Okay, so Sarah's Knight wants a new computer. But he's not going to run out and grab some crappy laptop or some piece of crap e-machine. So we set out to multiple places online and spected out computer parts.

Yay for him cause he gets an awesome custom rig and yay for me because I get to build it.

Well, here's the thing: Most of the parts for the computer came from Newegg. I've always used them for most hardware needs. Any extra modding I'll go to Xoxide and such. But when SK ordered the parts (including two monitors it was just at a grand) and his order was voided. Curious he asked his bank and they said that there's nothing wrong and that there was miss-information at newegg. So he went to speak to someone from newegg... and they said it has something to do with his bank account and that he'd need to speak with them.

This went on for a while, and every time his order was voided. We tried to go through a loop hole and make a paypal account. If paypal could pull from his account, then there should be a problem. But there was... Paypal wouldn't pull more than 500 bucks. So that got shafted as well.

After a few more futile attempts, I got the bright idea to buy the parts myself and let SK write me a check back. So that's what I did. And guess what. The Fraud Prevention Agency from Visa called me about it. I missed the call, had to call them back and go through this automated bullsh*t before I could finally talk to a human to tell them to go ahead and push it through. AND THEN THE ORDER WAS PUT ON HOLD because I had the shipping address as SK's and not mine.

I had to contact Newegg now. I got online and tried to get a hold of someone. After waiting 50 forevers, I finally got someone:


Please wait while we connect you to a Newegg representative.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationAll Newegg representatives are currently assisting other customers. Thank you for your patience. An agent will be with you shortly.

Chat InformationThank you for contacting Newegg. My name is Darlene. How may I assist you today?

Darlene: Hi! Thanks for contacting us. How can I help you today?

Darlene: I've noticed that you have been idle for 3 minutes; would you still like to continue this chat?

Jay: I'm sorry

Jay: I'm here

Jay: I guess I just wasn't expecting anyone to actually show...

Darlene: How may I assist you?

Jay: If you have my order number, then I guess you've seen that there's a hold on my order

Jay: and it was due to a change in address from what's on my card

Jay: the reason for that being is because I have a friend that's been trying to order these parts from newegg for a good long while now and newegg's been saying it's his banks fault... and the bank saying it's newegg's fault

Jay: though, when he ordered just one part from his original order, it went through

Jay: so instead, I'm going to buy it for him and have it sent to him instead

Jay: and he'll just pay me back at a later date

Jay: but what's funny is I have an account at the same bank

Jay: so, in summary... if you could go ahead and push that order though with that name and address, then everything would be great.

Darlene: Can you please give me one moment while I look into this for you?

Jay: that's fine

Darlene: For security reasons, we require for the shipping address to be listed on file with the credit/debit card issuer as an alternate shipping address if it is going to be different from the billing address. In order for us to release the order to the shipping address you provided, then you must add it on file with your credit/debit card issuer as an alternate shipping address.

Jay: that's inconvieniant... but rules are rules I guess. I don't live in the best of places for these items to be sitting on my doorstep.

Jay: but I guess I'll just go ahead and have it sent here anyway.

Jay: Thank you.

Darlene: Do you want me to update the shipping address to match the billing?

Jay: Real quick... so unless I go through my bank and change the address of my card it can only go to my address and no where esle, correct?

Darlene: If the shipping address is not registered with your bank as an alternate shipping address, then unfortunately we cannot release the order to that address and the order will get voided.

Jay: I understand... then go ahead and update the address to match my billing information

Darlene: Give me one moment please.

Darlene: Thank you for your patience...

Darlene: I updated the shipping address to match the shipping address. You will be notified by email confirming the status of the order.

Jay: Thank you for your help

Darlene: You are very welcome. Is there anything else I may assist you with?

Jay: That should be it.

Jay: You have a good day.



Why is it so hard to get someone to take our money?

It's too good for them?

That must have been very annoying.

yeah, I lost $20 on an order of PS1 games cuz the shipping address didn't match (I just moved) and when I contacted them they said I am lying and wouldn't answer any more emails.... I said effem and was just glad it was only 20.

But geeze your story is quite an annoyance as well. At least it worked out in the end. Hopefully you can watch the tracking number and try to be home for delivery.

for that kind of hassle id of gone elsewhere. saving a few extra bucks isnt worth it if they are going to play hardball like that and not bend. lame, how could they not want your money.

I live in southern arkansas... there's no electronic stores that are going to have the kind of parts I'd want. In fact, the ONLY stores that have to do anything with computers are run-down locally owned repair shops.

This is why you use credit cards on the interwebs, not bank accounts. I actually wasn't even aware you could use a bank account on the newegg. Also with credit cards, someone spends up a storm by stealing you number, you fight in court and lose nothing. Some one steals you bank account, you're f*cked.

I've never had an issue ordering from them, actually the only oddity I've had is getting stuff in 2 days instead of 3. But I think if this happened anywhere this would be the story. Why? Because no one wants to take responsibility, which is why you get the run around. Though they risk being wrong I think many more companies would have happier customers if they took more responsibility when they made a mistake.

As for the address thing, that makes sense, because that would likely be one of the first things someone tries to do when they steal your card, and over the phone it's not exactly easy to verify your identity.

But in the end, Customer Support sucks in general, because most companies are willing to spend the money it takes to have competent staff. Also it's like a rule in America to pass the blame onto someone else.

Yeah, but what in this case was the fault of the customer service representative as opposed to the system itself?

It seems like the reps were just doing what they had to in order to fulfill their job responsibilities, right?

That would make them competent.

So if your job description included assassinating people for the betterment of your company, should you do what you have to to fulfill your job responsibility? Over the top, yes, but the point is should we always go by what we're told, even if we know it's wrong. One of the customer service reps should have admitted that the fault was with their company and offered a way to resolve it, instead of playing the blame game back and forth. Responsibility and accountability seem to be in very short supply these days.

@thetruecoolness

I'm sorry that I missed this, but when was the company at fault?

What could the telephone customer rep have done to resolve it within their power?

A company that has CSRs who don't have any authority to resolve situations is an incompetent company. End of story.

We are talking about the competency of the reps not the company. When the rep is limited by the company as to what they can do, so long as they are doing what they can to help the rep is being competent.

Even still, regarding the companies, it would be incompetent for companies to function outside of the law, and it might be incompetent for a company to practice outside of standard or accepted practices that safeguard against theft, etc.

Companies should have reps that have authority to resolve situations. But it seems very incompetent for a company to give all customer service reps the same authority to handle every situation possible. It could lead to serious abuses.

Said abuses are not our problem, nor something we (as customers) need to think about.

I was not attacking the CSRs in any way. They are doing their job as their bosses tell them to, and that's fine.

But you, of all people, I would expect to have enough of the ability to comprehend english to understand that I was attacking a company that limits their CSR's ability to resolve an issue, which is supposed to be their job.

At my job, the CSR's all have the ability to do what they need to do to keep our customers happy. That includes refunds (whether partial or full), future credits, free product, and any combination required to satisfy the customer.

If a CSR is not allowed to resolve most issues, the company has failed its customers and they then do not deserve our money in the first place.

If a staff member is simply not doing that, then a firing is in order.

(Also, I was not joining in on yours or anyone elses discussion. To assume that is ridiculous, because it is extremely clear I was making a point that was not connected to either argument. It is fact, and that's all I was trying to convey.

However, to make it clear why I made said point in the first place:



This brings about my point. If the rep doesn't have the power to resolve it, the company has failed. If the rep simply isn't doing what they can with their power, the rep has failed.
What the rep is cabable of doing is defined by the company, and is different for each one.
Asking someone what the rep should have done with their power is also a ridiculous question, because I highly doubt EITHER OF YOU work for that company.

This point really shouldn't have needed so much explanation.)

What are you trying to accomplish talking to me in this tone? It seems unnecessary.

If it is a burden to post, then I'd rather you not post instead of posting and throwing around comments like these.

Regarding the subject itself, the reason I asked The Truecoolness what the rep could have done, notwithstanding the fact that you are right, we probably don't know what the rep could have done because we dont't work there, is because his not working there didn't prevent him to criticize the rep as though the rep had the power to do something. If he really thought the rep had the power to do something, that is what I wanted to know he believed they could do.

lol@bo muchly -

the rep prolly could have done something. even the lowliest rep works in a heirarchy of team leaders and senior support and can phone up and ask and harass other departments to get something useful done for the customer. but reps are lazy and don't really care and 'blame it on someone else' IS the first thing you do in a 'CSR' role. er... from the viewpoint of a 'CSR'.

All I'm saying is that in this particular case, it seemed the rep did what they could do. I know it sucked for Lantis to go through the hastle but that seemed to be either the fault of the company and maybe moreso the industry OR possibly even the fault of Lantis (without him knowing it).

It seems like everyone is taking out on the rep something that wasn't his/her fault because they are easy to blame.

But if I am misunderstanding what actually happened, I am just asking for clarification. That's all.

It would seem to me that if someone calls you back, explains that they had called your company and the other company in the transaction and you explain both had said it was the others fault, at that point they should have notified a supervisor to look in the matter more. At least they could have given the customer some indication of status or what exactly the failure was without giving out any personal information. This is what should have transpired. Like Stythe was saying, if someone at the company does not have the access to get to this information, and there is not some kind of escalation procedure then the company has failed to do there job. If there is and the CSR is aware of it, then the fault lies with the CSR for not fulfilling their job description. A good CSR would raise the issue to a higher authority if they cannot resolve the problem, especially if it is a return call.

What I am saying is that obviously one or both of the companies made a mistake, and both made no effort to truly determine the cause from the description of the conversations given by Lantis. Going by the job description of a CSR to bring resolution to a Clients issue, and if they cannot escalating the issue, I think they failed at their job.

Given the information Lantis gave I would assume the fault lies with the bank, since both Paypal and Newegg were unable to draw more than $500 in either instance. The point being someone at one of the companies knew what the real issue is, and the issue was not properly escalated.

Also what ever happened to going above and beyond your job description, guess people don't like promotions.

Now certainly I understand that sometimes higher-ups don't respond, but being the Customer REPRESENTATIVE it should be your responsibility to continue working at getting a response, and appropriately setting the expectations of when that response will be. Maybe that is my problem is that they did not set any expectations for the customer. Blaming the other system without any justification is BAD customer support. While I am not a call center person I do work in a customer facing job, and know better than to just blame someone else without some justification behind it, especially when you're the only representative of your company and the company your a subcontractor for standing in front of the customer.

If it is the case that the bank was at fault and Newegg was correct then I suppose the bank customer service was bad as it was providing misinformation, but what more could the reps at Newegg do, they looked into it and GAVE the correct information, right? They have no authority over the actions of the bank, understood it intelligently, and conveyed it accurately to the customer.

It really is impractical for the CSRs to get too involved in all the details of these conflicts. If they do it for everyone, including a differnent customer, Lantis would have had an even longer wait to complain about.