Circuit City Closing Down Stores Due to Shitty Service
Recently, Circuit City announced that they will be closing 61 stores nationwide. This came as zero surprise to me considering how crummy their customer service has become. Sure, there are many great employees at Circuit City, but I recently had an experience that left me knowing that the place was going down.
A few months back I went to a Circuit City store near Orlando, FL. I was looking to buy a video camera that was regularly priced at $600 but they had as an “open box” for $500. I inquired about it and was told it was missing the charger and manual.
I asked to see the manager and asked how this was any sort of deal for a used piece of merchandise with missing parts. He gave me a full spin cycle and marginally threatened me, pointing at me and saying “Do you work here?” I was shocked at the level of un-professionalism coming from a manager.
I called Circuit City headquarters to complain about my experience and while they were somewhat apologetic, they did not handle the situation appropriately. I received an apology letter stating their “open box” policy. Apparently, the organization felt that knocking $100 off a used $600 item with missing parts was totally acceptable and that it’s not such a huge deal for a manager to become irate and threatening. Yeah maybe, but look where they are heading now.
I didn’t realize until then that Circuit City was in the business of selling used merchandise with missing parts.
128 Comments
Doesn’t sound like bad customer service–sounds like you wanted to wheel and deal. It’s a retail, not a bazaar, not a garage sale. It’s not “bad service” if the retail store doesn’t want to haggle. Sounds more like you got belligerent and told the manager, who was just following policy, that you knew better than him how to price the items in the store.
Almost anything electronic has a tiny profit margin, around 5%, or even less for expensive items. Stores can’t afford to give deep discounts on most of those things. The store also may not give lower discounts because they can get all or most of the cost back by returning the item to the manufacturer.
I’m guessing Circuit City is closing for reasons entirely unrelated to what you described.
The manager was rude right from the get go, and in my book that constitutes bad service. Your right, it is a retail store so they shouldn’t be selling used merchandise with missing items. They charge a re-stocking fee so where is the discount anyways. Yeah, those stores are closing down for several reasons but I’m guessing poor business practices are one of them.
first of all circuit city ISNT just closing stores but in fact opening a bunch of new ones!!! you must be some cheap loser who wants everything for nothing!!! im sure the story goes a little different in the real version…. but hey its ok we need people like you out there if we didnt have any then how would we know when to appreciate the good customers???
Well, you must be a Circuit City employee who got bent out of shape about this. Listen, I realize that Circuit City isn’t supposed to be like a garage sale, but if they want to act like one and sell cameras with missing parts then I will treat them like one. This is FAR from wanting something for nothing.
Come on, do you just believe everyone in this world and throw your money around without caring? Wake up, there are loads of people trying to screw you every single day!
It’s good that you are loyal to them but I assure you they are far less loyal to you.
I used to be a former employee who was layed off in March of 07 after 10 years of dedication to the Company and the custmers who provided them an expert and honest help. Frankly speaking, I don’t think customers really realize that Circuit City doesn’t give a crap about their customers or employees. People can go back and forth arguing but the bottom line is profit and their concerns about the investors. Most people who bring back an item incomplete pays a restock fee and unfortunately that fee just gets absorbed and not used to restock the missing accessory or part. I
m just sick of retail period. And I am not going to start defending other big box stores just for revenge. Most of them are the same shit. Instead I purchase my products from either Amazon or other reliable online retailers. Screw these corporate big chain stores. I think people should try to educate themselves using the web instead of depending on some rookie in the store. I’m done shopping at big chain stores and don’t deserve my hard earned money. I just hope that more people will support the layed off employees and shop else where, because it’s not fair to what happened to them, and a human life should be valued much greater than it currently is today.
Robert-Thank you very much for your comments. As a former Circuit City employee you know exactly where I was coming from.
And your right, for the most part other big retail chains don’t give a shit about their employees or customers either.
Chain stores are a huge problem in the US. It’s good to have some but it’s out of control here and destroys small businesses. And it’s gotten to the point that Americans don’t think much about it, they like what is familiar and that’s where they shop.
The worst is restaraunts though because some people religiously eat at chains and those are the only places they eat at-not even realizing they can eat better food at a better price someplace else. It’s total tunnel vision.
I have been reading the comments that are posted. I have noticed lately that some websites such as this, have been posting a lot of unprofessional comments from some very unprofessional thinking persons. The comments are immature, mean-spirited, and in some cases, have no relevance to the issue at hand. Let’s have a serious discussion without personal attacks on one’s character. Thank you.
10 years in retail and still calling money “hard-earned” lol you must have been fired. Robert = loser.
Alex… Everyone who has posted replies under this with the exception of the failure retail worker Robert is right. You’re pathetic. End of story. I worked retail for only 5 years and hit near 6 digits in income. 10 years… and still scraping money and buying stuff online? Give me a break.
AMERICA, FUCK YA!
Yeah Elgin, there are some people on here who think they are somebody and love to leave shitty and demeaning comments. That’s ok, I’ll allow them.
If somebody has the time to write and tell me what a loser I am and what a winner they are, they CERTAINLY must be a HUGE winner.
I don’t have a fortune and being frugal with money has allowed me to visit 28 countries at 28 years old. So if that’s “being pathetic” I’ll take it John!
For your immediate attention and response.
I have purchased a NEW Canon EOS 40D 10.1-Megapixel Digital SLR Camera Kit with 28-135mm Lens at the Circuit City store in Wayne NJ Store on 9/24/07.
Ticket Number 369503125028. The box was marked EF28-135 IS USM Kit
03695 03125028 005 273043 9/24/07 11:15
I never opened the box in the store and took it as is because I was traveling abroad the next day and wanted to keep it in the original packing for safety and protection.
The camera was with me at all times and I carried it on the airplane.
I am overseas now and just opened the box, I am Missing a few items from the kit.
I am Missing:
The lens 28-135mm.
The Wide Strap.
The Battery.
The Battery charger.
Now that I am looking at the box, It was not sealed with the Clear sticker but it had 3 orange stickers sealing the box, the labels say 15% restocking fee….
Now I am on Vacation and have no use of the camera and will have to purchase a camera locally just to have some pictures
I will be back in the US Oct-10
Your immediate response will be appreciated
Haim Peer
I E-mailed Circuit City 3 times with a copy of the receipt
24 hours later:
No reply to my Email, not ever an auto response.
I talked to the Store and The Camera department manager told me to call headquarter
I talked to headquarter and they told me to go back to the store
I have a feeling that we will meet in the courthouse.
Haim-that’s an incredible amount of stuff to be missing from your camera. Mistakes happen but when they do corporations need to be responsible for providing adequate customer service and rectifying the situation. That’s unbelievable that the store would pawn you off to headquarters. It was their fault! That’s incredibly shitty customer service.
i think that nothing good will ever come from stores that pay 6.75 and expect people to take pride in the job they have and WANT to help people so that is the start of the problem before you even set foot in the store.
This is true Dylan, a lot of companies expect an awful lot from people that they underpay. So they in turn have no pride in their job and no reason to care about giving good service. So this turns customers away, they give bad word of mouth to family and friends and the end result is decreased revenue for the company. Then when revenues start decreasing companies think shit, we better cut back benefits and get on people’s asses!
Circuit City has poor customer service, but their telephone support is the worst. Skip the digital line hell to CC Manilla and dial direct to corporate 800 764 8814.
Circuit City screwed me by selling me a $550 3 year protection plan on my flat screen t.v. The sales person told me to plug it in to a dryer oulet to create a power surge and they would give me a gift card for the original purchase price. Turns out the protection plan is not quite so easy to cash in on and at best you will get a “like model” replacement cosing less than half of what you originally paid. Save your money, earn interest on it, and by a 2nd set.
Jane-Thanks for the tip! And good to know that Circuit City is giving jobs to the Philippines too.
William-Thanks for sharing your story. Yeah, Circuit City, Best Buy and that always try and sell you their bs service protection plans. I skip them these days because if something does happen, getting them to fix it is a big hassle. Better to pay to get it fixed (if need be and it’s worth it) or just buy a whole new one later. Good advice!
Heh, I stumbled across this on google and found myself amused that you (Alex) have fallen victim to your own accusations. In your comments you say that people fall victim to tunnel vision for national chains not realizing that can visit other establishments. What you have done is the opposite, you have created a tunnel vision based on one bad experience and refuse to consider that any national company will have lots of customers that will be satisfied and those that won’t. I doubt there is anything the manager could have done to satisfy you except knock another $200-$300 off the price. Even a mom and pop store that has far fewer customers a month will still have a close proportion that aren’t happy for one reason or another. I would love to know what stores you shop at that sell things “for customer service reasons” that deeply below cost.
All any retail manager has to do to deal with an angry customer to expose them for who they really are is ask one simple question. “What would you like me to do about it?” And then the customer has basically the following possible responses:
A: Nothing (then why are you wasting their time? If there isn’t anything they can do to make you happy…)
B: Lower the price more (take more then $100 off for a missing $20 charger? What more do you want? Then you’ve shown yourself to be nothing but a pain who is trying to wheel and deal at the wrong establishment.)
C: If an item is out of stock, get more? What do you want the manager to do? Fly to China and get one off the assembly line for you?
Which brings me to my question to you? What would you have the manager do about it? Take a money losing deal and lose more money? Throw it in the dumpster because of a missing accessory?
Then there are people like William posting. Of course it was shady (illegal?) for the guy at Circuit City to tell you to buy the warranty so you could short out your TV to buy a new one, you were obviously dumb enough (and without enough common sense/decency) to listen! I don’t have any sympathy for him and hope his next TV shorts out 25 hours after his warranty expires.
The only logical point in the comments is the one about getting what you pay for. Customers expect the sun, moon, stars from companies…Oh, and they want to pay $5.99 for it. You are right that corporations don’t value customers BECAUSE customers don’t value corporations. If Circuit City paid every store employee $20+ an hour and then expected them to be experts, then that extra cost would be passed onto customers and Circuit City’s prices wouldn’t be competitive. What would then happen is people would come to Circuit City and use up hours of employee time but buy very little. While some of those customers would pay extra for the great service, most would thank the salesperson for their time and then leave and go buy it somewhere else at the lowest price possible where there was no service whatsoever (read: Walmart). If customers were willing to pay more for service, instead of just getting information from salespeople and trying store demos then buying online, then I am sure stores would be more interested in getting better employees.
Mark-I don’t even know where to begin here but it seems like you work for Circuit City (like some others who have commented) to leave such a detailed comment in their defense.
People can believe whatever they want about how I acted, I don’t care, I know the truth about what happened.
So I’ll start with the level of unprofessionalism from the manager. Dude was a dick right from the get-go and he got to the point where he pointed right in my face and marginally threatened me. If he didn’t do that, there’s no way in hell I would get pissed off enough to write headquarters about the experience or write about it on here for that matter.
No, I did not expect him to knock an additional $200-$300 off of $500 for the missing charger and manual. I asked for $75-$100 knocked off because they do charge people a 15% re-stocking fee so they already got that $100 back (from $600-$500). I don’t know what their cost on the camera was but if the manager was smart he would have been able to break even on the ‘missing parts camera’ and be rid of it. It would have done me a favor too because I wanted that camera but would then have had to go out of my way to get that particular charger and manual.
As for the tunnel vision remark I was referring more to chain restaurants. I have friends who eat at chain restaurants all the time and it really shits me. Generally speaking, the food is garbage compared to what you can get at a decent restaurant where you are not paying for their advertising and franchise fees. Can you honestly argue against that??
Car mechanics are another good example where you should avoid chains whenever possible. I recently had some work done at Meineke and their mark up on parts was crazy compared to a small shop I know that does great work (problem is that because they are so good and are such a good value you need a week to get your car in).
Retail is a different ballgame though, I’ll give you that.
Dear Sir,
I am writing you to inform you that I have just been hung up on 5 times by 3 different stores in the metro Atlanta area. (Gwinnett Mall, Mall of Georgia and Snellville)
I was informed by staff at each of the stores that the Toshiba Laptop I wished to purchase was sold out but would be in this afternoon. I offered to pre pay but was told I could not.
My only option was to call back around 5:00 to see if it came in or hang out at the store.
Thus the reason for my calls.
This is beyond all reason for a business to hang up on a customer that wants to make a $400.00 purchase a total of 15 times.
I called back to each store asking for the manager and was immediately disconnected.
I assume this must be your policy as it happened at all three stores.
I will be sure to tell everyone I know about your complete disregard for customer service.
I only wish I could find the receipts for the many thousands of dollars of merchandise I have purchased from you and return it all!
Regretfully,
Bob
Bob-Thanks a ton for posting that on here!! That’s super shitty service and not surprising coming from Circuit City. It’s not these lower level managers fault though because everything starts from the top and the Circuit City big wigs don’t give a shit about quality customer service.
These dip shit managers don’t get that these aren’t the olden days where we’ll just tell a couple friends. We can come on to our computers and share our shitty customer service stories with thousands and together and ultimately cost them millions!!
Circuit City still doesn’t seem to get it though even as more and more of their stores close down. Their solution is to have people hunt down bad publicity and try and discredit and embarass the writers of these stories.
Alex… you’re an idiot. I’ve bought many things from CC.. and i am not saying that they are the best. Every store has it’s ups and downs… but as far as i’m concerned, on open box product, there is no Open box fee. I used to work there and not once have i charged a restocking fee on an open box item…ever. Either you didn’t comprehend right and got it mixed up with a BRAND NEW camera’s return policy, or you just were too worked up on getting the ULTIMATE deal on the camera that was $100 off already for a charger that you could have bought for like $20… and a manual you could have DOWNLOADED off the manufacturers website. if you are such a cheap ass, then use the one of the computers that is hooked up to a printer at CC since you value every penny that is in your pocket and can’t afford to pay for a litttttle bit of ink and a couple pieces of printer paper. It’s people like you that i hated when they came into the store that would try to haggle with me and make a huge deal and try to get management involved over a couple bucks. If you don’t like the open box item price and what comes with it.. THEN QUIT WHINING AND GET A NEW ONE IF YOU REALLY WANT TO. They adjust the prices accordingly, so they take consideration that yes… obviously it was used, and maybe all, if not some of parts still remain with the unit.. but AT A LOWER PRICE. You shouldn’t even be shopping at stores like that in the first place with your shopping mentality. You belong at the flea market getting your cheap money’s worth. I wouldn’t be surprised if you tried to buy an item from an online retailer and you think was too expensive so you’d write the admin a letter telling him/her to reduce the price cause its too expensive or cause you don’t know what it looks like in person so its a gamble. Give me a break man… gtfo.
Kevin-Whatever dude, more Circuit City propaganda. I wrote that post in February and what do you know, Circuit City is closing down more stores still!! Go figure huh?? I CALLED IT!!!!
And shit man, you must be a real winner to write that shit New Year’s Eve. Enjoy not getting laid in 08′ douche bag!
alex seems everyone is wrong and you have an answer for them dud you started this shit a year ago and goes to show what a loser you are still talking about it i just wonder what kind of reply your going to have for me
Steve-It’s not my fault people keep finding this on the internet. I accept all comments but this is the last “loser” comment I accept on here. This site keeps growing and growing so whatever dud! Go whack off in your tool shed…dud.
Anyways, if anyone else wastes any kind of time leaving a negative comment on this post do not wonder why it doesn’t get accepted.
I used to shop there regularly until about 8 months ago my wife and I ended up canceling a 5K sale due to poor in-house and stoor service and more so a disgusting display of arrogance by both the store and assistant store manager. Only when they realized that they went to far and we were really cancelling the sale did they try to nickel and dime us for so called services rendered. We now shop happily and hassle free at Best Buy or our local regional electronics chain. It is noticeably different how much more accomodating the sales people and managers are at these stores. After this episode I spoke to many and community and found I was pretty late to the party. Most of them abandoned Circuit City long ago due to obnoxious, shitty, and arrogance service or disservice.
No wonder their stock price is in the toilet, it couldn’t happen to a better bunch of low lifes. I hope they unclutter my neighborhood shopping area by going belly up. Stay Away from CC the worlds biggest rip off artists in my opinion.
1st of all you are a loser you keep responding to the answers people are giving you just shut your pipes and listen you didnt get your way and now want to put them down your a crying baby point proved when you answer everyone back that doesnt agree anyhow im not putting anything else on here to boost yur ego you keep your loser site for your self and see how far you can make it grow moron
Steve are you one of their loser employees?
Or are you just bitter that their stock price was trading @ over $30.00 a share less than two years ago and last week was @ $3.61?
Wow this shithole of a piss poor retail chain has really hit the skids with their ripoff policies and arrogant employees. Even if they sold the shit for half price, who would want to buy something from someone that looks like they won’t be around in six months.
DH-Really? I didn’t know that! That’s FUCKING AWESOME!!! No wonder these jack offs are so pissed off!
Circuit City is worth just a smidge more than K-Mart. Fantastic!
I didn’t see the 2 comments previous. Apparently Steve is not familiar with periods. But he works at Circuit City so go figure?
DH-Glad you were able to cancel that 5k Circuit City sale and found out, along with many others how crap that place is.
Is “are you a jack off?” on their job application.
Only jack offs need apply for CC.
I work at CC, and do not consider myself a “jack off”. Now that I’ve cleared that up. I’m perfectly knowledgeable about my product, and friendly to customers. I find quite often that a customer gets irate at me at least once an hour, because they don’t get something for nothing, we’re out of stock on a sale item, or because an attatchment is suggested. Anyhow, I have NO sympathy for whiny consumers, because after all CC treats its employees MUCH worse than its customers.
Peter-Thank you for being a CC employee who has not been a tool in their comments. The company can certainly use more employees like you.
Considering you don’t swear or threaten people you should be a manager (if you’re not one already).
Sheesh – I am surprised they even told you about the missing parts. That store has horrible service in Wellington FL too.
Emily-Ah, the wonderful combination of Florida and Circuit City stores, it’s a real melting pot of douche baggery
Well, as a soon to be former employee of Circuit City, due to a closing location, I feel it would be amusing to comment here. First off, yes some customers can be very childish and rude, demanding every courtesy whilst not spending more than your average Wal-Mart customer, if anything at all. However, I found that at least one in ten would be an absolute pleasure to work with, and I could spend all day with customers like that. As for the open box camera, perhaps I can shed some light on the hard facts, though as to the character of either persons involved I can hardly judge; Any hardware sold in the “Technology” portion of a CCity store, including Computers, MP3s, Cameras, Projectors, etc., produce nearly zero profit when sold at regular price in an unopened box. This means that if said camera was $600.00, and it WASN’T a display, they would have re-couped around $90.00, assuming they sold it soon after it was moved in the inventory system to “OB”. When an item goes on sale, profits become a negative. Retail stores make money on services, and though some warranties can be a total waste of money, a great many can be beneficial. Why would a TV warranty only payout about half? Because within a year, most TVs with the same specs are reduced to half price. So: spend $2000.00 on a TV or laptop, lightning strikes a year later. Receive a gift card for $1000.00? Yep. That TV or laptop isn’t worth as much later, though chances are you’ll get more dollar value back than you spent on that warranty. Oh, and laptop warranties replace batteries. Old batteries can damage laptops, due to their inability to release electricity evenly. Batteries range from $90.00 to over $250.00 per year, roughly, so do the math. That $400.00 ACCIDENTAL DAMAGE covering warranty for four years sounds pretty good now, yes? Another factoid: My store was in a poor location, in a dinky, dusty retirement community. We were still beating the competition, in both profits and customer loyalty. We are closing due to a shrinking local population, and partially, I believe, to the ignorance of some over-paid corporate type(s) who want to use alot of acronyms, slogans, and whatnot to prove to investors that they are indeed some bad muthas.
I have heard of some severely unprofessional service, and received some myself over the years. I don’t disbelieve people when they recount to me a poor customer service experience, but I take it with a grain of salt. I remember being a complete self-righteous jerk, before I knew any better. The problem is rather large in scale, and has many facets to consider. The reason I went to work for CCity was that they passed my mystery shop- EIGHT TIMES!!! I spent two months going into my local BBuy and CCity, feeling them out. If you gave BBuy a personality test, it would have come back negative. CCity, however, was full of energetic, friendly staff, with the exception of a few arrogant types. They were temporary. I have seen good and bad moments, but overall, it was good for me. I didn’t just give my customers good service, I wouldn’t lie to them, and would tell them if a particular deal was really a deal. Most of my customers did not in fact appreciate me, and MANY would later come back with newfound respect after experiencing problems I tried to help them avoid. I don’t begrudge them, humans are suspicious by nature. Some last words of advice, before I go off to work in the oil fields, or sell discount body massages to old women; Buy Canon. Kodak is a no-no. HP printers which use the 02 inks. Apple stinks. Don’t buy Dell unless you work for them. Don’t believe everything you read online. (gasp!) Don’t be rude to the staff just because you had to wait a long time- many a day I was the only associate for the whole day in my half of the store. Don’t buy warranties on stuff under $50.00, unless it is usually much more. ALWAYS buy the warranty on laptops. ALWAYS buy the computer services, even if it’s just the $40 cleanup. Unless you are a retail technician, you may end up making a huge mistake. You need advice? I’ll be job searching, but if I have the time, I’ll be glad to help anyone I can, provided you aren’t going to be a tool. benskin79@yahoo.com.
UncleRice-Wow, long one but thanks for the comment.
i currently work at circuit city, i hate the place, its just a job to get by until i finish school. 4 years i have had to just suck it up to management and other corporate assholes because their methodology of fixing problems is absurd, you wanna know why our customer service is so poor? For every average intelligent person with a decent amount of common sense, we get 10 rednecks who shouldn’t be putting a 42 inch plasma or whatever in their little run down trailer sitting on a useless plot of land somewhere. We get fed up with it. i do not agree that you should be treated like that anywhere you go. but come on buddy, this is not some high class establishment where we are gonna rub your feet while you decide if you want the trim to be gold or platinum. only thing i can say is, if the place sucks so bad (which i agree it does) i doubt we have a circuit city gestapo rolling into your house, twisting your arm and pushing you into a circuit city to waste your hard earned cash.
Matt-Thanks for the refreshing comment!
Good luck with finishing school and not having to work at CC anymore!
Good Day
I am writing to let you know of my experience with Circuit City.
On 1/19/08 I bought a Gateway QuadCore computer tower as well as an hemi HP 24″ Monitor, top of the line computer web cam, several computer programs…I spent almost $2,000. I also spent that night in tears, as the tower was totally unresponsive to me.
The next day I went back to Circuit City and the guys behind the counter told me to go have lunch and that they’d check the computer out. When I got back they apologized to me. They told me that this tower had never been ’set up at the factory’ before being sent to them. I was offered a different tower. In fact, they said it was the last one in the store.
I took it home, hooked it up and it worked for about a month before it developed the nasty habit of turning off whenever it felt like it. I dealt with it for a week or so…trying to adjust ’sleep’ settings and monitor settings…trying to fix the problem. I called Circuit City number on my register receipt and was told they’d notate my situation, but that I would have to call Gateway.
I called ‘Tech support’ at Gateway and the woman suggested I restore the computer to an earlier time…a time before it turned itself off. I asked her if doing a restore point was wise, as my initial problem is that the tower turns itself off. What if it turns off in the middle of this process? She replied not to worry, it won’t do that. Then it did. Now I had a useless piece of metal.
They sent me a box and I sent my computer in. the same woman that ran the restore point told the repair people that it turns itself off every 15 minutes. I never told her that. I said it could be 5, 15 or an hour… It turns off randomly. The repair people tested it for 20 minutes, it didn’t turn off and they sent it back to me.
It is still broken when I get it back.
DHL sent another box for me to return the machine but left it in a puddle to freeze to the ground. I had them remove the box, but no one ever sent another!
I called the phone number on my circuit city register tab. they were very nice and said they were sorry I’d encountered so much trouble with my purchase. I was told to bundle the machine back into the box and take it into the store. The tech lady at Circuit City (on the telephone) told me that it was within the store manager’s power to give me a new tower since I’d had so much trouble. She said that it was within his power to help me even though it was past 14 days.
However when I went to the Circuit City store where I’d bought the tower, the manager wasn’t there that day and I spoke with the Assistant Manager who told me after about an hour of him going into the back room to call the manager (we think) and coming back to speak with us…..that he would indeed replace my tower. Then he told me that I would lose the 4 year service plan I had purchased. I would lose this in lieu of the replacement tower. I told him that the woman on the phone from Circuit City said it was within his power to replace my tower and that he would pro-rate my 4 year policy for the TWO monthes that I’d owned the tower already. He just smiled and said he wasn’t doing that for me.
I am waiting on a box from Gateway AGAIN since the staff at your Circuit City store seem to not care about how they treat me. They said I’d get my box by the beginning of next week. I am at their mercy because the staff at Circuit City isn’t happy with simply selling me a lemon tower….they want another $250 for a warranty I’ve already paid for in order to replace my tower.
I have never been treated this rudely after spending that much money. I have never been treated this rudely after spending $1 in a shop.
I bought this computer 1/19/08 and had the use of it for almost 5 weeks. Now it is 3/20 and I’ve been without the use of the computer for as long as I got to use it. Half of my ‘warranty’ has been spent owning a tower that does not work, yet the staff of Circuit City feels that I still need further punishment.
I asked the fellow,,,, the assistant manager: What did I ever do do you to deserve this treatment?
I ask you all this same question although I think I know the answer….the thing that I did wrong was to shop at Circuit City. I didn’t feel this way until today. The day after Your South Portland store’s assistant manager told me I’d have to pay $250 in order to exchange a broken tower he sold me for a tower that works.
Just wanted you to know what goes on in your stores.
Circuit City Corporate toll free telephone number
800.764.8814
Circuit City is going down and I hope it happens soon. I am a former manager and I still get sensible documents from these idiots stating actual loses and big inventory and money discrepancies. If any body wants them I will send them. I think the stupid investors as well as the American public need to know how idiotic these places are.
Lou-That’s awesome! I’d love to see them! Could you forward some to me? alexkallimanis@gmail.com Thanks!
Update on my last comment: After emailing every possible location I could find on line to complain directly to Circuit City, I finally got a call from a woman who said she was in the Presidents office.
She contacted the store manager who immediatly reinstated my 4 year full warranty that I had paid for.
My THIRD Gateway quadcore is up and running. I did not allow the Circuit City people to ’set it up’ this time and I’ve had not a one problem other than the two viral attacks that Norton thwarted. I have a strong suspicion they came from one of the workers at Circuit City.
They have made me paranoid, I guess, lol!
Moreyn- What an ordeal you’ve been through. What’s the deal with so many items coming from Circuit City not working properly? Do some employees play electronics soccer in the back or something?
In the past I bought a computer and TV from CC that didn’t work when I brought them home and had to be returned.
Anyways, glad they finally honored the warranty that you paid for! I hope the 3rd computer is a charm!
As a former manager I can tell everybody that all the merchandise that comes in on shipments is thrown around by the associates in the store as well as the distribution center. The distribution centers have what look like convicts working loading up the trucks, since CC does not want to spend to much on shipments they try to cramp the 18 wheelers with as much merchandise as possible and most of the time put heavy plasmas and lcds on top of fragile cameras and pcs. Once they reach the stores the associates bang and most of the time break items as they come off the shipment trucks in order to do it as fast as possible so the truck can be on its way to the next location. If you really hate CC buy vacuumm cleaners, any big LCDs, Plasmas, and any Sony cameras or camcorders and return them open, stating they do not work, CC has to write these items off or sell them as open box; because the manufacture does not take these back. Do not let them charge you a 15% restocking fee, they send these items back to manufactures and get full credit for them.
Lou-That’s incredible but not surprising given my past experiences with CC merchandise not working upon purchase.
Obviously companies have to be efficient with shipping, but you would think the company would be better at protecting their valuable electronics. Proper packing and not hiring ex-cons would be a start.
Get this…I just bought a supposedly NEW video camcorder for 450.00 at circuit city today.(they also tried to sell me a 25 month warrenty for 189.00..passed on that one)The box was sealed with a orange sticker that said 15% restocking fee.As far as I knew this was a brand new camera.I went to charge it…it only took 20 min. to charge. I thought that was strange.I read the manual and it said to take a test video before use,so I did that.I took a 1 min. video of my dog.I went back to replay it and found a bunch of videos of some mom taping her 2 sons and their dog.I can’t believe that they sold me a camera and didn’t tell me it was used.Obviously someone bought it and used it a little and decided to return it.So now I have a USED camera that I thought was new…Very shady!!! I am going back tomorrow and returning it for a FULL refund…They are obviously very deceitful. Who knows if the camera was damaged,dropped,wet…it doesn’t matter to them.Just pass it on to an unsuspecting buyer. I will say that the salesman that I worked with was very nice and helpfull.Now I know better!!!!
Lisa Ann-Geez that’s awful and ridiculous. CC knew exactly what they were doing on that one because they put a new 15% restocking fee sticker on the camcorder box.
And it wouldn’t surprise me if they took 15% from the refund they gave the people who first bought it.
I really hope CC doesn’t give you crap about this and gives you a full refund. If you get a chance please write back and let us know how things went when you returned the camera.
Thanks for sharing your story Lisa Ann!
Yes,my jaw dropped when I found other videos on this supposedly”new” camcorder dated may 10 2008.I was so livid!That was when I decided to google… circuit city bought used merchandise…to see if anything came up as far as them selling used merchandise as new.I am finding,to my dismay,that it has happened to other people as well.Someone posted on another site that they bought a supposedly “new” phone and it had phone numbers in the memory and address book. Another had files of pretty nasty stuff on a “new” computer.It’s quite obvious what happened.Isn’t there a law against this???As far as I knew circuit city was selling new electronics.I didn’t even know that they were allowed to sell used.I didn’t see any signs and was NOT told that there was any used electronis for sale.I did call yesterday and the lady at the store said”wow,that shouldn’t have happened”.She almost made me feel as if I was lying. I am going to bring a photo in of my family(myself, husband and 4 daughters)and then play back the video of the mother taping her 2 young sons eating at the table.It’s so obvious that she is the mother of the 2 kids….I have 4 daughters…I can’t wait to see their jaws drop.
I’m so mad I almost feel like calling an attorney….or calling the local news station to warn others!!!There has to be some sort of law to protect buyers against this????Is this REALLY legal?????
Lisa Ann-CC does sell used merchandise but they are supposed to tell you, they are the “open box” items.
This should not have happened to you but it’s CC. I don’t know about calling a lawyer (your call) but maybe you should call the local news stations so they can do a piece bashing CC.
I really need to do a follow up post on CC. I wrote this little post a long time ago because I couldn’t believe what happened to me and I still get CC complaints all the time.
Did you get your money back?
Lisa Ann and Alex, just this past year while working for CC I was informed that the damn firedog people were supposed to be taking care of clearing out all the information on the cameras and PCs, because they have been doing an awesome job they were sued by an attorney from California and lost 10 million dollars due to this. If this happens to anybody else you have every right to take this to court, specially if there is pornography, or other peoples information.
Thanks for the input Lou! I guess CC forgot to wipe that camera and also forgot to sell it as an “Open Box.” I’m not sure which is worse here!
Thankfully there wasn’t porn on it!
I work for CC as an inhome tech. Ever since the layoffs in march 2007 the stores have gone to shit. I mean all the stuff lou has mentioned is true about every single CC store, and wuts worse now is that they cut hours. you are considered lucky if u get 20 hours per week, and also those 20 hours you have to clean, vacuum help customers, restock the floor, do tags, check intentory, ect ect..well u get the point. As an inhome tech I should focus on selling inhome installations or actually doing them. But cc managers at my store would rather have me doing other shit while they sit their ass in the back doing absolutely nothing. CC will go down unless they do a 180 degree turn in basically in every way they operate and treat both custs and ALL employees
hello,
I am a CCity employee and I work in Customer Service. Believe me I’ve seen my share of upset customers not getting what they want but I’ve also seen just as many customers who were more than happy with their purchase and experience with CCity. I make roughly about .80 cents above minimum wage and everyday when I put on that CCity shirt and go to work I work my but off. I care about the customers. I care so much, that I do whatever in my power to help them out, and when I cant help them out and the customer leaves outraged, I can’t help but think of what I could’ve done to make them happy. It eats me up, when I can’t help a customer. With that said, not every CCity associate isn’t a minimum wage-making employee who doesn’t care about the customers. Because I do, I really do. Anyway with your experience Alex, it is beyond me that ANY manager of ANY store would treat a paying customer the way they treated you. A manager/associate should NEVER, NEVER yell or be vile towards customers, regardless of the situation/customer. Honestly that CCity store handeled your situation WAY wrong. A store should always take care of their customers, especially a customer who is paying good money towards an OB camcorder. I know if it was the manager of my store, we would have worked something out with you, and helped you out to the best of our abilities. We probably would have offered you a battery charger free of charge and printed a manual for you, and possibly dropped the price another 25-50 dollars. If you wouldn’t have been happy with that, then that’s the problem of the customer, not the manager. But since that store didn’t do all in their power to take care of you Alex, then it’s definately the problem of the manager and that CCity store. I hope that manager is now selling burgers at the local mcdonalds, because he doesn’t deserve the manager position at ANY store.
Now with your situation over, theres a few things i do hate/disagree about CCity. I hate the restocking fees and completely disagree with them. Everytime I have to tell a customer that they have to eat 80 dollars on a computer or a camera I completely have butterflies because I know the customers going to explode. Just last week I had a customer return an opened $1699.99 camera because he had buyers remorse. And I had to tell him there was a 15% restocking fee on it! The camera and accessories were in perfect condition, but he still had to eat 15% of it. For all you math wizards out there, thats exactly $254.99 worth of restocking fees! I’m sorry Lisa Ann, if they charged you a 15% restocking fee, we HAVE to. We are trained to do so, and if we waive the 15% restocking fee, then its our job. I love my job, and I won’t jepordize it over a silly rule that I hate. I have to pay for my tuition, and I won’t put my job in the hands of 15% restocking fee, so if you were charged I do apoligize, and you have my deepest sympathies. I hate the restocking fee, I REALLY DO!
Also I hate the CCity protection plans. Some are actually useful, such as the dlp tvs, projectors and ipods. I always recommend the protection plan for those products since a lamp for the tvs are usally double the amount of the plan and we can replace a lamp free for you, and we can replace the ipod even if you shatter it into a thousan peices. But every other item in the store, I don’t recommend the protection plan. Because most of them are grossly overpriced, and typically you’ll never need it.
I just thought I’d give you my 2 Cents, and I want everyone to know if you ever run into me at a CCity in UTah, I’ll take good care of you, I really will. Thanks alex for letting me vent and argue and express my feelings toward CCity. Take care everyone and I hope you have better experiences to come!
Roy-Thanks for the comment. Believe you me it doesn’t make me feel good to read about CC employees who are struggling with their jobs. It’s unfortunate that because of CC’s economic struggles, so many employees are feeling the pinch. And unfortunately with the economy the way it is, lots of people in lots of industries are going through the same.
Snakedoc-Thank you as well for the comment. Wow, you had lots to say! It’s great to be getting all this feedback from various CC employees. That’s cool that despite your wage (while you work through school) that you take pride and enjoy your job. That sure makes life a hell of a lot easier! Good on you for your positive attitude and CC should thank you for helping to give them a positive image when customers deal with you. But good on you as well for being critical of what you disagree with. And for giving some good advice to everyone on what CC items they should and should not purchase extended CC warranties for!!
I dont want to sound like I am defending Best Buy, but if you go into your local best buy, it is usually crowded with people, and has a lively atmosphere. Now go into your local Circuit City, and I bet it is like a ghost town. I personally have never had a problem with CC, but when I go there I feel as I am the only one there.
Upper management really needs to be fixed. They need to change for the good towards its people-meaning its customers and employees. That should be its main priority. I was recently looking at Best Buy’s annual report and that is why they are doing much better than CC.
I hope everything works out in the end for CC as people need the jobs and such. I cant believe how low their stock price is. It is at around 2.50 today. Wow that is something to look out for. If they can right the ship, that has potential to be a huge money maker, but for now they arent looking so good.
Hey Chris, that’s an excellent point you bring up. Best Buys are always hopping compared to CC’s!
CC needs to do something about this. Maybe have some theme days. Clowns for the kids on Saturdays, perhaps an adult night, Fri. night strippers.
The stock is down to $2.50 huh? Perhaps I should pick some up. Though that would probably make me a hypocrite, lol.
On February 26, 2006 we purchased a 50 Inch Plasma TV, model no. (LG 50PX1D) for $3,299.99, ticket no. 316402608104, at store #3164 in Salisbury, Maryland. We also purchased a specific TV mount for $403.99 along with a five-year “Advantage” Service Protection Plan for $549.99 (on the advice of the salesmen, D. Abbott). We purchased this plan in good faith and expected “hassle-free” certified service.
This purchase was made after extensive research on purchasing a quality plasma TV with the correct dimensions. Our home had been recently remodeled and the family room fireplace and custom cabinetry had been made to fit the TV dimensions. The TV was professionally installed on March 6, 2006.
On Friday, May 12th, 2006 (two months later) the TV lost its picture quality and the screen showed large black spots. We were unable to watch the TV. We called Circuit City’s Service Department on Monday, May 15th at 1-800-787-0750 and were given a call reference no. 5925646, confirmation no. IHR605220412 and DUC no. 5927591. We were instructed to call Appliance Unlimited, Circuit City’s Authorized Service Provider at 1-800-448-3997 to set up a repair appointment. Jim, the technician (410-587-4945) called back a few days later to set up an appointment. We were given ID No. 6106800.
On June 6th, two weeks later, the technician arrived and quickly stated that he needed to order a digital board for the TV. He told us that it could take a short time for the part to come in or up to two weeks. Two weeks pass and we call the service technician. He informs us that the part is on national backorder and that it could take up to another two weeks. We wait another two weeks and call the service tech again. He does not return our calls. We call Appliance Unlimited and talk to the secretary and she acknowledges that the service technician is having a hard time finding the part.
We decide to call LG (the TV manufacturer) and they inform us that they have plenty of digital board parts. We then call Circuit City (Jesse, TV/sales manager at the time) with the hope of having him help resolve this matter. It’s now been over two months that the TV is unviewable. After a few more days of no answers, we call LG the TV manufacturer again and they inform us that Circuit City’s service provider “Appliance Unlimited” is UNAUTHORIZED to work on LG TV’s. They will not sell Circuit City’s service provider the parts. We call Jesse, the TV manager from Circuit City and explain the situation to him and he acts odd when we explain to him that LG stated the service company that was sent to our home is unauthorized to work on the TV. We ask to speak with the store manager. Lauren Palmer/CSA #1 who offers no solution. We contacted Circuit City Corp. and they put us on hold for two hours.
We felt deceived. Is this a scam or a tactic of Circuit City? We again contacted Circuit City Corporation and spoke with Marilyn Pando, and finally were given a contact ID Number 2205897. I never heard from Circuit City again. We contacted the Better Business Bureau. They were working on getting a replacement TV for us and checking into the unauthorized service provider issue. A few weeks later we speak with the store manager again, and she states that they are working on getting authorized service.
On July 14th, after several months of misleading information from Circuit City and their service provider, we returned the TV to the store. We were issued an exchange for our original TV on July 31, 2006 under ticket no. 14150118491 only after the Better Business intervened. However, we did not take the 50” LG exchange TV that was offered to us because of the unresolved service protection plan issue. In addition, by this time, our original model TV was no longer available and the exchange LG model was not similar in dimensions to our original TV. We were told by store manager, Paul Renshaw/CSA #2 that we could wait a few weeks to see if any new models arrive while the service issue is being resolved.
February 2007, we still have no TV. I again call Circuit City and speak with new store manager, Tracy Sgon/CSA #3, and return to the store to consider a different brand TV. This brand was a Sony 46” LCD TV (Model No. KDL46XBR2), with similar dimensions as our original TV and was priced at $3,609.99. It was not a 50 Inch Plasma TV. We were however, willing to pay the difference between our $3,299.99 original purchase and this particular exchange TV, but when we arrived, Tracy informed us that we had only been authorized an exchange value of $2,800.00. We never agreed to this amount, especially when the original TV only worked for two months. She also informed us that she still had not been authorized to refund our service agreement fee, and stated that “the corporate office should not be selling those service contracts when they know that we’re not certified”. We did not take the exchange TV. I called Circuit City Corp. and spoke with Amos Forman, and waited on the phone for over two hours, and was finally told that there was nothing he could do for me.
On February 16th, 2007 we contacted the Maryland Attorney General’s Office of Consumer Affairs to help resolve the issue. As of March 3rd, the office had not heard from Circuit City or had returned their calls.
On April, 9th, 2007 John Rekinburg, Circuit City’s new TV Manager calls to say that he has a different “lower-end” 46” Sony LCD model priced at $2,249.99 and asked if we were interested. Since Circuit City had still not addressed the service protection plan issue, and the quality and value of their TV offer was continuing to go down, we informed him that we were not interested. We also told him that we sent our complaint to the Maryland Attorney General’s Office and were taking steps to file in Small Claims Court. A week or two later, other TV salesmen from Circuit City called to say that 46” TV we ordered was in. We informed him that we did not order a TV.
After a year of explaining our case over and over again to different store managers, TV sales managers, customer service reps, making numerous telephone calls to the corporate office, typing emails, and sending many letters without resolve, we feel victimized. The Circuit City “Advantage Protection Plan” states that it provides you with the best product coverage and customer service available. “Relax with a peace of mind” only seems like an “Advantage” to Circuit City. I have spoken with hundreds of people on the internet that seem to be going through the same problems with Circuit City. The consumer should be made aware of this.
We would like to add that Circuit City is misleading the average consumer, with the intent to deceive. This is an unfair and deceptive business practice. They sell a service contract knowing that they can send anyone (an unauthorized service tech) to your home and say that they “attempted to fix it”, or actually fix it and make matters worse, and then after weeks and months of the consumer trying to get this resolved, they begrudgingly offer you an exchange that “is similar” … a new item with far less value or even worse, a TV that someone else returned, and then offer you nothing for the service contract fee.
Circuit City sold us a fraudulent protection plan. It is unacceptable that they are now only offering ($2,659.96)? exchange value for a $3,299.95 TV that only worked two months. As a customer, we have done everything possible to resolve this issue in a patient, timely manner. Circuit City’s customer service policy prolonged this situation by not being honest and forthright from the start.
In the interest of consumerism, we now expect Circuit City to refund the full amount of our original TV purchase, in addition to the service protection plan refund. If this cannot be resolved we will have no choice but to file in small claims court for the total amount of the TV, the protection, plan, the custom mount, installation and repairs. We have filed our case in small claims and awaiting our case. Circuit City how decided to contest the case by spending our money on an attorney to represent Circuit City, instead of deal with the customer …. and no one can figure out why they are in the shape they are now …
Here are some personal phone numbers that you guys can call to get a little ahead and get straight answers from these idiots at circuit city, sorry most of them pertain to the complete south region of the U.S. but nevertheless it might help.
Dustin Grant (firedog regional manager) 210-789-3612
Frank Delgado (district manager) 281-387-7971
Gilbert Perez (HR district manager) 832-364-0758
Lisa Cruz (South Store Manager) 956-342-5539
Mike Duke (district operations manager) 281-451-9745
Mike Freeman (district manager) 281-384-5210
Steve Prescott (Entire Southern Region Loss Prevention Manager) 281-387-8153
I know it is dick of me to put this kind of personal information about these people, but they deserve it for misleading all the customers and they will possibly never stop unless they first pay for their actions.
Donna Stiles- Ah, unfortunately not surprising at all considering CC’s business practices. I truly wish you the best of luck getting this ridiculous situation resolved. What a mess.
Lou- Thanks again for swinging by and providing really valuable information to consumers. I’m really grateful for the information and advice you’ve provided regarding CC!
Our area Circuit City has fallen in sales and the parking lots are always uncrowded…even at Christmas.
I don’t partonize them anymore if only for THAT particular store. We were largely IGNORED unless we were really looking for a sales rep. Then it was “here’s your change. Ta ta.” then they could’nt give a rat’s ass about you.
Hopefully that was an ISOLATED incident. ALso my friend wanted to join up for Fire Dog (he’s a computer geek) and found it wasn’t worth it.
So I go to Best Buy (who have been very helpful and FRIENDLY to us) or Amazon…where you are not sure WHAT you’re gonna get.
Another CC employee here. Unless you get someone who really knows the policies chances are you will get screwed. Yes we charge a 15% restocking fee on some stuff, most electronics retailers do. However corporate and some managers just don’t care about customers and even less about employess, which doesn’t make it suprising when most of your co-workers don’t do their job. The only thing corporate or managers talk to you about are numbers, but don’t ask about the number of hours you are getting, corporate sets that, they can’t change it. It’s tough providing for my 3 year old on 33 hours week now when I use to get 40, and I’m even paid more than most CSA’s. CC sucks and i’ll continue putting in applications to try and go somewhere else.
i work for the shitty too. sometimes it sucks but its not that bad. the 15 percent restocking fee is there so you dont buy a camera, gps, etc. use it on vacation the bring it back. its on the back of your reciept. those 15 percent stickers go on all those products that apply to it. people peel them off, use the product, and bring it back. so its not always cc fault if u get a product like that. also tvs dont come on the same trucks as other products. tvs come alone, everything else comes in totes. lou must have been one of those managers sits in the back and doesnt do anything, ive seem them. stop bashing cc. anywhere you go you can get shitty service. best buy, 6th ave, electronics expo, anywhere.
circuit shitty sux but it aint that bad
circuit shitty- LOL. I just wanted to say that. But agreed about service. It can happen anywhere it just so happened to have occurred at Circuit Shitty. Which thank you for that as that will now stick with me when referring to CC.
Well for your response worker of circuit shitty, you sound like one of the usual associates that does not know how to speak and for that matter write properly without any misspellings. And no, fuck no I was not one of the managers that sits in the back of the store playing on the PS3 or XBOX 360, I was an operations manager and if you really do or did work for circuit city you know the majority of times operations managers are not liked because they are really strict. But I am not here to state what I did do or didn’t do as an employee of this shitty company but how this company does not give a shit about it’s customers or for that matter its employees. So I hope they go bankrupt but before that get delisted from NYSE.
So “Open BOX” items usually aren’t “used” by other people… most likely it was a display, which may no longer be sold at circuit city…. so it’s discounted regardless if it’s missing parts.. and if the associate knows the parts are missing they tell the customer… and they told you… you didn’t go in “BLIND” from know there it was discount and parts were missing…. now if they never told you parts were missing it would BE A DIFFERENT STORY… but it’s not
you know whats funny Alex, you never mentioned in your little dumb story if the camera was still in great condition or not. which im sure it was. so tell me, how much did you want the camera for? And by the way ALL manuals are FREE, FREE online. and im sure the charger dont cost over $100. are you 100% sure it wasnt a display?
how does c city get to selling products with missing items? oh maybe when they get returned without all the accessories? hmm…
they most definitely mark down open box items when they are missing items but i think when a customer like you enters the store cocky like you they have the right to refuse to do so.
and Haim your story is full of it. umm and even if c city’s share go to 0…they wont close they’ll just be taking off of wall st.
at 1 point best buy was in the same situation as c city and look at the box now, they’re making it big! c city, the 2nd…SECOND greatest retailer isint going no where.
Come on Jessica and Papo, as a former manager from this shitty retail chain I know how things were runned. Not only in my store but through out the entire region. Circuit will sell those opened items as new eventhough they might be missing accessories, because if they don’t they take a hit in the store PMI. And once it’s sold if you as a customer are to come back to the store and say it is missing stuff the usual manager will say, “Well you bought at as is and how am I supposed to know you did not take the stuff out at home and just returned the product you did not need”. Everything was done like this in order for items not to be placed as opened box and hurt the store PMI if something looked new it was placed back in the box and sold as new. And all of this was done with the direction of regional managers, and everyone above. It’s also like their stupid firedog crap that in some instances wont even open the box when something is to be done to it. But of course they’ll charge you an arm and a leg but they didn’t do shit to it. So fuck off Jessica and Papo if you don’t know shit about what you are talking about.
This is hilarious. I ve worked at CC and at the BB. I currently work at CC. The company has gone through some really hard times thats for sure. And just like any retailer we have good reviews and bad. What I did notice when I worked at BB is that the customers came in not expecting as much from us as they did when I worked at CC. We turned down sales at BB if they were not very profitable for us and sent the m back to CC. And to the lady who was bent out of shape because of her camera having video of a mother and 2 kids on it…well my friend bought one from BB with pictures of a girl in her underwear and topless on it…..better yet this computer was on display in the store for any child or adult to see these photos of the previous owner. So stop your whinning about CC being so poor. Im not defending them but look around you ll find just as many complaints about BB. What has hurt BB and CC is places like Walmart. Ya I get paid hardly my worth and I have a child to support and gf in school that I help pay for. But you know what I enjoy what I do. One also very amusing fact that has already been mentioned, is the that CC employees typically are more informed on their products then their competitors. Remember Ive worked for both. But most customers will come in and get all the info from us then buy it at Walmart. And you wonder why these same employees may be a little pissed or rude with you????? well jeez I wonder why. You use them. It used to be back in the day where when you had someone that knew their product better then the next guy you paid more or equal for the experience and knowledge. But nowadays customers are not loyal to the “help” they are only loyal to the lowest dollar amount. Im not siding with CC cause I do know of some stores where I live that have horrible service. But typically that is a result of the upper management running the store and or the customers that come in treating the employees like they are their dogs. Fetch this …fetch that. Maybe if customers started treating each store equally when they shopped they might see they have a the same if not better experience with CC employees. The biggest thing though that makes me laugh Alex is because of one experience (which I understand could get to you) you have generalized a entire company. Maybe without trying to or wanting to. I could do the same when BB didnt return my xbox 1 day out of the 2 yr warranty that I had purchased. And the Csa Manager told me to sell it for scrap parts with a smirk on her face. But I didnt dedicate a entire web page to generalize the company, I just went down to another BB and spoke to a manager I knew who swapped it out. Just wanted to point out to all you who have such great experiences at BB and have changed to shopping there…….LOL LOL LOL DO you know that most their employees are Ex CC employees???? BB loves to hire them because they dont have to train them…….LOL So all that great shopping experience you received was in truth provided by CC. Congrats, on supporting a company that hires up old managers and employees from CC. They pay you mentioned…well the only BB employees I knew that were paid well or equal to CC employees….were once again Ex CC employees, or Geek Squad. Most others start off less the starting out CC employees. Once again Im not supporting CC, I just hate seen one sided, ill informed arguments and accusations.
The biggest problem with CC right now vs. BB is that their stores are all old looking with the exception of the City. That really does affect business. As someone like the rest of you who goes out and shops, I like places the do the up keep. Stores that look updated. Not outdated with 20 yr old computers to ring customers out on which half don t even have printers that work. That is a huge problem. And yes many employees have tried to talk to management to get it fixed and the same answer is used time and time again. Not enough money to switch it all out. Or we are switching to a new system soon ( well that was 3 yrs ago I was told that). Alot of these changes wont happen unless “you” the customers write in. All of us take pride in where we live, eat, shop….and we like to know that where we spend our money it is used to pay the employees well, and keep the store looking well. All your complaints are felt by the employees, and we do care. Upper management blames everything on its employee’s and the see themselves as the saviors of the company, when in fact they are the ones that have run CC into the ground. But with out a voice from customers in a positive way nothing will be changed. And soon CC will be out of business, and then next will be BB cause even they cant compete with Walmart. So unless you want no help, and cheaper products, you should start speaking up and supporting these companies. Not to mention that if you pay more for a product at CC or BB it generally is a better product. Walmart carries the same brands…..true with close to the same Model numbers. But they are not all the same. Look at the automotive industry, every one turned to cheaper imports. Like Hyundai and Kia. Yes they offered the same extras as the american brands and japanese brands. But not even close to the same quality. The plastic alone in Hyundai and Kia vehicles is absolute crap. Its soft. Now most american automotive brands are sinking down and losing money. Their employees are being left with out jobs. All be shipped over to India. A country that now is growing very wealthy off of Us wanting to pay next to nothing for everything. You may think your getting the same product or better for the same amount of money……but your not. Until you realize that this country will continue to put its own out of business in support of cheaper products made with cheaper parts over seas. If that s what you want…..then go right on ahead. Just dont complain when your things break quicker…or parts like (on Hyundai/ Kias) take months and months to get in just to fix your car under warranty.
I don’t know what Circuit City you guys shop at but come to my Circuit City and you WILL see a difference!! We treat our customers with the best loyalty you could imagine and we are 100% honest and will give you our opinions on items!! Check it out if you are nearby, Dickson City, Pennsylvania. Honestly I LOVE my job and they treat me and my family better than you could imagine! They love when my kids (who are 2 and 5 months) come to visit. WE ALWAYS HAVE SMILES ON OUR FACES! Some of you people need to get lives and start thinking of other people other than yourselves. When Circuit City closes their goes LOTS of people incomes. My husband and I both work at Circuit City and could not have it any better!!!
Thanks for your time!
I have been wary of Circuit City’s open box deals for years. Many years ago I purchased a stereo receiver at Circuit City and added the 5 year service plan. Shortly before the end of the 5 years, the unit broke. Then the case was damaged in shipping back from repairs, so they gave me a new model unit. I was happy with the service I got, but a few days later I was back in the store and saw my 5-year-old very used and damaged receiver on the open-box deal table for sale. Never been tempted by an open box buy since then.
Lou, your an idiot
Lou,
ladies,and gentleman.
please disreguard Lou’s comments, apparantly he got fired. After reading several messages it comes done to this, people do care about their jobs at $6.75 an hour if the management is worthy of their efforts, and rewards them. The open box and clearance items should always be checked out before selling to a customer. To show that the item is in working order before the transaction is tendered. also it comes down to the managers in the building that allow bad behaviors to manifest, not corporate, these buildings are in their messes because of some of you writing in these forums, not because of corporate. I also would like to apologize for the customers that did not get their cases handled correctly, my store would have made it right. so sry
Man alex tough times at circuit city. I do work at circuit city, and im a supervisor, there was an open box for a $100 off, you didn’t feel it was good enough, so you had the nerve to ask for a manager to say “Hey this ain’t no deal” you have a helpless associate just doing there job and you have to be billy badass the negotiator, the camera wasn’t even used for more than 14 days, and had a minor part missing because some jackass returned it with out it, and we should give you something more for it fuck you, i deal with little punks like you all the time, and when you leave, i say one less jack ass to worry about, now lets get back our loyal good customers who know how to ask, and not say that ain’t no deal. We give you a 100 dollars off but no thats not good enough for you, you want more. Oh someone paid a re-stocking fee oh boo hoo. that dumbass who paid it made it worse for you. And when you didn’t get your way you cried, lol. You sound like the former employees, wah wah wah. Now let me tell you Alex, I do work there, and i work deals all the time, especially on open box, its that much easier, when you make someone feel like they don’t know what there doing, by saying that ain’t no deal get me you manager, how do you expcet good service in return. You can take your dissatisfactory, your camera, the former employees, and the people who hate and despise circuit city, and shove em right up your ass. I have helped a lot of damn people in time with the company and i will say that i have met some really great people and i have lots of loyal customers who shop consistently, sorry you had such a bad time you had to rally the haters together to make yourself feel better, i guess cry babies need each other during these times of recession, I don’t give a shit if we close, but untill then, i have a job to do. And if we do at least you can stop crying, m-m-my camewa was to expensive waaaahaahhhhhhhhh! Oh yeah to anyone who appreciates our effort to do our very best I can’t thank you enough, just reading this crap is one small example of what we deal with, thank you. When you think we are here just to screw you that is just sad, we are not on commision, and have no incentive other than good job, which is fair enough for me, I would rather be honest without commision than make more money as a liar. If you don’t appreciate that than oh well. Alex you might make good money and have a well lived life which i commend you on, but that doesn’t mean you are nothing short of a complete jack ass. And to those that agree with him, former employees, and those who hate and despise our efforts…..FUCK YOU!!!
actually lou i like my ops manager shes really great and helpfull, it’s funny because you were just an asshole, alex is an asshole, you guys were meant for eachother. If you did what your saying than thats on you you should know better than that, selling ob as new, whatta rip. You probably helped him with that camera you jerk. When people don’t follow procedure properly, they usually end up as former employees. I bet you weren’t bitching when you were trying to get that job, or when you got paid. Since you were the ops manager it was your fucking job to make sure people weren’t doing what you said. Your bad time with the company was your own damn fault. And shut up about the PMI no one knows what your talking about you fucking retard. PMI is
profit margin increase for all you who don’t work for cc. Also known as mark up, it is the price we sell items for above cost. A camera, for example, could be purchased for $500 and sold for $600. Open box is discounted usually between 30 or 40 bucks. That lowers the profit we would have made, but still not losing money. But oh jerk off isn’t happy with that, so he wants more so what we do is go cost not making any money on the camera. But thats still not enough for jerk off. We go 120 off jerk off says 175 we say 120 and we will give you a moment to decide. that’s when managers come in. It is an every day thing and im so used to it, it i just find it amusing now.
Krysta ill do you a favor, quit now and no one will miss you. You talk like a blabber mouth, but you take the checks, you think your the only one with kids dealing with recession. Have you wondered why your still there, everyone is hurting, and the unemployment rate is at a record high, you might not be a millionaire but at least you have something. Think about the mother with no job, who needs one desperately, to feed her child before you open that mouth and complain. you get paid more than some people there you only lost 7 hours, so that means your still full time, SHUT UP, you could have lost everything. next time you feel like complaining try say thanks my life could be a lot worse.
LOL…well they charge a restocking fee because dumb customers like you wants to ‘rent’ the item instead of buying it…So after they’re done with it, they return it and expect not to get charged a restocking fee. Also, 100 dollars is quite a knockoff for missing parts. Considering that you could buy a charger for 20 bucks and download the manual for free. How about you just stop whining and stop being cheap. Don’t write anymore garbage columns like this, just because you think you had a bad experience. Cheapo!
Beansworth it sounds like you work for the establishment. It sounds like you don’t know what your talking about either considering the fact that i am in the industry and 5% is crap they mark up much more than than and can haggle. Some managers are just trying to look good by squeezing the consumer.
This is the worse store to shop at!! I am out the cost of a lap top that was not NEW but advertised as such called customer service 1st girl said take it back looked it up etc. when I took it back to the store it was not retuned/refuned or anything called again got a different person so i’m out the money if you buy from them i would make sure you can use the chargeback feature on your credit card you have to wonder when one in management or corporate will not give last name!!!!!! what comes around goes around they will get what is coming hopefully as the holiday season approches this whole store needs to be shut down
I have found that Staples and Walmart will honor returns and you don’t have to mess with those that sell something other than what they advertise.
Ok first off thats bs. open boxes in the store i work at are new, not used, just removed from the box for display or the box was dameged.
If you came to my store you would have goten a new camera still in the box. Do not think that just because you had a bad time there that other Circuit City stores are like that.
I am willing to help a custamer with what ever even if it means i get fired!
Well the 15% restocking fee is just for the “time and effort” to “restock the item” which means that some unlucky college kid gets told to place it on the back of the shelf. I did work for them, and they do not care about their employees, the managers are bad sued for their positions with little to no training, it was scary to work there. No one wants to work for idiots and assholes!
get over it
Whoever wrote this is an idiot. Corp has nothing to do with the prices on Open Box items. As soon as something gets returned it gets entered into the computer. The computer then spits a price back at you depending on the condition of the product. Sometimes its 100 sometimes its more or less. All depends. The manager had nothing to do with that price and yes circuit city has to sell used merch thats how you clear inventory idiot. You could of negotiated the price but it sounds like you were one of the hilibillies who comes in every so often and tries to pick fights.
I’ve read all post’s up to this point, Business is meant for profit, stop relying on others and research products before you buy them, and make decisions consciously people, and food for thought, all franchise’s from food to electronics are the worst to shop, high prices and majority of unknowledgable staff, just my 2cent deuces
well c that’s just the reason circuit shitty is going down you say your a sup. and your on here telling customers fuck you. what a joke and heather i dont know how you can say circuit city treats their employees with respect i sold the most PCI in the region and is wasn’t good enough because my CA wasnt at 10% what a joke i sell 100 grand a month and 9k of that was CA and i got a so called “write up” for it Alex is right circuit shitty is a shit hole company who i hope one day completely goes down the drain hope you have fun in your final days in that shit hole of a store
I agree with the CC haters. I have had nothing but shitty service at the Circuit City by my house. Nobody knows, or cares, where anything is or if you are helped or not. One time I was asked for my phone # at the register and said I’d rather not give it to them, as it is unlisted. They refused to sell me anything until I gave them a #. needless to say, I left without purchasing anything at all. The headlines today say there are 150 stores closing because they have had one, 1!, profitable quarter in the last year. I say good for them. You get what you deserve.
Oh, and Gordon? I don’t think he’s being cheap. The principal of the matter is what is important. It’s not their employees call whether someone is being “cheap” or not. They are supposed to help the customer, not give them a bunch of shit.
Man, that sucks. I’d know how you feel… if I could ever get ahold of anyone when calling Customer Service. I was on hold or transferred between people in different departments for nearly an hour (on a Wednesday, even!) just trying to figure out of their prices on Sancruzers (thumbdrives) were comparable with Best Buy’s when they were on sale. ::rolls eyes:: Should’ve just walked down there and found out for myself!
I worked at circuit city for 6 months january of tis year till july and everytime we opened there wern’t people on the floor I worked in the wherehouse the ones who did worked usually were talking amongs themselves or fooling around I went in there one sat night after work to buy a monitor two employees passed me by but they did say hello but none offered help the only reason I didn’t just leave was an associate remembered me and helped me the new mgr that took over for the one who got transferred to oxnard is turning the store into shit his name is DON so if any of you are in santa barbara and go into circuit city tell DON he’s turning the store into MORE SHIT I hope that store does close since it may happen cause whole foods is going in there.
after invesigation by my bank the other day they agreed i was in the right and thank goodness for visa they did a charge back for the full amount of the purchase i feel bad for those that the coumpany has filed bankrupsey to avoid the bad service they practice but did get a full refund and glad to see they did not get away with such bad business!!!!!
I don’t understand why anyone would buy a big lcd tv or other major electronics purchase from a retail store to begin with. Is it just fear of the unknown about buying online? After checking several price comparison websites, we bought a 52″ Sharp from a reputable online merchant for about $600.00 less than what it would have cost at CC, and it had free shipping. The TV arrived a only few days after the order. Unfortunately, it died after 6 months. We called Sharp’s customer service. A few days later, they called back and said they had no service person available in our area, so they just sent us a new tv and paid for shipping the old one back. I’ve had similar low-hassle experiences with Samsung lcd monitors and Dell Computer online orders and replacements for defective products. Chains like CC need to wake up and realize that they aren’t just competing with BestBuy and WalMart. The only things that they could really offer to make up for the extra expense of buying from them are superior convenience and customer service. Right now they don’t appear to offer either. I realize that bricks and mortar and warm bodies mean more overhead costs, but as long as I’m getting better deals and good service online, that’s where I’ll stay for major purchases.
W.L i do a lot of on line buys from staples if it’s over $50 delivery is free when ever they deliver it’s usually a staples truck that has delivered it, 1 time it was usp but i have found they back the items they sell
my experience with CC was a bad one and the part that is even worse the cost at other stores was lower on the same type and brand lap top but being in a rush to buy due to my other laptop going down i didn’t take the time to look around like normal.
i knew better because take a look at the feedback from those that bought on ebay where CC has a store as well. live and learn i guess I bought a dell lap top from ebay used for my husband for only $200 it is in perfect condition and he has had it now for a year. so it’s kind of a toss up as far as taking a chance.
Was in CC in Oklahoma City today looking for bargains. It appears to me that the CC discounted close-out prices are the same or quite close to the manufacturer’s recommended prices. In oher words, I can buy the same thing cheaper from other outlets.
I purchased a 10 disk cd changer that circuit city had in the sales paper. I was last the installation that night and the store was closed when I got in the car and tried out the new system…it didn’t work properly. I returned the next day to request that it be removed from my vehicle and returned with all of my money refunded. The rep at the counter laughed and stated that I could not have the installation fee back (even though I pointed out that they “installed” a piece of crap!). The rep went on to lie about the fact that he was the store manager, and made comments that I should have purchased one of the more expensive changers that they carried and I might not have had an issue. When I called the store and spoke to the real store manager, he condoned the entire thing. The changer was replaced, per their only offer to make things right, and I have still had problems with it ever since. I have not returned to Circuit City for anything since this experience, and tell anyone shopping for electronics or anything of that nature, not to bother getting it from Circuit City!
Apparently Circuit City not only had shitty service – but a shitty structure as well. I found this article from someone that actually worked there. Wow. How can any business run like this?
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1196424/circuit_city_bankruptcy_no_surprise.html?cat=3
alex, i for one will say thank you for starting this blog, i do agree with you, an open box product should at least state that parts are missing, why would someone want a radio with out knobs, or a tv with out a remote, or a camera with out the lense, come on now people, i feel alex was right, 100 dollars off something that is known to have parts missing, a return or a display, the idea is that someone else has used or abused this item, i don’t want it so i will return it, myself being a manager for a large retail company will always ask the customer what they consider a fair price, come on now alex may have offered or ask for maybe another 25 dollars off, sounds like a good move to me, and as a manager i would have taken it as now the product will be out of my store and into the hands of a happy customer. 15% restock fee, depends on the item and/or the person, honestly a happy customer is my best sells tool. come see me at macy’s i will be happy to deal with you alex.
so i don’t work at cc or bb nor walmart, i prefer target myself, macys is fair, when i put some item on clearance my idea is to sell it no matter the profit, while its on the rack or counter i make nothing. myself i don’t shop cc but i will always offer a counter offer no matter where i shop, store, flea market, garage sale, we all want to save where we can
i guess you have to be a member to post to this blog, or does it take something special to get ones comments approved, either we agree or even if we don’t should we not have a voice. i do 100% feel that alex had a good gripe and good for him standing his ground and not take a store managers abuse.
I took my desktop to CC last year for their “free” pc checkup. Amazingly, the power supply, which never had any problems was blown when they tried to start up the computer. I argued with repair tech and assistant mgr that seemed like an awful coincidence, but their response was to let me check out case for differences in dust and basically offer to sell and install new powersupply for me @ regular cost or I could take my computer back and have it repaired elsewhere. I caved-in, but in hind-sight believe that they probably broke the powersupply (don’t know if there is a big capacitor that you can discharge and cause damage like tv or monitor) in order to pad repair work. And definitely won’t take another computer to CC for repair/diagnoses.
Well I fall into the CC haters camp. I quit going there years ago. not because of bad service, which they and most of the big boxes have in abundance, but because CC had no stock on any thing I wanted.
Go in for a set of 6 ft RCA cables… “No sorry we only have the 3 ft ones”
so I end up at radio shack or best buy.
go in for a battery for my camera…. “No sorry we dont have the batteries even though we sell the camera”
so I go to best buy or radio shack.
Pretty soon I just started skipping that step driving past cc and just go straight to BB or RS.
From the 155 stores closing looks like lost of others figured out this trick too.
CC is closing in my town and I say good riddance they were just taking up space with out adding any value.
Circuit City is still one of the best retail stores to work at. They offer an excellent benefit package. They pay better than other retail stores. They train there employees better than say Best Buy. Best Buy is the worst store I’ve ever been in. There employees are rude and incompetent. Unlike Circuit City. The employees are always nice and yes occasionally you reach a few bad seeds within the company. But trust me when I say they are delt with. Many have been fired over poor customer service. It wasn’t from lack of training on Circuit City’s part. It’s just an employee that doesn’t like what they do. Circuit City in Mobile Alabama is great. You will get excellent customer service and the employees have been there for some time. They know what there doing and give the best customer service they possibly can. Don’t give up on Circuit City yet. There always better than Best Buy. Plus they have the best deals. You can’t get anything cheaper and good quality any where else. Look on there website and check it out yourself.
I am a CSA at Circuit City, one of the liquidating locations.
Here is my experience, you guys can take from it what you will…
I learned a lot from my job, and I feel that as a store we had some of the highest standards in town. THe Best Buy down the street was full of idiots, and the only real competitor to the store was HH Gregg.
That is….as a STORE. Not a company. And I soon realized the difference after my last year or so..
I started when I was making music, as a day job. Fresh out of high school and needing some cash to fund my studio I wanted to get running.
I started at CC making 8.75. Not bad for a first job. My job as customer service, was pretty much to mediate any returns or issues that customers might have. Now. You can be an ass at this job, or if you have decent standards, you can be pretty good. I did very little transferring unless it was a deep and specific question, and most of our store provided good service in the first place. Our budget stood at 150% and above on decent weeks. I’ll admit, there were days I could not stand working there. Sometimes people were just idiots…I hate people yelling at ME over company policies I have to uphold. It’s really not my choice. Ah…thats where management comes in. Our store was great, all the managers and salesman were top-notch and just really awesome people. The problem that kept effing us over was corporate. Our corporate office would pay us visits, and do this rediculous nitpicking. These visits always made the store worse off. They’d come in, move stuff around, get very annoying…and the store would end up hideous and stressful to work in. Epecially for us, since corporate was so convinced that our jobs were useless. Like I didn’t talk to at least 60 people a day and solve their problem(and in some cases going above what we are required to do)
Then one day, they just call us in and read off this stupid script. ABout the store closing, we were “underperforming”
I did my research…I find out they are closing the store because they don’t own it, and want to be free of the lease.
20+ great employees erased.
Big mistake.
It is at the employees discretion to make CC a desirable place to shop. It is up to me wether the warranty works, the sales are complete, and the policies are upheld but also benefit customers.
What can I say…they have hired the wrong people in the top, they are screwed. Ever heard of JENGA?
Well, at least I learned a bit. Liquidation of a company is a horrible time to work…you lose faith in customers and your own worth.
Yeah…bout time to finish up that studio…goodbye retail sharks..
You are soooooooo correct about “SHITTY” service. We bought a 3000.00 dollar sony HDTV and in less then a year it broke we called them and they said “TOO BAD, SO SAD” we called Sony (another winner in the customer service dept.) they at least fixed it “ONE” time and when it broke again within two months……..Sony was also done. They said they would send someone to fix it again, for 1000.00 and I said “KISS IT”.
Hello,
I am a CC employee. I also go to college. I went to CC for part-time work to help me through school. I make 9 dollars an hour plus bonus potential selling cameras and MP3 players.
oops….I found this “discussion” while searching for information about CC restructuring.
Anyway, the operations manager in my store is a genuine guy who has the customer’s and the employees’ best in mind. Why? Because he knows that is the way to make money.
If you sample any given population you find some assholes. Making a broad statement about a portion of people who have one thing in common is kind of ignorant. Of course some places will employ some uncaring jackasses. That doesn’t make all employees bad. Stereotyping is neither useful or fair to those who work hard and try their best to make customers happy (which is what they are paid to do, it isn’t some noble quest to create smiles on the faces of children.)
I have literally spent 45 minutes answering a customers questions knowing that he had no intentions of buying the product because thats’s my job
Also, here is an important piece of information that some of the people who posted here regarding CC not making good on warranties briefly after the purchase may have missed or omitted……
THE MANUFACTURERS WARRANTY IS STILL IN EFFECT. THE CC ADVANTAGE IS EXTENDED COVERAGE BEYOND IT! Meaning you must go through the manufacturer for the first year if a problem arises that leads to product replacement.
The other services CC offers like support, battery replacement, etc. starts immediately after purchase.
For each one of you who posted here with complaints (and I’m not saying they weren’t valid)
there are a dozen customers pleased with CC and the services offered.
Alex, your experience was unfortunate. But, hoping for the downfall of a company that employs thousands of people (parents, grandparents, students, teachers, policeman, firefighters etc,) …. is pretty dickish… and all because ONE guy was rude to you.
To everyone in this discussion, We all have our views and most of them are distorted in one way or another depending on our experiences with retail stores. In the same right not a person can say that they don’t try to get something for as cheap as they can. Retail stores don’t hurt when it comes to lowering prices because they have such a huge mark-up to begin with. It seems that alot of these arguments started from a video camera having missing parts and it being marked down by $100.00 due to an open box policy but an issue that seems to be missed is that how much it would cost the person to replace those missing parts. I bet if you were to look it up it would far exceed the $100.00 mark down that circuit city was giving. If they were going to replace all those parts and mark it down by $100.00 then that is a deal but don’t criticize someone fighting back over a company trying to take advantage of them. If I’m wrong then look around at all the companies going out of business and begging the American people for bailouts. Now, tell me where their compassion for consumers is located.
I don’t know where most of you are from, but I’ll take CC over BB any day in our area. (Northern Illinois SW of Chicago). The CC employees are well informed about products and take time to explain differences. We’ve purchased a plasma TV and an LCD TV from CC without a problem and got good info on both. Also purchased a Canon digital camera and 2 car stereos and a PS2 (other small stuff too). To the CC employee who said many BB employees are from CC. I liked your post, but I don’t think the BB employees here were formerly from CC, unless they were fired, as the BB employees seem pretty clueless at times. I used to play a game and go from one store to the other (they are less than a half mile from each other here) and ask about the same product. Suffice it to say – Hey BB employee I can read from the product info label next to the item so please don’t read from the label – LOL. I’m sure some p’d off BB employee will set me straight here though. This happened more than once! On a TV, camcorder (ridiculous as I was showing the BB guy how to use it), and computers. I used to be in the computer industry so the answers I get at BB are sometimes laughable. Also the returns at CC are seamless and friendly as long as you follow their return policy. No major questions asked other than “is there anything wrong with it?” At BB, forget it! I now sweat if I have to return something there usually given as a gift. I once returned and unopened, still shrink-wrapped sound card which I wanted to SWAP, not return, and pay the difference for a more expensive card. I was told before my original purchase this was NOT a problem as their return at the time was within 14 days on unopened products. The rep called over a department manager, they opened the box to make sure the card was in there! I could not believe opening a shrink-wrapped box! I told them at that point to forget the exchange and keep the card, give me my money back. They did after calling the store manager over. I asked him without being a jerk if he really believed I had a machine at home to shrink wrap a $30 item. He did not answer. Also returned a stereo and they accepted the return because I found the same for less at another store, but charged a 10% box fee. $70+ for a cardboard box (though this may be common in all stores). I still saved money as the difference was quite a bit. Now I keep all boxes until the warranty runs out.
I’ll take CC over BB any day.
Alex, you sound like a total jerk, people like you are what drove me out of sales, but thanks for the forum.
Circuit city Sux……lol your a complete idiot if you read what Joe said and got that then wow maybe you and Alex both should go back to school. Learn how to read, not just try to interpret. Actually listen. What he said was there is a system in place that decides prices based on the physical shape of the product. So arguing and accusing managers,employees, and a company of the crap you two have is RIDICULOUS. If you two find it so bad…try bb or the company ruining america….Walmart. Or maybe you two should start a page about price gouging by the oil companies….who now have gas down to 1.99 a gallon. Weird huh 4.oo a gallon cause of various reasons back down to ….1.99 and not a one is complaining….hmmmm. Yet you rip on a company and all its employee s cause of some shitty service? So you try to ruin it? Putting thousands of people out of jobs, kids with parents that have no money to put food on the table….And you applaud this cause of some shitty service. Do you pay attention? Hmmmm Can you say Bush…Shitty service….oil companies….shitty service….Much bigger things go on that affect you more then a bad shopping experience. Yet here you are with your tiny little life making judgmental comments about a company. What company do you guess own? Or work for? Tell us that so we know the background of your comments. Since your so ready to claim CC employees are not educated in your previous statements…tell us how educated you are. How smart and educated could you really be when you start a page like this? When you could go to actual blogs….who have actual business owners, investors, and educated people with actual degree s discussing all of this in a much more Educated and Mature way. Well you probably wont due to the fact that your comments are not based off facts. No they are just that Comments….with no basis. Get a life. O ya do you even know what Chapter 11 is? ? ? Not Bankrupt! its bankruptcy protection to stop vendors from being able to go after a companies assets. Oh by the way if you have been watching CC hopefully your watching BB cause the same people who forecasted this happening with CC have been saying the same for BB if they dont get rid of loads of their employees. Where will you shop when CC goes out of business….o ya BB right who then will have no competition. Face it Walmart is not competition. They have vendor s make tv s specifically for them (cheaper internals) with the same model numbers as CC and BB so it looks like they have better cheaper prices. And most of america falls for it. Making a company that scams and pays employees Shit….insanely Rich. yet you can get no help when you go there…..and no complaints from the people??? Interesting. Then Aig receives millions actually billions from the Government to help keep its company afloat….still it s having a hard time. Oh yea and its buying up other companies with that money(which is completely against the agreement for getting help from the bailout fund) but not one of you is complaining. The government has not even prosecuted them…..and you sit here and complain about customer service????????
Thank you for showing what little intelligence and care of the country you live in. All you care about is that money you didnt get to save…..My word then you sit there wondering why huge companies are going out of business….and why lots of products are turning to crap….Well with cheaper prices…..you get cheaper products. Jeez what a crazy concept. GET A CLUE!
Also, please note. If Firedog Joe is the person I think he might be. He recently lost his job at Cc due to the last group of firings. I knew Joe through mutual friends who worked with him. He is a insane installer, one who any of you if you knew him would want him to work on your car. He lost his job ( if its the correct joe) and not once did he ever down the company and even on here he didnt sing his sad story like all these other ex employees who feel the need to get sympathy by writing in telling you all how bad of a company CC is and how they know cause they worked for the company(hop on the bandwagon). Well so when you make comments (circuit city sux) to someone commenting about how they are the reason CC sucks…yet you know nothing about the person. And you took what he said and changed it to a Fuck you! You should realize what a idiot it makes you look like. It makes you look ridiculous. The fact that your parents never taught you that you dont fly off at the mouth ripping on someone that you dont even know shows what type of person you are. In other words Useless, not needed in society, and Ridiculous. It is people like you who claim how great they are by selling a hundred grande a month, saying how much they do and how little they get or are appreciated, people like this are the ones creating such a shitty society. One with little if any standards, morals, and ethics. You can all rip on my poor grammar, and lack of periods and quotations. But in doing so and then siding with someone like circuit city Sux you are basically saying its ok to have double standards. Again showing the lack of actual intelligent(not meaning college educated, can be though) conversation. Circuit city Sux…..you are one of thousands of employees who sold a hundred thousand a month. Once you actually sell two hundred thousand a month consistently then maybe talk about how your a decent sales person. Last Ill let you know one secret I worked for BB, I shopped at CC, have friends that work there. The CC Employees…..respond better when you approach them kindly rather then argumentive. You will get a lot further, imagine that. The CC employees are more educated and trained on their product then any BB employee trained solely by BB. That is why BB loves to hire every CC employee then can get.
wow u guys that are hating on ccity are a bunch of cheese dicks….first of all an OB “open box” gives the costumer an OPTION to buy a product for cheaper knowing that it has been opened and used by many other shoppers! second of all it is not an auction, and u cant expect to just thro ur bid out there…dumb ass!! and last but not least open box statements are that product comes as if…so if theres no accessories then dont buy it! simple as that!!! thousands of associates are losing their jobs and ur gunna laugh about it and blame poor costumer service for that! the economy is down face it and stop blaming shit on the wrong reasons…its costumers like u that give ccity a bad name, making ur own web page about stupid shit! think before u act…are u really helping the economy by putting down circuit city?! ask urself that
okay i can see that lots of you are mad at the company i work for the company i am a sales person and to tell you the truth ya some stores just plan suck and they will always until they close. but at my store we have the one price promise we all the price on our website(which are 30-50 cheaper) we match so u get to try out the product and get that same cheap price. and as far a customer service my store is one of the best i work and camera and pc’s and when i help a GUEST they always leave with a smile on their face so not every store suck people make mistakes some people do have a dick up their ass but there is still great ppl out there that work for the company like that get what the guest need and doesnt sell them bull shit that they dont need
I work for Circuit City, and yes they do offer shitty costumer service, and a horrible warranty program. The management is driven by dollar signs and nothing will change. I enjoy the job and the people i work with, and make $24+ an hour doing so…but, this will all end as the company is bound to fail. I plan to ride the sinking ship all the way under.
On-line buyers BEWARE!!! We purchased (on-line) a $600 HP lap-top. We were “guaranteed” that it would be available within 24 minutes of our arrival at the Spartanburg, SC store. When we arrived two days later, the customer service rep went to retrieve our lap-top. I started getting nervous the 3rd time she came back out – empty handed – to look at the location printed on the receipt. She finally returned with the HP lap-top, but it had a box of Kerpersky Internet Security software shrink wrapped with the lap-top. According to the operations manager, the only HP lap-top that they had to available was the one that was bundled with this software. Which means, Circuit City opened the lap-top, configured the initial set-up, and loaded this UNREQUESTED software. Since they had pre-loaded the software, they told me they could not remove it! This software was $79.99 (plus tax), but they were offering $80.00 rebate. I told them I didn’t want the software, and I wanted the model that we purchased (a vanilla lap-top). The operations manager said that we had to purchase the software in order to get the lap-top. They seemed to be confused why it was a big deal – b/c they insisted that I would be getting a rebate…. in 6 to 12 WEEKS… and all I would be losing was the TAX that I paid for the software (about $4). The operations manager said that – if we didn’t want it, they would refund our money – but they didn’t have the HP lap-top (without the software) in stock. (SURPRISE!) I have NEVER heard of the security software, and I really don’t trust the set-up that they performed on the lap-top. But Christmas is just a few days away – and that is the ONLY way that I could get this lap-top. Is it LEGAL for a “retailer” to OPEN a lap-top, load software, and then sell it as a “NEW ITEM”??? I asked them if they had HP’s approval to load software on their computers and then sell them, and the girl said, “Sure.” Sounds like BAIT – AND – SWITCH to me!!! NEVER AGAIN! IMO, it is NOT worth the risk. Oh, and this whole thing took over 30 minutes, and NO, they did NOT give us the $24.00 gift card?
CC has to be the most customer unfriendly company in the world.
I am convinced arrogance is a pre-requisite to work there. And to get a hold of someone at Corporate? You have a better chance of talking to the Pope.
The only thing I find surprising is that they haven’t closed down completely yet.
I see the same handwritting on the wall for Dish Network and ADT Security. Too bad management for these companies do not have a clue how out of touch the customer disservice people are. Once a customer is gone, it is gone forever!
This is dumb. you seriously got mad because they were discounting something that was missing parts. I agree with most of the other comments. its not a freakin garage sale. plus, its not like circuit city is the only store to do something like that. Best Buy does it all the time (no i’m not putting them down for it because usually its a good deal!)
Ditto on the Dishnetwork comment–I quit them because of poor customer service even though they have a good product.
Yup, Circuit is in the business of selling “used” merchandise. Actually, it’s merchandise that are former display models, and that particular model is out of production and they’ve sold out all the units of it, or merchandise that has been returned because the customer wanted a different model/color/style/etc. These are the aforementioned “open box” items that are discounted according to wear and tear, and the longevity that they have been deemed “open box.” Sometimes, some of the components are missing from the merchandise. So they are discounted accordingly. I can totally see how a manager may have matched your hostile personality should you attempt to rudely inform him of your opinion over the item, instead of making a scene, why didn’t you just choose not to buy the item? Well, not everyone’s the brightest crayon in the box, so I’ll chalk it up to idiocy and let it go…
I have read enough of these comments. All the crazy Stories.
Used merchandise?- Ever occur that customers buy items only to seal them back up and return them “As new” The Customer Service Associate believes the customer and takes the return, puts it on a shelf to go back in the case. If the Associate would have argued that the camera had been opened, The customer would came to this site and flamed CC for “Shitty Service”
OmG CC SuX!! – Ever think that Could be your one bad experience? There’s a little rule of service. “Give someone excellent service, They tell a friend” Give someone shitty Service, they go on-line and flame a retailer chain”
CC Protection Plans- Look at the repair rates of major electronics. Laptops have a 37% chance that they willl require service outside manufacturers coverage. Its not retail Propaganda, Consumer reports… Read it. Or, hell its all over the web.
The Guy with the gateway Quad Core tower – Sounds to me you had problems mostly with Gateway and DHL. You purchased a pc w/ factory defects.. CC replaced it. It crapped out in 2 months.. (probably your fault) Gateway didn’t help (surprise surprise) Cc was going to honor the warranty plan, but you didnt like that Idea.
BBY vs. CC – omg at this argument! est Buy is soooo much better!! LMAO at this! CC as a whole provides better service vs BBY. Thats the result of secret shoppers and Customer polls. BBY Teaches employees to make the customer believe that they don’t care then they will believe you. I have a friend that used to work at a BBY. His Sales manager told him to drop kick a laptop across the warehouse because they didnt want to buy a warranty. OOHh That was a bad experience… Don’t shop at BBY!
Distribution – Every retailer ships in bulk. they all have to make as best use of the trucks as possible. If associates are breaking merch, they would be fired -end of Story- You buy online, good for you computers are tricky little devils. They ship yhat product from truck to warehouse to truck to truck to warehouse to truck… and more. That stuff goes through much more abuse. The return policies at online retailer (yeas even the great ones) sucks… flat out!
got bad service in a store? gonna buy online? go ahead…. no service there..Click ummm click ummmm click..
And when Associates pour their hearts into the customers to give the best experience possible and the Customer say “I’m gonna go get lunch, but I will come back and buy from you” I (BTW, i am an In-home tech for CC Firedog) Go to setup a TV the customer was confused with to see that they bought the TV online! They just wanted info from the associate and myself. the customer admitted that he was just there for info!! Why do your best when the customers just lie and have no respect for you.
And Alex..If you are till reading these.. you probably do..
“And shit man, you must be a real winner to write that shit New Year’s Eve. Enjoy not getting laid in 08′ douche bag!”
That was in Response to a guy posting at Dec 31, 2007 at 7:22 am
That was early in the day wasn’t it?
but the flame response that the wonderful Alex provided us was posted Dec 31, 2007 at 11:19 pm… so, Who’s not getting laid? Wow Alex… You seriously have NO LIFE. You probably didn’t even have to money for the camera in the first place.
Oh Well, I’m finished…
First of all, I would like to start by saying the jackass lou who posted all of the phone numbers seriously lacks the integrity circuit city expects from an operations manager. As far as the original post that started all of this, the manager simply should have downloaded the owner’s manual off of the manufacturer’s website, and wrote off a charger. Very simple, its done every day. Now you have an owner’s manual and a charger and a 600 camera for 500 and ur not on this site bitching about how a CC screws its customers. BB charges restocking fees…does anyone bitch about that?? when cc got rid of restocking fees, a-hole customers (like half of you) treated us like a rent-a-center. So pipe down, if you don’t want to pay rs fees, do the proper research before you make your purchase.
i shop at many retail stores and i find the cc the best for info and pricing. frys just sucks ass in service. no one in there knows anything, all though they have good prices and as for bb well their employees seem lifeless they just try to keep the customers moving along. i love going to cc they know what they are talking about(most of the time) and great sales also. i dont think you can judge an entire company based a one bad experience with a manger. it could have happen anywhere. i have seen people cry at bb and cc because they cant get thing returned or what ever there problem is. its sad to see such a great company possible go out of business and it is also sad to hear u Alex and others who dislike the company so much you hate the people that work there. they need to work to support themselves just like everyone else. most employers have worked in both stores and if cc goes out of business where do you think its employees will go. but all that aside online shopping is the way to go! OH and i almost forgot FUCK YOU Alex, and have a nice day:)
Looks like I’m a little late to the party here but what the hell. I work at C-city (which is now in the process of negotiating a buyout) and after reading all of these comments, I just have a few things to say. 1st off, for the love of god, do not stereotype the entire company because of your local store. The stores in my region are helpful and in most cases will bend over backwards to satisfy a customer. The problem is, 99% of customers that take the time to complain, cannot be satisfied no matter what. No matter the discount, it’s never enough. Needless to say, we DO NOT negotiate. Circuit city is not a giant garage sale, a flea market, nor a used car lot, and the prices on the tags are what the items cost. When you go to the grocery store, do you say to the cashier, “i like this milk, but i dont like this price. Knock off 10% and I’ll take it.” That does not fly and when you make comments like that, all it does is annoy the salesmen and could create further tension. Obviously with C-city’s current situation, this is worse than ever as now customers think that because of our struggles, they can come in and bully salesmen into giving them better deals (as if we had that authority to begin with) which is simply asinine. Another thing to consider is that much like within the company, only the bad things are ever talked about. The happy customers dont talk, they just go home and enjoy their new toys. The so-called “bad experience” makes it their life’s work to tarnish a company’s reputation. Also, do not think that Best Buy is better just because their stores are a little shinier. At least in my local area, our employees are infinitely more knowledgeable and helpful. A guy that posted on here that worked for BB actually said they they TURN DOWN sales that are not profitable for them. Talk about arrogance. The BB stores are newer and undoubtedly in better locations which creates more traffic, but dont kid yourself. The better service and product knowledge lies with the red team. As was also pointed out, we do not work on commission and are not out to screw anyone. Keep that in mind next time you grunt and snidely remark that you’ll just have to go elsewhere as you walk away because we wouldn’t give you the 50% off that you offered us for the product. Bottom line, bad experiences happen at every store. Best Buy is up big right now so they can afford to mistreat customers because they know they have endless traffic and if that person doesn’t buy it, someone else will. Nice problem to have. Circuit City clearly does not have that luxury (at my location anyway). And Walmart, please. Anyone who buys a TV at walmart needs their head examined. They carry the absolute bottom of the barrel garbage models. That’s why their 52″ LCDs are $1300. Good luck getting some answers in there also. If Circuit City does shut it down, which this week is looking like a real possibility, BB’s prices will go even higher than they already are since they will have absolutely no competition. Anyway I’ve said my piece, hopefully someone reads it!
I couldn’t even make down the whole page. At first i thought all of this was funny, then it turned sad. I work at CC as of right now….. only because i have to. There aren’t many options now a days. No one is hiring. And it is completely true that no one does their job perfect. It sucks that happens, but nothing is perfect, crap breaks, everyone gets taken every once and a while. let it go. don’t forget that the people you down because of their service and bad attitudes are more than likely about to loose their jobs. think about how many people the stores employ. What happened to the freaking good attitudes in this world. Maybe if the world was a tiny bit more positive, things would go better. people would be more inclined to help, they would care about each other, instead of wasting time on little things. I am sorry someone’s t.v. blew up or you didn’t like a store manager, but you should be glad you had a circuit city to walk into and have the option to waste your money on a 600 dollar camera. we are blessed beyond what we deserve here. as americans we spend 450 billion dollars at christmas every year. 10 billion dollars would pay for everyone in this world to have water. lets start thinking about those things. lets love each other. thats the right thing to do. I bet this won’t even get posted, but i sure hope it does. Life is great if you just let it be great.
ok in my defense as a CC employee and a CC CSA i have to say i deal with customers who have complaints everyday and just the other day i had a customer who was so happy with the service an associate provided she waited and LOOKED for one of our managers so that she could tell them about it and give GOOD feedback. Also as a fellow alex(lol) i do feel bad that you were treated that way but not every CC store has managers like that. yes we sell items open box that have been RETURNED but not “used” as you say most the time the customers just decide the camera wasnt the best fit one for them but if its missing pieces it is because some asshole didnt bring them back or lost them and wanted to return his/her product right there and then. plus it is store policy unless there is something totally defective with the product its not openboxable or its not opened we have to open box it. as for the restocking fee thats company policy and thats the only other way besides sale the company makes its profits. It is really diffucult to tell a customer to return a product they werent satisfied with they have to pay a 15% restocking fee but if the product is defective it is waived and if you trade it for a different product that is the same or another video camera, camera ect it is also waived. We dont like some of company policies and some of them do suck but please remember we dont make them corp. does. I have only worked for CC since august now but i do love working in customer service and trying my hardest along with my managers to make sure customers leave happy. I can say that all the people that work at my cc store are the most helpful and awesome people to work with and none of them would be that rude to you. i am very sad to see cc going in such a bad direction because unlike many of you i have had bad experiences at best buy and i know many of our loyal customers who have and many of them have called our store for 2 months now asking if we are going out of business and saying they never want to shop at best buy again and all i can say is not every cc store is going to be like that and as far as i can say right now we are staying in business.
Hello. Looks like Circuit City might be closing down after this Friday. Maybe you did call it, Alex. I was reading the original post and that’s horrible how they treated you. The Circuit City near my house is actually very good with customer service, I’ve shopped there for years.
I think it’s a flawed premise to base your experience on a group of people and blame the entire company. Like I said, my experience with them has always been a good one. Although I do understand that they represent the company as a whole; I believe it might be the people working at your particular area that may be to blame.
I work as technical support for a large company and I will admit that the work is hard. There are co-workers that have the mentality that “I don’t get paid enough to do this”, and they scrape by and act like jerks.
Surely not everyone in my department acts this way, but it’s bad representation. People approach me apprehensively with a bad attitude from the start thinking that I’m the same way.
Sorry to hear about your bad experience, Alex. You’re probably glad they’re closing down too. As for me, I did enjoy shopping there. I think individual experiences will vary though.
About http://www.circuitcity.com/ Back in OCT
I bought a laptop that was junk it was in the Sunday ad on sale, the rest is history
I first called back then spoke with customer service corporate and the girl was nice told me to take it right back to the store and it would be taken care of
It is no wonder they filed for Chapter 11 to get out of all the dirty deals they have made
I feel for those loosing there jobs but not for the company how they dare continue to sell gift cards and offer that warranty when people will simply be out of the buy they make!!!!! Take a look at the web site they have on eBay it says it all.
what corporate wimps to get out by file of bankrup I never did get my issue taken care of and out of $620.00 I hope they never go back in business people have enough economic problems today and how dare they steal from them.
Good reddens to C.C.
I will say I got a kick out of David Letterman show when he was on the topic about C.C. file to get out of trouble.
I do so hope they are not able to ever re open!
Ha! Ha! There’s the proof! CC has a store on GreedPay eBay! A sinking ship with a store in a sinking ship, lol! Anyone that sells on eBay nowadays is only selling garbage. It’s a dumping ground, CC & Ebay should make a nice combination. Too hilarious. They deserve each other…they both live off of us and they both treat us as garbage.
Yeah, I think big corporations are to blame when it comes down to the way they do business. It’s reflected in the policies that the employees are asked to uphold. It really builds an environment that isn’t good for the employees or the customers at all.
Oh well. Maybe I can get a good deal on some of the stuff they are liquidating. Lol.