Keep Calm And Discuss Retro Generally!

The Last Bandit

Serious trouble... And gift vouchers are not being redeemed 'for the moment'.

o1s1n

Grafton Street will be weird without a HMV. I dont thinl there'll be a single shop worth going in to now. Well, maybe the Disney store...

Atavan-Halen

The Last Bandit wrote: »

Serious trouble... And gift vouchers are not being redeemed 'for the moment'.

Same thing happened with game when they were going bust.

I like browsing in hmv and you can usually pick up a bargain or two, also convenient that there's one within walking distance from my house.

Myrddin

Yep my voucher was declined today, fairly repulsive policy seeing they've been paid for the vouchers. They've effectively stolen money from the public.

johnny_ultimate

EnterNow wrote: »

Yep my voucher was declined today, fairly repulsive policy seeing they've been paid for the vouchers. They've effectively stolen money from the public.

It's a very common policy for companies going into administration, to be fair, and one of the reasons why unfortunately vouchers are an increasingly troublesome gift. I wouldn't panic yet - its likely vouchers will be honoured once the dust has settled and the administrators have settled on a gameplan.

Myrddin

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

to be fair

To be fair? How about being fair to the customer who has already paid for the voucher & now can't use it? Also, they can have whatever policy they like, it should never be allowed to supersede a consumers statutory rights

Sparks43

Nasty situation alright
Glad i didnt take out the extended warrenty on the WiiU when i got it

€45 they wanted :eek:

And i did say "No point you are going bang in a year"

Won a 30 quid voucher for gamestop last week think i might go and have a browse

johnny_ultimate

EnterNow wrote: »

To be fair? How about being fair to the customer who has already paid for the voucher & now can't use it? Also, they can have whatever policy they like, it should never be allowed to supersede a consumers statutory rights

Unfortunately your statutory rights do not require HMV to instantly honour your giftcards, according to the NCA anyway. It also applies to administrators:

When a company is in administration, it no longer exists in its previous form. So legally, it does not have to fulfil its promises.

A gift card is simply a promise it will let you spend a certain amount in its store or on its website. So under insolvency law, it is up to the administrator whether to accept vouchers.

The administrator's job is to try to squeeze every last penny out of a company to pay those who are owed money. Often creditors only get a small percentage, if anything of what's owed.

It's not a nice situation for anyone - staff, creditors/debtors, consumers - but unfortunately the administrators are within their rights to deny gift vouchers being cashed in. Its **** for anyone with vouchers, not for a second denying that, and 'to be fair' may have been the wrong wording.

Nerdkiller1991

I don't want Limerick to lose their two HMV's. I mean, where else do I have to go? Xtra Vision? Their BD selection is pure cack.

Myrddin

Yeah I had a scan through a load of that type of stuff this morning, its an Administrator call. I still think its wrong though that the voucher is now deemed void, it was bought & paid for its not as if its a loss to the company to accept it. From my point of view they've basically taken loads of money off people & now aren't giving it back. Its wrong that that can be lawfully condoned.

DinoRex

All I know is that HMV didn't have Dredd in stock on BluRay the weekend. Only time I've gone to buy a film in a physical media format in about 5 years and they didn't have it. Tower didn't bother their hole getting it in either.

Had to buy from Amazon in the end.

Mr.Saturn

There's some recourse, I believe, if your debit/credit card provider take part in a Chargeback scheme, but that's about the extent of it.

It's doubly sketchy, as in the plausible scenario of HMV surviving/being sold on in some form, even if only in name, then the new owners aren't obliged to honour vouchers. I don't imagine too many potential buyers leaping at the chance to snip up voucher debt either, even if it'd make for decent PR.

James Howlett

DinoRex wrote: »

All I know is that HMV didn't have Dredd in stock on BluRay the weekend. Only time I've gone to buy a film in a physical media format in about 5 years and they didn't have it. Tower didn't bother their hole getting it in either.

Had to buy from Amazon in the end.

That "one time in five years" is a little unfair man.

Part of the problem they faced was people choosing digital media over physical media. Physical retailers had no choice but to order low quantities of most stock or face being stuck with excess, unsellable stock, cloughing thier ability to then buy new stock. I think it would be safe to say that adult males increasingly prefer digital avenues, legal or illegal, to view their movies. That's why you see their shelves were full of Twilight, One Direction etc, because that is what their regular customers buy.

They probably only got in as much Dredd as they thought they could sell in the present environment.

CiDeRmAn

So, for games we're left with Gamestop, Smyths, Xtravision and [shudder] Harvey Norman [/shudder]

I was talking to one of the directors, now ex-director, of Gamestop, formerly a founder of Gamesworld, and he told me way back some 18 months ago that HMV were going to go bang, that as long as they sold tenners for a fiver they'd never succeed, which seems to mean all the discounts, all the sale items were killing them as they weren't selling enough full price stock to cover the shortfall, and then they couldn't raise the prices as they wouldn't compete with the online prices.
Catch 22 my friends.

So, for Blu and DVD we are left with......
Golden Discs?
The bargain wall in Heatons?

Tower Records would seem to be the only large store to stock this stuff.

We're doomed!


We can see now why MS never bothered with the Bluray drive, with digital delivery of media it was a pointless exercise, and they've been proved right, with Netflix and it's ilk more of a selling point than a DVD/Blu ray drive.

CiDeRmAn

Lets face it, most of us stopped going in when they started refusing to take Atari Jaguar games on trade.....

Myrddin

I never buy full priced games anyway, and I'd never pay more than €20 for a used game either...but HMV did have some decent prices any time I'd wander in for a browse

CiDeRmAn

Better pop in quick, they have their preowned DS games on sale, I saw Aliens in the Blanch branch and it's stickered price was around €16, so you'd be looking at only €12 for a great game and one that may be hard to get later.

DinoRex

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Lets face it, most of us stopped going in when they started refusing to take Atari Jaguar games on trade.....

They never had Battletoads in stock either, no matter how many times I rang up to ask!

Shame about people getting burned by HMV's refusal to honour vouchers. I think they're covered legally to refuse though, especially as they're a UK headquartered company. Although the consumer regulator will no doubt be testing it in court, I think all of HMV's obligations to creditors are suspended until they either exit administration or cease trading. It's unlikely the company will go anywhere but arse up at this stage, and creditors will be lucky to get a fraction of what's owed to them. Minor creditors( like vouchers holders for instance) will be unlikely to get anything at all.

Watch out where you spend your money if you need to come back for service or honouring of any promises. It just shows you that it's not just small fries going under...

It's the price of progress. Digital downloads is the future of movies, music, and (eek) maybe games too, for better or worse. HMV were never really on board with that or diversified enough to stay profitable. Richard Branson saw it a few years back and that's why he got out and sold his music store chain.

That clock is ticking for the likes of xtra vision, golden discs and the rest too. Shame though, apart from the loss of jobs, HMV have always been at the lower end of the price spectrum for new games, so it's a loss for game buying consumers at least.

Mr.Saturn

Kinda fascinating to behold how the high-street electronic retailers have essentially consumed themselves out of existence. Virgin to Zavvi, then Zavvi to HMV (among others) and what next. I mean, who'd be a viable candidate to gobble up what's left of HMV?

johnny_ultimate

I definitely think gamers are losing out most from a potential HMV closure - they were easily the best-priced retailer for both new titles and discounted games.

While I disagree that physical media is completely dead - as a film fan, smaller distributors still offer high-quality and niche DVD / Blu-Ray releases I can't get even digitally - but HMV certainly weren't ideal for anything other than mainstream new releases and mass-purchased discount stock (only so many copies of Step Brothers or The Nightmare Before Christmas one household needs). The price and range of Amazon remains the only really viable option.

MrVestek

Mr.Saturn wrote: »

Kinda fascinating to behold how the high-street electronic retailers have essentially consumed themselves out of existence. Virgin to Zavvi, then Zavvi to HMV (among others) and what next. I mean, who'd be a viable candidate to gobble up what's left of HMV?

The R.A.G.E? :P

Mr.Saturn

Achilles wrote: »

The R.A.G.E? :P

I suppose they could afford if they shift one of their boxed copies of Mario Allstars.

Atavan-Halen

I think what could work in the future is bricks and mortar online stores. The company I work for has 2 in the uk and basically it's a small store with a few terminals set up and customers can come in, sit down, browse our website and purchase from there with staff to help if need be. Afaik both stores are fairly successful so it might be a way forward. If amazon set up something like that I'd say they'd do really well

OwaynOTT

atavan-halen wrote: »

I think what could work in the future is bricks and mortar online stores. The company I work for has 2 in the uk and basically it's a small store with a few terminals set up and customers can come in, sit down, browse our website and purchase from there with staff to help if need be. Afaik both stores are fairly successful so it might be a way forward. If amazon set up something like that I'd say they'd do really well

You do you work? Just curious.


If brick a d mortar stores all go I will miss browsing, not that I've got anything recently from HMV or the likes. Apart from Lord of airings extended blu ray but that was only because I returned the regular edition that I got for Christmas.


Maybe the could start charging an entrance fee to satisfy our browsing needs.

CiDeRmAn

atavan-halen wrote: »

The company I work for has 2 in the uk

I always thought you were a test pilot for Captain Morgans!

DinoRex

Last thing I bought in HMV was Super Mario Bros. WiiU last week. They were €5 cheaper than Gamestop.

Atavan-Halen

I work in a large uk premium department store!

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I always thought you were a test pilot for Captain Morgans!

Oh I just do that in my spare time.

CiDeRmAn

DinoRex wrote: »

Last thing I bought in HMV was Super Mario Bros. WiiU last week. They were €5 cheaper than Gamestop.

I got mine in Smyths, trading in ZombiU, got €36 for it, which is €6 more than GS or HMV.
I just don't like fps based around melee, give me the same game with lots of weapons and plenty of ammo and we're away!

DinoRex

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I got mine in Smyths, trading in ZombiU, got €36 for it, which is €6 more than GS or HMV.
I just don't like fps based around melee, give me the same game with lots of weapons and plenty of ammo and we're away!

Wouldn't feel the same then, it's supposed to be a desperate struggle for survival, can't do that with plenty of ammo.