Employees at computer retailer Time have been venting their fury about the state of the company this week, after parent company Granville Technology Group closed 78 retail stores and entered administration.
The drama has also left customers fearing that they may not receive computers which they have recently bought or sent in for repair.
The first sign of trouble at Granville came last week when insiders revealed that staff were being paid late amid problems with the company's bank. On Monday some staff were being sent home, and by Tuesday all 78 retail stores, operating under the Computer Shop brand, had been closed.
On Wednesday, the administrators were called in.
Those most affected by the crisis, Granville's own staff, point the finger of blame at top management in a series of impassioned TalkBacks to ZDNet UK.
"The way this company is run is a bloody shambles and you can't realise the extent unless you work for them," said one employee with several years experience, who chose to remain anonymous.
"Alarm bells have been ringing for a while, rumours of takeovers going wrong and then blaming the bank when we got paid late two months in a row," said a second employee. "It's all very worrying."
IT consultant Simon Callow hit out at the tactics used by Time's management.
"Although I am sorry for Time's employees who seem to be getting the same treatment Time usually reserve for their customers. I for one will not be sorry to see the back of Time computers," he wrote.
"If the company had spent as much time and energy improving their products as they spent thinking up new dirty tricks to tie customers to a rotten deal then perhaps they would not be in the hands of the receivers now. Hopefully we will not see their like again."
One reader, who claims to have stopped working at Time last week, said that the situation at the firm has worsened in recent months. "Over the last few months I had daily complaints about late delivery or poor service from customers, and all I could tell them was that stock was due in any day soon."
Many workers claimed they had been kept in the dark about the scale of the problems. The arrival of the administrators, reportedly alongside the police, left little doubt about the scale of the situation — and sparked a flood of furious comments.
"Its nice to see that all employees have been told that they are now out of a job. Just a shame that I have had to sit surfing the net all morning to find out though. This is an absolute sham and a disgrace... and if we don't get paid there's gonna be all hell to pay," warned one Computer Shop 'ex-employee'.
Several Time employees expressed concern for customers affected by the crisis.
"All stores are closed, all staff are at home wondering if they still have jobs, nobody been told about what's happening, company looking like it's the end. There has been problems for a while and this is the show from it... will we all get paid [and] will the customers get their computers?" posted one salesman.
Granville sells an estimated 500,000 PCs per year, so there are likely to be many individuals and small firms affected by Granville's predicament.
"Yesterday I emailed Tiny [part of the Granville group] that I intended to take legal action to recover the £620 they have had since May 3rd for a laptop I ordered in April," wrote one customer, a doctor.
"Delivery was supposed to be 7-14 working days. I cancelled the order 4 weeks later when I was unable to get replies to emails or letters and got fed up of listening to the musak on their customer services line. On one occasion I hung on for 35 minutes. To add insult to injury this is an income-generating 0870 number. Unfortunately I smelt the rat too late!," he added.
Customers who have sent kit back for repair could also lose out.
My son's laptop has just gone in for repair. Am I ever likely to see it again?" asked one IT worker.
G Hockey, a 'retired coal miner', says he too suffered at the hands of Time.
"I paid £900 for a Tiny computer tower from Time Computers a year ago. It did not work from day one but I could not get Time to fix it so I got a solicitor to get in touch with them, Time totally ignored all letters sent, so I had to pay the solicitors bill for nothing," wrote Hockey.
"This has always been a bad company to get involved with, so if I have lost my £900 then I have myself to blame for dealing with them," Hockey added.
Talkback
I Have paid £1100 for a plasma package from time and have not recieved my goods. I am absolutely disgusted and worried sick that I will not get my money back as I paid cash. I am stuck can anyone help me. I need numbers to phone for advice in this matter. I have scoured the web for help and advice can find none. Can someone advise me what steps I could take in getting my money back.
Thank you so much.
Linda.
grant thornton are the administrators but I am sorry to say if you literally paid by cash and didn't use a credit card you are stuffed. the administrators haven't found enough cash to pay for their services let alone the banks and then onto the suppliers and then the staff.
time have had a anonamus buyer, and all employees have not been sacked they are keeping asround 100 people on if the buyer goes ahead . but looks like all new orders are stuffed. most emploees walked ut of time as they were told they would not be gettig paid to work.
I only got the job two months ago and this is definitely not what I expected. I'm not British and I must say I never imagined things like this could happen in this country. I used my first month's wages to pay off the first month's debts and the second month's living and now I am back to square one. I'll fill in the form for a claim to the government and hope I get some money some time soon but I don't have my hopes up. How come I work real hard for a month, get more sales in than the company really deserves what with the backlog and all, and then I lose my job in a blink? Someone got the money for free cause neither the customers nor e will ever see it again ... Ridiculous
I have to put on record why the police arrived. The Mohsans, who were no longer directors, though still nominally owning the company, ordered the Security staff to prevent anyone from leaving to prevent the percieved risk of theft.
One member of staff, who has only been back at work for a few weeks having suffered a stroke 8 weeks ago felt ill due to the malfunctioning air conditioning and attempted to go outside. He was stopped by the Security staff. The police were therefore called on his behalf, and the Security staff were informed that if they prevented anyone else leaving the building, they would be arrested. Time did not call the Police, nor did the Administrators. The Police were called by the staff to ensure the safety of the staff member concerned
Just goes to show that if you want a computer: step 1: invest a few quid in a computer magazine step 2: Buy a dell - cheap, on time and well supported. (have bought 4 of them over the last 8 years) step 3: if you must, buy an IBM, Sony or HP. Step 4: ON NO ACCOUNT BUY A COMPUTER FROM ANYONE ELSE - THEY ARE BOUND TO GO BUST SOME TIME. Simple really, but no one seems to say it.
Well, Mr anonymous student, that was about the least helpful comment I have seen in a while. Time and Tiny had some good deals on their kit, but it was the customer service that let them down. Delivering late (if at all), malfunctioning kit and a poor management attitude (this one was the killer!). Now we have 1500 people without a job, with at least a months worth of wages owing to them who are wondering what will happen next.
If I were you, I'd be advising anyone who wants to buya computer to buy it on their credit card, not buy a Dell HP etc. At least with a credit card you do have some protection.
(On a side note, I would never buy a Dell voluntarily!)
I also had the misfortune to work for the company, i heard from one of the area managers that the directors had siphoned off 40mill of the company funds to buy another plant in saudi, they basically raped the company of all its cash, and left it to collapse. They showed no regard for the futures or securities of their staff and have never showed regard for the customers. I only hope that there is a full and proper investigation into the manner in which they practiced business and that they end up in court. UNlikely to happen, i dont think extradition from saudi is possible. I can pay the mortgage and that mohsan bloke is sitting pretty with 110mill in his pocket....
I would just like to say how sorry I am for the employees of Granville Technology.
I bought a laptop from Time over 5 years ago. Every time I have dealt with them since, without exeption, every member of staff I have spoken to has been wonderful, even the laptop was not bad,( still going after over five years.) It's just that the administration side of things didn't run well.
I also feel sorry for the customers who will not get their goods. This could have been me as I recently bought a new laptop recently thankfully from another company.
Some customers of ours have been waiting over 4 months to get their Plasma TV's they ordered from us, if the company were taking money off people then and up until now, for plasma's they new they could never deliver there has to be some sort of criminal activity going on i.e. obtaining funds by deception, surly this means that someone is responsible for this and will see the long arm of the law, its not that we don't know who they are... EVEN DICK TURPIN WORE A MASK...
Ex-staff & customer site www.tinycon.com has been setup to allow people to tell there stories in full and also to try and help customers with any technical (hardware/software/or the deaded SUPANET!) issues that they my have.
I PAID £3870 FOR 50" PLASMA. I CAN'T AFFORD TO GO AND GET ANOTHER ONE FROM SOMEWHERE ELSE. I PAID BY SWITCH. I COULD HAVE BROUGHT FROM CURRYS AND HAD IT DELIVERED BY NOW. IF THE STAFF HAD FEELINGS SOMETHINGS WHERE WRONG WHY DID THEY GO AHEAD AND LET US SPEND OUR HARD EARNED MONEY?
Time computers will go, the hundred staff members that were kept will be laid off in september, they will have to work the whole of august with limited service and information (apparently the press has more info than staff) and get paid real LOW. This is injustice the administrators are treating them really badly, actually there are less than 100 people working at time as some more were laid off today.
I paid 1,140 for a Home Cinema System with my credit card which I have not received. I have spoke to customer services who tell me that they are trying to get orders already paid for delivered.I think it's disgusting that they allowed people to order in the first place knowing that they were in difficulties & also I find it even more disgusting that they are still advertising in the newspapers, the same packages!
I have also paid 1300 pounds cash for a plasma tv 100 pounds of that was for the delivery sfter making a number of calls to tiny i was delighted when i recieved a call on friday evening from tiny saying that they weresorry they could not deliver my Tv on Monday the 1st as arranged but if i was willing to wait another week or two i would have the Tv delivered however after speaking to tiny today(1/8/05) i have been told that i should never have recieved that call as that is only for finanace customer who will in fact get there goods while we who have paid cash will get nothing. has anyone else had similar phone calls or any advise on this matter please let me know.
disgruntled
Brian
Why pussyfoot around--is it a British thing? One thing you can be sure of is that the Directors knew about this fiasco months ago and knowingly took more money from unsuspecting customers.Why wait to be told by the Administrators that you will not get a penny back. You can be sure that the Directors have placed money in such a manner that it is not visible to the Administrators. How would Italians respond to these issues. Certainly in a more outspoken ,demonstrative manner.Search out these Directors and suggest dealing with them in the manner the Italians dealt with Mussolini. I am sure you are more likely to get your money back personally from them .Be proactive.
Anonymous Student wrote:
" Buy a dell - cheap, on time and well supported."
That has not been my experience with Dell, the last laptop I ordered was still undelivered after 6 weeks. I then cancelled the order. Laptop arrived 2 weeks later and Dell refused to collect and refund. I had to get my credit card company to force Dell to take it back. Similar story with a desktop, delivery quoted as 2 weeks, took 4 weeks. A good friend of mine works in IT for a London bank spends over £100Kpa with Dell and they have the same problem of delvery taking many weeks. After cancelling the Dell laptop I ordered an IBM Thinkpad and it was with me next day.
I'd happily buy from IBM, Toshiba, Sony, Mesh and any of the other larger assemblers. I'd even buy from a one man shop as long as I could pay by credit card.
Its a shame to see Time go bust. Hopefully, the EU investigation into Dell will put an end to them (allegedly) selling below cost and save our other samll assemblers.
On the 31st may 05 I paid £1199 on my debit cvard for a 42" plasma tv with dvd recorder and surround sound system do you think I have got it NO.
Anyone with help of information please advise.
Many Thanks
Thank you to whoever provided this site and it's facilities. There seems to be conflicting stories about credit cards payments, my credit card company told me NOT to pay the bill, but I hear others have been told to keep up the payments. I am keeping my money in my pocket and the credit card company can try and take me to court for non payment of something I have not received!!!!
any customers who bought tvs or pcs and had outstanding orders with the computer shop, tiny.com or time bought them by credit card should be able to claim from the credit card company. It is call the s75 consumer credit act. Check on www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/time.
Anyone who bought using a visa electron debit card are also covered. From what I can gather, Abbey are reinbursing their customers as they have insurance to cover this. You need to check with your banks, those of you who purchased with debit cards as some do not have insurance to cover debit cards. The best place to find out if you are going to get a refund is to visit the tradings standards website which gives a very comprehensive guide on what can be done plus template letters to banks to claim from them. From what I have seen it is becoming highly unlikely that anyone who has made an unsecured claim will recieve anything as it is looking like even the administrators are not going to be paid also! I currently work at Time Technology Park and are helping customers to claim wherever possible or give them the best plan of action.
can any body help?. i am trying to find who supplied my BTC FLAT SCREEN for my time computer, it has a fult, it is only 16mths old and should be covered by a 3 year warrenty from the supplier?