Coolermaster Elite 340 PSU Passive not Active

[sibeer]

Offering me the cash equivalent of free carriage on a replacement order does not in any way constitute what you previously stated:

"3.) A reduction in the price paid the mis-advertised product to reflect the lower specification."

As stated if you can show me an example where a £7 saving reflects the difference between the supplied and advertised product then maybe you would have a valid point. I would point out too that at time of suggesting some goodwill parts instead of cash, both were 5.99+VAT hence my £12 description. One of them had been £3+VAT as a today only a few days ago and is available for that sort of money from other suppliers. Obviously you won't be selling either at a loss so that seemed a fairly cheap solution for yourselves to me.

As your deliveries cost £7+VAT each way, then surely the least you should be offering is £14+VAT for saving you the cost of taking the incorrect item back and delivering a suitable replacement. Not to mention the fact that you would then not be able to sell the returned opened item. As stated numerous times, what I actually wanted was the advertised product I paid for, trying to get that or fair recompense for not receiving it seems to be like trying to get blood out of the proverbial stone.

[Mark@SCAN]

We do not sell what you want which is a coolermaster Elite 340 case which comes supplied with a coolermaster aPFC power supply.

The website was amended at the time the mis-advertisment was noticed and as we could not supply the goods advertised we advised a collection and full refund for the mis-advertised goods. As you already benefit from free carriage you would be free to order a seperate aPFC power supply and case to suit your customers needs.

For your own reasons you chose to keep the product and would consider a refund on your order to keep the mis-advertised goods.

Taking advice from our customer services department I was advised to offer a refund to the value of carriage which is currently £6.99 + v.a.t.

If you are unhappy with this we can still collect and refund the mis-advertised case/psu.

[sibeer]

If that is all you are willing to do then I must state I am very unhappy with the service I have received. As you well know I have supplied the system to my customer as to not do so would have meant all the parts coming back to you when he bought elsewhere. This would have been a loss of face and profit for me that I am also sure you would not have covered. I talked my customer round on the basis that you said you would offer:

"3.) A reduction in the price paid the mis-advertised product to reflect the lower specification."

This is not the same as a free carriage, a completely irrelevant value that you would have paid for twice had I returned the good to you. I am saving you the inconvenience of having open goods in your warehouse, as well as the two deliveries, and have been inconvenienced myself. Your valuation of this as being the same as one delivery just doesn't add up.

"SCAN is arguably the UK's most customer focussed retailer of PC technology"

[TAKTAK]

One thing i don't get, is that, initially, you said aPFC are not cheap, and yet you purchased a cheap case and expected it to be and aPFC PSU inside?

Surely you had doubts as to the price...

And if so, why continue with the purchase...

If you buy cheap, you get cheap, it's the same with everything... surely that should be obvious...

As with everything, common sense is needed...

[Ph4ZeD]

If that is all you are willing to do then I must state I am very unhappy with the service I have received. As you well know I have supplied the system to my customer as to not do so would have meant all the parts coming back to you when he bought elsewhere. This would have been a loss of face and profit for me that I am also sure you would not have covered. I talked my customer round on the basis that you said you would offer:

"3.) A reduction in the price paid the mis-advertised product to reflect the lower specification."

This is not the same as a free carriage, a completely irrelevant value that you would have paid for twice had I returned the good to you. I am saving you the inconvenience of having open goods in your warehouse, as well as the two deliveries, and have been inconvenienced myself. Your valuation of this as being the same as one delivery just doesn't add up.

"SCAN is arguably the UK's most customer focussed retailer of PC technology"

Let me get this straight:

1) You bought an item that advertised as something that it wasn't.
2) Scan admitted their error and offered to return the item and give a refund.
3) You won't return the item, yet you still want... I don't know, something?

Heres the post by Scan:

"Hi,

Further to your post I can confirm that we offered to collect and refund both the mis-advertised case/PSU combo to which you declined.

As a gesture to reflect the fact a mistake had been made we would normally offer free carriage on a future order, however as you already benefit from the free carriage offer a refund of £7 + v.a.t was offered.

The goods suggested by you were to the value of £16inc v.a.t which on top we would have incurred further shipping costs of £7+ v.a.t"

I think Scan have done/offered more than enough to correct the situation.

[sibeer]

One thing i don't get, is that, initially, you said aPFC are not cheap, and yet you purchased a cheap case and expected it to be and aPFC PSU inside?

Surely you had doubts as to the price...

And if so, why continue with the purchase...

If you buy cheap, you get cheap, it's the same with everything... surely that should be obvious..

Many would argue that around £50 for a basic steel case and PSU isn't "cheap". My "obvious" interpretation was that there was a saving due to it being old stock (case is old and PSU isn't modern high efficiency modular type). On the first site I looked at I found Coolermaster cases from £26 and modern modular approx 450W PSUs for £45. As such why is it obviously a mistake when an older designed PSU with a older case is sold at £50 as a combo deal? For that matter, why on earth should I have doubts about their ability to read what was clearly displayed on the box? Here is a better spec PSU, from a better regarded manufacturer for under £50:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/144086

and a Coolermaster Case for £26

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/146337

Note that I have used Ebuyer because most of their PSU's specify if they have an active PFC whereas most Scan ones do not. Scan also don't have as many Coolermaster cases.

As with everything, common sense is needed...

seems as obvious to me as your rude and incorrect assumptions are to you. Why not take your own advice before voicing a unfounded opinion.

[sibeer]

Let me get this straight:

1) You bought an item that advertised as something that it wasn't.
2) Scan admitted their error and offered to return the item and give a refund.
3) You won't return the item, yet you still want... I don't know, something?

Heres the post by Scan:

"Hi,

Further to your post I can confirm that we offered to collect and refund both the mis-advertised case/PSU combo to which you declined.

As a gesture to reflect the fact a mistake had been made we would normally offer free carriage on a future order, however as you already benefit from the free carriage offer a refund of £7 + v.a.t was offered.

The goods suggested by you were to the value of £16inc v.a.t which on top we would have incurred further shipping costs of £7+ v.a.t"

I think Scan have done/offered more than enough to correct the situation.

If it had been possible to return the item for a refund I would have. As I have stated all along, if they could send the correct PSU I would happily change it over and then return the wrong one. When you are faffing around making PC's for yourself then maybe that is OK to wait. When you are doing it for customers then "Do you mind waiting an extra week or so with no system whilst I prance around dancing through RMA hoops due to Scan's mistakes" isn't really an option. You seem to expect me to be willing to be further inconvenienced and lose work because Scan made an error, surely that is the wrong way round?

A usual cost for them in this error's case would be at least two free deliveries, one to collect the old case and one to deliver a suitable replacement. Surely this should be a minimum refund if I help them out by accepting the incorrect item? All I am looking for is a fair refund given the reduction in spec. Telling a customer. "Here is £8.04" doesn't really seem worthwhile.

[TAKTAK]

All I am looking for is a fair refund given the reduction in spec. Telling a customer. "Here is £8.04" doesn't really seem worthwhile.

A 15% refund isn't fair?

When they offered to have the whole product in question collected, and you refused....

Yes you were building for your client, but surely you need to take into account errors like this?
What if a component had been faulty? You would have had to return it and "kept the client waiting an extra week or so with no system whilst you prance around dancing through RMA hoops"

The current standing is SCAN made a mistake (whoopy do, who doesn't?), SCAN accepted that they had made a mistake and offered to collect the mis-advertised product, you refused insisting on return of part of a product, SCAN said can't be done, you agreed to continue, SCAN offer you a 15% reimbursement, you turn your nose up...

Sounds to me like SCAN have tried following all the paths...

I'd say that a 15% refund was a "fair" reimbursement...

edit:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/144086

and a Coolermaster Case for £26

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/146337

and that comes to £85 inc VAT...

and AFAIK £85 > £55..
thus leaving my claim that you bought a cheap case and PSU intact...

[sibeer]

A 15% refund isn't fair?

When they offered to have the whole product in question collected, and you refused....

Yes you were building for your client, but surely you need to take into account errors like this?
What if a component had been faulty? You would have had to return it and "kept the client waiting an extra week or so with no system whilst you prance around dancing through RMA hoops"

The current standing is SCAN made a mistake (whoopy do, who doesn't?), SCAN accepted that they had made a mistake and offered to collect the mis-advertised product, you refused insisting on return of part of a product, SCAN said can't be done, you agreed to continue, SCAN offer you a 15% reimbursement, you turn your nose up...

Sounds to me like SCAN have tried following all the paths...

I'd say that a 15% refund was a "fair" reimbursement...

Very few components arrive faulty in my experience and I have spares for most. Whilst loaning a spare stick of RAM would mean a 5 minute site swap over when non-faulty stuff arrived, loaning a case means a full system rebuild, who foots the bill for that? It also means the system you are sending out looks nothing like what the customer wanted on delivery and looks decidedly 2nd hand. Whilst to you a 15% refund seems acceptable, to me it doesn't. As previously mentioned I feel that is less than the difference in cost between the the advertised item and the supplied item. It is also considerably less than it would cost Scan if I had returned the item. Are you guys employees or something?

[TAKTAK]

Are you guys employees or something?

Nah, i'm just bored, and this is the only form of active discussion going on ATM
If it isn't a rhetorical question... most of the SCAN bods have @ SCAN in their names or the SCAN logo/3XS logo as their avatar

[sibeer]

And in note to your edit, yes £85 is more than £55, top marks. That is why one is offering a better case and PSU regardless of the aPFC. It is also worth noting that is regardless of savings for buying a Coolermaster package of old stock. Further to that I would point out that I linked the first set that came up on ebuyer, I don't have time to do serious research into it, but a quick scan of the today onlys show a Coolermaster case for around £20 on Scan today. I never said I didn't think it was good value when I bought it, hence why I suggested it to my customer. You implied I was an idiot for not being suspicious, I was just showing that it wasn't that far away from normal prices.

[sibeer]

Nah, i'm just bored, and this is the only form of active discussion going on ATM
If it isn't a rhetorical question... most of the SCAN bods have @ SCAN in their names or the SCAN logo/3XS logo as their avatar

I will admit to being a little bored myself, otherwise I wouldn't be responding to all of these. I know the SCAN bods have the @ SCAN, but maybe there is a few ringers amongst the forum members?

[Mark@SCAN]

As has been explained a number of times we cannot provide what was advertised as it does not exist. The cheapest Coolermaster aPFC I can find is atleast £50 for just the PSU.

Unfortunatly a mistake in the advertisment of a product has been made this was accpeted by ourselves when brought to our attention. In situations where the product advertised cannot be supplied we can either arrange to have the goods collected for a full refund or offer a discount to keep the goods.

With all due respect your customer is your responsability and you as a SCAN customer are our responsibility I cannot answer what you should do with your customer. You took the descision to keep the PSU as there was little difference between the two and you agreed it wasn't worth the hassle.

I have again checked with customer services team and provided the details of your order. As the margins for profit are very small already us offering a refund of your carriage charges in respect to the mistake made and the cost of the product purchased we feel is fair. At the most we can provide a refund of £10 back to the card used to pay for the goods.

Please bear in mind that every order placed with SCAN via HEXUS you save at least £8 on the shipping costs which will certainly add up if placing a number of orders with us.

[Bugbait]

Some people need to get off their high horses.

Back in the days when I bothered building custom systems for customers (ie. Non-friends) and had a critical deadline to meet I would:

a) Only use parts I had used previously to prevent the sort of "confusion" the OP is complaining about.
b) Only use suppliers I had dealt with before.
c) Always order spares.

To the OP, if reputation is so important as you claim then the above are minimum criteria. In the past, I've ordered over £1000 in extra parts for a single PC build (servers are a different story), just in case there were faulty components. Not from Scan mind you, this was when I bought wholesale in another country. If I didn't need the extras, which was often the case they were easily returned at a small expense to myself and was covered in the markup I charged for the service (ie. Being time critical). Not Scan's problem if you don't leave enough margin for yourself.

Errors occur, atleast in this case Scan fully admitted it and offered a full refund which most of us would consider very reasonable.

[sibeer]

Some people need to get off their high horses.

Back in the days when I bothered building custom systems for customers (ie. Non-friends) and had a critical deadline to meet I would:

a) Only use parts I had used previously to prevent the sort of "confusion" the OP is complaining about.
b) Only use suppliers I had dealt with before.
c) Always order spares.

To the OP, if reputation is so important as you claim then the above are minimum criteria. In the past, I've ordered over £1000 in extra parts for a single PC build (servers are a different story), just in case there were faulty components. Not from Scan mind you, this was when I bought wholesale in another country. If I didn't need the extras, which was often the case they were easily returned at a small expense to myself and was covered in the markup I charged for the service (ie. Being time critical). Not Scan's problem if you don't leave enough margin for yourself.

Errors occur, atleast in this case Scan fully admitted it and offered a full refund which most of us would consider very reasonable.

I have been building systems as a sideline for about 15 years now but unfortunately the margins you speak of just aren't available any more. It used to be cheaper to buy the parts than to order a PC from Dell or what have you, now it isn't. I get business on the basis of letting the customer have a full input into exactly what parts he chooses (prevents option A). I have dealt with Scan through a few accounts for around 10 years now so hopefully that meets your B requirement. C is dream land when building a individual system tailored to requirements with around £50 profit. These days components are more reliable and have far less incompatibility issues than back in the day so normally it doesn't matter.

Mark, thanks for getting back to me again. Regarding the free deliveries due to Hexus I am happy about them, but they are factored in to my full price comparisons. You are not always cheapest for the parts and this has been a saving grace on more than one occasion. I also get free next day from OCUK and free slower deliveries from Novatech and Ebuyer. I am sure that if you didn't still make a profit after the delivery was taken into account you wouldn't do the offer.

Yes my customer is my problem, but the issue comes from a Scan mistake and as your customer I am the one bringing the complaint. I did not decide to accept the PSU due to little difference, instead it was due to the lack of choice in the matter. I decided to make do with the situation to keep the customer happy as they would be more annoyed about a weeks delay than a different PSU. I appeased them by saying what you had stated in this very thread, i.e. that they would get a refund to reflect the lower specification. As stated I don't feel the refund offered in anyway reflects the difference in specification. Instead of your refund being based on the difference in specification, it seems to be based on free deliveries, profit margins and anything else you can think off. The end result is that I am going to have to make up the offer from yourself to something more in line with the cost difference as I do not intend to change what I am offering my customer from what I stated a second time, unlike has happened to me.

[Mossy]

I totally agree with you in regards to selling computers, here at Scan we aim to be different in the market in terms of offering customised mid to high end bespoke systems. Anyone can purchase a cheap computer from the likes of the suppliers in question but its a case of is what you are buying suitable for the customers requirements. Scan benefits suplying computers taylored to the customers requirements it would be simple for Scan to advertise low end cheap PC's and "Just be like the Rest" this is definately not our aim nor does it fit into what we call our Mindset "3XS".

We use branded better quality high end components and although it may cost more we certainly think if someone is prepared to spend hard earned money on well built computers the expect to get what they pay for in terms of quality. If this is explained to your customer and discussed sometimes price and how cheap can I build a computer is not always the main subject on deciding on your PC specification.

There is not as much money to be made these days I agree totally that is why you have to find the niche in the market and provide a service which somebody else can not. I hope to think most people will agree with me here but if you are building computers for people you may get half the aftercare issues using better quality products than using the lower end hardware and I do not need to go into the benefits here.

In respects to we would not do it if we did not make a profit I can correct you as in some purchases we actually do, offering Hexus members free delivery is not all about generating more orders from hexus users but also showing people by forms of the forum that we are a company that cares, takes on board feedback and hopefully getting more business from showing exactly what Scan are all about. We have made a loss in regards to your purchase the margin offered for refund and considering the free delivery also Scan are at a loss but we know this was our fault due to the miss advertisement. we have offered what we can to hopefully put you trust back into Scan.

I hold no critism agaist you but if you have been building computers for 15 years then within them years by experience you should be aware that issues can arrise especially with hardware and sometimes you have to give leeway as such to delays. if this is explained at the time of purchase to the customer i always find them to be quite understanding as long as they are kept informed from the start.

Profits margins and free deliverys in nonsense from the start we admitted we was wrong and have offered what we can to get this sorted. what ever way we sorted this Scan are the ones who are loosing out and rightfully so as we made the mistake. I hope this clears everything again we apologise for the confusion and hopefully our actions have made up for the mistake we made.

Regards