But their main output of factual information, the news, is certainly left leaning.

It depends on your own political views though...

I wouldn't call the BBC a left-wing organisation, but would agree it sits slightly left of centre.

Most journalists do, though.

Lol @ Mirror being bias right.. It'll be less subtle if Neil Kinnock wrote it.

But yeah, in the 70s and 80s we made our own skate parks and they didn't get cordoned off or ripped up. We were allowed to do shit then, nothing was out of reach. Kids school fields were fenced off under Labour. Parks knocked down if anything was broken, again under Labour. Today the kids have nowhere left to go - but outside off licences.

All in the name of left wing red tape.

Erm, this thread is halfords fails, not politics!

Anyway, there's only a few people in my branch I'll actually ask, as their advice had always been sound in the past and is how customer service should be. If the people i'll actually ask aren't working and I need to ask something, I'll come back another day when they are working. I'd rather wait a few days for sound advice, than get shit advice straight away.

Lol @ Mirror being bias right.. It'll be less subtle if Neil Kinnock wrote it.

Forgot about The Mirror. Easily done.

That's fine Duey, but politics and business go hand and if the political climate is contributing to the failure of Halfords, then amongst criticism, it should be acknowledged.

The state of education, red tape affecting employers, training, business costs, not to go into immigration/jobs and resulting morale and general attitude etc = dumb staff for a dumbed-down state.

It's not just Halfords staff, they're not even the worst. But it's getting worse. In fact, the point is now all over the news. And in an otherwise biased and one sided topic, isn't it fair to genuinely question why?

Recently quit my job at halfords,

I can explain a few things to people posting about the "fails"

basically as we all know its next to untrained teenagers that typically end up fitting bulbs and wipers to our cars, but the reason why they are doing this and not stacking shelfs is for the new "image" that Halfords are setting for themselves,

basically they started out as a store that sold branded goods at low prices in high quantity, just to shift stock

then they got a name and started getting brave..

Charging more, being less of a "macro" or "supermarket" and moving more to a specialist.

now we've upped our game (says a recent meeting) to the "Service sector" hence the phrase: thats helpful, thats Halfords.

But a huuuuuugggge number of stores and a minimum wage staff = untrained, piss poor service.

I worked on Bike hut, I have an ambition for bikes, so was a good job for a bit.. but I think its down to the person shopping there. As an entusiast you shouldn't. just don't, go to euro car parts or something

But you get what you pay for at the end of the day, go to a main dealer, bet they wont fit an indicator bulb for £2.99 AND throw in a free one ;D

And as a fail... Selling me the wrong spark plugs. For fuck sake.. aha

Edited 9 June, 201214 yr by KieranYeh

But you get what you pay for at the end of the day, go to a main dealer, bet they wont fit an indicator bulb for £2.99 AND throw in a free one ;D

yeah win all round haha

Meh, I was quite happy with the service I got, I obtained an ex display Double Din Sony Head unit for peanuts, it play's DVD's and works as it should, the speakers all still work, the listening position function is excellent so Halfords get a +1 from me.

I wouldn't take my bicycle in there for a service, but for general bits and peices they have got a lot better over the past few years.

But a huuuuuugggge number of stores and a minimum wage staff = untrained, piss poor service.

Couldn't be any more true.

The amount of training = none.

It's a joke.

I was watching that british highway patrol show on dave (can't remember what it's called) the other day, some women had been driving with two bikes on a roof rack on her golf and got where ever her destination was and found out the roof rack and bikes had gone.

She said they must've of fell off, which is stupid of her in the first place but I thought it was funny cos she said she'd only bought the roofrack that morning and got the shop to fit it for her.

I bet you can't guess where she bought it from

I stopped off in Halfords to get some sticky fixers for my car's new number plates yesterday and overheard an epic one while queueing up.

Guy behind the counter was giving advice to someone, and this other young lad walks up with a head unit price tag in his hand and a customer in tow.

"Could you check the price on this for me, £29.99 sounds cheap for a stereo..."

Counter guy replies: "That's the fitting cost."

Other bloke mutters something about it not being clear, walks off.

YOU WORK THERE.

29.99 to fit a stereo i takes a matter of seconds!

Compared to £2.99 for fitting wiper blades, it's a bargain!

Flip, click, remove, slide new blade in, click, flip back down. £2.99!!!

At least with a head unit you could end up dealing with dodgy wiring or tricky to remove factory units.

Halfords in Stamford - to be fair - let me borrow their head unit tools to get it out of my Passat. But I think that was because I came in looking to buy the tools and they didn't have any. They could've removed it and charged me.

I wandered into a halfords and asked to borrow their removal tools. They had no bother with me using them for a few minutes. One of them got stuck however, so i had to go and ask for some pliers too to get the removal tool out the cage!

Compared to £2.99 for fitting wiper blades, it's a bargain!

Flip, click, remove, slide new blade in, click, flip back down. £2.99!!!

At least with a head unit you could end up dealing with dodgy wiring or tricky to remove factory units.

Halfords in Stamford - to be fair - let me borrow their head unit tools to get it out of my Passat. But I think that was because I came in looking to buy the tools and they didn't have any. They could've removed it and charged me.

It took me about 3 calandar months to fit my wiper blades the other day. Fuck me they are a puzzle. If I was doing it, the service charge would be a bargain

basically they started out as a store that sold branded goods at low prices in high quantity, just to shift stock

then they got a name and started getting brave..

Charging more, being less of a "macro" or "supermarket" and moving more to a specialist.

now we've upped our game (says a recent meeting) to the "Service sector" hence the phrase: thats helpful, thats Halfords.

But a huuuuuugggge number of stores and a minimum wage staff = untrained, piss poor service.

Here is the problem, as with some many other employers, they feel its necescary to line their pockets as much as possible and increasing workload and also diversifying the workload without offering fuck all to the emplyee. They should at least give them decent training and then offer them a little bit more money to do the work.

Its happened where I work too, I know do 2 peoples job (other guy retired) so now I run a weighbridge and also have work in the mill. Guess what, no extra pay for all the extra work though....

halfords reduced section ftw

got a wiring kit for my sub for £3 because a label from a cup holder magically jumped ontop of the £15 label

Its almost painful to read some of this and know that halfords staff are all going to be branded morons, and then admit that i work at one of the sheffield stores (although on the cycles department). i think the problem is that the staff is made up of students from as young as 16 that want a job there purely for the money and don't have an interest in cars or bikes! this is the case in the store that i work at, there is about 4 people in the store that know their stuff! I've ridden 24" street bikes (basically bmx) for 5 years now and generally have an interest in it and (without sounding big headed) can rebuild anything on a bike including suspension fork rebuilds and wheel building.

this is my fail story though which pissed me off because now i am going to be branded lazy and the whole of the department is now being monitored because of something another member of staff said to the manager. The manager asked this particular member of staff what he did if he had not been given a task to do and there was nobody about to which he replied, "why should i do something if i havnt been told to". This is something that can be thought but not said to a manager.