We all like to save a buck when we can, but I wanted to tell you a little story about what happened to one of our clients recently who purchased a Sony Vaio system from an Amazon seller…

And the saga begins…

For the sake of not typing ‘our client’ over and over we’ll call him, oh, Bob, and let’s call the Amazon seller Skippy.

So Bob find a great deal on a Sony Vaio desktop system on Amazon and orders it and receives it with no issues.  He installs MS Office and his printer and off he goes, happy as can be.

All of this goes down with no issues – the system is up and running; everyone is happy.

Flash forward one week…

The system starts hanging up, blue-screening, locking up, powering itself down, spewing green vomit, well, you get the idea.  Something is *definitely* not right here.

Bob contacts Sony, who determine that there has been a major hardware failure in the system.

Bob then contacts the Skippy the Wonder Amazon seller, and makes arrangements to send the system back for replacement.  Bob packs up and ships the system back, eagerly awaiting the replacement system.

A week or so goes by and Bob receives his replacement system.  He plugs it in and wham, same problem as before.  blue-screens, lockup, green vomit, it’s ugly.

At this point Bob is not a happy camper.  Skippy the Wonder Amazon Seller has simply shipped him back the same broken system without making any repairs or replacements.

Bob checks into Skippy’s feedback on Amazon and begins to find a series of unhappy recipients of Skippy’s computers with similar stories.

Bob contacts Sony again, in the hopes that perhaps he can deal directly with them and have the system repaired under Sony’s warranty.

Now here is the meat of the story, and what prompted me to share this with you all…

Sony has Bob run some hardware diagnostics, and Bob is reading off the make/model of the individual internal components of the system.  Sony informs Bob that someone (Skippy!) had replaced the internal components of the computer with sub-standard, weak and broken parts.

So what Bob basically had was a nice shiny Sony Vaio case on the outside, but inside it was garbage.

Bob had been scammed.

Have I mentioned that Bob is a lawyer?

Bob contacts Skippy the Wonder Amazon Seller and explains to him that he will be refunding 100% of Bob’s money, shipping, etc. and what will happen to him if he doesn’t.  Bob also contacts Amazon and alerts them to the fraud that took place.

Bob now has his money back.  Skippy’s account has been banned at Amazon, and Bob has since ordered a NEW computer directly from Sony.

If you must order a computer from an individual online, but SURE that you check out the feedback for that user.  If they have negative feedback read them closely and if there is *any* doubt don’t send them your money.

Once you receive your computer have it checked out by a pro and verify that what you paid for is what you received.  Bob was extremely fortunate that he got his money back.  Not all of us would be that lucky if that were to happen to us.

Cheers,
Daniel Scurlock
Scurlock Systems and Associates LLC
972.633.1111
scurlocksystems.com