Bad Shopping experience

[Christoph]

Just had a really bad shopping experience online with Axiontech.com . Ordered last early Monday morning. All items were listed in stock and ready for shipping. Asked Tuesday night about status of order but did not get a reply. Send out 2 more emails and finally got a response that my order arrived Monday after their deadline (early bird) and that they had problems Tuesday with their warehouse and that my order should ship Wednesday. No tracking information on their web page available - of course!! Asked again and received an email 2 days later that my order would really ship! Well, my order shipped finally late Friday.

Axiontech.com ? My first and last experience with this store!! I will never buy from them again!

Just wanted to share this with you guys to see where you shop and how you're experiences are?! Shopped with Mwave, too and received good service and pricing.

[mairving]

Yep, I had the same experience. I ordered a fan from them on a Friday. I never heard anything from them. Wednesday or so I tried to look up the status of my order online. That failed every time. I then e-mailed them on Wednesday. Never heard anything. I emailed them again the next day. Late in the day I receive a response back that the order has been shipped and a tracking number. The order didn't ship until Wednesday. So it took them a total of five days (3 without weekend) to ship a fan. I won't be in any hurry to use them again either. I only ordered from them because I wanted the item a bit quicker than I could get it from Mwave in CA. Fat chance.

Mwave has always responded quickly to emails. I once ordered something from Mwave and I emailed them back to ask if they could add something to the order. They said that they could but it would delay the shipping 24hrs. Well guess what, it still shipped that day.

[LawyerRon]

I had a similar problem with Egghead. They said the part was in stock when it wasn't and said the part would ship on a certain day and it didn't.

[Kubie]

Well fellas. It looks like the good vendors are dropping by the wayside. Its a shame too.
Carl

[glc]

There are very few "discount" vendors that actually stock items. Most of them use one of the major distributors that do not sell to the public (Ingram Micro, Tech Data, Merisel, etc.) for a "back room". When you order something, your order is entered into the distributor's system as a "drop ship". Most of the time, this works just fine. However, if there is a problem, the vendor you are dealing with has no direct information or control over the process. All they can do is try to deal with the warehousing distributor, which can be a painful process.

I am a small reseller - and we do have an Ingram Micro and Tech Data account. If something is on back order, all I have is their "guess" when it will be in. When it gets busy, there are shipping delays, with no communication. When I need a RMA, I get it when I get it. When I need *service* I deal with a local independent distributor.

Don't hammer the vendor so hard - a lot of these problems are beyond their control. If you don't like doing business this way, spend a little more money and deal with someone locally, or at least a vendor that does their own warehousing and distribution. You get what you pay for!

[Christoph]

You ask for 'mercy' with the vendors?

Well, where is the problem telling the customer "Hey, there is a problem with the items you ordered. We will contact you as soon as we find out what is going on and when we can ship the items!" ???

But if a vendor is not telling a customer, even on the customers request, what the heck is going on - the vendor does not deserve any business!! The vendor who is fair and honest will make more business (even with slightly higher prices) than the one who always lists lowest prices but has problems delivering the products or has no customer service. I rather pay a little more but like to have good customer service. I ordered the first time from axion and checked some of their reviews and it seemed to be OK. Well, I was wrong and that was my last shopping experience with them!

[LawyerRon]

glc,
That's why I like http://www.mwave.com. They actually stock the parts and you can even go to their warehouse and purchase if you want to.

[Xayd]

Yes and no. I've ordered from Axion for a year or so now, and never have had a problem. When something I ordered wasn't available on two different occasions, they shipped a superior product to replace it (i.e. a 20 gig hard drive instead of the same model 15 gig one that I paid for, and a Soundblaster Live Value to replace the SoundBlaster 16 that I ordered for my parents' box).

BUT, I don't order online specifically, I always call to order, thereby verifying that something is in stock at that moment. Axion does have a physical store in Houston and they do stock the most popular items at any given time, but not everything.

Every time I've ordered on the phone, I get one of two things. Either a simple "yes, no, yes, yes" type thing when I ask whether a group of things are in stock and ready to ship, or a runaround when I ask about something's availability and price.

Of course the runaround gets hung up on, and the one who's quick and honest about what they do or don't have ready to ship gets the sale.

Xayd

[Christoph]

Well, I live in Colorado and if I can use an online store to avoid long distance phone charges ...!

When I buy something it is important to me, if something is in stock and where I can expect proper shipping. If I do not see it in stock I buy somewhere else - especially if I need those items soon.

I am still waiting for my shippment and that really makes me mad because it should have been delivered last Friday if they would not have screwed up. It was just a really bad experience of how customer service should not be!! Some stores maybe have it to learn the hard way - I do not know. If they have an online store they should make sure they can handle the traffic and the incoming orders. If they don't ...

[SARGE]

Yeah, well when building my pc recently, I went to Crucial and ordered the Cas2 RAM, 256 mb. Kept waiting daily and when would check on "status", would get something about pending. Come to find out, the RAM was backordered, which wasn't indicated originally. I was pissed, since I could have gotten what I wanted at Mushkin, but noooo, I emailed Crucial to change to CAS3 and apply the $15 difference to super-duper overnight mail. Got my RAM a week later plus they kept the change. Now that they got the CAS2, wonder if they'll swap?

I'll walk into a store to buy my trash from now on... I wanna see Crucial cook their books to cover my $15. Damn crooks.

[Edited by SARGE on 03-06-2001 at 11:50 PM]

[Xayd]

Sarge you must have the luck of a road-wandering turtle.

The time before last that I ordered from Crucial they actually cut prices the next day after the order and sent me a 20 dollar check back with my RAM...

Xayd

[SARGE]

I've used Crucial many times; it just hacked me cause I'd just gotten the new mobo, cpu, etc ordered and took a few days off to play. Figured everything would be delivered on time. Ended up waiting for the RAM. I'd use 'em again, but can't figure why they're cheaper than Mushkin, unless it's quality.