A few days ago in Newegg Sucks! It’s Official, Newegg Has Gone Rotten! I complained about how Newegg rather badly packaged my order for shipping and I was lucky to A) still have all of my items in the box and B) have none of the items damaged, even though they went Freddy Krueger on one of the items. Clearly this is how not to package items.

Well let me give you a completely opposite experience. I ordered a largish item from Amazon.com not long ago. It took a while to get here because I had it shipped by “Free Super Saver Shipping”. Now, in spite of going with free shipping, this item was in its manufacturer’s box (in perfect condition, in a box that just perfectly fit the manufacturer’s box – presumably to protect it, and then in the actual shipping box with protective packaging. The latter two boxes were both considerably thicker and stronger than Newegg’s flimsy box. And so my item was protected quite well from the rigors of shipping. (Especially UPS. I don’t know why UPS seems to play hacky-sack with boxes, but I swear they must.)

Now this was a purchase from Amazon directly. These days so many Amazon products are delivered from third parties. But this one was from Amazon. Obviously third party experiences will vary. I’m not saying all Amazon purchases will be packaged well. But the ones directly from Amazon seem to be handled exceedingly well.

And so, there we have it. Some companies today (like Amazon) still know how to package a product for shipping. And some companies (like Newegg) couldn’t properly package if lives depended on it.

Amazon is good.

Newegg sucks.

It’s as simple as that.

It’s really a shame that Amazon doesn’t sell computer parts like Newegg does, or just based on their quality of packaging alone I’d be tempted to do all of my business with them.

Now if you haven’t heard my last sorry tale with Newegg, let me tell you, they Jolly Roggered up time and again on what should have been a simple RMA, turning it into months of turmoil because for some reason their staff was completely incapable of processing a simple refund. (After Newegg refused to repair/replace my printer.) You can read the whole story here: Newegg Has Cracked And I’m Hard Boiled With Egg All Over My Face!

But after some time, and an offer from their customer service for $100 my next order, I finally decided to give them one more shot. Maybe I’d just had some extraordinary run of bad luck. Maybe. I’m a generous guy. And while I wasn’t going to go out of my way just to pick a hundred bucks of placation, I found myself in the need to order parts to build my hun a new computer, since hers is a Pentium 4 Willamette on it’s last legs. So I can give Newegg one more chance as I order her parts, and in the process nab myself a free Seagate (I always go with Seagate for their 5 year warranty) 250GB external hard drive to perform the PC backups that I really should be doing but never got around to getting an external hard drive to do them on.

Now, I have to say that Dianne V. Segue the Senior Customer Service Representative that tried to make up for Newegg’s gross incompetence was at least nice enough to talk to. And ordering everything seemed to go okay. She even not only applied the $100 discount I was promised, but also upgraded my shipping to priority and waived all shipping costs. That was nice of her, since the combined shipping on all of the parts came out to about $35 with standard UPS and it was a budget build because right now money is kind of tight, so every little bit helps. And I felt safer with priority shipping because I figure A) UPS will treat the parts better and B) the less time I have to wait, the less time I have to worry about her old computer going up in smoke before I can assemble the new one.

Now … having grossly screwed up before … you’d think Newegg would be on their best behavior this time. You’d think that everything would be hand-held micro-managed to perfection so that they don’t lose a customer … a customer not afraid to leave bad reviews on Reseller Ratings as well as write blogs about it all.

You’d think.

But no. Maybe Newegg has just grown too big for its britches. Maybe they just aren’t the finely tuned machine they once were. But sure enough, they screwed this one up too. I got the tracking order email that verified (by shipping date, but by nothing else) that my order was on the express route to my home. But also every bit of confirmation I got from Newegg still had the full retail price and shipping cost on it. Had they forgotten to discount me even after Dianne promised on the phone that it was done? Yes. They had.

A kind enough (all considered) email the morning after placing my order (since that’s when I’d finally gotten any confirmation emails) confirmed it. They’d boffed up. Again. On their last chance. And an abashed Dianne at least managed to issue a credit to my card for the difference that I’d been promised but hadn’t gotten. Thank the gods my card wasn’t close to max, and that at least, in the end, I did get the money back.

But that still doesn’t change the simple fact that once again, Newegg proved they can’t do anything right.

Now … I suppose I could turn the other cheek … and by that I mean my left butt cheek since I’ve already been slapped in the right mouth cheek, the left mouth cheek, and the right butt cheek. But thanks to the priority shipping I also got to be slapped in that last cheek.

Here is an example of Newegg’s idea of shipping (click on the images for larger versions):

You will notice that this box, shipped from Newegg, is rather lacking in tape to hold it together. The top of the box is barely even holding things in because no one bothered to run that tape down the side of the box … either side. So it’s bulging up like mad. Inside, the box was only half-filled with peanuts. I can only guess that the other half of those peanuts are in the UPS van or some such, since they were pouring out when I tipped the box as I brought it into the house. I’m not going to blame Newegg for the beat-up ragged condition of the box. That’s UPS’s fault I’m sure. But come on, at least tape the damn thing closed, will ya? It’s a miracle everything I ordered was still in it. Thank goodness nothing was small like a USB stick or an extra cable.

But that’s not all:

No, that isn’t a prop left over from some Nightmare on Newegg Street production. Freddy Krueger is not endorsing Logitech speakers. This was one of the products shipped from Newegg. Slashed more than a little bit. I have yet to even open that box. I can’t decide if I want to send it back on the grounds that they sliced and diced it, or if I’m sick of dealing with Newegg and am going to open it up and hope that there’s no internal damage so that I don’t have to RMA anything … again. But as you can clearly see by this example, Newegg no longer treats the products they peddle with kid gloves. Not only can they not tape boxes up right to ship products to customers in, but they seem to practice fencing against innocent Logitech speaker sets.

I am not impressed.

This is not the Newegg I used years ago.

Anyone who considers buying from Newegg … be warned. This is how they treated my order when they were on their best behavior to not lose me as a customer. They screwed up processing my discount and showed exactly what they mean by shipping and handling. Imagine how they treat customers that they aren’t afraid of losing.

Frankly, in my informed opinion, it’s official: Newegg sucks!

Newegg.com, they used to be one of the best. I’d go there first for most of my computer hardware and software needs.

Not anymore.

Their prices were usually competitive, but rarely the absolute best. Their shipping and handling fees were sometimes ludicrous as odds and ends were raised in price to pay for the main selling items that were listed with free shipping. It was annoying, but if you were building an entire PC it tended to wash to be something approximate to fair. But the selling point, THE best thing about Newegg, used to be their customer service.

Used to be. I’ve had to RMA them in the past. Shit happens. Once even for their own blatant mistake – to which I was refunded for them shipping the wrong part and both shipping costs: the original and the RMA shipping price, because it was their mistake. Newegg’s customer service used to be quite excellent. Their people were friendly, skilled, and fair.

But this isn’t yesterday. It’s today.

On September 29th, 2007 I ordered a printer. A nice black and white laser printer with built in networking and a full duplexer. A) because I’m a geek. And B) because I’m trying to break into the world of fantasy/sci-fi novel writing and so full duplex printing allows me to save on paper as well as print neat little books very much like the common paperback, all from my seemingly normal printer. This printer was, well, costly. It was more than I had to spend really, but I told myself it would be worth it.

Newegg processed and shipped my order with their usual alacrity and splendor. You don’t get to be the top in the business by doing things wrong. They are Newegg after all. So I tracked my order with glee, and on the 2nd of October, it arrived.

Arrived defective. The printer worked fine … except the duplexer. The duplexer jammed every other page. Literally. So on the 2nd of October I began the RMA process. I got my RMA number, and made it clear the return was for replacement. I sent the printer back at a hefty cost, because these things aren’t light. Now here’s one place where Newegg screwed up. It’s a minor thing. I got my RMA confirmation through their webpage. I boxed it up, shipped it back. THEN, much later, I get an email from Newegg with the RMA confirmation, but with DIFFERENT instructions on the RMA and with an RMA barcode that I didn’t get in the webpage confirmation. Oops! Like that’s going to be on the box then, since it’s already on its way back.

But to Newegg’s credit, they informed me by email that they received the returned printer on the 10th of October, and at least got that part right.

And on the 11th of October they created a new invoice of zero dollars to ship a new printer as a replacement. A strange method. But it’s Newegg, so surely it must work…

Well, later on the 11th they sent another email saying that they were out of inventory (they couldn’t check before?) and were issuing a refund instead of a replacement. No calling to ask if I’d like any other option like waiting for a new shipment, using store credit to buy a different printer, or even to just apologize. Nope. Just here’s your refund, sorry you paid double shipping on a non-product because we shipped you a defective product and then ran out of stock when you RMAed it, have a crappy day.

Okay, bad enough. But at least I was getting a refund for the cost of the printer.

Only a month and a half later, still no refund. Even after I called customer service twice. Even after once I was told they would look into it and call me back, which they never did, and another time I was told I that my refund was definitely being processed – which it wasn’t! Oh and did I mention that in that process I was blamed for the problem? Right! Because according to customer service, I never responded to their email asking if I wanted a replacement or a refund. Except, wait, there was no such email. As I already said, the only email I ever got close to that stated that they were out of stock so I was getting a refund no matter what I wanted. And that email also specifically stated, and I quote, “This email has been sent by our automated notification system. Please do not reply directly.” (Okay, so the bold was my emphasis, not theirs.) Lovely of them to blame me, no? Obviously I was supposed to respond to their email. Clearly it’s all my fault. (For those of you who can’t tell, that was sarcasm by the way.)

So late December, utterly pissed off, I leave a deservedly scathing review on ResellerRatings.com, one of the best resources out there when you’re trying to determine how safe or shady is the company that you’re considering making an online purchase from. I highly recommend using them! My review was nothing nasty, just brutally honest of the situation.

Well, Newegg – the friend of the world that they are – doesn’t like that. Almost instantly, the 28th of December, 2007, Dianne V. Segue, a Newegg Senior Customer Service Representative, leaves an oh-so-friendly response to the review as well as contacts me – by email – to sort out the problem. Now, in all fairness, maybe she really does mean well. Maybe she really is trying. Maybe Newegg really does care.

Maybe.

But let me tell you, even after discussing it with her, and her promise that I will get the refund (that I should have gotten months ago now) right away along with the shipping and handling refund, when do I get it? Well the two have to be processed seperately you see… So I get the important one – the printer cost refund – on the 4th of January, 2008. So then the S&H refund is right behind that, right? Well … umm …

The S&H refund, which is still only half of the total S&H I’ve paid for this non-product since I had to return it at my own cost, remember, finally arrives on the 17th of January, 2008. Yes, that’s right, two weeks later! Even with a Newegg Senior Customer Service Representative taking charge of the situation, it still was screwed up!

So because I ordered a printer from Newegg in September 2007, and did everything right with my RMA, which they received on time, I’ve had to fight with them all the way until the 17th of January, 2008! It’s been the RMA from hell!

And even after all this time, after not getting any product in the end, I’m still out about 45 bucks from my own pocket between the RMA shipping cost and the interest I’ve had to pay on an RMA that they didn’t refund me for months.

Oh, but in Newegg’s world that’s all right because they offered me a 100 dollar credit off my next order. If I call Dianne first to sort it all out. AS IF I AM EVER GOING TO SHOP AT NEWEGG AGAIN?! Honestly, what good does a store credit do a customer when they’re so utterly disgusted that they’re never going to buy from you again? But that’s Newegg’s idea of being fair about it. And maybe, if I’m lucky, I can order a hundred dollars worth of stuff that will all need to be RMAed and I can pay out of pocket for all of that shipping again! Yipee! Sound like fun?

(Again, sarcasm.)

I don’t think so.

Newegg used to be worth the little extra cost because of their renowned customer service.

Now?

Totally not worth it.

Newegg has cracked and all I got out of it was egg on my face.

Never again. In that one process they’ve had well more than three strikes. I’ve been fair and fair again with them. And repeatedly they have screwed up a flirking simple RMA! Clearly Newegg no longer has the customer service chops to handle even the simplest of things. Don’t buy from them. Their prices aren’t worth it. Their customer service isn’t worth it. They aren’t worth your business.