Amazon replacement?

[BlueMR2]

Wondering if there are other on-line stores similar to Amazon that people have had good experiences with?  Amazon has continued their downward slide on my "vendors list".  As of today they just went from "meh" down to "only use when I have no other choice".  Even just attempting to file a dispute with them has only made me even more annoyed.  I'd really prefer to just cut ties with them and do business with someone else, but I don't even know if there are any other players in the book/movie/all kinds of random stuff department?

[big_slacker]

What actual problems have you had with them? I order TONS of stuff from 'zon and rarely have any issues. The few times I had the wrong item sent or a delay the customer service line (the phone #, not e-mail or chat) refunds partial or all of the price instantly.

We also get thousands of $$ of free stuff through the Vine program, and never had any notable problems with that either.

[TheBuddha]

Walmart.com

[ltt]

I'm also on the page where we've not had problems with Amazon--ever.  And we've been ordering from them for years. 

[MsPeacock]

What actual problems have you had with them? I order TONS of stuff from 'zon and rarely have any issues. The few times I had the wrong item sent or a delay the customer service line (the phone #, not e-mail or chat) refunds partial or all of the price instantly.

We also get thousands of $$ of free stuff through the Vine program, and never had any notable problems with that either.

What is the vine program?

[kpd905]

What is the vine program?

Looks like it is a program that gives you new products in exchange for a review.  You probably need to be one of Amazon's top reviewers to get in.

[big_slacker]

Wifey and I were both top 1000 reviewers, one day she got an invite to the program. I thought they'd be sending us little junky things that no one reviewed. In reality you get to pick a number of items at a time, some general some tailored to the stuff you buy. Most are in the $50-$100 range but we've gotten some high $$ stuff. For instance we just got a new $1000 mattress, got a DLSR around $750, we now have a $600 vacuum (they make such a thing???) and so on.

It sounds too good to be true but really all they require is a thorough review and you keep the stuff.

What is the vine program?

Looks like it is a program that gives you new products in exchange for a review.  You probably need to be one of Amazon's top reviewers to get in.

[Dollar Slice]

What actual problems have you had with them? I order TONS of stuff from 'zon and rarely have any issues.

The last time I bought something from them was a few weeks ago - I paid $15 for 2-day guaranteed shipping and they spent (according to the post office rep I spent 45 minutes on the phone with trying to find the package) $1.50 on the cheapest possible shipping method with no guarantees. And the Amazon rep lied to me about it, promising it would be there on time even though they obviously shipped it the wrong way. If she hadn't lied I would have tried to go out and get it locally since I absolutely needed it by a certain day (hence paying $15 for guaranteed 2-day shipping). Needless to say it did not arrive and I wasted a lot of time on the phone/online chat trying to sort it out.

Something similar has happened three times in the last 2 years (out of maybe 5-10 total orders). So I'm pretty much done with them too. There are other vendor-fish in the internet-sea.

[music lover]

I'm fine with Amazon...they are just one of many sources I check before making a purchase.

The only issue I have is their choice to mail their statement rather than make it electronically available. For a company that relies 100% on internet purchases, this is baffling.

[coppertop]

I had something weird happen to me last night - I had bought a charger for my cell phone and it came with a car charger, which I have not used. I used the regular charger and it worked okay, but nothing remarkable.  When I got the request for a review, I stated that I had not had time to try the car charger, but that the other charger seemed to be okay (I had used it once).  Gave it three stars - got a phone call from the vendor wanting me to upgrade my review, offering me an incentive to do so, what can we do to make this right etc.?  It was a bit creepy to get a phone call from a vendor I never gave my phone number to.  I told him that once I tried the car charger, I would revisit my review.  Just didn't sit right with me, though.

[MandalayVA]

Count me in with the "love Amazon" crowd. It opened up not one but two distribution centers within twenty miles from my place. End result?  Order something one night, get it the next day. I'm trying not to buy extra stuff though.

[ketchup]

I've never had an issue with Amazon.  It's my first stop if I need something I can't find locally/don't need right away from dog food supplements to USB cables to weird spices to a new mirror for my car.

[GuitarStv]

I've had nothing but great experiences ordering from Amazon.com and .ca .  Not always the cheapest prices, but worth checking whenever considering a purchase.

[nobodyspecial]

Buying stuff from other people through them = great.
Buying their own stuff (downloads, S3, AWS) = generally a pain.

"You can't download this ebook your kindle is registered in another region". email them = I don't have a kindle, they reply with a link to the page that says "You can't download this ebook your kindle is registered in another region".  Same with Amazon S3 at work. Their customer service reps know nothing and can do nothing.

[BlueMR2]

Walmart.com

Nice!  I didn't even realize Walmart had a web store.  I'll have to give it a shot.  On the few occasions I visited one of their big box stores it was a good experience.

I don't want to get into *all* my problems with Amazon, but here's the just the last episode that finally pushed them onto my list of evil companies.  An "in stock" book had a listed 3 week lead time for shipping, I was happy to receive it after about 1 week (which is still crazy when they like to brag about their quick shipping).  I can live with slow shipping and ridiculous shipping estimates.  When it came in it was obviously a non-standard edition and had a special resale (legal type) sticker on it.  That's OK, I can live with that, I just wanted to read it (a collector would have been upset though as it clearly didn't match the actual advertised book).  I read it and we decided to sell it back to them for store credit vs. trading in locally (which is what we usually do).  The trade-in of that book was accepted on-line, we shipped it, then they shipped it back saying it was a version they couldn't sell (they said it was an international version and could not be sold).  They had sold it to me with no problem just a couple weeks before, WTF?  So, were they just dumping off stuff on me?  I'd even shrug that off (I mean I already accepted a huge hit selling it back to them and I did get to enjoy reading the book which was my original goal), but the book also returned in non-saleable condition too as someone had obviously torn off international sticker documentation for resale.  If you don't want the book, fine, send it back, but to go and deface it too?  Taking property from someone, damaging it, then returning it is totally unacceptable.  Then, the complaint phone line people are nearly impossible to understand (presumably off-shored), and like to stick you on hold for extended periods of time while they accomplish nothing.

[snogirl]

I like Amazon and never had a problem with the company or the customer service.
However, I have changed my consuming consumer habit, dumped their Prime Service and figure every dollar not spent at the Big A goes towards my freedom.
If I do buy, it is more locally at farmer's markets or the Co-op.
 

[HipGnosis]

I use to love Amazon - prime member for many years.
But the bloom is faded and withering fast.
Searching for ANYTHING is now a joke because of all the 3rd party vendor items - many with HORRIBLY inadequate or down right wrong descriptions.
You virtually can't sort search results by price, because they don't include shipping, which varies greatly.  There are THOUSANDS of items for $0.01 with shipping cost of $3-$33.
Reviews use to be their greatest asset.  Now they're 'selling' those.
I recently bought an Amazon Basics HD TV antenna.  It didn't come with the adhesive pads to stick it to the wall or the back of the TV.  I could not find any way to contact them about it - my only option was to request a return for credit, which I didn't want to do.  EVERY other Amazon order has a 'contact the seller' link.  But not Amazon Basics!??!
I've also been contacted with requests to 'improve my review rating'.  Sorry, my reviews are totally honest and empirical.  You can't change what I have experienced with the product.

[Dicey]

I don't want to waste any more life energy reliving the problems I've had with Amazon. Nothing so, so terrible, just frustrating as hell. When they're good, they're fine, when they're bad, getting resolution is a total pain in the ass.

What concerns me more is that their prices just don't seem that great. I can generally find the same item at a better price outside of the Amazon tentacles just by doing a google search. My amswer is that there ate a myriad of replacements for Amazon, not a single source. Dealing with Amazon is like buying convenience foods. You're paying for someone else to do some of the work for you. 

The comments from coppertop and big_slacker confirm what I've always suspected: the review and rating process is clearly orchestrated by Amazon, if not downright rigged.

[big_slacker]

my only option was to request a return for credit, which I didn't want to do.  EVERY other Amazon order has a 'contact the seller' link.  But not Amazon Basics!??!

1 (888) 280-3321 is their customer service number. Every time I've had to call it I get a prompt refund. I've even called because prime shipping was a day late and they'll extend out your prime a month or two.

I know I'm sounding like a shill here but I really just have a favorable opinion of them. I'm actually really shocked to hear all of these issues because I do a significant chunk of our shopping (subscribe and save can be cheaper than costco!) and actually prefer to buy stuff off da 'zon because I can always count on it getting here and in the unlikely event that it doesn't I'll get a fast refund.

I will say about the reviews though, there is a lot of shady stuff going on under the surface. Not by amazon themselves but by manufacturers and reviewers.

For instance I got a fitness item to review. I did a VIDEO review of the thing not working as advertised and I got bombarded with 'unhelpful' votes by suspect accounts (ones that only vote on that manufacturer's stuff)

Or, in terms of people fighting for the top 50 reviewer spots (which can be monetized as manufacturers *WILL* pay them for favorable reviews) there are actually organized crews of people that are running multiple accounts and will vote down challengers to the top spots.

I was actually a top 1000 reviewer and didn't know any of this was going on. I'd never read the reviewer forums until researching the vote down thing that happened to me, haha! You can generally trust reviews but not the aggregate score. I would only trust a review that says 'verified purchase' and of course read it critically to make sure the person who wrote it isn't a raging idiot which is somewhat common. :)

[socalteacher]

Not sure of a replacement to Amazon. . ..  but you can use this site to give you an idea of what the current price is compared to the past prices??  www.camelcamelcamel.com

We use Amazon all the time but only when we know the price is decent.

I figure that by having my wife use Amazon it means she is not tempted by all the other stuff that Walmart or Target have in front of her while she walks the isles!

[MoneyCat]

I use Craigslist and Etsy a lot more than Amazon these days.  Amazon just isn't as good of a deal as it used to be.

[seattlecyclone]

Wifey and I were both top 1000 reviewers, one day she got an invite to the program. I thought they'd be sending us little junky things that no one reviewed. In reality you get to pick a number of items at a time, some general some tailored to the stuff you buy. Most are in the $50-$100 range but we've gotten some high $$ stuff. For instance we just got a new $1000 mattress, got a DLSR around $750, we now have a $600 vacuum (they make such a thing???) and so on.

It sounds too good to be true but really all they require is a thorough review and you keep the stuff.

Nice to see another Viner on here! It's a great program once you get in. I have my fair share of expensive free stuff (a computer, a vacuum, a microwave, a rug, some speakers, etc.), as well as countless prerelease books of varying quality, enough shampoo to last me quite a while, and various granola bars. My reviewer ranking was somewhere around 8,000 when they invited me but has slipped down to about 12,000 since.

[lise]

I sell on eBay and I recently sold a rare book via auction for a price higher than what Amazon resellers had it listed for.  I asked the buyer why he bid that high when he could get the book for a fixed price via an Amazon reseller and he said it's because Amazon customer service is the pits compared to eBay and he also trusted me to have the item as described (he was a repeat customer so I felt comfortable asking him why!).

[FIRE me]

Amazon has been good to me.

But if I were dissatisfied with them, I think my next stop would be e-Bay. It also depends on what you're buying. Amazon and e-Bay are one stop solutions for most categories, but you could easily switch to more specialized stores for whatever you happen to need for a particular purchase.

[Thegoblinchief]

Customer service on refunds has always been easy. But try to find out product information or any other remotely technical question? Hah!

All the other website I've tried have pros and cons as well.

I'm surprised to see eBay mentioned. Their CS is far worse, and fraud is a huge issue. Less so for buyers, admittedly, but selling on eBay is a huge risk.

[big_slacker]

Customer service on refunds has always been easy. But try to find out product information or any other remotely technical question? Hah!

All the other website I've tried have pros and cons as well.

I'm surprised to see eBay mentioned. Their CS is far worse, and fraud is a huge issue. Less so for buyers, admittedly, but selling on eBay is a huge risk.

I've never had many issues with ebay either, I feel like I'm leading a charmed life here. 758 sales and I can think of only a handful where we had issues. And they were resolved via ebay/paypal disputes. I've sold at least 4 mid/high end bikes on there. Their real problem for sellers is the ridiculous fees. I prefer craigslist for selling but Ebay has a wider audience and you don't get the lowballers and flakeouts.

I think some of my lack of problems with these sites is due to my wife's eastern european skills at discovering/working systems. :) 

[GuitarStv]

I stopped using ebay permanently after I paid for a 500$ bass guitar that was never delivered.  Ebay/paypal told me I was SOL, refunded 200$ and sent me on my way.

[Nothlit]

I've had no problems with Amazon, and a few good customer service encounters. A few weeks ago I had a prime 2-day shipment miss its guaranteed delivery date. I sent them an email and within 12 hours they had extended my Prime membership by 1 month as a form of compensation. Sometime last year I contacted them because I had purchased a Windows 7 installation disc from them several years ago, and I was now missing the sticker that had the product key on it (I tried to contact Microsoft first, but they told me to contact the store where I bought the disc for a replacement key). Without me even asking, Amazon just refunded me the entire amount (around $100) that I had originally paid for the Win7 disc years earlier. I was blown away.

You do have to pay attention on Amazon to make sure you know who you are buying from. Many products are sold by third party sellers, and in some of those cases, the third parties are selling fake or knock-off versions of the item. When in doubt, I always buy directly from Amazon even if the third parties are selling the "same" item for a few dollars less.