High Technology

For the past two years, I've had nothing but good things to say about Amazon. That all changed today...

I preordered Star Wars Ep II and Beauty and the Beast back in August. At the time I applied a coupon code that came in the mail for $5 off $35. The order system accepted the order, and showed a total that reflected the pre-order price for both movies, supersaver shipping and a $5 promotional certificate. My order total was $30.68, reflecting the $5 coupon, a share-the-love discount and supersaver shipping.

When the movies shipped, they failed to apply the coupon, so I wrote an email explaining the situation:

This order was placed using a $5 off $35 coupon that I
received in the mail. My order summary from August 29 (of which I have a print out) shows a $5 promotional certificate. The invoice accompanying the order no longer shows this discount, and I have apparently been charged the full amount. Please issue a $5 credit to my credit card.


Their response was:

Thank you for writing to us at Amazon.com.

I'm sorry you weren't able to take advantage of this promotional offer before it expired. Our promotional offers function much like a coupon in a physical store. They are sometimes limited to certain products and are valid only for the length of the promotion.

I hope you will be able to take advantage of our future promotions. Thank you for shopping at Amazon.com.



I then wrote:

Please reread my original email - your order system accepted the
coupon, and priced out the order as $30.68 in total, but I was charged $35.68 as you failed to apply the coupon. I have a print out of the order confirmation page showing $30.68, so I am requesting that you correct my charge amount. If you fail to do so, I will have no choice but to put this charge into dispute with American Express.


They replied with:

Thank you for writing back to us at Amazon.com.

After researching your inquiry and your order, I see that all the
promotions were properly applied to your order. Both Share the Love and the Super Saver Free Shipping off a $25.00 purchase have been applied to your order.

When you receive a Share the Love discount offer, you are entitled to 10% off of the item shown, rather than 10% off of your entire order. My research indicates that you had originally redeemed one Share the Love discount offers on this order.


So, I called customer service, who refused to refund the $5.00 - I even offered to fax them a copy of the order confirmation page showing a $30.68 total. The CSR stated that they do not have access to a fax machine. When I told her that I wanted to send them back the discs, she proudly stated that DVDs are not returnable once opened. So, I gave up and disputed the charge with AMEX.


HEY AMAZON, SAY GOODBYE TO A $1,000+ PER YEAR CUSTOMER!!!

J-Dubya

So you opened the discs already? I wouldn't even open the box unless I was charged correctly. Try calling again and speaking to another CSR.

eau

Try to write to [email protected] instead.

MrN

Thats not right. I've had coupons drop off my order before and they corrected it - send them the confirmation e-mail showing the original total.

I also never e-mail when I have a problem, the phone has always worked better for me.

RonG617

The final items of my $10 off $100 coupon order just shipped minus the $10 off. I simply emailed customer service and they refunded me the $10 that day. I don't know why they are giving you a hard time. My coupon expired at least a month ago.

LBPound

Are you SURE you were charged the wrong amount? Amazon's Order Status listings are really screwy.

Venom

amazon has given me lots of trouble. but they usually fix it one way or another.

since i only shop there with gc from offers/rewards etc, and usually with share the love, when they screw up it usually results with them fixing it nice and fast or them over compensating me.

for instance i had a 50$ gc to borders, borders prices around here suck so i went to amazon via borders.com. i ordered hitch hikers guide to the galaxy and pre-ordered south park season 1. however they were gonna hold hitch hikers until southpark was released so i cancelled the order, and split them up into two orders since they were both over 25 each. the problem came when i entered one number wrong from the gc (it was smudged.) well they never bothered to tell me that it was incorrect.... the site took it, with the note that borders gc aren't deducted until the product ships, so there was no way to verify if there was a problem anyway. i get a shipping email and it doesn't note the gift card. i wait for the invocie when it arrives. same deal. i check out my billing statement online and see the full charge on it. i send an email to amazon wanting to know why they charged full price when the total cost was covered by the gift card. i learn i entered the wrong number. i figure out the right number and email it to them asking for a refund on my credit card and to deduct that amount of the borders card.

it took about 7 emails back and forth, with myself getting more and more frustrated and getting nasty. finally i got someone who could read and comprehend.

so with media play's south park price i cancel that order. now i'm left to figure out what to due with the remainder of the card so i call the number to figure out what the night gc code is and get informed the balance on the card is 50$. ( i got that credit card charge credited back to me.) so while it was totally a pain in the ass, they gave me hitch hikers for free.

mookiemeister

Speaking of Amazon, has anyone noticed that Amazon's estimated delivery date is a bit goofy? On the 'Recently Completed Order' web page, the estimated delivery date is listed as something different from the delivery estimated date from the individual order? For example, on one of my order, delivery estimated date is 11/22-11/25 on one page, yet is shown to be 11/15-11/18 on another page. Does anyone know what's going on with Amazon? Even their Amazon.ca has the same delivery date discrepency problem.

jason978

I had a problem with amazon too. I ordered star wars:aotc and lord of the rings. Everything was fine with email confirmation. Then the invoice in the box came. My free shipping was not applied. My gift certificates were not applied. My share the love was not applied. My 5 dollar coupon was not applied. It took 5 separate emails and a threat to report fraudulent charges on my credit card to get them to make it right. A major pain in the butt to make them fix their mistakes.

mookiemeister

That's very strange. Amazon is a large company. It wouldn't cost them a bucket of their money to hire competent software engineers to write their web related programs. Also, it doesn't make sense that they would let buggy software be used by customers like this. It's cheaper to just hire some test engineers to verify everything works before letting the customers use it. In the long run, it would cost them more money to have to hire customer service people to resolve these problems and risk loosing those same customers. It just doesn't make much business sense to do it this way. Does anyone know who is responsible in Amazon for making idiotic decisions like this?

eau

Jeff Bezos?

Vision Society

Get this, I had an order that was incorrectly overcharged by $2. (It's a really long story) anyway at the end of a couple of email exchanges they simply said, here's a $5 promotional coupon, that's it. I don't know if this is a good deal or not?