Geoffrey Long: Don't Buy.com.

January 14, 2007
11:49 PM

Don't Buy.com.

If anyone out there is considering placing an order with the online retailer Buy.com, don't. A few weeks ago I used the Google Checkout promotion (now ended) to pick up a bunch of stuff on deep discount after Christmas. Most of my purchases came through fine, but one of the orders has been screwed up pretty badly. Half of it arrived damaged and half of it hasn't arrived yet at all.

Now, here's the kicker – my request to return the damaged merchandise was denied because it wasn't returned within 14 calendar days of the original purchase. They also refuse to look into the undelivered half of the same order because "delivery can take up to 9 business days" after purchase.

My emails were answered as follows:

You have 14 days from the date your product left the warehouse (regardless of when you actually took delivery of the product.

...And:

Please take note that delivery process takes 7-9 business days after ship date. If you do not receive your order by that time, please inform us so we can then look into your order.

Following this? Five business days usually translates into seven calendar days. Nine business days means that it's one day short of two full weeks – and when holidays are involved, it can be exactly two weeks... And, as my own experience has proved, 'nine business days' can still not cover it. This means that according to Buy.com's official policy, their return window can be shorter than their delivery window.

When I pointed this out to them, it certainly didn't seem like something they had any intention of fixing – multiple emails were all returned with the same citing of their policy. I'm going to give them a call this week, and if that fails, I'm going to call the Better Business Bureau.

The damaged object in question is less than $10 – a DVD of Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan – but the undelivered merchandise is a $50 year-long membership to Xbox Live card. If the card shows up, I'll probably drop the issue, but I wanted to get my experience out there on the Internet so anyone Googling for something like "Buy.com problems" or "Buy.com return trouble" or anything like that sees that they're not alone.

I know I won't be buying anything else from Buy.com ever again, and I'm going to warn others away from buying from them as well.

January 16, 2007 9:43 AM

Remember that you can always go through your credit card company to have the payment stopped. You have made a bona fide effort to work through making a legitimate return. Let the big-time lawyers sort it out.

– Bill

January 24, 2007 1:39 PM

I ordered some wireless earphones from buy.com for my wife for Christmas. They sent me a different person's order (bluetooth headset for a cell phone). I asked for RMA, which they provided. 10 days later I emailed them asking status, they said: "...we have received the merchandise you returned with RMA #2090373, on January 9, 2007. It will take 5 to 7 business days to process your return."

On 1/23 I emailed them again... here's the response:
"...Please note that we have received the merchandise you returned with RMA#2090373, on 01/23/2007...."
They flat out lied to buy themselves more time. Also, every email is returned by a different, seemingly random name. I've got emails from "Dax", "Ada", "Kelly", and "Rochelle". In all their emails they say "if you give us your phone number we'll call you..." I've given it to them several times and they never called.

I bought this item before Christmas as a gift for my wife and I still don't have it!

– M Burke

January 24, 2007 1:47 PM

Update... called their service, spoke with thick-accented individual who said her name was "Jesse Williams" (yeah, right). She said that they would not be able to process my order/RMA until 1/30. Given their track record for lying through their teeth, I demanded refund. Again, it would take until the 30th supposedly to process refund! They keep my money, while I have nothing.

– M Burke

February 7, 2007 3:59 PM

I have been fighting with them for over a month on the return of a laptop computer that was advertised with features it did not have. After finally getting an RMA, I returned the item over 2 weeks ago. No refund yet. Buy.com says they are delayed in processing refund due to high volume. VERY POOR customer service.

– chuck

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