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GW Customer service regarding any issue other than Finecast has been great, parts replaced or missing bits sent out straight away, friendly helpful etc couldn't be happier.

Regarding Finecast I was fobbed off with all sorts of excuses for the quality of the received products. They tried their best to stop me asking difficult questions constantly offering a refund rather than trying to solve my problem and supply an acceptable quality product.

I hate GW with a passion, wish nothing but harm on them, and hope they die as a company. That's well known. So it may come as a suprise to some that I actually give GW credit for having good customer service when it comes to mail order and returns. Over the years, I've had a couple of metal kits that have had pieces missing. (the 40k Nurgle Daemon Prince and the Epidemus models) Both times a call to GW has seen them sending me a whole new kit without requiring me to return the incomplete box. (one can imagine what a less moral person could get up to given that fact....) The amusing thing is that in each case I bought the models second hand (albiet unbuilt)from Ebay at reduced price, which made the deal even sweeter.

So I actually cannot complain about that one aspect of GW's business model.

TR

So, ahat was the point of the thread? I count overwhelming support for GW customer service. The only real reason I see to eveb bother starting this thread was GW asking for the return of a damaged collector's edition book, probably to ensure that it was damaged and was not the work of some unscrupulous manipulator of the system. For items like that, many companies would probably require a return.

The only problem I have ever had with GW CS is with FW's emails. Its a little annoying that they are so bad at replying, but it's not like they don't answer the phone. Normaly they answer within 3 rings, know what you are talking about and get what you want done and then some.

I have to say, despite various misgivings I might have for GW, I've got nothing bad to say about their customer service. It has always been fine in my experience.

Actually, I never had a bad treating but I had a HORRIBLE FW product. I ordered a Lufgt Huron mini , he just looks so awsome, and I got a BLOCK of resin. No miscast, no molten parts it was a massive BLOCK. Well, I called them and they said that they would send me a new Lufgt Huron and as a excuse they sent me a pack of Tartaros Terminators. Now I have a Blood Angels general with the most awsome E-Claw/Fist in the history of men and a free squad of termies.

azreal13 wrote:

Cave_Dweller wrote:

lord marcus wrote:

Cave_Dweller wrote:It's been with Forge World, whom have repeatedly failed to respond to my multiple attempts at email communication to replace or even address a seriously defective item. I eventually got so frustrated by their lack of response I gave up.

Call them?

If their email service is already that much of a fail, why should I have to spend more money in the form of an international call to get a replacement?

Screw em, is what I say.

PP
Yeah, screw them and the fact that they've taken your money and given you a defective product, that'll show em!!

For feths sake, just get your arse out of your hand and use your newly free appendage to pick up the phone and call them. Their auto reply email even states that they get more traffic than they can handle and if you haven't heard back within a couple of days then give them a call.

For the many things you can fault GW and FW for, after sales service is not one of them, and if you are going to insist on being a diva then you are doing nobody a disservice but yourself.

If you use the google voice app you can place international calls for about a nickel a minute - if it was in the same hemisphere, you could get it for less than that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
GW has always been good to me - I bought a box of marauders and it didn't come with enough torsos in fact it came with 24 legs and 8 torsos. GW sent me a new box and on top of that sprues with 16 torsos. My one box of marauders netted me some 40 marauders. I was quite happy.

I have NEVER had a bad dealing with GW. Ever! I had two messed up minis, they sent me new ones. I had a bad can of Chaos spray, sent me a new one. They have great customer service.

I know right! GW has TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE! WORST COMPANY EVAR!!!!!1!!1!ONE!

I had bought one of the first kroq-gar on carnosaur models when they were done in finecast. The tail on that model doesn't fit with the body at all. It's a HUGE error. They shipped me a new one immediately, let me keep the old one. With a bit of green stuff, I now have 2 carnosaurs. Huzzah!

Bought a dark angels upgrade sprue, one part had a problem, was given a whole new upgrade sprue. Huzzah!

Worst experience was not getting a whole new land raider kit because 1 piece was bad.

The new sprue they sent me (actually sprue number 2, but that was because I gave them the wrong sprue number because I clipped the part before I noticed it was bad) also had a defect, but on a different part. So all in all, I got to build a great land raider, and had plenty of bits to use for terrain!

Also FW is great but you HAVE to call them.

My worst experience is instore, not with their customer service guys... I have never been hounded so much outside of a GW store, they are like used car salesmen trying to make budget... Just leave me in peace to decide what I want to look at or add to my army, and please, FFS don't try to sell me games-day tickets when I already told you twice that I am NOT going to attend and have NO interest in going, and no, you can't convince me to go just because you tell me three times that "so and so from the UK is coming for the first time in over a decade!" whoopee doo darr...

Never had a bad experience. I don't use their online services much, but when I ordered a bunch of stuff from the UK to ship to Australia (back when you could buy bits from the UK but not Oz) and it didn't arrive for a few weeks, I called them up told them I ordered something X weeks ago and it hadn't arrived and they said no worries they'd take care of it. A few days a package arrived with everything I'd ordered in it plus a bunch of extra stuff related to the same armies I'd ordered bits for to apologies for the problems.

In store the guys have always been awesome, from when I started out as a snotty nosed little twerp until now as a mid twenties little twerp they've always been really good and helpful and such. The only annoying thing is when there's a new employee who doesn't recognise me and they do the standard "so what brings you in today, have you seen this stuff before, what armies are you working on, blah blah blah" when all I want to do is look at some models and not be told things I already know about the hobby (admittedly I don't go there often, but most the older employees recognise me anyway).

Aside from that my only gripes are the price, of which there's not a lot of point arguing with the retail store guys about, and more recently the pathetic quality of finecast. Finecast has largely destroyed my faith in GW, it was such a terrible move and my local store has nothing but pathetic bubbly finecast models which I'm avoiding until the magical day they fix all the problems with them and they get back to the quality of the metal models.

I've actually had a defective plastic kit that GW redshirts refused to help me with. One of my Razorbacks was missing the weapon sprue and they just utterly stonewalled me because I could not present a receipt and hadn't opened the box in the store so they had no way of knowing whether I'd simply removed it myself (their excuse).

It was all just weak handwringing and saying "Tough noogies."

No "official" GW store near here, but I did buy a box of Necron Warriors from a "retailer" on ebay ($28 shipped).

Sadly, there were some major signs of stress on some of the bits (I haven't had a problem yet with this), but one gauss flayer was broken to bits.

I called GW today (about 10 minutes after I opened my package of Necrons) and they said they'd ship me out a fresh flayer right away.

i havent had issues like this yet.

None. That's not none out of thousands; we rarely deal with GW directly. So it's none out of a dozen and a halfish over 25 years. There's been a couple of excellent experiences, but the rest I would describe as average.

So there was this one time when I bought a Warp Hunter from FW. If you know the WH parts list, you know that you basically get the parts to a Fire Prism turret for free. I had the gun crystals and only needed the turret window (which is actually different in shape from all of the other universally used "Eldar glass"). So me wanting a FP turret I call GW's phone support and explain that I just bougt a Warp Hunter and pretty much everything I've just mentioned above. The rest of the call goes like this...

Me "So can I buy the clear plastic sprue for the Fire Prism kit."
Customer Service "I'm sorry sir, but we don't sell individual sprues from kits anymore."
Me "So is there any other way I can rephrase that question to get the part I need?"
Customer Service "Let me see if I've got one...I do and I can get this in the post for you today."
Me "Thanks!".....that's literally how that conversation went line for line.

Now I've heard they're a little jaded with FineCast calls, but luckily I've never had to deal with that. But every other of the several times I've called to get a replacement I've gotten one no questions asked. I've gotten an Autarch, 4 'Stealers from the new sprue (for one missing claw), 2 Howling Banshees (miscast on the hands), 10 DA metal shouldpads (they sent me the wrong ones). I've never had to send in anything first. If anything I don't think they send out entire sprues, I think they're sending out exact pieces. I got the impression that the operators all had their own piles that they could clip the bits off of.

Honestly, GW's customer service has always treated me right. ForgeWorld's big thing is you really do have to get them on the phone. But once you have a live voice they're pretty much the same way. I got my bits replaced no questions asked. But FW is pretty bad about emails, which is unexpected for this day and age.

My daughter bought me a plastic fantasy tower about a year ago. It didn't appear I'd be using it any time soon, so I asked if she'd mind if I exchanged it for some Dark Eldar goodness. She was cool with that.

So I go to my local GW store without a receipt, walk up to the store owner and ask if I can exchange it. He looks at the box, and says "Really, sorry, but it's been opened".

Since I'm not an entitled child, and understand that businesses need to make smart business decisions to stay in business, I said "no worries", and left. Although I knew GW has had a very generous return policy in the past, I knew they'd eventually wise up and get in line with every other industry.

A lot of the complaints here seem to come under the category of "Why should I have to take any responsibility for acheiving a satisfactory outcome?".

Last year, I had bought a paintbrush, standard Citadel Detail Brush. When I used it for the first time, I noticed that the bristles were immediatly spayed and damaged. Someone probably dropped it and I've just been unlucky enough to pick that particular brush. I admit, I should have properly checked it in the store, but "no matter", I think to myself. I don't use it, instead I take it back to the store and ask for my money back. The blackshirt behind the counter says that for an unspecified reason, I can't have my money back, but I can just take a replacement brush. Now wherever this was BS or not, I'm about to question why I can't get my money back for a damaged product but before I can voice my concerns, he has taken the brush out of my hands, snapped it in half and thrown it away, leaving me to simply take another one, knowing that I'm not going to get any explanation out of him.

I also despise how impossible it is to get a game in some stores because of the so-called "demo-tables". At my local GW, there are 5 tables to play with: 2 6x4 and 3 4x4. Even during the late night gaming which can last until 10pm we aren't allowed to play on the 4x4 tables, incase someone wanders in that late and wants to start the game. Even though there are 3 demo tables I have been kicked off one of the 6x4 tables for demo-games. When questioned, the staff simply say that because this one has more terrain on it, they have to use it for demos, despite the 3 other tables going to waste.
Again, I went down that same store a few weeks back to take part in a campaign. I had driven down straight after work, hoping to have my first game since September last year. When I arrive, I see that both tables are being used for the campaign. "Happy days" I think to myself, as I try to organise a game. However, despite the whole friendly-atmosphere they put forward, they take an adamant stance that no more players are allowed. I ask since when was this rule implemented. You honestly know what they said? "I should have checked the Facebook page, which was updated this morrning to say that it was fully booked". When I explain that I had been working since 5am that morning and therfore had no opportunity to see the update and if I had honestly come down for nothing, I get a mumbled "...yeah" as a reply. ¬¬

/rant

Valkyrie wrote: The blackshirt behind the counter says that for an unspecified reason, I can't have my money back, but I can just take a replacement brush.

That's how every store works over here, it's a retail thing, not a GW thing.

Trench-Raider wrote:(one can imagine what a less moral person could get up to given that fact....) The amusing thing is that in each case I bought the models second hand (albiet unbuilt)from Ebay at reduced price, which made the deal even sweeter.

I would 'love' to see your definition of 'less moral'.

my one issue was from hobbytown usa and another small game store, recently i bought a unit of wracks on one finecast sprue the arms were stressed and broken and i cut another since all i saw was shredded plastic, my other issue was my wych squad actually had to many upgrage sprues and not enough basic combat weapons and after they were stepped on i had even less.

DarknessEternal wrote:

Valkyrie wrote: The blackshirt behind the counter says that for an unspecified reason, I can't have my money back, but I can just take a replacement brush.

That's how every store works over here, it's a retail thing, not a GW thing.

Same here. You won't get a refund without a receipt, but it is not clear whether Valk presented one? The Blackshirt did good by him by just changing the brush no questions asked. You presumably still needed a brush.

GW will exchange sealed products to its equivilent value. I have done this with a Mines of Moria boxset which I didn't want and Swales fir sixty quids worth of VC stuff. That's really good service when I did even buy it from GW and I had bought it for about half RRP but got full RRP for the exchange. A bit naughty but it's good when things work out in your favour occasionally.

As for the poster who wanted to return an open but other wise undamaged product, I have never heard of that being taken as reason for exchange.

Valkyrie wrote:
Again, I went down that same store a few weeks back to take part in a campaign. I had driven down straight after work, hoping to have my first game since September last year. When I arrive, I see that both tables are being used for the campaign. "Happy days" I think to myself, as I try to organise a game. However, despite the whole friendly-atmosphere they put forward, they take an adamant stance that no more players are allowed. I ask since when was this rule implemented. You honestly know what they said? "I should have checked the Facebook page, which was updated this morrning to say that it was fully booked". When I explain that I had been working since 5am that morning and therfore had no opportunity to see the update and if I had honestly come down for nothing, I get a mumbled "...yeah" as a reply. ¬¬

Either you knew it needed registration and didn't bother, or you weren't aware of the need to register, neither of which are the shops fault as others were clearly aware.

I went from expecting a variety of horror stories in this thread to feeling really good about being their customers.

Once I had picked up two Lord of the Rings miniature boxes, a Warriors of Rohan and a box of Uruk Scouts (I was really into the Lord of the Rings) from my local GW. Upon getting home, I opened the Scouts and found they were essentially pre-assembled (not a miscast, the line just doesn't have separate bits like 40k or Fantasy, it's just 'glue the figure to the base')

Disappointed, as I was looking forward to assembling them, I brought them back to the GW, hoping to return them. I didn't have a receipt. The black-shirt told me I couldn't return the Scouts (entirely understandable, it was no longer shrink-wrapped, so they couldn't confirm nothing was altered, and I didn't have the receipt)

But they let me exchange the unopened Warriors of Rohan for anything in the store (where I pay the difference in value if the new box if more expensive. It became a fancy gift card)

Honestly, it was far more than I expected, and it was very much appreciated. I left the store with a good feeling about the company.

Steve steveson wrote:

Valkyrie wrote:
Again, I went down that same store a few weeks back to take part in a campaign. I had driven down straight after work, hoping to have my first game since September last year. When I arrive, I see that both tables are being used for the campaign. "Happy days" I think to myself, as I try to organise a game. However, despite the whole friendly-atmosphere they put forward, they take an adamant stance that no more players are allowed. I ask since when was this rule implemented. You honestly know what they said? "I should have checked the Facebook page, which was updated this morrning to say that it was fully booked". When I explain that I had been working since 5am that morning and therfore had no opportunity to see the update and if I had honestly come down for nothing, I get a mumbled "...yeah" as a reply. ¬¬

Either you knew it needed registration and didn't bother, or you weren't aware of the need to register, neither of which are the shops fault as others were clearly aware.

Or that no mention of registration was mentioned until the morning before?

As far as the brush story goes..

The UK sale of goods act states you are entitled to a refund or exchange at your discretion if goods are found to be faulty at purchase. This would require proof of purchase as the act allows a fixed period for these faults to be discovered.

Outside of this period, it is at the retailers discretion as to whether a refund, repair or exchange is offered. If a refund is offered, the retailer has the right to reduce it from the original sale value if enough time or use has passed to devalue the item from an 'as new' condition.

The rights or wrongs all hinge on whether a pop was available.

Can't say I've had any. Only time I've contacted them was when the third edition box set I purchased was missing some of the bits from the SM squad. They fixed it with no questions asked.

But that was... 13 years ago I think, so I can't say if anything has really changed since then.

Back when they did hobby classes, they had an offer where once you completed the class by playing a game of 40k you got a box of either assault marines or a tactical squad. I ended up not being able to play the game when I was supposed to because of personal reasons and even phoned in to tell them I couldn't make it and asked them if we could reschedule. I come back to play the game about 2 weeks later, and they deny that I ever took the class so that offer didn't apply to me. The worst part was that the guy teaching me quit before I came back 2 weeks later.

The only complaint I have is that when I recieved my one damaged finecast kit they did not telepathically know and automatically send out a replacement.

Wait we dont have that tech yet? THAT HOBO LIED TO ME

Other than that they are pure awesome in the customer service department.