Inclement weather floods PC World help lines

By Matt Whipp

Posted on 13 Jun 2003 at 13:00

PC World says it received more than 10,000 calls to its helplines following bad weather that affected parts of the UK last weekend.

The company said that this is the first time this year that it had seen such a spike.

Steve Campbell, marketing director at PC World, said: 'There has been a massive increase over the weekend in calls to our support staff with queries about modems and data restoration due to damaged hard drives and modems... this time last year we saw the same thing, with almost one in 10 calls to our PC Servicecall helpline being related to thunderstorms and the damage caused by a surge... surge protectors are a simple and effective way to put your mind at ease.'

Even customers that take up extra warranty services from wherever they bought their computers, such as PC World's PC Performance service, may be covered for an upset tea cup, but not for storm damage. And it's unlikely there's anything that can be done for any lost data that hasn't been backed up.

While Dixons, owner of PC World, is one of the companies at the heart of an investigation by the Competition Commission into extended warranties, a spokesperson said that the OFT had recently praised PC World for the clear and informative literature it offers its customers about warranty services.

The best protection is simply to pull out plugs and telephone wires at the first swing of the barometer needle, or stump up the £20 or so necessary for a surge protector to defend both your plugs and modem wires from electrical spikes. PC World says it advises its customers of the benefits of doing so in store.