Tuesday, December 25, 2007

The NewEgg gift card fiasco

newegg.com has finally pissed me off. I've been a customer for at least four years. They have decent prices, and a good "power-search" tool. I've placed many orders, returned partial orders, and in all this time they have never screwed up anything for me... until now.

I need would like to build a new computer. Something with four cores. Mmmm. Christmas was coming up and so I gently grafted this desire into the extended family gift-giving grapevine. Word got out that I wanted a newegg.com gift certificate. "Why not just cash?" Well, I have a habit -not necessarily a bad habit- of hoarding any cash I get. It ends up in a savings account, or goes toward paying off my student loans. Disgusting, I know... but with a gift-certificate I'm pretty much forced to buy something I actually desire.

Grandma was the first to attempt the purchase. She couldn't figure out the website, so she reverted to cold-hard-cash. She's 84, I don't blame her. Thanks Grams.

My father-in-law was next to give it a go. The guy is a scientist, so he had no trouble with the site, and even bought it a few days early to make sure I received it. Sure enough, on Dec 21 I got an email from NewEgg containing the proper redemption credentials. Danke.

The rest of the family procrastinated a bit, and bought them on December 24. That's two brother's-in-law, a sister-in-law, and my own parents. Now, maybe they weren't waiting until the last minute, maybe they just wanted me to receive my gift no earlier than Christmas Eve. Unfortunately I haven't received any yet. I did get an email though:

fromNewegg. com (info@newegg.com)


date
subjectGift Certificate From www.newegg.com
mailed-bynewegg.com

So, there's one certificate- except that the email doesn't have a body. No body, means no Claim code, no Security code, no form letter to tell me where the love came from. So now I have to track down my family members and ask if they tried to send me a gift card from NewEgg- because if they did, I didn't actually get it; and I'm not sure if I ever will...

NewEgg, you've let me down. Did the NewEgg grinch get any of you too? Leave a comment!

1 comment:

Dave said...

Well, two more gift cards showed up in my inbox on the 26th. I told an online sales rep about the blank email and she was able to find it. Since I knew the email address of the sender she gave me the claim code. Still, it was a hassle... I'll probably ask for cash next time.