Tiny Computers-The Consumers Complaint List-In the Public Domain

I purchased a computer from tiny at the end of 1999 for £1400 including an extended 3 year on site warranty.The computer has never really worked properly and I always seemed to be on the phone to technical support.

Earlier this year the computer went drastically wrong and it was yet another call to technical support, only to find out that I would need a restore pack that should have been supplied on delivery and as I hadn't reported it missing in the first thirty days after delivery I would need to buy one.

A little miffed at having to fork out yet more money I soldier on but unfortunately a couple of weeks ago it packed up all together. I phoned tiny on the 8th Feb and again was told that I need a restore disk so this time I decided to give in and purchase one. A week later it still had not arrived, so I phoned again on the 15th only to be told that Tiny had ceased trading and were in administration and that I should have been told this last week (which I was not).

I finally managed to get through to the administrators after speaking to several rude and nasty technical support and customer service advisors (one of them refusing to give me their name )and once again ordered another restore pack.

Once again this did not arrive so I phoned again and spoke to yet another technical support guy who informed me it could take at least 2 weeks to arrive as all there components were now being dealt with by Time (who have bought out Tiny).
Whilst on the phone I wanted to check on my extended on site warranty which cost me an extra £200 and was told to contact the Time customer service line that has been set up for Tiny customers.

After 20 minutes of waiting to get through, I tried the ordinary Time customer service line only to be told that at that time there was a 45 minute wait to get through to a Tiny advisor and that was my only option as the Time customer line was unable to help me.

After much persiverance I managed to get through only to be told that my warranty was no longer valid and as a good will gesture Time would send my computer off for repair but this would be a once only thing.

So the long and the short of it is I am lleft still paying for my Tiny computer that has not been working for nearly 3 weeks and an extended warranty that is not worth the paper it is written. I think the treatment I have received has been appaulling and the fact that I have received no correspondance telling me that anything has altered with my warranty is outrageous.

Other Tiny Computer: Link1; Link2;Link3

Editorial Comments

Tiny Computers collasped and has apparently been 'rescued' by Time.

We would like to hear and publish as many accounts received from consumers caught out in the middle of the Tiny collapse.

Bought extended warranty for tiny pc , firm went bust along with my hard drive. time refused to honour extended warranty so replaced hard drive myself. Please be aware of the grief you are giving yourself when you buy a machine frome tiny/time (they are all the same). the components used to put these systems together are unique to tiny and non-industry comaptible. this means that if your power supply goes or mainboard , then you cannot replace it with one from your local dealer. Dave Morgan (dundee)... 25 October 2002
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As an ex tiny/time employee this sounds as if you weren't told that time had purchased the group a little over 24 hours after going into receveship and it is very very typical of the group acting this way.
Edmund ... 28 October 2003