Just curious....what've been your RMA experiences..companies that do it right or not

[C'DaleRider]

Well, always been curious about other people's RMA experiences with various companies.....and not really speaking of etailers or retailers. Those are another subject. Instead, I'm talking abut the "manufacturers", like OCZ, Corsair, Asus, etc.

I really don't RMA much.....have had to very few times since I started "playing" with computers back in the early 1990's. But I have had to RMA two things the last few months.

First was an item from Corsair. Specifically the foam pad for the Nautilus 500 external wc setup. I'm moving away from that and into the "real" world of wc'ing.....but when I broke down the Nautilus, the foam block didn't spring back very well.

After a couple of emails to tech support, the second of which was for my physical address....DUH!..forgot to include that the first time...I received a new foam block a couple of weeks later......and a new set of standoffs and a new top cover.

Kudos to Corsair!



Second RMA....done two weeks ago....was for my Intel BX2 motherboard. Some surface-mounted part shorted out and the board wouldn't boot beyond the BIOS setup screen.

Contacted Intel's tech support, explained I thought I had shorted it out myself with an LED light strip that was under the board (it was supposed to be silicon encased, but now I see that was worthless!) and the problem that was now happening. Told them I could see a burnt spot on the mb around a particular surface mounted part on the board.

Next email was where to send the board and an order number. (Apparently Intel calls their RMA numbers order numbers.)

They received the board on a Monday and shipped its replacement the next day...and shipped it two-day UPS. And the box it was packed in....talk about overkill packing! The box was big enough to house three motherboards and foam upon foam layered. Nothing was going to hurt it in shipping, well....maybe if a truck physically ran over the box, maybe.

So, I got it to them in three days, and they got the new one back to me in the same amount of time. This despite the problem with the board stemming from my own screwup!!!

High kudos to Intel on that one!!!



So, other good or bad experiences with companies and their RMA procedures/turnaround times?

[uOpt]

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=103199&highlight=warranty
http://forums.2cpu.com/showthread.php?t=80315

[Bigchrome]

Ocuk do it just about the worst I've ever seen....Took over 2 months to get my then week old 1900 replaced...They refused to refund and the boss hung up on my dad.

[ineedaname]

I took my Asus Striker Mobo for RMA it took about 2 months to get it back.

[[cTx] Nooc]

I RMAd a hitachi deathstar 160gb back in November and newegg was super about it, just had to cover shipping.

[Emerica]

Yeah newegg is really good with returns. I've noticed something though, if you request an RMA through email they sometimes won't cover shipping but on the phone they will.

Hopefully Mwave is good about RMAs because I have to RMA my MS Natural Ergonomic 4000 keyboard because it came DOA. I am still waiting on the shipping label through email.

[cadaveca]

Good(in no particular order):

Crucial, OCZ, Geil, ABIT, Seagate, Western Digital, LG, Sony, Microsoft.

BAD:

ASUS, Gigabyte, Sapphire, Mushkin, Logitech, Samsung.

All personal RMA's, no cross-ship.

Good parties returned a working product within 1 week of reciept of bad part.


Bad companies either did not respond to original RMA request within 5 working days, or did not return product within 2 weeks.

[uOpt]

Maxtor's RMA sucks, too, BTW.

I had to deal with Mushkin's RMA department and it was extremely smooth.

[revogamer]

I had good with Asus, got my P5B-Deluxe back in less than 2 weeks, they replied to all my emails fast, and kept in contact, and i live in new zealand. and with crucial i had to wait a week to get 1 email back, they only replied once a week, so i didnt have terribly fast service with them

[TouGe]

I have gone trough the RMA process with just two e-tailers: New Egg and ZipZoomFly. Neither of them posed a hassle and turn around was very reasonable. I think, after taking delivery, I received my stuff back w/in 7 days.
I also have to give props to EVGA and their cross-shipping program, very nice. On top of that, when their new revision 680i's were out they sent them to customers who requested a replacement board w/ return shipping pre-paid and they also gave you time to test it out before you had to send them your old board:up:.
Patriot Memory are also good at honoring their products. I RMA'd 2 1 gig sets of their 8500 memory, two months apart, without any hassle but it took a little over 2 weeks to get the memory back.

[ColonelCain]

ABIT: Well, I RMA'd my AN8 Ultra, got an AN8 (standard) back. No more ABIT for me.
Ultra: Screwed over twice on a PSU. First, had to rip off the barcode for a "rebate" with fry's electronics. Well, didn't get that $50 rebate, then the thing gives out and kills my system. No more Ultra for me.
ATi: Very helpful. When the ultra crap fryed my system, they were very helpful, answered all my questions, and then got my RMA to me within a week.

[Vice]

Sapphire has to have the worst RMA service out there.

Its so bad, I refuse to buy anymore of their products (before I needed to rma my card, all my gfx cards were made my sapphire)

[Bigchrome]

I forgot to add Dell seem to be unbelieveably good! My 24'' came with a big hole burned through the box and a small burn on the foam covering over the screen (I absolutely freaked! How the :banana::banana::banana::banana: does this happen??) But dell left me keep the screen while I waited and had a new one to me in 3 days. (when at the time there was a 30 day waiting period for a new one)

[Emerica]

So far mwave is doing excellent. They sent me this fedex shipping thing via email and I printed it out, took it to the fedex kinkos by my house and off it is to mwave. They made it really easy to send the package out and at no cost to the customer.

[PsYkHoTiK]

Crucial is superb when it comes to RMAs. :D

I had to RMA some Ballistix DDR500 1GB kit twice (first one was unmatched pairs and one had errors in memtest) and the second set started giving errors after a few months. Each time I got new sticks. Top notch.

Though not RMAs, OCZ, GSkill, and XFX have excellent responsive tech support. I get very quick replies if I have any questions/issues.

Some e-tailers that were very responsive were Jab-tech and sidewindercomputers.

One that was a gift that kept on giving was Powercolor. I will never buy/recommend powercolor cards. :\
I had a 9800SE that softmodded into a 9800Pro (coolness) but then a year later it died (artifacting). Sent it in for RMA, they mailed the card back to me and declined my RMA due to it being a physical damage issue. When I read that I was shocked. Apparently a cap broke off (and it was loose in the box too). I emailed them and told them, the damage was not done by me. Naturally, they didn't believe me. Fortunately for me, I actually took a pic of the card right before backing it properly in a anti static bag wrapped in bubble wrap. RMA'd it again, and they sent me a replacement card, which died after a few months, rma'd and got a replacement card, died after a month, rma'd and got a replacement card. This cycle went on (about 4-5 times) until the warranty period ended upon which they declined my RMA.

[Movieman]

Just had to RMA an item with NewEgg. Got a sweet young lady on the phone, explained the situation( not anyone's "fault") and taken care of in 5 mins.
Yup, I'm paying postage back to them but no restocking fee.
Very smooth.

One more:
Just tried to get a pair of heatsinks for an unusual MB..Essentially a dual yonah, Intel board..
Couldn't find them anywhere.
Emailed Intel for help, explained and next day a guy emails me that he's sending me 2 HS from Intel and glad to help..
10 mins later I get a tracking number and he's overnighting them UPS..:up:

[Emerica]

Just had to RMA an item with NewEgg. Got a sweet young lady on the phone, explained the situation( not anyone's "fault") and taken care of in 5 mins.
Yup, I'm paying postage back to them but no restocking fee.
Very smooth.

One more:
Just tried to get a pair of heatsinks for an unusual MB..Essentially a dual yonah, Intel board..
Couldn't find them anywhere.
Emailed Intel for help, explained and next day a guy emails me that he's sending me 2 HS from Intel and glad to help..
10 mins later I get a tracking number and he's overnighting them UPS..:up:

Holy crap? You didn't have to pay for the HS'?

[Movieman]

Holy crap? You didn't have to pay for the HS'?

Nope, didn't go looking for a freebie, just for help finding them, got this from them:
Hello David,

Thank you for contacting Intel(R) Technical Support.

I see you have being throught some trouble trying to get this piece.
Unfortunately I have not being able to find a picture of the heatsink in question. But if you would be kind enough to provide me with your address I would be able to send you a pair of heatsinks for your system.
Please also provide us your Intel(R) Channel Member ID, if you have one.


Please do not hesitate to contact us again if you need further assistance.

Regards,

XXX X.
Intel(R) Technical Support

[Emerica]

Wow, you got hooked up.

[Movieman]

Wow, you got hooked up.
Now to see if I can get those 31w sossamans so cranked up the heatsinks won't work!:ROTF:

[TouGe]

Yup, Movieman is the Intel hook-up guy:up:

[Movieman]

Yup, Movieman is the Intel hook-up guy:up:

noooooo, don't start that rumor!:rofl:
I just got lucky and then happenned to get a good guy at Intels tech support! That's it, I promise..
I know NOONE!....Wish I did:D

[Peepaw]

I've had one rma with newegg, it couldn't have gone smoother.:up:
I've had two rma's with Crucial, had my ram back in less than a week.:up:

Couldn't have asked for better service from them both.

[Reinvented]

this is a nice thread...i've had lots of great experiences...

Hitachi GST (Global Storage Technologies - HDD's) - RMA'd two 250GB T7K250's after they did the click of death thing... got them back in 4 days. Very nice.

OCZ Technology - GREAT guys. Shipped overnight for memory to reduce downtime! And plus, Eric and Tony are here! So, that's some pretty awesome support also!

eVGA - 7900 GT/GTX fiasco. Man, what a nightmare. After it was sorted by changing the GPU memory to something else, they offered to overnight stuff to customers, and pay for return shipping!

Same goes for motherboards also, with their EAR policy.

Intel - Had a faulty BX2 board, they offered to 2 day a board, and pay for return shipping after calling in to get some troubleshooting done.

PC Power and Cooling - Needed a PSU re-pinned! Got it done in a nice timely fashion, and had it shipped out via 3-day.

That's it! ;)

[[XC] Angstrom]

Western Digital - Great (with advance RMA), too bad the RMA'd drive only lasted about 3 months and I have to RMA it again. Something is odd with their Caviar line since my RaptorX is still going strong on the same power cable.

Razer - Good, replaced my Copperhead with a faulty laser.

G.Skill - Great, 3 day shipping.