Amazon Is Just Giving Money Away Now
It's not often that we get an email from a reader complaining about a company that gives him money and won't take it back, but with Amazon, anything is possible.
Joshua and his wife both adorably purchased Kindles from the e-tailer, and one of them didn't survive a not-so-rowdy night. So Joshua contacted Amazon for a repair/exchange, and when the dust settled he was left with not only a new Kindle but about $300 in free money that he's tried to return to Amazon to no avail.
In Joshua's words:
I bought two Kindle 2's from Amazon at launch in February 2009. My wife and I received them without incident and use them constantly. The problem came in September 2009, when my wife had an 'accident' with hers. She was reading before bed, and after turning out the light, set her Kindle on the nightstand. A couple minutes later, we heard it fall in the dark. It was a short fall to the carpet, so she did not worry about it. Come morning, as she got out of bed, it must've slid further than expected. She stepped on it. CRACK! The screen was toasted.
She called me at work, and asked what could be done. I called Amazon and spoke to a representative. I explained the issue, and asked what my options were for repair. Amazon stated that for $135, they would cross-ship a replacement. After receiving the replacement, we would ship back the broken unit. I was shocked when Amazon told me that depending on refurbished Kindle stock, I could actually get a new one. I sprung for overnight shipping as my wife was in the middle of reading and wanted it ASAP.
The order was processed at Amazon, and as luck would have it. We were being shipped a new one, not refurbished. Excellent!
The unit arrived the next day as scheduled. We packed up and shipped the broken one back within a few days. Everything was proceeding without a hitch. Once again Amazon exceeds expectation in my eyes.
Here's where it takes a strange turn.
Three days after Amazon received the broken Kindle, I received an e-mail stating this fact. Problem is, the e-mail stated they received the returned Kindle, and were processing my 'return' and a refund would appear on my Visa card within 7 to 10 days. They were going to refund a total of $291 to me. I was surprised. I paid the $135 for the 'repair' and cross-ship of the replacement. That amount was charged. At first I figured this was just accounting on Amazon's end and the credit would never actually appear on my statement.
About 8 days later it did appear as a pending credit, and a day later it was fully credited to my bank account. I immediately e-mailed Amazon bringing this information to their attention. It has been almost 3 weeks since I brought this to their attention and have yet to get a response.
I would like them to provide an official response, as I technically have almost $300 of their money, to which I am not actually entitled. Any ideas of who else to e-mail and notify?
So what does Josh do here? Launch an EECB? Donate the money to charity in Amazon's name? Pay it back in goodwill by spending it on Amazon? Stuff it in the Consumerist tip jar? Call his bank and ask them to reverse the refund?
What would you do, Consumerists?
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Comments:
Wait six months for a response. Donate the money in Amazon's name to the local food bank.
I'm always wary of these type of situations, because you never know if in a year or two Amazon realizes he owns them money and comes after it, and if he has moved, they can't contact him, take him to collections, and screw his credit. I might also be paranoid, but you never know.
Oatmeals for the Captain, what else?
E-mailing them a second time would be a good start.
I appreciate Amazon because they have a good sense of when to cut their losses, which is good for their overall goodwill and customer service rep. Rather than quibble with someone over $30, they frequently say "Whoops, keep it, our bad," and then earn that money right back by keeping a customer.
I do think it's in the OP's best interest to spend a bit more time and energy tracking down whether he gets to keep the money....Sounds less like they've said "keep it" and more like he didn't reach someone with any authority on that one. But I wouldn't be surprised if they do, in the end, let him keep it.
Try to pay it back. They'll love you for it, but I doubt they'll accept it. Best of all worlds.
It sounds like your "repair/replace" order somehow got mixed up with a "refund my money for this piece of crap" order. You'd better hold onto that cash until you've gotten written confirmation that it's yours to keep (or donate if it still weighs on your conscience). And "in writing" probably should be on paper rather than a simple email. You might want to start communicating by mail rather than email. If someone on their side "mistakenly" says you can keep the money in an email, that might not be sufficient evidence on your side if this ever becomes a court case.
It's too easy for an email to get lost in the shuffle or ignored. Go their customer service page and fill out the form to have them call you. My wife did that the other day, and she had a call back within minutes.
@Cant_stop_the_rock: Good luck with getting an email reply from them, especially for the kindle. I sent 3 emails over a kindle issue I had, finally had to call. Then they tried to deny my refund for not calling within 7 days, despite my having emailed them within 10 min of the faulty download. Had the CSR not already admitted he saw a record of the email on my account, he probably wouldn't have been able to get approval on the refund.
@JPropaganda: this.
Plus, if they notice it and don't catch it till later, just be warned on them trying to reverse it months later, like with bank errors.
In other words, don't spend someone else's money.
With Amazon's penchant for rewarding good consumers, it can't hurt to e-mail them and be honest. Worst case scenario, they take the money back and you feel good about it. Best case scenario, you keep the money and get to feel good about it.
I had something similar happen. I ordered a DVD, and got 2 day shipping via Amazon Prime. It didn't show up after almost a week, so I contacted Amazon. They immediately sent out another one, next day shipping, at no extra charge. I ended up getting both, and went through the steps to return. I made note that I received both and one was originally lost in the mail. They credited my account for the amount of the DVD. I was going to contact them to clear up the situation, but figured it would be way to much effort to explain to customer service that I was incorrectly credited. I shop on Amazon a lot, so I took it as a thanks for being a loyal customer and sorry your DVD was late.
He should hang on to it. Theres always a chance they'll come knocking for it eventually.
@DAK: That thing is creepy! I've had my phone ring within seconds before! Creepy, but cool. No one wants to sit on hold.
People may be reading too far with this. With advanced exchanges (where a product is shipped first, then the damaged one is shipped back) it's common to take a security deposit of sorts. It may be that they had initially charged that amount to assure the return, then refunded it when they received the faulty one back.
Last year, I bought a service package from an exterminator for about $900 on my credit card. I happened to check my account a few days later and it had been refunded. I called, and they had recently switched CC processing companies, and apparently this happened to several other customers, too. Of course, I let them re-charge me; I had already received the service and felt it was unfair to let it pass
is it just me, or does it almost seem like Amazon might be doing this for some good PR?
granted they're allowed to anything they want with their own money, and if it's our hearts they're after then doing this type of thing to people who read/post/submit stories to Consumerist couldn't hurt our view of them (admittedly, it *would be difficult to guess who does/does not know about Consumerist...).
Don't email them - call customer service. She emailed Jeff Bezos and got a phone call from his executive secretary and got the whole thing straightened up.
@ilves: Your paranoia is justified. Haven't there been stories similar to what you've described on this site?
I called Amazon and spoke to a representative.
Any ideas of who else to e-mail and notify?
Can't you just call the number you used when the Kindle got broken? They ought to be able to transfer you if they're not who you should talk to about this.
He should do a chargeback on the refund. Or try, anyway. Just because it'd be interesting to find out how the credit card rep would handle it, if it's even possible.
Do you think they lost $291? NO, lots people are gonna read this story, and then they will probably become an Amazon customer. So they really lose no money, they are gonna make more then that back.
@Rectilinear Propagation: Agreed. Also, it's the right thing to do - it isn't his money to donate or keep. Kudos to the OP for actually asking about this rather than taking the money and running.
@DAK: This is also my experience, but the fact is, when they have people paid to read emails all day, and email systems that track what emails have and haven't been responded to, they should be neither lost in the shuffle or ignored.
They might come back to you for the money, but it's unlikely.
Similar thing happened to me with AT&T (back when you needed a long-distance carrier). Our phone number previously belonged to block of numbers from a large company. AT&T kept sending them the bill, and they paid it. When we realized what was happening after a couple of months without a bill, we contacted AT&T.
They said the situation was out of their hands, and wouldn't give us the name of the business so we could pay them back, and they wouldn't accept our payment. The sent three "customer satisfaction" checks in amounts of $100, $250 and $300.
After about 6 months, they got things straightened out, and we started paying our own bill, but they never let us pay back the money we owed. It was weird.
If they have a policy stating that customers have x number of days to correct a billing error then I would write them a certified letter stating the facts and giving them the same number of days to repspond, notifying them that I would no longer be responsible for the moeny after the time had passed if they did not respond.
If Amazon winds up letting him keep it, I suggest donating it to a library or a books-for-children charity. Since, you know, it's a Kindle and reading is gud and stuff. ;)
Or, there's always this:
Wanting to keep it has brought him here. He thought maybe the anti-corporation team would make him feel alright about it. And while I hate amazon, I'm going to suggest you don't just get rid of it. They could easily ask for it back in the future. Besides, contacting them about it once is pretty weak. Just call them until they fix it.
Also, he seems like an overly wasteful american. Kindles with overnight shipping. He'll just blow it on a margaritaville mixer or something anyway.
Use it to buy the wife a larger nightstand or.. a monkey.
@ilves: Reminds me of Social Security. Sent me an extra payment after my benefits expired. One year later they wanted it back. Luckily, I'd been advised not to spend the money (on the upside, the interest it accrued was mine to keep).
Try calling Amazon's billing department: 1-866-216-1072.
@skwigger: The same thing happened to me, except with a $90 wrist watch I ordered for my Wife. First one didn't show up, so they overnighted me a second one. Eventually the first one came (like a week later). I didn't need two of the same watches so I just ended up returning it to Amazon. Amazon has always been good to me, I go in on a $100 off coupon a few years ago (that didn't require any minimum purchase, just $100 free). Amazon honored it. I would rather spread the good karma.
Here's the REAL answer. What SHOULD happen if the Kindle CSA follows all policies: The CSA he spoke with will, about a month after the initial conversation about the broken Kindle, check on Joshua's account to make sure the Kindle was returned. When he sees that it was and it was refunded, he will be retro-charged.
That's technically what should happen, anyway. What Joshua needs do is call Amazon back, say "Hey, I have this money," and let the rep on the other end of the line tell him to keep it because it was Amazon's error. That rep will make a note of it in Joshua's account, which will keep the original Kindle CSA from retro-charging.
And please, for the love of everything, DO NOT CALL THE BILLING DEPARTMENT!
Amazon seems to function this way just to keep customers happy. A call to them would likely result in an insistence that he keep the money, be happy with it, and perhaps use it to buy more stuff from Amazon.
The kind of loyalty that $300 buys will be worth much more than $300 down the road.
buy lots of drugs!
Ha! Amazing. Amazon did almost the exact same thing to me and I couldn't get anyone there to take back the money. Unlike the above situation, my Kindle 2 problems were covered under warranty - it had a software glitch. I called, they shipped me a replacement (a new one!) and I shipped the broken one back to them the next day. Two days later, I got an e-mail saying they had processed my return and that I would receive a full refund less some percentage for restocking. A couple days later, a $270 credit showed up on my AmEx bill.
I called four or five times to clear it up and, after spending considerable time on hold, I just gave up. If an Amazon auditor ever finds the error, they are welcome to take back their money. In the meantime, I've wasted enough time trying to give them back their cash.
@ilves: Yep. It happened to me once with Anthem Blue Cross. They applied someone else's check to my account and I attempted to resolve the error but none of their idiot CSRs were able to figure out exactly what had happened. I just let it slide but two years later they sent me to collections (for roughly $80).
he could, y'know, call. that tends to get me results. sometimes even the same day!
@noctorum3520: It's possible, but it should be either returned product or returned repair fee - this is more than double that fee.
@Colonel Jack O'Neill: If this was "and Amazon said, nah, keep it" (which happened in another recent story) I'd agree - but here there's no resolution and thus no surefire incentive to jump on board (although the painless trade process is fantastic)
@LostAtoll: Wow, in a story where the consumer has clearly done nothing wrong and is trying to do the right thing, you still find a way to blame them. Amazing.
@coren: in my opinion he did do something wrong. Taking the time to write consumerist about it in order to alleviate guilt instead of just keeping it, or giving it back to them. Both of which would have been infinitely easier.
Also, I think kindles are completely ridiculous. read a book for christ's sake. they don't break when you step on them.
@LostAtoll: ...what are you talking about? He wasn't alleviating his guilt, he was finding a way to give back money that wasn't his. From the letter he wrote:
"It has been almost 3 weeks since I brought this to their attention and have yet to get a response.
I would like them to provide an official response, as I technically have almost $300 of their money, to which I am not actually entitled. Any ideas of who else to e-mail and notify?"
Doesn't sound like he's trying to pass off his guilt, sounds like he wants to give the money back. Which, by the way, he did do with some guidance - check the follow up.
Also, you personal opinion on the kindle doesn't mean he was in the wrong here, but then again you're dead set to blame him for something, no matter what.
I think posting it here should suffice.