2004-10-06-2150Z


I carelessly ordered a 200GB hard drive for $120 -- I say carelessly because I didn't even notice it was Serial ATA -- from jazztechnology.com. They accept PayPal for payment, which is cool, and just after I paid that "Serial" caught my eye... did some googling, and sure enough, it's a different type of host adapter than the normal (parallel) ATA... and I don't have it on my mobo.

So, I go to jazztechnology's website. There's an option to cancel the order, which I did... go back to my account page and the order is still active. Boo. Hiss. Tried canceling again, and again it says it worked, and again it didn't really.

Fired off an email to sales@jazztechnology.com. Surely a company that is savvy enough to accept PayPal will answer its emails promptly, right? Nope.

I didn't worry too much. It was my fault after all, and if they didn't cancel my order and refund me I'd just pay another $40 or $50 on the host adapter, and I'd still be well under a buck a gig. But according to BizRate.com, jazztechnology was just getting started in online sales, and already had one very bad review out of only a handful of reviews. They needed a chance to make things right. I really want newcomers to web commerce to succeed if they're clueful and have good prices.

But as of today they still hadn't answered my email. So I send them another:

From:   jcomeau.jcomeau.com
To:	sales.jazztechnology.com
CC:	management.jazztechnology.com, ceo.jazztechnology.com
Subject: Re: Account Information

So I guess by ignoring my emails you figure you can take my money for something I can't use, rather than invest a few minutes in selling me something I _can_ use? Not a good strategy for staying in business on the web. You might want to get on the cluetrain.

--- John Comeau <jcomeau.jcomeau.com> wrote:

> I made a mistake! I don't have serial ATA. Do you have > any parallel drives for about the same price? I tried > to cancel the order twice, and each time it says it > was canceled, but the order status still shows it > active! Please help! -- jc > > --- sales@jazztechnology.com wrote: > > > Welcome! > > > > A password for your account has been automatically > > generated.

I got a notice from PayPal within minutes that my money had been refunded. But still not a peep from the jazzguys. Oh, well, another one bites the dust. I won't give them a bad review, but I won't give them a good one, either... they'll either clean up their act or fade away into obscurity. I couldn't care less, I won't ever trust them again.

Finished my RAC job, the customer gave me a 10 rating, which should boost my Top Coder rating next time they recalculate; that 2744 that shows as of this post is old news, and was good enough to put me in the top 1500 until recently, when other more industrious coders have passed me by and bumped me down to 1520.

Also, got a consulting job from another consultant back home in Florida, and it's always nice making real money for my efforts, for a change. Of course, then I have to guarantee my work, something that I don't do for my rentacoder clients.

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