Hey I used to be an CEX employee for a total of 6 months. Although my first stint was at the end of 1994 just before the Sony Playstation and Sega Saturn. When people were part exchanging their entire console collection to buy a PSX and a Game for £1000 (about $1600 at the exchange rate at the time...), I remember one guy came in with a Neo Geo Cart unit with about 10 games and I said to him, 'No don't part exchange your Neo Geo and PC Engine for a Playstation, just wait unit it comes down in price', he gave me a dirty look and I duly took all his stuff off him, Boxed PC Engine Duo? Well you'll get £60 exchange on that.. Neo Geo, £75 exhange After everything the guy still had to pay £200! Idiot! At that point I realised if people are dumb enough to exchange consoles for something new and shiny and pay over the odds because they can't wait a month or so then so be it.
Although working at CEX back in 1994 was quite cool and most (not all) people were cool and Bob (the guy that owns the company(!)) bought people drinks.
I left as I had a fight with a munkin there.
Fast forward to Retro at Whitfield St and I'm there again helping out, this time you had Ash and Graham running the show. Ash thinking he is gods gift to Retro and Graham appearing like he is in the wrong shop. Still apart from Ash it was quite nice, I still had massive arguments with Ash over pricing on virtually everything esp on Neo Geo, PC Engine, Megadrive and Super Famicom.
Dave Mullins is a munkin and I left Retro as I dropped (after tripping on some uncovered wiring) and destroyed a CPS2 board. I decided that the best thing to do was to buy it with a reduction as it was fucked (B board was cracked) but the A board was fine. Come Monday Dave Mullins is on the phone about it, moaning about it. The following week I bring the board back, showed it to him fucked, he says I should pay full whack for it, I tell him where to go as I tripped on loose cable that was CEXs fault, he was tring desperately to make me pay, saying I will be fired or get it docked from my pay if I didn't. I told him that I do this job because it's fun, not because I need the money as I had a full time job anyway. I picked up the board, chucked it at him, walked out, went to Retro, returned the reciept and took my money out the till and took my stuff (and some other bits too).
Ash was a dick sometimes as he got into an arguement over someone over an Arcade PCB which I said to Ash was flakey when I saw it, didn't stop Ash selling it and arguing with the guy when the guy brought it back defective. Ash was going 'Well it worked when it went out, we only give 24 hour gaurantees on PCBs (technically illegal...)'. The guy looked like he was going to deck Ash at one point before Graham stepped in and took control of it.
Lee liked Weed a bit too much and got fired because he didn't attend.
Joe (the guy with the glasses and the blond hair, he was also an extra in Judge Dread (seriously...)) was a nice guy, I never had a problem with working with him back in 1994 and he left CEX back in 1998, so some of you guys have really long memories.
There was also Mark who thought himself gods gift to Neo Geo games, although during his reign I did end up quite well with Neo Geo CD games. I did pick up a copy of Breakers with Spine for £12 ($18 at then exchange rate) (labeled wrong) there once as well as Samurai Spirits RPG (labeled Samurai Spirits 1, not that the munkins could read) with Spine for £5 ($7.50). Thanks guys! They also helped me get a Neo Geo CD for free by paying way too much for US Neo Geo CD games. £40 ($60) exchange for Last Resort in crap condition, ta very much. Also persuaded them that Gan Gan was Ninja Masters.... turning a £3 exchange into a £24 ($35) one.
CEX have also been in recievership twice (remember when it was called TCR CEX...), this is one of the reasons why Retro moved from Whitfield to the basement as they needed to cut down on rent. All the CEX branches now are all limited companies in there own right so if one loses too much money then they can pull the plug on it without effecting the rest of CEX. The leases on all the buildings are also held by another company, so if CEX goes bust they can set up another CEX in the same place without the customers knowing, they have done this once and managed to buy back the stock from the recivers for a lot less money.
They also pissed off a lot of wholesalers and at one point they had to go to Game (Electronics Buttocks as they liked to call it) to buy stock and then price it up and stick it on CEX shelves...
CEX have gone downhill a lot over the last 9 years but they do sell some bargains from time to time, you just have to ignore the brain dead staff (most of which don't stay more then 6 months...) and the stupidly loud music, once I got so pissed of with it that I got some paper and a pen that was on their desk and wrote out everything adding 'Look I can't be arsed shouting over this loud and frankly shite fucking music'. Holding it up like some flash cards, when they tried to speak, I wrote 'Sorry mate, can't hear you over this loud music, you'd think they would turn it down a bit...'. I did complain to Camden council about the noise and they did threaten CEX and they did turn it down (for about a week...).
CEX staff also blanently disregard the sale of goods act, and the resale of goods act. Items must be fit for purpose and you have a legal right to an exchange or refund within 28 days if the item is defective. CEX take the biscuit over this trying to blame the customer as much as they can if the disc is scratched or it works on their system. I stepped in one day and the CEX monkey (short fat guy down in Retro) was arguing with a customer, the customer was right and I told the customer that he had a legal right under the Resale of Goods act of 1974 to a refund as the goods are defective, after words with the tall hairy faced monkey (I assume the manager) the customer got a refund and he said 'I won't come back in here again'...
Most staff should been beaten with a large bat to teach them manners and customer care... Although on the flip side some customers are rude and arrogent and should be beaten too.
