Comments on: Newegg is no Amazon, Even if They Want to Be

By: JLiRD808

JLiRD808 — Fri, 04 Dec 2015 22:01:36 +0000

YES! I feel the same about a lot of what you’re saying here!

The 300 max character count on the email form bugged the crap out of me too. No count tallying the characters we’ve used (+8 more characters or -8 too many characters)??! I think it was ~2004 when I recall seeing character counters on limted-size forms ubiquitously. Can Newegg really be 10+ years BEHIND???

Besides that, Newegg’s shipping is almost a scam. 2 or 3 days shipping doesnt include their 24-48hrs processing time. They cant get orders out the door the same day even with RUSH PROCESSING (at 1am in my particular example!) and they dont utilize Fedex’s Saturday shipping capability!

Amazon will overnight you a new item if they lose it–not Newegg. They will apologize and offer a refund or replacement…the replacement will not be expedited in any way.

Newegg’s online chat box consistently says there’s a 5-7 mins wait…but it’s always been over 30 mins in my experiences. That is if chat’s even working during their business hours, or if the “Contact Page” isn’t down with constant “there’s an error, refresh your page” message.

Someone said they’ve been using a cheap Romanian web development company to handle their site…seems like it could be true. I’ll only be using Newegg for research in the future but will stick with Amazon for purchasing!

By: Scott

Scott — Tue, 20 Oct 2015 16:04:17 +0000

Thanks! It’s been at least a couple of years, but Newegg was actually pretty efficient in dealing with returns for stuff bought directly from them. It’s their Marketplace that seems to have a miasma of indifference and disorder. Don’t worry about cancelling Premier, though. Even though it is a ridiculous process, you can cancel for a full refund after it auto renews provided that you haven’t used any Premier services since the renewal date. (I never remember to cancel stuff like that ahead of time either.)

By: Mike

Mike — Tue, 20 Oct 2015 14:46:37 +0000

Spot on with your write-up! You have expressed in writing 100% of my feelings towards Newegg! I have been shopping with them for years, usually as my 2nd source to check when ordering electronics/computer stuff from Amazon. They are slightly cheaper sometimes, and other times they have a bit more selection. But interface wise they are stuck in the 90s! Luckily I haven’t had to deal with their customer service department for any returns, but I am not looking forward to it if I ever need to do it.
I got a 6 month Premier for free to try and I am still not sure what is it good for (I have Shop-Runner free shipping already). I am trying to figure out now how to cancel auto-renewal for Premier, because for sure I will forget in 6 month.

By: Scott

Scott — Thu, 09 Apr 2015 23:00:07 +0000

Thanks for posting! I’m glad to see that I’m not alone.

Amazon (especially with Prime) absolutely defines what online retail should be. If only it weren’t for all that pointless processing it might be a close contest for NE — excluding the Marketplace, of course.

By: Trike

Trike — Thu, 09 Apr 2015 22:20:52 +0000

I have the exact same feelings towards Newegg. I’ve been shopping there for years like most people. But my “Premier” experience with them hasn’t been the best. I was about to place an order for a new build and decided to give “Premier” a 3 month try. Figure I’ll be ordering more stuff in the next three months. When I signed up for Premiere, I had the same issue you had. I tried checking out right after I signed up for “Premier”, and the free shipping wouldn’t show up. Going into the “Premier” settings had no indication that anything was wrong. After getting pissed for about 15 mins trying to checkout with “Premier” it just started working.

After finally being able to place my order (Sunday night) thinking it was successful, I get bombarded with the Newegg emails, My card holder texts me stating they declined the transaction due to suspected fraudulent activity. I get that fixed. I go back into my orders in Newegg to check the payment status to make sure everything is ok. Newegg showed the transaction as completed and I still had pending charge with Newegg with my credit card provider. I thought all was well. Monday afternoon rolls along and I check the status of my order to see if it shipped. Now it shows that my card is declined. Baah, So I fix it, being mad at myself for not checking it again earlier. Of course in one of those 4-6 emails that get sent to you, indicated the card was declined. If they had only sent me one email, I most likely would have caught it. So now I have wait another day for it to process. Package states it was shipped on 4/7/2015 with an estimated delivery date of 4/10 and it’s now 4/9 and there’s no update at all to the tracking info. It looks like I wont get my parts, before this weekend now.

Maybe I’m spoiled with Amazon Prime. I get most prime orders within 1-2days from the day I ordered. Seems like with all the “processing” that Newegg goes through with an order, it feels like it takes forever and if something wrong happens it takes another full day to reprocess it.

I know these are all little things and some of it was my fault, but it’s all the little things that went wrong during my “Premier” experience that is making me not happy.

I will most likely not renew the Newegg Premier service.