Monday 6 December 2021

Hisense Hi-Jinx

Some 6 weeks ago, Hay ordered what was meant to be a new, 40 inch, Hisense SMART TV for the static caravan. A week went by, and then another week, and still no TV delivery. 

Using the tracking number, she discovered it had been delivered to an address somewhere in Surrey. The seller wasn't responding to email and the Post Office seemed capable of intervening and having it delivered to our house, as it had been delivered to the address on the package, which the seller had gotten wrong, so she raised a dispute with e-Bay in the hope of getting a refund.

Refunds on e-Bay take a while, as there has to be a waiting period for the seller to respond. A week went by, and possibly more, and the refund finally came through.

She then looked at what Argos had to offer and found a 40 inch Bush TV. Now I haven't seen a Bush TV since they were black and white, were sat in a walnut cabinet, had no more than 2 channels and came from Radio Rentals. However, it was her decision and she ordered it. She received an email to say it would be available for collection sometime between the Saturday and the following Saturday, but she'd receive a text message with a PIN first. No PIN was forthcoming. 

It was now getting very close to the day the photographer was to come to the caravan to take the official advert photos, so we bit the bullet and she took our TV to the caravan on Friday, leaving us with no TV. 

She called Argos on Friday, who said there had obviously been some glitch in the system and that it would be available the next day, which was Saturday which finished the week it would allegedly be there for collection. I duly went into Argos on Saturday morning and, you guessed it, the TV still wasn't there.

The lady I spoke to said there was yet another glitch in the system, but she could let me have a 40 inch Hisense or a 32 inch Samsung at the same price, which was a Black Friday deal. Alternatively, she could register a home delivery of the Bush between 7pm and 10pm that evening. I opted for the home delivery.

At 7pm the Bush TV duly arrived. I then spent the next hour attaching the legs, plugging all the cables in and trying to get it to work. There were problems I couldn't quite fathom out - while I could get it to connect to the SkyBox and to the internet, there were no Apps for Netflix and the like. I looked at the TV box and, bugger me, it wasn't a SMART TV. Yet another night without TV, but we crowded around my laptop again to watch BBC iPlayer.

I now had a couple of choices; return the TV to Argos the next day and buy a seller refurbished SMART TV on e-Bay (seller refurbished meaning nothing other than it was a shop return and still came with a 12 months warranty), meaning I'd have to rush to South Cerney and repatriate our Samsung, so we had a TV till the seller refurbished one arrived, or see if Argos would exchange the Bush for the Hisense I knew they had and had offered me the day before. I wasn't holding out much hope for the latter.

Luckily the same lady was in the shop, so I didn't have to wade through the story again, and she happily exchanged the Bush for a Hisense SMART TV, which was a dream to install at home (although the sound is garbage, as it is on all flat screen TVs). She also told me that they sold a lot of Hisense TVs and she hadn't had a single return, which was good news, as I'd never heard of the brand before.

I blame Hay for not ordering a SMART TV in the first place, but there again she isn't conversant with the latest technology, so she has an entirely valid excuse. But what a palaver!


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