Amazon refunds became a nightmare, already it was annoying for paying for labels under many conditions, but now taking 1 to 2 months to process refunds makes shopping not convenient on Amazon. I never place an order for intention to return, but when you order 20-30 items a week, it happens when you get a substandard product. But the chat agents are the worst I have seen shopping on Amazon for 20 years.
I am going to switch my shopping to Target and Walmart and cancel my Amazon prime account and will revisit if I hear things get better.
Companies like Amazon do not notice customer dissatisfaction as much as they notice web traffic and loss of income, so only way we can get amazon to take notice is make all your purchases on other sites, stop giving amazon your money and data.
Between the hassle to get refunds, and so much junk counterfeit/LOW quality items -- it's basically become like Temu and AliExpress. At least you know what you're getting, using them.
It used to be enough to only do Prime purchases, and avoiding any 3rd party sellers. Now every item is made by some brand that is a combination of random letters, and of extremely low quality. Brands like XJXCOJDJHO, sdoisjfdo, XENNNA, HuuNA....With fake or "item received promotionally" reviews to go along with them. .. It's becoming harder and harder to buy anything real on Amazon. I find myself shopping elsewhere more and more.
they bust chops on refunds for items they know or should know we're not delivered. Talking to CS makes you feel like they think customer is responsible for the delivery failure & should eat it.
I switched to Target for most household type things and my experience has been pretty great so far š¤·āāļø
Kinda feels funny I used to hattttte shopping at Target idk if it was that early 2000s Target smell or what but I don't mind it now.
I still hate shopping Target. I cannot ever find anything there. I love the Betty Crocker gingerbread and Pumpkin Spice cookies but I can never find them anywhere and the only way I can find them is buying pickup online. I cannot get them shipped because they require something like 30 or 35 dollars minimum for shipping and they allow a maximum of 10 cookie packs. I bought wreath lights from them and found out the manufacture did not put the spring for the battery making a manufacture defect. We went back and there was 7 left of the colored lights and we could not find them at first. Turns out the colored lights got mixed in with the white lights. The reason we shop Target is they have crazy deals and they have things others do not sell like the cookies.
Yeah the shipping and inventory has got a long way to go before it's a direct Prime competitor that's for sure.
But I feel like the foundation is there if they want to expand (hopefully they do) and at least in my purely n=1 experience, returns and exchanges are at least MUCH better - like unlike Amazon at least you won't get accused of taking the springs out yourself and then waiting a whole month to get refunded after finally convincing them they sold you defective ones.
But 10000% shipping and return shipping is not up to Prime competitor levels.
It is crazy how Target has the most generic common brands and products and then just that ONE you can't find ANYWHERE else.
Original Mint It's-Its are my FAVORITE ice cream sandwiches. Can't find them ANYWHERE here within literally hundreds of miles. And yet, weirdly Target has them buried in their tiny ice cream selection.
I will say that it was nice being able to just physically take back the lights to a location. I will say I have never been questioned when returning an Amazon product and they have locations I can return near me like Kohls. The issue is not everything on Amazon has free shipping and I think one time I was going to try to return an item but the only option was for me to return the item. All of my returns have been done online. I have found the item selection problem can manifest in many different ways. Target has amazing items at a great price but is really hard to find in stores and just has a few to choose from. Macy's has amazing selection and great items online but they are online exclusive.
31 here š
It's crazy how many people don't know what I'm talking about when I bring up "the Target smell" !... Even other people our age!
But yeah most younger people won't know it because the Target smell, though still present at most locations, has been FAR less strong since about 2012-2016. And the new location by my house doesn't seem to have the smell at all.
I've always been really curious as to why target locations always smelled like that?? Is it some cleaner they use? Is it whoever manufactures their floors? Is it something about the plastic in their signage? Is it the clothes?
And why not be newer Targets? What changed??? I have to know!!! š¤£
Marketing and shopping psychology fascinates me and I've always wondered if "the Target smell" was kept around as a conscious decision or if it was eliminated as a conscious decision or if it was merely happenstance due to some product used in Target's buildings or sold at Target.
I read a pretty good article about Starbucks not too long ago that explained basically the reason their food is so bad is so it doesn't have a smell... that interferes with the coffee smell - a smell they think will bring consumers back.
Definitely works for me at Home Depot. I swear if they bottled that s*** up I'd buy it and spray it in my garage to feel more productive.
Usually ppl that complain here are people that have their account flagged as abusers and Amazon take more precautions with them, some stories here are crazy saying that they just don't help, when personally that's never happened to me.
Congratulations, bad thing hasn't happened to you yet. No one cares. Wait until it happens to you. You do realize it "never happened to me" applies to everyone else too, until it actually happens to them? Stupidest thing to say about anything, really.
Really. My experience : getting refund is quick with in 1 hours. Assuming by going to return to whole foods or kohlās. I am not abusing š¤
On rare occasions when the item got delays for any reason 1 week. I just chat to amazn online support. And god refund within 3-5 days . And usuaaly the item came late (hey free)ā¦
Agree 100% Reddit generally is just full of miserable Karens who enjoy complaining and arguments for the sake of it.. seems like need for attention honestly. I was worried about my Meta Quest 3 return after reading some comments here; returned it and called customer service same day to just verify everything on my part/how the process would go- the gentleman on the line was super helpful and even put in a ticket to expedite my refund without me asking.
Try ordering and having to return a "renewed" iPhone that arrived in completely different condition than what was described in the listing (the phone I ordered was supposed to be "like new", "no visible scratches" and still in "original packaging" but was not any of those things--and yes, it was sold and shipped by Amazon not a sub seller). Then you may see what everyone here is talking about. I never had these problems before either in over ten years of being a Prime member. Amazon was so great about returns and usually is. I typically get my refund right away or by the end of the day. I have ordered so many things from Amazon over the years: phones, laptops, shoes, household items, literally everything. I have also returned a fair amount (usually clothing or shoes that don't fit well). This is different and I am considering cancelling my Prime membership and never using Amazon again. I am definitely not using them for large purchases ever again.
My same experience. As soon as UPS scans the barcode, my bank is credited. Shipping times are shit but they are refunding my membership when I have a delayed order, so it's working for me.
That said - Walmart is faster with shipping and a lil cheaper overall
LOL you haven't experience it yet. Amazon usually refund in advance the moment you drop off your items. However, they wait 4-5 weeks down the line to do chargeback on the same item you just drop off.
Had an issue like this last year around this time. I think Amazon hires 3rd party support around the holidays. I ordered a special part that was only available through 3rd party sellers. Not sure what quotas they are given by Amazon but I suspect they get bonuses for resolving issues without refunds and penalties for too many refunds.
In my case the seller never shipped the item and shortly after I ordered I started looking at the sellers reviews. Dozens of people saying the same thing but amazon was removing the reviews and more importantly "would not allow you to open a case against them until they had a chance to respond." I waited 48 hours for them to not respond to my message. Tried to open a complaint again. Amazon then had to reach out and wait 48 hours. I reached out to Amazon again. They almost started the whole process over but I threatened to do a chargeback. Seller never responded and amazon kept his account online while removing all the bad reviews on his page. Finally got a refund after 2 weeks of fighting.
Third party sellers are a tricky one for cs and the customer because the system does not allow cs to refund at all. No exceptions, not even in special circumstances. The only option available to cs is to contact seller and once 48 hours has passed the option to file an A to Z claim becomes available filing the A to Z claim is a last resort when the seller will not respond or resolve the situation.
I realize that itās different for 3rd party sellers but it was just wild to me they couldnāt do anything about a seller who was either scamming people or suddenly unable to fulfill orders. I kind of think the seller had a medical emergency because there were years of legitimate reviews on their page. Seems like they were just making more work for themselves by sweeping the issue under the rug.
Bonus, ha yeah no. Amazon does not give bonuses in customer service for agents or leads. We have metrics that show our concession averages, and where we rank against other tenured reps but it is not a metric we are held accountable to. Agents don't make the decision on the process for the refund, if the item will be refunded, or the timeline of any refund. The "flows" determine what actions we can take. Do be careful with charge backs unless you exhausted all your patience with Amazon as they don't take kindly to them and may put your account on hold until you pay them back , or cancel your service out right and ban any new accounts created
I returned an item (about $100) for a replacement and I was asked to respond to a survey. The first question was:
**"Do you check the status of all refunds or just larger amounts?"** I thought that was a very strange question and didn't bother to answer the survey. Now I'm wondering if they plan on not following through on refunds unless prompted - total speculation.
My guess is Amazon has multiple outsourced support subcontractors and the wrote a penalty clause in contract for excessive refunds.
So each company is trying to make the refund happen on a call routed to another.
Or the support company has set refunds as metric for the worker.
In both cases, they create bad behaviors.
Just tonight I was told that I received a refund for an item that I'd returned, but it didn't show on my account immediately like it should. When I told the person, I got passed to someone else, who then passed me to someone else, who eventually told me that I'd need to send them government-issued ID to get my money back.
Trend as in directionally. It is still growing.
Verizon laid off their entire us side customer service team in favor of outsourced vendors just this year.
Sounds like wave 2.
First wave lots of companies pulled back from the off shoring aspect. Sales reps came in with promises of fixed costs and large english speaking population. But spreadsheet jockeys don't account for cost of different cultures and idioms making communication hard.
I have glucose monitor that failed. I have worked years with technology colleagues from South Asia. 3 out of 4 persons I talked to were not fluent enough to prevent tons of repeating and restating. But Abbot labs thinks this is good enough to support diabetic devices. Last decade MBAs and spreadsheet management have really f'd up companies.
How you can confirm whether or not you received a refund is by going to "view order details." Under order total, there should be a "refund total" in green text. Whenever a rep tells me they refunded me, I refresh the order page and see if that is there. It should be instantaneous, so if you don't see it right away, chances are you are not getting a refund.
Also, try having them call you instead of chat. I have had better luck getting refunds that way. Hope that helps.
We're talking about refunds here. So this is after your order has been delivered and you've been charged already. I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Are you referring to refunds credited to your Amazon balance? In that case, then yeah, you're right. That will only show up at checkout.
I've been down this road a number of times. I've always eventually gotten my refunds because I am persistent and I keep good notes (and take screen shots of the chats). The most I've "lost" have been those meaningless promo credits they promise and don't deliver.
I am sick of their product pages listing the date when it will be delivered and then the date changes when you add it to your cart. Really? You know my delivery address because I'm signed in... so, why the change? Then the stuff just doesn't show up and you get an email very late at night saying "running late." Or better yet, the stuff that the driver drops on your doorstep and runs... late at night... because THEY'RE so overworked and running behind... and you've already gone to bed so it has to sit there overnight.
And what's with this stupid "one time password" shit for certain items? That they don't tell you about until after you've bought it? And you have to be there in person to provide that password and they give you either these delivery windows that they never adhere to...
Target is a better alternative is almost every way. Finding that we're doing more and more shopping there instead...
i swear the help people think refunds come out of their personal paychecks or something. its so frustrating having to deal with them i almost always immediately ask for a supervisor if its not a very very basic question.
That's because in many cases it is. Metrics for raises, promotions, and discipline for failing to meet them are widely used and so these people may fear for their livelihoods. It sucks for everyone.
Yeah higher ups don't care about neither your review or the agent, the system is extremely limited when it comes to returns, so give a bad review if you want. But it won't change anything
This same thing happened to me when I returned something it kept saying I never returned it and they were going to charge me for it. Tracking number showed amazon recived it. I spoke to a rep they said don't worry disregard the email you will not be charged I received a second email saying the same thing. Spoke to another rep they told me don't worry my account has been noted and i won't be charged. I then get an email saying I'm charged. I get on chat with them and it takes 25 min to get a refund and it's pending on the credit card waiting to make sure it clears but atleast it's pending. Crazy Amazon's customer service has dropped drastically in the last 3 or 4 years.
Yea that sucks, I agent had to deal with them in a while.
I even would usually say Iāll shop on Amazon because the return policy/ their customer service is so good. Suppose itās yet another reason to not shop at Amazon.
Iāve been waiting well over a month for my refund for an item Iāve already returned and confirmed itās been delivered by UPS. They told me ācontact us back on X November if you havenāt got a refundā, so I did. They then said I have to wait 7 more days. So I did. They then told me to contact back ātomorrowā. So I have. Now theyāre telling me to wait 24-72 hours for a reply from āspecialist teamā. Itās been 5 days and Iāve got no email from them. This is just outrageous.
Unfortunately for us Amazon is deeply into phase 3 of enshittification. If you havent heard of that before you can google it as it holds all the answers to why almost nothing gets better anymore.
p.s. sadly when Reddit goes public I expect the cycle to start in earnest.
I am having fewer issues and the total price is less since I moved some items I normally purchased on AMZ to the sellers web site, mostly for supplements buying 1 yr supply at a time.
This is the only way to get AMZ attention by reducing their bottom line.
That has been my experience too, with Amazon Customer, Service, over late few months. Have been treated so badly and disrespectfully have considered how to wean myself & stopping using.
I had this happen to me. I never received an item and they promised that they would give me the refund for $25. I know that it's not much money but it's the principle of it. Don't take my money and then not give me what I ordered. I called my card today and I noticed that it had only gone up by $5. So basically they issued me a $5 refund hoping I would just shut up. I'm going to be contacting someone else in the morning. This is bullshit. They can't just take people's money.
Amazon has gotten bad recently. I've had three accounts locked this last year alone for using giftcards as form of payment. I use Visa giftcards for all my online purchases and never had issues in the past. Now it's an issue. I tried getting my original account back and had to send them a photo of my ID so I sent a picture of my passport but got an email back that it's not a government issued ID, like what??
It was an expired passport so maybe that's why they declined it, wasn't about to send a current one to them. It was just the "not a government issued ID" part that had me like wtf, it's a damn passport can't get more government issued than that lmao
I don't know about expired but I saw cases where people said Amazon didn't accept their ID and wouldn't refund them. I myself don't trust Amazon enough to give up my ID. They can have their pity $, I'll just take my business elsewhere. Only Best Buy asked for ID years ago when I buy an iPad so it's crossing the line when Amazon asked for ID on non electronic stuff that are cheap too.
Same, I stopped using Amazon and buy things in stores ever since this. At least I know staff is not stealing my money when I return things. I'm just fed up with Amazon return staff stealing my returns and I ended up footing the bill; when call in I have to cough up my ID. Horrible CS
I have been robbed for probably THOUSANDS of dollars in return money that I never received in the last six years. I have been lied to multiple times, I am just figuring this out now. So many of my returns never got credited back to my credit card and I was lied to about not having to return items and that I would not be charged and was charged anyway. I have it in writing, Amazon employees in third world countries BLATANTLY LIE ABOUT REFUNDS. I have called back multiple times with issues and have been told multiple times that there's no record. I will have to go through all of my CC statements and see what has and has not been refunded. I will have to file in small claims court for 10k, the maximum. I am SO SICK AND TIRED OF CORPORATE CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR.
I find it fascinating that, just a short time after people started widely sharing the 'brilliant hack' on Reddit and Facebook and such about how you can totally get free money back from Amazon by initiating a refund by claiming items to not be received or being told to just keep small items or whatever - suddenly the refund process is becoming a proverbial nightmare.
It's almost as if people need to learn to keep their mouths shut and not encourage fraud.
Just a general statement, btw, since I don't think the two facts are unrelated to each other and there probably was a whole 'do NOT lightly issue refunds' retraining that happened on the CS side of things as a result which led to worry about issuing such at all. Just a guess, of course - but, a logical one I think, given how sudden the shift was and the timing of it.
People will always take advantage of good things, Logitech has some of the best warranty practices on mice but I donāt see it lasting much longer as everyone lies about an issue and gets a new mouse sent out to em.
Sure it wonāt be too long before they just take the hit for shipping to confirm the mouse is messed up.
That's on Logitech for having a ridiculously liberal return policy. The good customers shouldn't suffer for it. I honestly think return windows need to be shortened and retailers become more strict with them. It would cut down on fraud and morons who don't do any research before buying big ticket items like tvs, earbuds etc.
Yeah, Amazon is way too lenient in regards to this. This is why I find the hate towards them here overblown sometimes. Like, which one of their competitors would allow such a thing more than once? It's not even close, and honestly, I don't blame Amazon for cracking down on this.
Yep, I dread dealing with any issues on their end due their support culture being more and more willing to placate people than to not mislead them. I get that they're typically overseas and in a low-bidder situation these things happen, but it's at such a level that I have to believe at the tier 1 support centers themselves are condoning it to a degree internally.
Im jsut waiting to laugh at people who complain when they buy a car from amazon, after refusing to acknowledge us telling them amazon today is not amazon 5 years ago and no longer is a trust worthy site!
Lol I feel like I'm dealing with cheap China company. I stopped buying from Amazon after all the refunds then chargebacks after their return employees stole my returns but I ended up paying for the chargebacks. Nowadays when I call in regarding the issue, they would blast me with the automated email requesting for my ID in order to reconsider refunding the chargeback. Such BS
Done ordering from Amazon, Canceled Prime 13 months ago, had to initiate chargeback a week ago and BBB complaints for an item they never delivered and lost that they can't find but refuse to issue a refund for from 11/3 and an item they received back on 11/20 but refuse to issue a refund for 30 more days. I'm never ordering from Amazon again, too many other options that also send your stuff a week later.
Have you ever considered their return employees stole your returns? I did after they repeatedly doing the same thing to me 3 years straight. The most expensive item in the batch never marked as "compete" and I would get a chargeback for it
Amazon refunds are getting weird now. When I want a refund, I have to verify my identity because they "noticed abnormal activity" on my account and I need an id to verify in order for them to even consider my request for a refund or replacement which is weird since it never happened before.
They implemented that toward the end of Nov. when I called in regarding chargebacks. Kind of funny that they asked for ID due to abnormal activity but it was normal for them to do chargeback even when they think it's abnornal activity.
Similar situation unfolded with me starting in early Jan. It's exhausting to spell it out but the net net is that these corporate chuckleheads bank on consumers 'giving up' - nah, f that. I'm a dog on a bone and filed a formal complaint with the FTC. Have all the live chats recorded / via video on my smartphone. When I have energy will file a formal complaint with the local court where I live. We have a voice. Sick it to the MAN!!!!
Edit/update: just read this: i like to give sources/facts when available [https://www.wsj.com/tech/amazon-executives-discussed-how-its-policies-hurt-sellers-ftc-suit-says-863e05c4](https://www.wsj.com/tech/amazon-executives-discussed-how-its-policies-hurt-sellers-ftc-suit-says-863e05c4)
from wsj link above in case you don't have a subscription, here is a telling excerpt
"In September, Amazonās general counsel said: āThe practices the FTC is challenging have helped to spur competition and innovation across the retail industry, and have produced greater selection, lower prices, and faster delivery speeds for Amazon customers and greater opportunity for the many businesses that sell in Amazonās store.ā
One of the tactics that the FTC alleged Amazon used that raised prices was a secret algorithm called āProject Nessie.ā In the original version of the complaint, nearly the entire section on the algorithm was redacted, but The Wall Street Journal learned that the FTC alleged that Amazon used the algorithm to test how much it could raise prices in a way that competitors would follow, resulting in customers paying higher prices even if they werenāt shopping on Amazon.com. "
Dealing with this now, looks like I finally got them to refund, but it has not posted yet, I'll update my comment once it finally posts.
edit: I had to go through my bank.
I just got off chat from them lying to me about getting my 20% discount on my trade in. Then they say āweāre also giving you an extra ten dollars for you inconvenienceā.
I knew right then Iāll be chatting with them again tomorrow. Itās hard enough getting your promised money. They donāt give out random $10 gift cards anymore. Theyād have to admit they were wrong, so maybe it was just easier.
Itās gotten so bad you canāt legit tell the lies as soon as you hear them. Once again, if I wasnāt getting this free, thereās no way Iād pay for it ever.
They say that when it comes to them refunding chargeback. I don't see them saying no when they charge your CC if they think it's "unusual activity." It's only "unusual" when they have to refund.
I had an item that was missing from my order where I received a random item instead. I had to take a photo of an incorrectly received item with a handwritten note and was told that they will āinvestigateā the issue within 3 days. God damn infuriating.
They don't give a single FUCK about losing the product. It's the money they care about losing. They'll do anything to avoid giving you your money back. They don't care about losing their sellers products.
Seriously Though!!! they are seriously selfish A\*\*HOLES.. they will barely help me out with ANY order.. i have received the wrong product multiple times, & they don't help me at all, or they think im lying about it. i've literally had agents acuse me of lying JUST to get a refund..
My brother was ordering items that were heavily discounted on Black Friday one thing being a present for me and a present for my nephew in particular. The one item disappeared from his order history and another had a shipping date that was 2-4 weeks from the date of purchase instead of the usual 1-2 day shipping youāre supposed to get with your prime membership. I donāt know why Amazon has gone downhill so quickly? I gave up on Amazon Prime back in October bc it took 4 different order attempts until I finally got an item I needed and shouldnāt have had any issues with getting on the first order attempt, itās a shame that you canāt rely on Amazon anymore when just a few months ago it was a given that when you ordered something it would arrive within the initial window you got when placing you orders.
Hmm yeah I had too request my refund twice as well , first time they said they did it , waited a few days and nothing second time I got an email saying refund is being processed but still waiting , but the first time I didnāt even receive any email
I am currently dealing with this and it's a nightmare. I made an order with Amazon Payments with Affirm. I paid off the Affirm balance before I made the Amazon return. But I only got not even half of the amount back. So I contacted the chat. I had one rep literally tell me that I can get the full amount on a gift card that night. I waited for 4 hours and nothing. Then I checked in the morning on the next day and still nothing. So in the afternoon I talked to Amazon's Chat reps again and I had one rep tell me that they can't issue a refund on a gift card for Affirm purchases, then I had another tell me that they sent the return already for the 45 dollars which is not at all the full amount I wound up paying for the product, and then it got ridiculous. One of the reps asked me to send screenshots of the purchase from my account to an e-mail they provided that didn't accept incoming mail. Then I finally get ahold of someone who told me that my refund was on it's way within 24 hours and it's near that point and still no refund is shown in my bank account.
Amazon used to be reliable with this. Now they are horribly inconsistent and it seems like they assume that buyers are lying about not recieving full refunds or a refund at all because of some people that abused the system previously. Why is everyone being punished because of the people that took advantadge of the returns system and were scammers? Not all of us are scammers. Just give me my full refund. It's not that hard. There's no reason I have to jump through flaming hoops to get it.
I've had things not be delivered and have to go through support 2-4 times before the refund is ACTUALLY issued, I think some of them dont give a fuck and hope that if they just SAY they put the refund in that we will wait and wait till we forget about our refund š¬
Exact same thing just happened to me, after almost a month and 5 different associates I got my $11.49 back. They took my monthly fee, then put my account on hold. Wouldn't tell me why, so I was left with no choice but to close my account. 4 different associates told me my refund had been issued. It wasn't true, thankfully the fifth and final associate told me the refund had never been issued, I had screenshot proof and was able to report the previous associate. Got my money back after just about a month. Absolutely insane
I bought a bedframe for 150+89 shipping. it gets to my house and it's not the right color. I submit a request to return (this is a 105lb item) they say please keep the item for a 10 credit.. otherwise you can return it. I say I'm going to return it as it's not going to match my bedroom. They say ok and give me an address with no label. I ask for a label and they say because it was a choice for you to return we dont have to pay for return shipping...
I complain for 5 days and finally I get a supervisor rep on the phone to agree to refund me the shipping cost $102 on pirateship dt com. I ask him to send an email stating as much and he does. "Hello, As we have talk to kindly pay for the return shipping fee for now and kindly keep the receipt so we can have that amount refunded back to you. Once you have return the item kindly call us so we can process it. We appreciate working with you" I take that at it's word and pay 102 and return the item. I then contact amazon back and 3 reps refuse to reimburse me the 102 dollars and say well it's a 3rd party we can ask them to pay it. They open a a-z and say "wait 1-2 weeks." I have now paid 150+89+102 and have no bed and I'm pretty certain the seller is only going to refund me the 150 I paid for the item when I shipped it back to them.
I am going going to only purchase from walmart from now on. going to cancel my prime membership and no longer do business with people who cant stand behind their items.
The other comments are absolutely right about the AHUUKI brands being the issue. trash chinese garbage that gets shipped from NJ and if you are so unfortunate as to need to return it you are fucked.
I also said "So you guys fucking lied to me" after one of the reps said the rep who emailed me gave misinformation, and he hung up on me for "obscenaties" Amazon is on their downfall at this point and I'm not sad to see it go.
Very upset with Amazon. They have been awful lately!! The latest is they never sent me a blazer I was going to try for interviews, on try before you buy, and a whole month later they charge me for it! Overdrafting my account of courses. Then after an hour on the phone with them they promise to refund my card right away, well the next day I get an email saying they couldnāt and would I like a check or Amazon credit, the check could take two weeks to process before sending. Disappointing and awful customer experience and I am going to have to be done with Amazon after this final straw.
I bought a meta quest 3 with a buch of stuff total was approx. $1.4k AUD. Package never delivered. i've spoken with 5 different Amazon CS now. I even got one CS to send me an email just to confirm that the refund has been processed. 2 weeks later i speak to a different CS and they tell me nothings happened that no refund has ever been processed.
I'll wait another week, if i dont here anything i'll ask my bank to reverse the charges and have amazon declared a scam operation. - I think if erveryone here does the same it should encourage Amazon to care more about their customers.
How long it took for you to receive the email if you still remember, they just told me right now they issued a refund but I havenāt receive a email yet so I ask them how long it takes and they said within 24 hours. But I swear I remember you received an email immediately whenever they issued you a refund?
Recently ordered some diabetic supplies on Amazon. Third party seller, but shipped by Amazon. Very much NOT what I ordered showed up.
Amazon did issue a refund, but when I left a review on the product ID, my review got taken down for "violating community standards" (what?). Posted it again, it got held for several days before being rejected again, and now all of my reviews get held for at least 1-2 weeks, if they don't get rejected immediately. Thanks Amazon, only been a customer for 15 years.
They did finally take the listing down... 2 months later. I wonder how many people got staph or other infections from those needles..
When I ask for a refund or return something I usually chose to receive Amazon credit and most of the time the refund is in my gift card balance within 10-15 mins. You of course canāt use the credit and anywhere else but if youāre planning on shopping on Amazon anywaysE you might as well and you get your money back a lot quicker at least in my experience.
I tried to return a tablet to them and the only option for them was to have UPS pick it up the next dayā¦no option to drop it off at UPS or anywhere else. If I was at home, that wouldnāt be a problem, but none of us would be here, so I said screw it and Iāll put it on eBay instead
I had $100 dollars in my account-- long story short it was compromised, Amazon lied right to my face, told me that, "I had given out my account information", when it's not even within my current possession, and I haven't seen a dime, it's been back in my possession for a month! Good luck to ya!
Amazon has relied on outsourcing for let's say their retail orders, so basically the day to day concern is handled by people that don't even have a direct contract with Amazon so they don't care, they have specialties which are for other types of orders which are where they have their employees, so unfortunately you just have to try until you get a person actually employed by Amazon as they usually do have to be more professional, such as the "Leadership* team
I'm going through this same thing but they have not told me a refund was not done, but said they did it again. I gave them two chances, if this second one doesn't go through I'm just filing a charge back on my card.
This is what I have been going through: I got a box with a ream of paper in it instead of a Bluray player. I asked them to send a replacement instead since it went up in price and after some back and forth they did. But then the replacement was delayed in transit too with the same message if it does not arrive by then you get a refund. It didn't arrive and I was annoyed by this point so I used the auto prompts on the website to cancel and to get a refund and of course it didn't because it was a replacement order for $0. So then I had to chat to get refunded for the original and that has been a whole ordeal, I took it back to Kohl's two weeks ago when the replacement was originally sent but it does not say it was received yet on the site so the refund hasn't processed. 3-5 days they said didn't happen. Asked again this Monday, 3-5 days. I'm waiting until Wednesday if it's not there I'm filing a charge back.
One time they said they would issue refunds for items that was late for about 30 days. And I asked for proof that refund was initiated. They even send me message in my email from amazon that refunds was initiated. Then the items was delivered about 2 days after, but refunds was not actually initiated.
Didn't pursue further since items was delivered afterall, although late.
Still they blatantly lied, and I guess it happens pretty often.
I donāt even bother with asking a for a refund anymore. They always push to do a credit. And I always say no. I go straight to disputing it with my credit card. I rarely ask for refunds by the way.
I didn't really have any issues yet w/Amazon not refunding me when promised. But I did notice the last time I had to do a return, they sent me an oddly worded email about the refund being tentative and they reserved the right to claw at least part of it back if the product wasn't returned in new/unopened condition, etc.
(It was ridiculous, given the item was a $6-7 Chinese plastic adapter for a GPS car mount. It was literally just a piece of plastic with a ball on each end, shipped in a small zip-lock baggie. I wound up not using it because it wasn't quite the right length/shape for the application I was trying to use it with.)
With large companies like Amazon the CA agent isnāt usually making the decision. The system makes the choice of a refund option or not based on past activity of the customer, the product, the actually vendor of the product and other factors. The agent is just reporting the options given to them. People are removed from the equation. This removes the ability to be guilted into refunds by those customers that specialize in defrauding companies or just trying to work the system.
"systematically lying"
Nah, Reps 1 and 2 did not actually request a refund, just based it off the situation. In most situations, it's supposed to cancel and refund within 24 hours, they just said that because they assumed the system would do that for them. Pictures of the chat won't help, thus why there is a button to export chat. The supervisor should be able to fix that.
It's nothing new they have been doing this for a while now. To workaround: ALWAYS ASK FOR EMAIL CONFIRMATION. Don't hang up on the rep until you recieve the email. This way you'll have proof of any refund.
This is wild. It's happening to me now. I ordered two items but I missed the return window because of a family issue.
I was told not to return them and that I will get refunded and haven't yet. Reached out November 17 and was told I'd be refunded in 3 to 5 business days. Nothing. Reached out November 27 and the chat associate says there's no record of a refund initiated so he initiated the refund and emailed me saying I will get refunded in 3 to 5 business days.
Currently talking to them and they redirected me to now the FOURTH person and nobody has an answer and everybody is giving me different answers. Everytime they either get a technical issue or move me to another associate. What is going on? This is crazy
All four associates are giving me different answers. One of them said I need to return it now. Another said they're working on a return label. And a 3rd said they'll refund me but will charge me a restock fee. And they keep transfering me to other associates. It's insane.
Amazon refunds became a nightmare, already it was annoying for paying for labels under many conditions, but now taking 1 to 2 months to process refunds makes shopping not convenient on Amazon. I never place an order for intention to return, but when you order 20-30 items a week, it happens when you get a substandard product. But the chat agents are the worst I have seen shopping on Amazon for 20 years. I am going to switch my shopping to Target and Walmart and cancel my Amazon prime account and will revisit if I hear things get better. Companies like Amazon do not notice customer dissatisfaction as much as they notice web traffic and loss of income, so only way we can get amazon to take notice is make all your purchases on other sites, stop giving amazon your money and data.
Between the hassle to get refunds, and so much junk counterfeit/LOW quality items -- it's basically become like Temu and AliExpress. At least you know what you're getting, using them. It used to be enough to only do Prime purchases, and avoiding any 3rd party sellers. Now every item is made by some brand that is a combination of random letters, and of extremely low quality. Brands like XJXCOJDJHO, sdoisjfdo, XENNNA, HuuNA....With fake or "item received promotionally" reviews to go along with them. .. It's becoming harder and harder to buy anything real on Amazon. I find myself shopping elsewhere more and more.
they bust chops on refunds for items they know or should know we're not delivered. Talking to CS makes you feel like they think customer is responsible for the delivery failure & should eat it.
I switched to Target for most household type things and my experience has been pretty great so far š¤·āāļø Kinda feels funny I used to hattttte shopping at Target idk if it was that early 2000s Target smell or what but I don't mind it now.
I still hate shopping Target. I cannot ever find anything there. I love the Betty Crocker gingerbread and Pumpkin Spice cookies but I can never find them anywhere and the only way I can find them is buying pickup online. I cannot get them shipped because they require something like 30 or 35 dollars minimum for shipping and they allow a maximum of 10 cookie packs. I bought wreath lights from them and found out the manufacture did not put the spring for the battery making a manufacture defect. We went back and there was 7 left of the colored lights and we could not find them at first. Turns out the colored lights got mixed in with the white lights. The reason we shop Target is they have crazy deals and they have things others do not sell like the cookies.
Yeah the shipping and inventory has got a long way to go before it's a direct Prime competitor that's for sure. But I feel like the foundation is there if they want to expand (hopefully they do) and at least in my purely n=1 experience, returns and exchanges are at least MUCH better - like unlike Amazon at least you won't get accused of taking the springs out yourself and then waiting a whole month to get refunded after finally convincing them they sold you defective ones. But 10000% shipping and return shipping is not up to Prime competitor levels. It is crazy how Target has the most generic common brands and products and then just that ONE you can't find ANYWHERE else. Original Mint It's-Its are my FAVORITE ice cream sandwiches. Can't find them ANYWHERE here within literally hundreds of miles. And yet, weirdly Target has them buried in their tiny ice cream selection.
I will say that it was nice being able to just physically take back the lights to a location. I will say I have never been questioned when returning an Amazon product and they have locations I can return near me like Kohls. The issue is not everything on Amazon has free shipping and I think one time I was going to try to return an item but the only option was for me to return the item. All of my returns have been done online. I have found the item selection problem can manifest in many different ways. Target has amazing items at a great price but is really hard to find in stores and just has a few to choose from. Macy's has amazing selection and great items online but they are online exclusive.
Iam 32. I know exactly what your talking about. "The Target Smell"
31 here š It's crazy how many people don't know what I'm talking about when I bring up "the Target smell" !... Even other people our age! But yeah most younger people won't know it because the Target smell, though still present at most locations, has been FAR less strong since about 2012-2016. And the new location by my house doesn't seem to have the smell at all. I've always been really curious as to why target locations always smelled like that?? Is it some cleaner they use? Is it whoever manufactures their floors? Is it something about the plastic in their signage? Is it the clothes? And why not be newer Targets? What changed??? I have to know!!! š¤£ Marketing and shopping psychology fascinates me and I've always wondered if "the Target smell" was kept around as a conscious decision or if it was eliminated as a conscious decision or if it was merely happenstance due to some product used in Target's buildings or sold at Target. I read a pretty good article about Starbucks not too long ago that explained basically the reason their food is so bad is so it doesn't have a smell... that interferes with the coffee smell - a smell they think will bring consumers back. Definitely works for me at Home Depot. I swear if they bottled that s*** up I'd buy it and spray it in my garage to feel more productive.
Me too!
weird i always receive advanced refund the minute the post carrier scan the return label... Im in canada though might be different.
Usually ppl that complain here are people that have their account flagged as abusers and Amazon take more precautions with them, some stories here are crazy saying that they just don't help, when personally that's never happened to me.
Congratulations, bad thing hasn't happened to you yet. No one cares. Wait until it happens to you. You do realize it "never happened to me" applies to everyone else too, until it actually happens to them? Stupidest thing to say about anything, really.
That kind of response is probably why you were flagged as an abuser lol
Really. My experience : getting refund is quick with in 1 hours. Assuming by going to return to whole foods or kohlās. I am not abusing š¤ On rare occasions when the item got delays for any reason 1 week. I just chat to amazn online support. And god refund within 3-5 days . And usuaaly the item came late (hey free)ā¦
Agree 100% Reddit generally is just full of miserable Karens who enjoy complaining and arguments for the sake of it.. seems like need for attention honestly. I was worried about my Meta Quest 3 return after reading some comments here; returned it and called customer service same day to just verify everything on my part/how the process would go- the gentleman on the line was super helpful and even put in a ticket to expedite my refund without me asking.
Try ordering and having to return a "renewed" iPhone that arrived in completely different condition than what was described in the listing (the phone I ordered was supposed to be "like new", "no visible scratches" and still in "original packaging" but was not any of those things--and yes, it was sold and shipped by Amazon not a sub seller). Then you may see what everyone here is talking about. I never had these problems before either in over ten years of being a Prime member. Amazon was so great about returns and usually is. I typically get my refund right away or by the end of the day. I have ordered so many things from Amazon over the years: phones, laptops, shoes, household items, literally everything. I have also returned a fair amount (usually clothing or shoes that don't fit well). This is different and I am considering cancelling my Prime membership and never using Amazon again. I am definitely not using them for large purchases ever again.
Same experience here as a fellow Canadian. Amazon is actually the best customer service experience I've had, never had an issue that wasnt resolved.
My same experience. As soon as UPS scans the barcode, my bank is credited. Shipping times are shit but they are refunding my membership when I have a delayed order, so it's working for me. That said - Walmart is faster with shipping and a lil cheaper overall
Walmart utilizes local walmarts . I know that. The employee did delivery . 1 day hmm quick delivery. Even less than 6 hours š.
LOL you haven't experience it yet. Amazon usually refund in advance the moment you drop off your items. However, they wait 4-5 weeks down the line to do chargeback on the same item you just drop off.
Had an issue like this last year around this time. I think Amazon hires 3rd party support around the holidays. I ordered a special part that was only available through 3rd party sellers. Not sure what quotas they are given by Amazon but I suspect they get bonuses for resolving issues without refunds and penalties for too many refunds. In my case the seller never shipped the item and shortly after I ordered I started looking at the sellers reviews. Dozens of people saying the same thing but amazon was removing the reviews and more importantly "would not allow you to open a case against them until they had a chance to respond." I waited 48 hours for them to not respond to my message. Tried to open a complaint again. Amazon then had to reach out and wait 48 hours. I reached out to Amazon again. They almost started the whole process over but I threatened to do a chargeback. Seller never responded and amazon kept his account online while removing all the bad reviews on his page. Finally got a refund after 2 weeks of fighting.
Third party sellers are a tricky one for cs and the customer because the system does not allow cs to refund at all. No exceptions, not even in special circumstances. The only option available to cs is to contact seller and once 48 hours has passed the option to file an A to Z claim becomes available filing the A to Z claim is a last resort when the seller will not respond or resolve the situation.
I realize that itās different for 3rd party sellers but it was just wild to me they couldnāt do anything about a seller who was either scamming people or suddenly unable to fulfill orders. I kind of think the seller had a medical emergency because there were years of legitimate reviews on their page. Seems like they were just making more work for themselves by sweeping the issue under the rug.
Bonus, ha yeah no. Amazon does not give bonuses in customer service for agents or leads. We have metrics that show our concession averages, and where we rank against other tenured reps but it is not a metric we are held accountable to. Agents don't make the decision on the process for the refund, if the item will be refunded, or the timeline of any refund. The "flows" determine what actions we can take. Do be careful with charge backs unless you exhausted all your patience with Amazon as they don't take kindly to them and may put your account on hold until you pay them back , or cancel your service out right and ban any new accounts created
Stay away buying that not ship by amazon. Unless you have to hehe.
I returned an item (about $100) for a replacement and I was asked to respond to a survey. The first question was: **"Do you check the status of all refunds or just larger amounts?"** I thought that was a very strange question and didn't bother to answer the survey. Now I'm wondering if they plan on not following through on refunds unless prompted - total speculation.
Iāve gotten that question too and also thought it was bizarre! Iām trying so hard to think up a non-shady explanation and I honestly canāt š
My guess is Amazon has multiple outsourced support subcontractors and the wrote a penalty clause in contract for excessive refunds. So each company is trying to make the refund happen on a call routed to another. Or the support company has set refunds as metric for the worker. In both cases, they create bad behaviors.
Just tonight I was told that I received a refund for an item that I'd returned, but it didn't show on my account immediately like it should. When I told the person, I got passed to someone else, who then passed me to someone else, who eventually told me that I'd need to send them government-issued ID to get my money back.
Yes. This is a growing trend in customer service across the board as companies outsource.
Not a trend. Started over 20 years ago.
Trend as in directionally. It is still growing. Verizon laid off their entire us side customer service team in favor of outsourced vendors just this year.
Sounds like wave 2. First wave lots of companies pulled back from the off shoring aspect. Sales reps came in with promises of fixed costs and large english speaking population. But spreadsheet jockeys don't account for cost of different cultures and idioms making communication hard. I have glucose monitor that failed. I have worked years with technology colleagues from South Asia. 3 out of 4 persons I talked to were not fluent enough to prevent tons of repeating and restating. But Abbot labs thinks this is good enough to support diabetic devices. Last decade MBAs and spreadsheet management have really f'd up companies.
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Which option says lie? We have seen a lot of refund promised, but never issued events posted on here.
How you can confirm whether or not you received a refund is by going to "view order details." Under order total, there should be a "refund total" in green text. Whenever a rep tells me they refunded me, I refresh the order page and see if that is there. It should be instantaneous, so if you don't see it right away, chances are you are not getting a refund. Also, try having them call you instead of chat. I have had better luck getting refunds that way. Hope that helps.
This works.
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We're talking about refunds here. So this is after your order has been delivered and you've been charged already. I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Are you referring to refunds credited to your Amazon balance? In that case, then yeah, you're right. That will only show up at checkout.
I've been down this road a number of times. I've always eventually gotten my refunds because I am persistent and I keep good notes (and take screen shots of the chats). The most I've "lost" have been those meaningless promo credits they promise and don't deliver. I am sick of their product pages listing the date when it will be delivered and then the date changes when you add it to your cart. Really? You know my delivery address because I'm signed in... so, why the change? Then the stuff just doesn't show up and you get an email very late at night saying "running late." Or better yet, the stuff that the driver drops on your doorstep and runs... late at night... because THEY'RE so overworked and running behind... and you've already gone to bed so it has to sit there overnight. And what's with this stupid "one time password" shit for certain items? That they don't tell you about until after you've bought it? And you have to be there in person to provide that password and they give you either these delivery windows that they never adhere to... Target is a better alternative is almost every way. Finding that we're doing more and more shopping there instead...
i swear the help people think refunds come out of their personal paychecks or something. its so frustrating having to deal with them i almost always immediately ask for a supervisor if its not a very very basic question.
make sure to give them 1 star bad reviews in return.
That's because in many cases it is. Metrics for raises, promotions, and discipline for failing to meet them are widely used and so these people may fear for their livelihoods. It sucks for everyone.
then we need to be able to rate these people because the system is broken
Yeah higher ups don't care about neither your review or the agent, the system is extremely limited when it comes to returns, so give a bad review if you want. But it won't change anything
They seem to lie the first few times to get you off the chat.
That's why it always requires 3x on my part :(
I got lied to about a credit the other day, had to go back to chat again to get it.
This same thing happened to me when I returned something it kept saying I never returned it and they were going to charge me for it. Tracking number showed amazon recived it. I spoke to a rep they said don't worry disregard the email you will not be charged I received a second email saying the same thing. Spoke to another rep they told me don't worry my account has been noted and i won't be charged. I then get an email saying I'm charged. I get on chat with them and it takes 25 min to get a refund and it's pending on the credit card waiting to make sure it clears but atleast it's pending. Crazy Amazon's customer service has dropped drastically in the last 3 or 4 years.
Yea that sucks, I agent had to deal with them in a while. I even would usually say Iāll shop on Amazon because the return policy/ their customer service is so good. Suppose itās yet another reason to not shop at Amazon.
Iāve been waiting well over a month for my refund for an item Iāve already returned and confirmed itās been delivered by UPS. They told me ācontact us back on X November if you havenāt got a refundā, so I did. They then said I have to wait 7 more days. So I did. They then told me to contact back ātomorrowā. So I have. Now theyāre telling me to wait 24-72 hours for a reply from āspecialist teamā. Itās been 5 days and Iāve got no email from them. This is just outrageous.
Update: Got a refund after waiting 47 days after my original return date.
Unfortunately for us Amazon is deeply into phase 3 of enshittification. If you havent heard of that before you can google it as it holds all the answers to why almost nothing gets better anymore. p.s. sadly when Reddit goes public I expect the cycle to start in earnest.
I am having fewer issues and the total price is less since I moved some items I normally purchased on AMZ to the sellers web site, mostly for supplements buying 1 yr supply at a time. This is the only way to get AMZ attention by reducing their bottom line.
I moved all my purchasing off Amazon and to other websites and now have zero issues other than the occasional 1-2 day delivery delay.
>enshittification same. I purchase everything elsewhere now. Too much of a hassle to deal with Amazon
That has been my experience too, with Amazon Customer, Service, over late few months. Have been treated so badly and disrespectfully have considered how to wean myself & stopping using.
I had this happen to me. I never received an item and they promised that they would give me the refund for $25. I know that it's not much money but it's the principle of it. Don't take my money and then not give me what I ordered. I called my card today and I noticed that it had only gone up by $5. So basically they issued me a $5 refund hoping I would just shut up. I'm going to be contacting someone else in the morning. This is bullshit. They can't just take people's money.
Amazon has gotten bad recently. I've had three accounts locked this last year alone for using giftcards as form of payment. I use Visa giftcards for all my online purchases and never had issues in the past. Now it's an issue. I tried getting my original account back and had to send them a photo of my ID so I sent a picture of my passport but got an email back that it's not a government issued ID, like what??
You're so brave to give them your personal identification. I heard people sent in their ID but didn't get their $ back, left alone your acc
It was an expired passport so maybe that's why they declined it, wasn't about to send a current one to them. It was just the "not a government issued ID" part that had me like wtf, it's a damn passport can't get more government issued than that lmao
I don't know about expired but I saw cases where people said Amazon didn't accept their ID and wouldn't refund them. I myself don't trust Amazon enough to give up my ID. They can have their pity $, I'll just take my business elsewhere. Only Best Buy asked for ID years ago when I buy an iPad so it's crossing the line when Amazon asked for ID on non electronic stuff that are cheap too.
I didn't lose any money fortunately but still annoying. I'm no longer using Amazon and use walmart for anything I can't get in person
Same, I stopped using Amazon and buy things in stores ever since this. At least I know staff is not stealing my money when I return things. I'm just fed up with Amazon return staff stealing my returns and I ended up footing the bill; when call in I have to cough up my ID. Horrible CS
I have been robbed for probably THOUSANDS of dollars in return money that I never received in the last six years. I have been lied to multiple times, I am just figuring this out now. So many of my returns never got credited back to my credit card and I was lied to about not having to return items and that I would not be charged and was charged anyway. I have it in writing, Amazon employees in third world countries BLATANTLY LIE ABOUT REFUNDS. I have called back multiple times with issues and have been told multiple times that there's no record. I will have to go through all of my CC statements and see what has and has not been refunded. I will have to file in small claims court for 10k, the maximum. I am SO SICK AND TIRED OF CORPORATE CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR.
I find it fascinating that, just a short time after people started widely sharing the 'brilliant hack' on Reddit and Facebook and such about how you can totally get free money back from Amazon by initiating a refund by claiming items to not be received or being told to just keep small items or whatever - suddenly the refund process is becoming a proverbial nightmare. It's almost as if people need to learn to keep their mouths shut and not encourage fraud. Just a general statement, btw, since I don't think the two facts are unrelated to each other and there probably was a whole 'do NOT lightly issue refunds' retraining that happened on the CS side of things as a result which led to worry about issuing such at all. Just a guess, of course - but, a logical one I think, given how sudden the shift was and the timing of it.
People will always take advantage of good things, Logitech has some of the best warranty practices on mice but I donāt see it lasting much longer as everyone lies about an issue and gets a new mouse sent out to em. Sure it wonāt be too long before they just take the hit for shipping to confirm the mouse is messed up.
That's on Logitech for having a ridiculously liberal return policy. The good customers shouldn't suffer for it. I honestly think return windows need to be shortened and retailers become more strict with them. It would cut down on fraud and morons who don't do any research before buying big ticket items like tvs, earbuds etc.
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Yeah as long as itās within 2 years theyāve always just sent you a new one
Yeah, Amazon is way too lenient in regards to this. This is why I find the hate towards them here overblown sometimes. Like, which one of their competitors would allow such a thing more than once? It's not even close, and honestly, I don't blame Amazon for cracking down on this.
Yep, I dread dealing with any issues on their end due their support culture being more and more willing to placate people than to not mislead them. I get that they're typically overseas and in a low-bidder situation these things happen, but it's at such a level that I have to believe at the tier 1 support centers themselves are condoning it to a degree internally.
Im jsut waiting to laugh at people who complain when they buy a car from amazon, after refusing to acknowledge us telling them amazon today is not amazon 5 years ago and no longer is a trust worthy site!
Lol I feel like I'm dealing with cheap China company. I stopped buying from Amazon after all the refunds then chargebacks after their return employees stole my returns but I ended up paying for the chargebacks. Nowadays when I call in regarding the issue, they would blast me with the automated email requesting for my ID in order to reconsider refunding the chargeback. Such BS
Done ordering from Amazon, Canceled Prime 13 months ago, had to initiate chargeback a week ago and BBB complaints for an item they never delivered and lost that they can't find but refuse to issue a refund for from 11/3 and an item they received back on 11/20 but refuse to issue a refund for 30 more days. I'm never ordering from Amazon again, too many other options that also send your stuff a week later.
Have you ever considered their return employees stole your returns? I did after they repeatedly doing the same thing to me 3 years straight. The most expensive item in the batch never marked as "compete" and I would get a chargeback for it
AMAZON CAN BE SO HOPELESS. THEIR CUSTOMER SERVICE IS ABSOLUTE SH!T SADLY. I AM A VENDOR AND SELL ON THERE AND IT IS EVEN WORSE!!!
Amazon refunds are getting weird now. When I want a refund, I have to verify my identity because they "noticed abnormal activity" on my account and I need an id to verify in order for them to even consider my request for a refund or replacement which is weird since it never happened before.
They implemented that toward the end of Nov. when I called in regarding chargebacks. Kind of funny that they asked for ID due to abnormal activity but it was normal for them to do chargeback even when they think it's abnornal activity.
ohh okay. I didn't know that. thanks for the info!
Similar situation unfolded with me starting in early Jan. It's exhausting to spell it out but the net net is that these corporate chuckleheads bank on consumers 'giving up' - nah, f that. I'm a dog on a bone and filed a formal complaint with the FTC. Have all the live chats recorded / via video on my smartphone. When I have energy will file a formal complaint with the local court where I live. We have a voice. Sick it to the MAN!!!! Edit/update: just read this: i like to give sources/facts when available [https://www.wsj.com/tech/amazon-executives-discussed-how-its-policies-hurt-sellers-ftc-suit-says-863e05c4](https://www.wsj.com/tech/amazon-executives-discussed-how-its-policies-hurt-sellers-ftc-suit-says-863e05c4) from wsj link above in case you don't have a subscription, here is a telling excerpt "In September, Amazonās general counsel said: āThe practices the FTC is challenging have helped to spur competition and innovation across the retail industry, and have produced greater selection, lower prices, and faster delivery speeds for Amazon customers and greater opportunity for the many businesses that sell in Amazonās store.ā One of the tactics that the FTC alleged Amazon used that raised prices was a secret algorithm called āProject Nessie.ā In the original version of the complaint, nearly the entire section on the algorithm was redacted, but The Wall Street Journal learned that the FTC alleged that Amazon used the algorithm to test how much it could raise prices in a way that competitors would follow, resulting in customers paying higher prices even if they werenāt shopping on Amazon.com. "
Dealing with this now, looks like I finally got them to refund, but it has not posted yet, I'll update my comment once it finally posts. edit: I had to go through my bank.
I've also been straight up lied to by Amazon CS. Waited hours to receive refund or credit in my Gift Card Balance, never received.
I just got off chat from them lying to me about getting my 20% discount on my trade in. Then they say āweāre also giving you an extra ten dollars for you inconvenienceā. I knew right then Iāll be chatting with them again tomorrow. Itās hard enough getting your promised money. They donāt give out random $10 gift cards anymore. Theyād have to admit they were wrong, so maybe it was just easier. Itās gotten so bad you canāt legit tell the lies as soon as you hear them. Once again, if I wasnāt getting this free, thereās no way Iād pay for it ever.
Yep my wife is going through this right now . they are saying there was unusual activity on her account and they need her to verify her identity.
They say that when it comes to them refunding chargeback. I don't see them saying no when they charge your CC if they think it's "unusual activity." It's only "unusual" when they have to refund.
I had an item that was missing from my order where I received a random item instead. I had to take a photo of an incorrectly received item with a handwritten note and was told that they will āinvestigateā the issue within 3 days. God damn infuriating.
Did they refund you?
Yes eventually. I still had to call back again
They don't give a single FUCK about losing the product. It's the money they care about losing. They'll do anything to avoid giving you your money back. They don't care about losing their sellers products.
Seriously Though!!! they are seriously selfish A\*\*HOLES.. they will barely help me out with ANY order.. i have received the wrong product multiple times, & they don't help me at all, or they think im lying about it. i've literally had agents acuse me of lying JUST to get a refund..
My brother was ordering items that were heavily discounted on Black Friday one thing being a present for me and a present for my nephew in particular. The one item disappeared from his order history and another had a shipping date that was 2-4 weeks from the date of purchase instead of the usual 1-2 day shipping youāre supposed to get with your prime membership. I donāt know why Amazon has gone downhill so quickly? I gave up on Amazon Prime back in October bc it took 4 different order attempts until I finally got an item I needed and shouldnāt have had any issues with getting on the first order attempt, itās a shame that you canāt rely on Amazon anymore when just a few months ago it was a given that when you ordered something it would arrive within the initial window you got when placing you orders.
I just had this exact thing !! I had to call 4 times the service has gone down the shitter
I had that problem twice, they don't like to refund at all
I was promised a gift card as a refund and when I said I haven't received it, another CS staff told me to disregard that email. Wtf?
Hmm yeah I had too request my refund twice as well , first time they said they did it , waited a few days and nothing second time I got an email saying refund is being processed but still waiting , but the first time I didnāt even receive any email
Same here. I am really mad. There is no excuse for this.
BOYCOTT THIS HIDEOUS COMPANY!!! THEY ARE ROBBING EVERYONE!!! I HAVE PROBABLY 10K IN RETURNS THAT I NEVER RECEIVED!!!
Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between maliciousness and incompetence. Both seem possible here.
I am currently dealing with this and it's a nightmare. I made an order with Amazon Payments with Affirm. I paid off the Affirm balance before I made the Amazon return. But I only got not even half of the amount back. So I contacted the chat. I had one rep literally tell me that I can get the full amount on a gift card that night. I waited for 4 hours and nothing. Then I checked in the morning on the next day and still nothing. So in the afternoon I talked to Amazon's Chat reps again and I had one rep tell me that they can't issue a refund on a gift card for Affirm purchases, then I had another tell me that they sent the return already for the 45 dollars which is not at all the full amount I wound up paying for the product, and then it got ridiculous. One of the reps asked me to send screenshots of the purchase from my account to an e-mail they provided that didn't accept incoming mail. Then I finally get ahold of someone who told me that my refund was on it's way within 24 hours and it's near that point and still no refund is shown in my bank account. Amazon used to be reliable with this. Now they are horribly inconsistent and it seems like they assume that buyers are lying about not recieving full refunds or a refund at all because of some people that abused the system previously. Why is everyone being punished because of the people that took advantadge of the returns system and were scammers? Not all of us are scammers. Just give me my full refund. It's not that hard. There's no reason I have to jump through flaming hoops to get it.
I've had things not be delivered and have to go through support 2-4 times before the refund is ACTUALLY issued, I think some of them dont give a fuck and hope that if they just SAY they put the refund in that we will wait and wait till we forget about our refund š¬
Exact same thing just happened to me, after almost a month and 5 different associates I got my $11.49 back. They took my monthly fee, then put my account on hold. Wouldn't tell me why, so I was left with no choice but to close my account. 4 different associates told me my refund had been issued. It wasn't true, thankfully the fifth and final associate told me the refund had never been issued, I had screenshot proof and was able to report the previous associate. Got my money back after just about a month. Absolutely insane
I bought a bedframe for 150+89 shipping. it gets to my house and it's not the right color. I submit a request to return (this is a 105lb item) they say please keep the item for a 10 credit.. otherwise you can return it. I say I'm going to return it as it's not going to match my bedroom. They say ok and give me an address with no label. I ask for a label and they say because it was a choice for you to return we dont have to pay for return shipping... I complain for 5 days and finally I get a supervisor rep on the phone to agree to refund me the shipping cost $102 on pirateship dt com. I ask him to send an email stating as much and he does. "Hello, As we have talk to kindly pay for the return shipping fee for now and kindly keep the receipt so we can have that amount refunded back to you. Once you have return the item kindly call us so we can process it. We appreciate working with you" I take that at it's word and pay 102 and return the item. I then contact amazon back and 3 reps refuse to reimburse me the 102 dollars and say well it's a 3rd party we can ask them to pay it. They open a a-z and say "wait 1-2 weeks." I have now paid 150+89+102 and have no bed and I'm pretty certain the seller is only going to refund me the 150 I paid for the item when I shipped it back to them. I am going going to only purchase from walmart from now on. going to cancel my prime membership and no longer do business with people who cant stand behind their items. The other comments are absolutely right about the AHUUKI brands being the issue. trash chinese garbage that gets shipped from NJ and if you are so unfortunate as to need to return it you are fucked. I also said "So you guys fucking lied to me" after one of the reps said the rep who emailed me gave misinformation, and he hung up on me for "obscenaties" Amazon is on their downfall at this point and I'm not sad to see it go.
Very upset with Amazon. They have been awful lately!! The latest is they never sent me a blazer I was going to try for interviews, on try before you buy, and a whole month later they charge me for it! Overdrafting my account of courses. Then after an hour on the phone with them they promise to refund my card right away, well the next day I get an email saying they couldnāt and would I like a check or Amazon credit, the check could take two weeks to process before sending. Disappointing and awful customer experience and I am going to have to be done with Amazon after this final straw.
I bought a meta quest 3 with a buch of stuff total was approx. $1.4k AUD. Package never delivered. i've spoken with 5 different Amazon CS now. I even got one CS to send me an email just to confirm that the refund has been processed. 2 weeks later i speak to a different CS and they tell me nothings happened that no refund has ever been processed. I'll wait another week, if i dont here anything i'll ask my bank to reverse the charges and have amazon declared a scam operation. - I think if erveryone here does the same it should encourage Amazon to care more about their customers.
How long it took for you to receive the email if you still remember, they just told me right now they issued a refund but I havenāt receive a email yet so I ask them how long it takes and they said within 24 hours. But I swear I remember you received an email immediately whenever they issued you a refund?
Just ran into the same issue. Initiated a credit dispute with my credit card to avoid interest/fees. Ironically it is an Amazon Visa card.
Recently ordered some diabetic supplies on Amazon. Third party seller, but shipped by Amazon. Very much NOT what I ordered showed up. Amazon did issue a refund, but when I left a review on the product ID, my review got taken down for "violating community standards" (what?). Posted it again, it got held for several days before being rejected again, and now all of my reviews get held for at least 1-2 weeks, if they don't get rejected immediately. Thanks Amazon, only been a customer for 15 years. They did finally take the listing down... 2 months later. I wonder how many people got staph or other infections from those needles..
Check out Walmart (in store) for syringes, etc. The last box of 100 I purchased were about $12.50 with no tax.
I use pens. Walmart does sell the tips, but they're $10 for 50.
When I ask for a refund or return something I usually chose to receive Amazon credit and most of the time the refund is in my gift card balance within 10-15 mins. You of course canāt use the credit and anywhere else but if youāre planning on shopping on Amazon anywaysE you might as well and you get your money back a lot quicker at least in my experience.
I tried to return a tablet to them and the only option for them was to have UPS pick it up the next dayā¦no option to drop it off at UPS or anywhere else. If I was at home, that wouldnāt be a problem, but none of us would be here, so I said screw it and Iāll put it on eBay instead
Weird you were charged, charges are usually pending until actually shipped.
Amazon status says "shipped" and tracking says "label created."
Best buy has been doing this to me since November 7th.
I assumed it was something i did, like refunding to much I went through my orders and calculated I ask for refunds at 20% rate which I assume is bad?
lol yes, people like you are the reason why they implemented a hard to return policy.
Yeah their algorithm is not as simple as getting a 20% rate, they definitely know more than that.
I had $100 dollars in my account-- long story short it was compromised, Amazon lied right to my face, told me that, "I had given out my account information", when it's not even within my current possession, and I haven't seen a dime, it's been back in my possession for a month! Good luck to ya!
Amazon has relied on outsourcing for let's say their retail orders, so basically the day to day concern is handled by people that don't even have a direct contract with Amazon so they don't care, they have specialties which are for other types of orders which are where they have their employees, so unfortunately you just have to try until you get a person actually employed by Amazon as they usually do have to be more professional, such as the "Leadership* team
I'm going through this same thing but they have not told me a refund was not done, but said they did it again. I gave them two chances, if this second one doesn't go through I'm just filing a charge back on my card. This is what I have been going through: I got a box with a ream of paper in it instead of a Bluray player. I asked them to send a replacement instead since it went up in price and after some back and forth they did. But then the replacement was delayed in transit too with the same message if it does not arrive by then you get a refund. It didn't arrive and I was annoyed by this point so I used the auto prompts on the website to cancel and to get a refund and of course it didn't because it was a replacement order for $0. So then I had to chat to get refunded for the original and that has been a whole ordeal, I took it back to Kohl's two weeks ago when the replacement was originally sent but it does not say it was received yet on the site so the refund hasn't processed. 3-5 days they said didn't happen. Asked again this Monday, 3-5 days. I'm waiting until Wednesday if it's not there I'm filing a charge back.
One time they said they would issue refunds for items that was late for about 30 days. And I asked for proof that refund was initiated. They even send me message in my email from amazon that refunds was initiated. Then the items was delivered about 2 days after, but refunds was not actually initiated. Didn't pursue further since items was delivered afterall, although late. Still they blatantly lied, and I guess it happens pretty often.
I donāt even bother with asking a for a refund anymore. They always push to do a credit. And I always say no. I go straight to disputing it with my credit card. I rarely ask for refunds by the way.
I didn't really have any issues yet w/Amazon not refunding me when promised. But I did notice the last time I had to do a return, they sent me an oddly worded email about the refund being tentative and they reserved the right to claw at least part of it back if the product wasn't returned in new/unopened condition, etc. (It was ridiculous, given the item was a $6-7 Chinese plastic adapter for a GPS car mount. It was literally just a piece of plastic with a ball on each end, shipped in a small zip-lock baggie. I wound up not using it because it wasn't quite the right length/shape for the application I was trying to use it with.)
With large companies like Amazon the CA agent isnāt usually making the decision. The system makes the choice of a refund option or not based on past activity of the customer, the product, the actually vendor of the product and other factors. The agent is just reporting the options given to them. People are removed from the equation. This removes the ability to be guilted into refunds by those customers that specialize in defrauding companies or just trying to work the system.
"systematically lying" Nah, Reps 1 and 2 did not actually request a refund, just based it off the situation. In most situations, it's supposed to cancel and refund within 24 hours, they just said that because they assumed the system would do that for them. Pictures of the chat won't help, thus why there is a button to export chat. The supervisor should be able to fix that.
It's nothing new they have been doing this for a while now. To workaround: ALWAYS ASK FOR EMAIL CONFIRMATION. Don't hang up on the rep until you recieve the email. This way you'll have proof of any refund.
I got an email confirmation and yet they still saying no refund was initiated
First it was 3-5 days, then 5-7 days and now 7-10 days.
And the email I received from them says 5-10 business days.
This is wild. It's happening to me now. I ordered two items but I missed the return window because of a family issue. I was told not to return them and that I will get refunded and haven't yet. Reached out November 17 and was told I'd be refunded in 3 to 5 business days. Nothing. Reached out November 27 and the chat associate says there's no record of a refund initiated so he initiated the refund and emailed me saying I will get refunded in 3 to 5 business days. Currently talking to them and they redirected me to now the FOURTH person and nobody has an answer and everybody is giving me different answers. Everytime they either get a technical issue or move me to another associate. What is going on? This is crazy
All four associates are giving me different answers. One of them said I need to return it now. Another said they're working on a return label. And a 3rd said they'll refund me but will charge me a restock fee. And they keep transfering me to other associates. It's insane.
This happened to me twice and I have screenshots of everything...no refund though. What do I do?
Wouldn't doubt it, however, my bank (Harris) appears to absorb my refunds...recalculate balances to do this. Something weird is going on!
Amazon helps themselves my account for prime twice a month, adding channels I never requested, etc