H(acked-off) M(oney) V(ictim)!

HMV suck. I mean really suck. Yesterday I went to return my mum's Christmas present coz it wasn't right.

My mother is not an easy person to buy gifts for. Everyone else in my family is fairly easy. We've all found that an effective way of making sure that everyone else is well aware of what we like and dislike is to inflict our preferences onto others. Therefore, we will be made to watch whatever Dad wants to watch on TV while Lisa blasts John Williams music out of her bedroom to make us all aware that she's into her "classical" music as she laughs uncontrollably (and somewhat overwhelmingly) at her latest favourite comedy box set. Daniel will leave little room for doubt as to what he's into as his art work rapidly replaces the carpet and as he looks after his growing collection of strange DVDs that he has no interest in but were bought for him by his thoughtful older brother because I wanted to see them (to this day he has no idea why I bought him "The Royal Tenenbaums"). My mum, however, is a bit more selfless. Which makes it difficult when I'm wandering around HMV trying to find something she'd like. The thing is, she only really insists that we let her watch one thing on TV, and as HMV weren't selling the whole series 12 of the BBC 9 o'clock news, that didn't really help.

So I thought I'd give Lisa a ring (my sister is, conveniently, the same gender as my mother and so tends to be a little more tuned in to her wants and needs). She suggested the ER box set, series 7.

Perfect.

Thank you sis. Present bought.

A few days ago, however, I received an emergency voicemail on my phone from her to tell me that mum didn't have series 6 yet and if I were to present her with series 7 everything would get confused. So yesterday I went back to HMV with Matt to exchange my purchase. Now here is HMV ridiculousness #1: ER SERIES 6 COST £46!!!!! What is that?! How much are they expecting people to pay for one stinking series of one stinking drama programme type thingy!

I was not impressed. But it got worse. As me and Matt were looking through the box sets we noticed that there were getting more and more steep until we got to HMV ridiculousness #2: the box set for all the series of Kavanagh QC cost £199. Two hundred quid for a few measly episodes about some wiggy lawyer. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! And the really stupid thing is that there were only 5 series and only about 5 episodes in each series. And the really REALLY stupid thing is that each series only cost £15 when bought seperately. Matt did the maths and worked out that HMV were charging £75 for the DVDs and £125 for the box.

So I decided to simply get a refund for the box set and get my mum something else instead. Which brings me to HMV ridiculousness #3: HMV DON'T DO REFUNDS!!! They charge the earth for DVDs and then don't give you your money back when you've got the wrong one. I had to "exchange" it for a Gift Card.

So that's why HMV suck. And that's why I'm starting a campaign to boycott HMV (as soon as I've spent my £34 gift card).