Newegg is under fire from PC builders after the electronics retailer was caught reselling a faulty motherboard to a popular YouTube channel and initially denying an attempt to return it.
Newegg apologized on Monday and pledged to reach out to customers who experienced the same problem. “These were unintentional process errors and isolated incidents,” the retailer said in a statement on Twitter. “As a result, we have already changed internal procedures to improve how we manage product returns.”
The controversy centers on a $599 Gigabyte motherboard Newegg resold to the YouTube channel Gamers Nexus as an “open box” item. This means another customer bought the item only to return it to Newegg. The company then inspected the PC part, tested that it still works, and decided to resell it at a discount.
Gamers Nexus bought the motherboard, but never opened up the packaging. After realizing the motherboard was no longer needed, the YouTube channel decided to return it to Newegg, expecting a “hassle free” refund as the retailer had advertised. However, the company ended up denying the return, claiming the CPU socket pins in the motherboard had been damaged, even though Gamer Nexus had never opened up the box.
Newegg then shipped back the motherboard to Gamer Nexus, which discovered something surprising about the PC part: The product actually contained a sticker showing Newegg itself had tried to return the motherboard to Gigabyte at some point. Allegedly, Newegg refused to pay $100 to repair the motherboard, but nevertheless decided to resell it as an open box item.
Although Newegg has since refunded Gamers Nexus, the controversy sparked an outpouring of anger against the electronics retailer, especially among consumers who’ve faced similar return denials with the company. Gamers Nexus later posted on its YouTube community feed: “We are seeing a frightening amount of stories from customers of Newegg about very similar things happening to them—many with support chat logs and receipts to prove it.”
In response, Newegg said open box return problems are accidental and rare. “We have become aware that a very small number of returns may not have been thoroughly inspected before being routed for returns, liquidation or e-waste recycling and were accidentally resold as ‘open box’ merchandise,” it said. “We sincerely apologize to our customers who were negatively impacted.”
To prevent future disputes on open box items, Newegg added: “We have put in place new policies to ensure a hassle-free return experience on ‘open box’ merchandise returns on motherboards and CPUs.” This amounts to a “no questions asked” policy on the open box returns within a 30-day period, Newegg later told Windows Central.
Still, the incident is a bad look for Newegg at a time when consumers are frustrated with retailers for failing to make it easier to obtain GPU supplies at normal prices. Gamers Nexus plans on meeting with Newegg later this week to further discuss the retailer’s return problems.
