Newegg.com d/b/a Rottenegg.com
Newegg.com is an online technology store selling primarily computer hardware. It was founded in 2001, in California, by two Asian immigrants. The company is often mistakenly confused with the old “Egghead Software“, but there is absolutely no relationship between the two. Newegg’s explosion from primarily eBay sells to their own direct online store was a welcome phenomenon. Unfortunately, their customer service has deteriorated in recent years and product quality has reached a crisis.
For savings of up to 20% - 40% over retailers, such as Best Buy, Newegg.com offers computer goods to online shoppers with exceptional savings. They keep their staff lean and provide no support for the items they sell, which seemed fair enough in the past, as they manage to reduce costs resulting in low prices.
However, things started to slip in 2005. There are now enough alarming problems with Newegg.com that some analysts are advising shoppers to steer clear. When there is a problem, it isn’t easy to seek resolution from their lackluster customer support. Communicating with their rude and poorly trained staff makes for some very stressful situations. If you do order from Newegg.com, cross your fingers and hope there isn’t any problem not related to manufacturer warranty.
Local computer merchant Trent Keller summed it up well, “In the past two years I have received defective hardware about a third of the time, order screw-ups about a fifth of the time, and shipping delays nearly half the time with Newegg. I think they have turned into a rotten egg!”
The following problems have been reported with Newegg.com:
1. Canceled orders without customer notification
2. Statistically high occurrences of defective hardware
3. Poor customer service
4. Rude customer service
5. Failure to honor rebates
6. Delayed shipping
7. Incorrect items shipped
One of the most alarming complaints by customers in recent months is related to rebate scams. Over 30% of the inventory on Newegg.com is priced with a mail-in rebate discount. Customers complain that they send for their mail-in rebates and never receive their check.
We no longer give Newegg.com a pass on customer service under the excuse they have to make cuts to maintain their low prices, and here is why- Their competitor, mwave.com, offers a similar inventory, with pricing practically the same, and on top of that - real customer support. Mwave, also known as Multi-Wave Computers, also staffs a complete technical support department. They do all this, and still offer prices competitive with Newegg.com.
In summary, Newegg.com has recently started to smell a bit like a rotten egg, and their competitor mwave.com is picking up the disgruntled customers and making them happy once again.
October 3rd, 2008 at 3:35 pm
I called newegg.com on their toll free number, Toll Free: (800) 390-1119, and spoke with at Stephanie in customer service. I explained that I was actually able to login to view my online shopping cart, but could not checkout to place my order. Clicking the checkout button kept redirecting to a login, even though I was already logged in, and no matter how many times I logged in it would not allow me to check out.
Stephanie said that it must be a “fire wire” problem. She said that I had to make sure I had my firewire disabled. I asked her if she meant, “firewall” and she said “oh yeah.”
I explained to Stephanie that I had followed all of the recommendations on the newegg.com FAQ, including clearing my browser cookies, cache, and that I was not using any firewall. Furthermore, I explained that the only part of the web site that isn’t working for me is the checkout.
Stephanie then asked me what web browser I was using. I responded with “Opera.” She said that I had to use Microsoft Internet Explorer. She said that newegg.com only supported Microsoft Internet Explorer. I asked her if that meant that newegg was denying Apple Mac users from placing orders.
The arrogance of customer service agent Stephanie was mind-boggling. The fact is that ever since newegg.com updated their web site early this year, the checkout process no longer supports many browsers. It is a problem with the way their site performs forced browser redirects.
Newegg.com invites customer feedback, even in the same FAQ that explains the steps for clearing the system cache and other checkout or shopping cart troubleshooting.
After a lot of persuading I finally convinced this bubblehead Stephanie to transfer me to a manger. I then spoke with a Peter that said he was a manager. He said that Stephanie was incorrect in stating that newegg requires the use of Microsoft Internet Explorer but he was not an export in web development and said he only knows that not all functionality is available to Mac users or individuals using a web browser on a PC other than Microsoft Internet Explorer.
The only functionality that is broken is their checkout, the way they get money allowing me to order.
They’ve changed their web site and now the checkout utilizes some sort of nonstandard web development technique involving a double redirect, an overly complicated means to accomplish something that all of their competitors seem to be able to do much simpler as well as maintaining support for all the major web browsers.