Black friday with Costco Tire Service Center

I plan to change battery for my mini van, so I turn to Costco. But I'd like to call their Tire Service Center before heading to the physical store. You know what, the experience greatly reduced my best shopping impression with Costco. Here is my experience:

I first call Almaden Costco, which took me 8 minutes wait to get someone talked to me. (There is standard Costco waiting recording audio) I asked them if you have the battery for my car model, the answer is "we should have". Then I asked them to double check, they guy went to check the system for in stock info.

I then call Sunnyval Costco, the call was answered without any voice, but put aside. On the other side, the employees are talking, laughing about birthday, camera, dinner etc. I understand this is holiday, but can you please also consider your customer's time? And at least, put to the system automated voice instead of your chatting/joking?

I am getting curios if all Costco service centers are doing the same thing, I selected another San Jose Costco to make the same inquiry. Well, the guy answered me with "Please hold on", then switched to automated recording audio. Exactly same as the Almaden Costco, I am putting to long waiting experience. This time, the waiting time exceeded 14 minutes to get my questions answered.

Costco, are you still feeling the competition from Amazon? Why not put customer (members) as the first priority when do business? I once expect Target or Costco can complete with Amazon, but the thought is getting the other direction. I have to admit Amazon is flying day and day, and it will beat every retail or wholesale stores after Amazon improve their return policy with local Whole Foods stores.

To sum up, Costco online and phone services are bad. The only strength they have are physical store experience with best return policy.

Amazon Shopping Tips and Tricks

I shop online with Amazon.com very often, so summarize some tips and tricks regarding the shopping experience.

Amazon prime
Suggest to enroll with your friends to split the cost for FREE 2 days shipping for all primary members. The account owner also gets unlimited video streaming service.

No-Rush shipping reward
If you buy something and choose no-rush shipping, you will get credits for Digital, prime panty or prime now. The rewards have expiry date, usually 3 months. You can check the balance from https://www.amazon.com/norushcredits

Amazon Smile
Always shop through https://smile.amazon.com to donate to your selected charity (like home school, your church etc) while you are shopping with Amazon.

Amazon Assistant
You can install "Amazon Assistant" browser extension to quickly access Amazon, search product, track your orders, see today's deals, and add product to your wish list. This is a very handy extension to help you shop with Amazon.

Return your purchase
Amazon only provides 30 days return window, so act quickly if you don't like the purchase. For prime member, the return shipping is free as well. When you return something, select a reason which does not cost you shipping fee. Drop to UPS is a convenient way as they are many UPS stores.


Price Match
Amazon doesn't provide price match. The easiest way is to buy a new one, then return the old one if it is still in return order. I usually chatted with their support, they can provide price adjustment, but recently they change this, and prefer buy-and-return flow with extra shipping cost. I guess Amazon shipping cost with UPS or USPS is very low.

ReadyRefresh sucks

In May, there was a promotion (spend $30, credit $15) from AMEX to buy online with ReadyRefresh which looks like a beverage delivery service, but my experience shows it totally sucks and looks like a scam. I never ever will use their service, even free stuff. If you see this post and never try ReadyRefresh, I hope it can help you out.

I totally ordered 8 items which amount is about $33, just above the promotion credit threshold. However, the online order confirmation page (see below) immediately gave me the impression, the service sucks because I see two amounts on the single same page.

I was more confusing when I got below email summary for my first order.

 

This happened on the same hour, three different charge amount: $30.71  $33.45 and $28.03.

I got my first (and last) order from ReadyRefresh delivered on Monday. Guess what, I expected total 8 items, but only 6 items got delivered. There was no any delivery confirmation email or delivery statement, just the boxes (original beverage package like we get from local store) dumped in front of my front door. I am an Amazon fan, if you are an Amazon frequent shopper, you will understand my feeling when see such a delivery experience.  I carefully examine the 6 items, 3 items are with expiration date just in July and August. I totally got mad about these delivery.

The second day, I called ReadyRefresh customer support number (1-866-813-4939 show on their website https://www.readyrefresh.com/). The only good experience is the call center wait time is short, about 1-2 minutes, I got some representative talking with me. I explained the reason I called. The representative told me she will make a note to deliver the missing 2 items without charge. Well, I got the 2 items delivered 2 days later. However, I noticed 2 more charges on my bank activities on June 2nd. Before June 2nd, I notice my banking hold amount keep changing, and finally I was charged $29.33 on May 24. (Please note the amount is just a bit lower than the threshold of AMEX promotion $30, by purpose or not, who knows).

I have to call their customer support again for these 2 extra charges. I was asked to check my online account activities, and the support representative explained all these charges are correct.

 

She explained the extra $1.20 is for CRV deposit, and $14.14 is for one box of Nestle 1/2 water (24 bottles) delivery. I can get such box of water from local store about $2.99+CRV. She then told me there was a delivery fee included, and she will credit that amount. I asked why I was not explained when I made the first call for 2 missing items, and asked if I can return this order. (I didn't use due to so many items are expiring very shortly, I plan to throw them away) The answer is: I cannot return any thing. I got mad from above experience with the 1st ever order from ReadyRefresh, I requested to talk to her supervisor or escalate to someone. Finally I got a callback from supervisor, and she promised to credit back the $15.34 amount (charged on June 2nd). Thanks to the final result, but considering the time I spent on this, it is far more than such a lunch cost. (You know what, I plan to dispute the charges with credit card company if they don't want to credit).

I could not trust ReadyRefresh from the moment I saw 2 different amount numbers right after I placed my order, so I took all screenshot, recorded all conversations as a proof. Now I better understand why Amazon is the best online shopping experience in USA (from my experience). 

Go Amazon, Skip ReadyRefresh. That is the whole point I wrote this blog about my shopping experience with ReadyRefresh.