THE REAL STORY OF PC WORLD (PC World)

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Product:	PC World
Date:	01/06/02 (42 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: CLOSE TO HOME , LOTS OF GAMES

Disadvantages: OVER PRICED

PC World is probably the UK’s largest retail outlet for computer goods. They have a massive range of stock ranging from the simplest software up to some top of the range hardware but they also have many flaws that are inherent due to their business practice and ethics.

Many people that know very little about computers regard PC World as one of the greatest shops around. And the truth is that for some people this may be the case although for the majority it certainly isn’t. Looking at PC World’s strong points it is easy to see why they succeed. The salespeople are always very friendly and they appear helpful. For beginners, ease of use and convenience is more important than getting the cheapest possible prices so to them, PC World appears a very attractive proposition.

The stores are often located just out of town in retail parks and they’re also near other useful shops so if a consumer has a spare afternoon, they can take a trip out to the retail park and buy everything that they need/want.

The range of products at my local PC World is pretty large. They have all the latest games and even a large selection of budget titles available. They also stock printers, scanners, modems, graphics cards, memory, hard disks, CD Writers and just about any peripheral that you can name. They also sell complete PCs although I wouldn’t advise buying one of these, for reasons I will explain in a minute. The stores are all neatly arranged so it is easy to find products on the shelves and the staff appear friendly and courteous. So far so good then?

Unfortunately it doesn’t remain like this. The majority of the staff know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING if you ask them a technical question. When I was trying to gain information about ISDN adapters and BT HomeHighway, I was informed by one of their ‘experts’ that HomeHighway was just a piece of software and that I could use a normal 56K modem and expect speed incr
eases. This is certainly not the case. Without going into too much detail, HomeHighway is a product/service that BT offers which essentially splits you existing phone line into 2 ISDN channels and 2 analogue lines. It is certainly not a piece of software.

PC World sell HomeHighway application forms for about £100 and this is what led to the confusion. I was trying to purchase one of these and an ISDN adapter and I was informed that I couldn’t use an ISDN adapter with HomeHighway. The most annoying thing was that some members of staff admitted that they knew nothing about HomeHighway and they referred me to a bloke that supposedly knew all about it. It was this man that told me that it was software. I don’t mind if the staff admit that they don’t know anything about the product; to me that is acceptable. You can’t expect each employee to know everything. What does annoy me is that this man didn’t know what he was talking about, yet he pretended to be an expert.

This isn’t the only case I’ve had of receiving bad or incorrect advice from the staff at PC World but it is the most startling. Another major flaw of PC World is its pricing. Recently in PC Format there has been an investigation into PC World and it was concluded that on average their products cost 33% more than they do from a mail order company. Obviously, there are certain benefits to buying from a shop, such as you don’t have to pay postage and it’s also more comforting to know that if the product does go wrong, you can nip down the road and return it. These benefits don’t apply quite as much to the advanced user so I feel that PC World is exploiting people with limited PC knowledge.

The salespeople at PC World may all appear to be helpful and friendly, but they do have a lot of incentive to do so. They get paid on a commission basis, so the more they sell, the more they get paid. Because of this, they will try and sel
l you as much as possible. When I got my first PC, I bought it from them because I knew nothing about computers. Now that I know a large amount about computers (I program in C++, Java and have built several systems) I would not even consider buying a PC from them ever again. The PCs are always well overpriced, often you can end up paying almost twice as much than you would if you bought the PC from a reputable mail-order firm. This is primarily because PC World are intent on bundling extended warranties with their PCs. The way that the sales people sell them is very convincing to the computer-newbie and I was persuaded to buy one. I would never do this again, because the only thing that went wrong with the PC was the monitor and this was within the 1 year standard warranty anyway. The truth is that if anything is going to go wrong with your PC, it will normally make itself known within a few weeks of purchase.

My extended warranty cost about £500 for 4 years. If something went wrong in the 3rd year of the warranty period, I would be able to buy a NEW PC with that £500 if I hadn’t bought the warranty. So my advice as far as extended warranties go is ‘Don’t Buy Them!’

My main complaints with PC World are as follows:
The staff aren’t trained properly
The goods are too expensive
The staff give bad advice just to get a sale
The products are often out of date anyway.

For someone new to computers price and performance aren’t imperative, and often they aren’t aware that they’ve been given bad advice. PC World will always have a massive revenue because there will always be people that are buying PCs for the first time, with relatively little knowledge. My advice is that if you are an advanced user, buy online or mail-order. If you are a beginner, go to a place like Time or Mesh because their staff are trained properly and are always helpful. Also their PCs are cheap and well spe
cified. But please, don’t go to PC World!

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