Trying to avoid Amazon is an adventure
While I do not see myself cancelling Amazon Prime any time soon, I am actively trying to bring my business somewhere else. Amazon has proven too many times that they are a company I do not want to support. (Especially after their "support" basically left me hanging with a broken screen and the seller ghosting me.) But they got one thing right - letting me buy stuff.
I was looking for some memory to upgrade one of our systems. Nothing fancy, 32GB modules DDR4 registered ECC. Something you would expect to find in most servers these days. Usually I order hardware at Alternate. They ship fast, have okay-ish prices and an amazing customer support. Sadly they did not have anything close to what I needed, so I was browsing a few shops I ordered from in the past. I ended up with Mindfactory.
If I would have known what a mess this will be, I would have tried my luck with eBay, the experience could not have been worse…
- I placed the order on November 5th.
- On November 6th they let me know that the product is not available anymore and that their tech team is happy to assist me with finding an alternative (well, that can happen, right?)
- I sent them the specs I needed
- A day later they got back to me telling me they do not offer any recommendation as "it would not be possible to ensure that whatever they select would meet my requirements" (um sure,… DDR4 ECC RDIMM 32GB at least 2666MHz. IMPOSSIBLE TO MAKE A RECOMMENDATION!)
- I sent them a link to the memory I would like as a replacement
- And do not hear anything for three days
- 7 tweets and DMs later someone from their social media team starts to poke people to respond to the email
- "it would not be possible to ensure that the product I select would meet my requirements"
Took me 30 minutes to cancel the order and actually notice that Alternate now got inventory for the memory I want. One day later I receive a package with 6 32GB sticks.
So far, the number of articles I ordered on Amazon.de that were not available after the order was placed? Zero. Problems cancelling an order or modifying on order before it was shipped? Zero. Number of times Amazon told me I do not know what I ordered and refused to sell me the items? Take a guess.
Shopping at a local store usually works well. Ordering something from the manufacturer directly has always been a great experience. Amazon, no matter how much I dislike it, just works - they streamlined the experience so much that it's nearly impossible to have a bad experience. Everything else is a gamble if the experience is great or a complete disaster.