Arguably, we are buying not all that much hardware components and gadgets, still considering all the memory modules, hard-drives, USB-Flash drives, SD-Cards, Arduino Boards, routers, etc. it surely adds up.
Frys is still a place I really enjoy going to but most of the above-mentioned things are purchased from online e-commerce companies such as buy.com, newegg.com, mwave.com etc., among which I had always favored newegg - until yesterday that is.
I had ordered a memory upgrade for a Laptop, a standard 1GB • 200 PIN • PC5300 667MHz • DDR2 SO-DIMM and while the price was not the lowest, I considered newegg a trusted source, worth the few extra bucks.




Unfortunately, the memory did not work. After plugging it in, the notebook beeped twice but refused to boot. After a couple more equally unsuccessful attempts, including reseeding the memory, switching modules etc., I gave up and notified newegg of the broken part. What I hadn't realized until then was that at newegg even broken parts are subject to a 15% restocking fee.



$62.89 - $49.80 refund + $1.30 shipping cost for the return = $14.39

Having paid 14 bucks for a brocken SO DIMM plus a trip to the local post office makes it highly unlikely that I will be purchasing from newegg again any time soon.

Now let's just hope they don't mean the restocking fee literally or somebody else will (due to the very same memory module) go through the same process. Thinking of it, could circulating broken chips and charging restocking fees be a valid business model? Hm..