Busted: CDWow Hit With €61M Fine, Future In Doubt!
May 30, 2007 (27 Responses)
THE FUTURE of online retailer CDWow is now in doubt after it has been ordered to pay the British and Irish pop industry a record €61 million in damages (£41 million stg). A High Court judge today found in favour of the British music industry against CDWow for alleged illegal imports of CDs and DVDs into the UK from Asia. They would then sell these imports at a lower price than standard retail outlets.
It looks as if the lads at CDWow were using this technique to pass on savings to online consumers and make a tidy profit in the process. They would then sell these imports at a lower price than standard retail outlets. Certainly CDWow has been a hugely popular online site here in Ireland, although the parent site is actually a Hong Kong based operation. They were able to offer savings of up to 45% compared to retail outlets in some instances. Albums which had an official list price of around £13 could be found for as little as £6.99 on the company’s website.
It remains to be seen if they can survive the imposition of such a huge fine on their operation, but if you have any orders pending with them folks, I’d be checking your accounts pretty quickly if I were you.
Rather quickly I’d suggest. 
I don’t think it will have any impact on them. It’s your typical case of fat cats trying to create artifical walls to protect their massive profits and pockets. I received products from cd wow today, and orders went through no problem. Could be just a scare monger tactic by the music execus
This is bad news for CDWOW and will mean the cost of CDs will start to rise again :(.
Howdy Coyote,
Just came across your post re CD WOW! and wanted to let you know that there have been some updates. You can catch up on all the news on our US blog; http://cdwowus.typepad.com. Rest assured that all orders are being processed as before and it’s business as usual.
And Dave, I think you may have hit the nail on the head with your comment!
Thansk to everyone for their support.
Cheers, Kevin
Orders are beeing pproced my foot,i payed for 1 item that,not only didnt i get,as it was charged twice!!! This after they have said they would return me the money,but nooooo,they charged me again,so be careful.And they dont responde to my e-mails.
Hi Patricia,
We’ve had a difficult month (fire in our warehouse which slowed things down for a few days, following by the BPI issues) but that shouldn’t have affected the processing of your order or our customer service.
Sorry to hear you had a bad experience but I’ll look into it for you and make sure everything is sorted out. Just fwd the order details (or the email you sent our customer service team) directly to me, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I have news.
Thanks,
Kevin
blogusa@cd-wow.com
Hi! I just sent you an e-mail. Just want my money back,honestly,i lost 62 euros for nothing,really sad.And i ve asked for the tracking postal numbers but got no response,just publicity.
It’s nice to see that CDWOW are monitoring what websites are saying about them and (hopefully) reacting appropriately. I’m also delighted that this article/my website may be of some use to you Patti in sorting out your problems. Hope you get back all you need from them.
Hope so Coyote,and thank you so much. I placed an order but didnt received it. Complained and as told it hadnt been sent so they were sending it this time. Nothing! And then charged me twice,after saying they were going to make me a refund. I m very disapointed,i prefer to pay more in the future.
Patti - I personally use play.com for all dvds, cds, games etc. They are well priced, have an excellent customer service and have never let me down. I’ve been using them for years.
No disrespect intended towards CDWOW, but my personal choice would always be play.com; check them out.
But play.com wont shipp to Portugal,dont know why.
I normally check out what is cheapest on the rpoints forum http://www.rpoints.com/?ruid=174008 then buy from there.
I will,thank you so much.
Hi Patricia.
I tried emailing you directly last week, but just wanted to check again with you to make sure that our customer service team were able to sort out your refund.
As I explained in the email, your order was shipped for the second time after you emailed our customer service dept originally, but this second CD has also gone missing en route. Be sure to contact me if you have any questions regarding your refund.
Thanks,
Kevin
Sorry Kevin,but so far no dvds and no money, i was told i was going to get a refund but was charged twice.I send the bank extract after cdwow told me they had indeed refund me,wich never happend im afraid.
Ladies and gentlemen,it happend again. cdwow must really hate Portugal cas a fried of mine ordered the exact same item from them and got zero,no money and no dvd,just great.Cheap? I rather pay more but be safe. I ve ordered from cdwow before and had no problem but now,never again.
That is absolutely insane. I can’t believe that after contacting you through this site (and not even the cdwow site) they let you down again.
I’m telling you Patti - just use http://www.play.com, they never let you down and have an excellent customer service. Cut your losses, cancel your account, delete your credit card details and move on.
I know but http://www.play.com doesnt ship to Portugal. And i more than 120 euros with cdwow,not fair, i really needed that money.
How about amazon.co.uk? Will they do portugal?
Hi Patti,
When we swapped emails yesterday I fwded your issue to our customer service team again. I assure you that I have not forgotten about your problem and I expect to have a definitive answer for you in the morning. Sorry for any trouble it has caused.
I’ve sent you an email with some private information I need clarified.
And just so you know, your credit card information is 100% secure and is never known to the merchant when a purchase is made online.
Also, please ask your friend to contact help@cd-wow.com and explain the problem. Please CC me in on the email so I can track the issue for you.
Regards,
Kevin
My friend sent everything to cdwow last week,including the bank extract with the second debit,i dont know what else we can do.
Yes,Amazon delivers to Portugal,thank God.
Im getting fed up hearing of lots of people who also havnt received their orders. Im waiting on 3 items at a cost of 110 euro. One item is still not in stock 6 weeks on even though it didnt state this when I originally ordered it. The other two items ive been told where dispatched 6th June and still havnt arrived. Im really fed up as the order was for my daughters birthday present which is now long past. I ordered an item from play.com same time and got this the following week, so I know who I’ll be shopping from in the future.
Oh! It’s CD WOW Im giving out about
Same story with me in Ireland- ordered mid-June- charged to credit card. No delivery, no response to queries. Having read the above, now I am getting more worried.
Well Im stunned, just when Id given up all hope on my order, One item arrived in the post yesterday, 6 weeks after it was ment to be dispatched, now it came from luxemberg and im in Ireland and it did have priority post on it!!! 6 weeks seems like a bit of a round trip. I’ll keep yee posted if I do any time soon receive the other 2 items I ordered.
Have used cd wow in the past with no problems. Lately they have been slow to send orders,sometimes sitting in pending dispatch for more than a week and if you are lucky enough to get a reply to your query they say the are waiting order from their supplier so they have taken your money when they do not have your goods in stock.
After recent problems with CD-Wow am not ordering from them again. First, I was more than patient, waiting three/four weeks before contacting them about my order. E-mail back saying that there had been a fire, and would be dispatched within a few days - a week later, e-mailed them again, as no update on the status of the item, and it took 3-4 e-mails before they finally responded. The one they responded to was when I used legal jargon (the advantage of working in a Solicitor’s office, lol). It took over 6 weeks for my money to be refunded. As I had paid by debit rather than credit card, I had no come back with the bank. Based on my own experience, I am dubious about the fact that there was indeed a fire - the timing is just a bit too coincidental!
I am also based in Ireland.