!!! Unless you're a government employee we live and work in a free market economy. If the market feels a clerk at bestbuy is worth $12.00/hour thats what they'll get. If they're legitimately getting exploited thats why there are labour boards.

 

[wolverine]

I too have done my time in the trenches of retail when I was a student. I made the best of the situation, receiving some accolades and bonuses for outstanding customer service. But would I go back to a job of serving slurpees to drunks and trailer trash and putting in long ungodly hours with petty, backstabbing co-workers and slave-driving managers who believe in not having a life outside the store, all in exchange for a pittance that barely covers the rent? Hell no.

Today I am mostly patient and understanding with retailers who serve me but I do become greatly annoyed by laziness, greed, incompetence, lies and preferential treatment. In many cases of poor service it is not the fault of the front-line workers and in those cases I assure them of their lack of blame.

It's my personal policy to be friendly to people first but if their response is indifference, sneers or aloofness then I reciprocate in like fashion...doesn't matter if the person is the CEO of my company or the person making my lunchtime sammich.

 

[shedevil]

So, I am looking to purchase a lap-top...

Which is better?

This thread has me worried now...

Any suggestions? Understanding that either on of them is so-so...

I need a Pentium 4 and I want something with a good sized hard drive... (no pun intended )

On another note, I have never worked retail, but all customer service jobs are somewhat similar.

They all take shit down the line and usually, if any problems arise, it is due to higher ups and not the sales-person.

The sales people are often the ones the receive the majority of the abuse.

I will side with Smakyo on this. I do treat all salesperson's the same and I usually never take my frustrations out on them.

I am one of those annoying bitches that calls the manager and leave the poor trenchies out of it. I get better results than making salesperson the center of my frustrations. They are the messenger after all.