- Jun 24, 2001
- 24,195
- 857
- 126
If you ever buy anything on-sale or with a discounted bundle, you'd better hope nothing's defective because you will lose your discounts and they have no streamlined way to compensate you or adjust for it. I've just encountered this TWICE on the same product.
Best Buy put a $199.99 Samsung YP-T7Z MP3 player on sale for $189.99 on their website only. Then they provide $25 off JBL OnTour speakers when purchased together. Both are reasons to buy online and both end up being a problem they seemingly didn't account for.
The player was defective. It never charged though I left it on all night and I had no idea until I used it all day and it wouldn't turn on anymore (The battery indicator aways showed max charge). I originally used in-store pickup and went back to that Best Buy to do an exchange. They told me that they could only refund the item and not exchange, as backwards as that sounds, because it was from bestbuy.com. Anyway, I told them that I saved $25 on a set of speakers by buying them together and I didn't want to lose that just because they treated it as a return & rebuy. They called the .com number and they were told to go ahead and process the return and that I would not lose the $25. Of course, when they refunded the money they refunded it MINUS $25. They told me to call back the number they called (1-888-BESTBUY) and that they would refund my $25. Of course, I still had to re-buy the MP#player, but it was $10 more in-store. I had to process it as another .com order so I did that on the phone with the person who was trying to help me with my $25 issue. She told me that she would send the $25 request to the credit guys and I wont know anything until I get a statement. I got my replacement, also with in-store pickup and went to work. After charging it, I tried using it the next day only to find that it often thinks the hold switch is active when it isn't. By the end of the day, it thought it was active 90% of the time and was unusable! In fact, you could just touch the player in certain places and see "HOLD!" appear on the screen when no buttons were pressed at all. I even left it dangling while driving and watched as every couple minutes it would light up and say "HOLD!" on the screen again with absolutely no one touching it.
Because I can't do in-store exchanges and the sale has ended online, I logged into my account online to investigate exchanges. The website clearly says I can do in-store refunds AND exchanges. I called up their number and they told me that they, also, can only do refunds even though I would lose $10 by returning and buying again (The price went back up). They wouldn't even help me rebuy another one for the same price until I "got feedback" on my $25 thing (Even though this was set up as a totally different order and my "feedback" is only my credit statement).
This is ridiculous. Why can't they just sell me another one with the price adjusted to give me BOTH amounts back? Why can't they institute an exchange procedure for defect, even if by mail-order only? I shouldn't have to use my manufacturer's warranty on the day I purchase a product or the day after. This is ridiculous.
Best Buy put a $199.99 Samsung YP-T7Z MP3 player on sale for $189.99 on their website only. Then they provide $25 off JBL OnTour speakers when purchased together. Both are reasons to buy online and both end up being a problem they seemingly didn't account for.
The player was defective. It never charged though I left it on all night and I had no idea until I used it all day and it wouldn't turn on anymore (The battery indicator aways showed max charge). I originally used in-store pickup and went back to that Best Buy to do an exchange. They told me that they could only refund the item and not exchange, as backwards as that sounds, because it was from bestbuy.com. Anyway, I told them that I saved $25 on a set of speakers by buying them together and I didn't want to lose that just because they treated it as a return & rebuy. They called the .com number and they were told to go ahead and process the return and that I would not lose the $25. Of course, when they refunded the money they refunded it MINUS $25. They told me to call back the number they called (1-888-BESTBUY) and that they would refund my $25. Of course, I still had to re-buy the MP#player, but it was $10 more in-store. I had to process it as another .com order so I did that on the phone with the person who was trying to help me with my $25 issue. She told me that she would send the $25 request to the credit guys and I wont know anything until I get a statement. I got my replacement, also with in-store pickup and went to work. After charging it, I tried using it the next day only to find that it often thinks the hold switch is active when it isn't. By the end of the day, it thought it was active 90% of the time and was unusable! In fact, you could just touch the player in certain places and see "HOLD!" appear on the screen when no buttons were pressed at all. I even left it dangling while driving and watched as every couple minutes it would light up and say "HOLD!" on the screen again with absolutely no one touching it.
Because I can't do in-store exchanges and the sale has ended online, I logged into my account online to investigate exchanges. The website clearly says I can do in-store refunds AND exchanges. I called up their number and they told me that they, also, can only do refunds even though I would lose $10 by returning and buying again (The price went back up). They wouldn't even help me rebuy another one for the same price until I "got feedback" on my $25 thing (Even though this was set up as a totally different order and my "feedback" is only my credit statement).
This is ridiculous. Why can't they just sell me another one with the price adjusted to give me BOTH amounts back? Why can't they institute an exchange procedure for defect, even if by mail-order only? I shouldn't have to use my manufacturer's warranty on the day I purchase a product or the day after. This is ridiculous.
sorry
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