Saturday 25 February 2023

The Voice - Consumer's Voice

Where's my laptop?

I bought a laptop from a store in Game City in August 2022. The laptop had a 1 year warranty. I then realised that the laptop does not have network drivers. I was far in Lobatse and needed to use it for school work but I got the drivers installed. Around September I realised that the battery lasts for only an hour. I felt that this is too much now and I contacted the store for assistance. They took the laptop with the claim that they are going to fix it. On my return, they told me it was not the battery. It was the capacitors and they had changed them. However the battery remained the same. I kept on following the store and they claimed they have ordered the battery and it will arrive in the second week of January 2023. The second week of January arrives and there is no battery. They again took my laptop to go and fix it. It got worse. The technician left a screw inside which short-circuited the charging system. Right now, the laptop works well connected to the power only. I approached them and what I got is that I should fix the laptop, buy a new battery and they will refund. I'm so exhausted because of these guys. Please help me.


This is a complete mess. Can this store do ANYTHING right?

Firstly they sold you a laptop that wasn't "in good working order and free of defects" as required by Section 15 (1) of the Consumer Protection Act. Any new or even second-hand laptop should have the basic network drivers, the bits of software that allow it to connect to the world. Clearly there's something suspicious about this device if it can't even connect in 2023.

Then there's the issue of the battery. New laptops these days have batteries than can last for several hours and the battery in yours only lasted an hour when you bought it? That's not good enough. And now let's add in the incompetence of their staff who leave a loose screw inside the laptop that caused further damage.

Finally there's their suggestion that YOU need to fix the laptop and get a new battery. That's crazy. It's not just the laptop that has a screw loose, it's the store management as well. It's their job to fix this issue. I contacted the store and they told me that the battery "will be replaced this week". They later told me again that "it shall be done this week".

Not true. A week later, there's still no solution.

I'll contact the store one last time. I saw that you posted a complaint in the Consumer Watchdog Facebook group which named the store. Maybe that will motivate them to fix this issue finally?

Who did it?

Since last year I have experienced P214 disappearing from my husband's account every month. In early January when I went to withdraw money it showed there was no money. I called the bank but they could not give me an answer. Last night we discovered after calling the bank, they said it's Netflix.

The lady at the bank was saying they can't reveal who did this but I heard that bank staff can do this?


There's good news and there's bad news.

The good news is that you later told me that you had spoken online to Netflix and after you explained the situation they said they would refund 12 months of monthly subscriptions. That's clearly good news. It also suggests to me that Netflix understand that sometimes people's accounts are misused and they're prepared to do something about it. Never underestimate what an international brand will do to protect its reputation.

Now for the bad news. Your credit card has been compromised. Someone has used your card to purchase a Netflix subscription. Yes, it's possible someone in the bank did this but there's a much more likely explanation. It's someone who had physical access to your card. Maybe it was a waiter in a restaurant, a cashier in a supermarket or someone in a store where you swiped for some airtime.

However, it's much more likely it was someone you know. I've heard of this situation many times before and it's almost always a family member or a friend who did this. The first thing you should do is ask your bank for replacement cards with different numbers and different CVV numbers. Then you have a choice. Ask some serious questions of everyone you know. Or pretend this never happened. It's not a choice I envy.

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