CeX — Local services in Reading

I had good intentions when trying to patronize the CEX Reading store. I thought I might sell 2 older phones, get a bit of store credit, and apply that to a second-hand phone, thus satisfying my need for a new phone while being a little eco-friendly. The website makes the selling process easy enough, except you have to self-select the 'grade' of your device. That didn't concern me too much because I assumed they would make their own assessment. I took my receipt generated online and went the store, and from there things did not go smoothly. I had the charging cables and the phones. The sales representative says, "We need the chargers." I was certain at least one was not sold with a charger from new, but they insisted. After some wrangling and discussion with other staff, and consultation with the internet, it was determined one was sold with a charger and one was not. The result after all of that: they would have to reduce the purchase price of one phone by the cost of the charger - about £2. The bothersome part was not the wrangling and confusion, it was the dismissive attitude of the staff - they were right and I was wrong. As it turns out, we were both part right. Since I was there, I asked about my current phone, which I would want to sell in the near future. It has a hairline crack in the screen. The sales representative says, "We won't take that." Then she consults with another staff, and he says, sure they would take it. In the end I was told they would inspect the 2 phones I wanted to sell in the store and let me know the outcome. Later in the afternoon I get a call from CEX and am told, "Unfortunately we can't accept these phones. They failed testing." One phone purportedly had a small crack and the other allegedly would not make phone calls. When I went to pick up the phones they showed me the "crack" - a microscopic, pixel-sized chip in the side of the screen next to the bezel that has no bearing on the integrity of the device frankly isn't even noticeable. It was so small I can't even be sure what it was they were trying to say was there and whether it was there when I took the phone in to the store. This phone was in a case with a screen protector for as long as we owned it. It seems to me they just didn't want it and looked for a reason to reject it. Why bother even offering to buy that model of phone? The alleged issue with the second phone is the real whopper. Staff told me it wouldn't make calls. I took the phone home, popped in a sim, and called up the CEX Reading store. I got right through to the recorded message. So either the staff testing the phone was incompetent or they simply lied. Either scenario does not engender trust in the CEX Reading store and CEX as a business. Ultimately I wasted a bunch of time, received nothing, was challenged to provide original chargers when one of them was not sold with one from new, deal with confusion, and encountered either incompetence or deceit. I normally do not buy second-hand electronics, but I had good intentions to try it. Now, I guess I won't. I'll just bin my old phones and buy new. And at the very least I'll not patronize CEX...

I have to say this store has the worst customer service of any store I have ever visited period. I regularly use C.E.X stores to purchase DVDs and Games in particular as does my brother. Bracknell, Camberley, Newbury, Basingstoke, Southampton all have incredible staff who are attentive and actually want to serve you. Reading on the other hand has the laziest bunch of staff around. There is always a queue in there as they ignore the buy and sell lines and usually use 2 people who they have serving for selling which takes so much longer. The other 4 members of staff stand around chatting or pretending to do something every time. They can clearly see a queue forming yet none of them are either instructed to help or use their initiative. This happens every single time I go in there which is at least 3 times a month. They're beyond lazy it's embarrassing. During the lockdown part of last year they were so disorganised. They would not come to the door despite seeing you there waiting then when you go to collect your order they wouldn't have half of the things you ordered yet when you went online it still said in stock and when you order again miraculously they had it 2 days later. You would always have to wait for them to go and collect the items rather than them being prepared unlike every other store I visited who would have items sat there waiting for you to collect. The store needs to get rid of its staff. The manager clearly doesn't care that his staff are the laziest around so he needs to be chucked too. I don't expect great customer service from shops like C.E.X but every other one I've visited has been excellent which makes you realise just how bad the Reading store is. Great choice in stuff but I guarantee 95% of the time you'll give up waiting for the staff to pull their finger out. Absolutely useless bunch. Gutted I can't give a 0 star review as they definitely don't deserve the 1...

In the space of 4 days, I have had to re-visit CEX in Reading - on friar street, 4 times!

Firstly I went to trade in an in-expensive camera valued at roughly £40. The member of staff called 'Sean E' (taken from my receipt) actually snapped a piece of the casing when he was doing the checks and then had the audacity to tell me they wouldn't take it because it was broken, and denied breaking it after doing so infant of me! 'Sorry dude we're not taking that' I was absolutely fuming. After telling him to get his manager and explain the situation, he came back and told me they would rightfully be giving me the money - instead of apologising, he said nothing and I was on my way.

I also wanted to trade in my iPhone 6 which had a cracked screen and scuffing on the back, I was told to pay to get the screen replaced elsewhere and bring it back by one person, who said the scuffs weren't an issue as they were cosmetic. Then upon returning, they forgot to test it over the weekend - so I had to make 2 trips in one day back to the shop. When I got back (again) they then said they wouldn't take it because of the cosmetic scuffs??? Eventually after complaining for a while and to 3 or 4 different members of staff that were sent over to me, I got some money for it.

The work done by these staff is absolute guess work, there are no guidelines at all in CEX. I was also given 3 different valuation prices for the phone by 3 different members of staff, one for every time I visited....

It'll be music to their ears that I'm not coming back after the amount of complaining i've done, there definitely needs to be more training done at this shop, staff were so...