Update: Don't dismiss your old product as Jordan Palmer managed to bring a 2010 MacBook Pro back to life.
Newegg is a popular retailer, particularly among PC builders. Unfortunately, the company has found itself in the middle of a controversy so serious that it could make people think twice about purchasing a product from it.
As Gamers Nexus (via Windows Central) reports, it seems Newegg has been selling broken products. Gamers Nexus, which is a popular YouTube tech channel, purchased a motherboard from Newegg, which it later decided to return after realizing it no longer needed the part.
Newegg declined to offer a refund, claiming Gamers Nexus had damaged the motherboard. What’s strange about this is that Gamers Nexus had never opened or used the motherboard. After months of being denied a refund, Gamers Nexus posted a video detailing the situation.
It comes as no surprise that Newegg soon refunded and returned the motherboard after being publicly outed. As it turns out, the damage the motherboard received wouldn’t happen during normal transit. In addition to having bent pins, the motherboard still had an RMA sticker on it. This, according to Gamers Nexus, shows that Newegg had tried to repair the broken component.
Naturally, this leads to the assumption that Newegg has purposely been shipping broken products in their “open box” reselling program. It would then decline refunds and returns of damaged products so that customers wouldn’t see what it had done.
This isn’t an isolated incident either. Reddit users and folks in the Gamers Nexus community have apparently experienced the same situation with Newegg. Windows Central has also been contacted by Newegg customers saying they’ve been denied refunds for damaged components.
Newegg apologies and changes policies
Speaking with Windows Central, Newegg said that it has become aware that “a very small number of returns may not have been thoroughly inspected before being routed for returns, liquidations, or e-waste recycling and we accidentally resold as 'open box' merchandise.”
The company apologized and claimed these were “unintentional process errors and isolated incidents” and that it has changed its internal procedures to improve how it manages product returns. New policies are now in place to make return items “hassle-free” and that the company will accept all returns on "open box" products with “no questions asked.”
While this story seemingly has a happy ending, it’s clear that Newegg only enacted changes after being caught red-handed. It begs the question of how long the company would have kept this up for had Gamers Nexus not done its report. Here's hoping the company sticks to its policy changes.
