Has NewEgg gone down the toilet?

[Gasoline]

I've bought thousands of dollars worth of stuff from NewEgg over the past couple years and *always* had a great online shopping experience. Never ever got any defective stuff, prices were cheap, orders were always processed very promptly, packaging has always been secure and shipping right on schedule. In short, NewEgg has always been for me the kind of online vendor I could take for granted to treat me right.

Recently I've been reading an abnormally rapidly growing amount of bad reports against them. Ludicrous restocking fees, DOA parts, refusing to accept returns, etc, etc. Even their website responds slow as crap and doles out lots of error messages recently.

I recently bought a new mobo from them, and noticed that they now advise of "manufacturer only" warranty on it. That's right, if you get one that's DOA, you must take up the issue with the mobo manufacturer, NewEgg has washed their hands of the deal once they hand over the package to the shipper. I bought the mobo anyway, understanding that since it's the most hot-rodded OC'ers board selling right now, and probably a lot of customers burn them up right away or they get one that doesn't OC as well, so NewEgg probably got burned with lots of bogus returns on this particular mobo. (BTW, mine arrived in perfect shape and OC's very well :) it was a gamble I was willing to take).

All in all, I've always been done right by them.

However, something just happened yesterday that is seriously making me think twice about ever doing business with them again. I check my bank credit card account info online every few days, and one credit card which has only ever been used for online purchases from two vendors (ATT Wireless and NewEgg) suddenly had a fraudulent charge on it. It was one of those infamous "Amazing $9.95 Credit Card Scam" charges. I promptly notified the bank, they recognized exactly what it was after one look, and they took care of it and issued me a new card number.

I meticulously maintain the security of the PC I use to make online purchases with. It's Linux and I use Mozilla FireFox as my browser, so the chance of spyware being present on it is virtually non-existant. I know better than to use Windows and Internet Explorer for online credit card stuff, that's just plain foolish.

Now I'm left wondering just how the fraudsters got hold of that particular card number, name, address, expiration date AND cvc code number. One of the only two companies who had it in their customer databases has got to be the culprit who's guilty of poor security of their customers' credit card data, right?.

ATT Wireless or NewEgg?

I'm just having a difficult time suspecting AT&T Wireless, although it's still a possibility, since I hadn't done online business with AT&T with it for about 4 months. All the recent valid activity on that card had been exclusively with NewEgg, especially in the past month where I've made lots of NewEgg purchases.

[daniel_dynasty]

I have heard from my friend personally because he owns his own store and he has been telling me that Newegg was going to go out of business. I was like heck no man, they get so many orders and the time he told me that Newegg just revamped the site to the new look. I personally think that they arent closing down BUT have you realized that prices have gone up? Warranties down? Service Down? this is probably due to a new owner or new management. Someone probably bought Newegg from the orignial owner.

[mrgreenjeans]

I think I'd look a little deeper. I doubt a true credit card frauder would only hit you for $9.95 if he got the numbers. The one time I got burned, and this was several years ago, they used my cc# to set up a website for me(?) and then used that to run up several thousand dollars worth of charges. Even after two years I was getting renewal and overdue charges for my(?) website. My CC company took care of everything after it was proven I didn't have anything to do with it and all charges were refunded. But from that, I like you, have a card with a very low credit line I use strictly for online purchases, which is something I recommend to all online shoppers. It was determined that my numbers were probably a result of a random number generator and they got lucky with a hit and ran a credit check against the numbers revealing my mailing, etc., provding enough info to set up the website, which they then used as an additional credit reference to authorize the ongoing charges. The $9.95 was probably a box you neglected to check or check during a transaction. The pros would go for more than chump change once they had a valid cc account.

EDIT: and re: Newegg, I just purchased a power supply that proved incompatible and they issued an RMA immediately. I am still very satisfied with their service and products. Prices are going up accross the board, and the more you do business with a company the odds increase you will have an unpleasant experience, but remember to work the percentages. And as you read about the transfer of warranty suppport, remember all the noobs who post proudly about frying their board/CPU's/memory and "RMA'ing" 'cause nobody gets hurt.

[I.M.O.G.]

The pros often stick in small charges to 1000's of people they scam... The majority of people don't check their statements or even balance their checkbook for that matter. EVERYONE would notice 1000's of dollars missing... But few people out of 1000 would notice 10 bucks - do the math and consider who the smarter criminal is?

[Imperial]

I ordered a video card from them about a month ago. I got it real fast. I still think they are top notch.

[mrgreenjeans]

Yeah, but its a lot harder to get thousands of valid numbers than 1 good one. Could work both ways. Personally, I'd go for the big hit, and send a postcard from the Islands. :burn:

[I.M.O.G.]

Haha, the islands huh?

I wasn't talking about randomly guessing numbers... The simple mathematics on that make it pretty ridiculous to try for even a single number. What I meant was that pros get access to as many CC numbers as possible over a long period of time and then periodically make small transactions which go unnoticed, and have been known to pull it off for quite some time.

I'm with you though, if I were gonna do it myself... I'd go for the old smash and grab - one big hit and send a postcard from my tiki hut on the beach.

[Gasoline]

I think I'd look a little deeper. I doubt a true credit card frauder would only hit you for $9.95 if he got the numbers.

(snip)

The $9.95 was probably a box you neglected to check or check during a transaction. The pros would go for more than chump change once they had a valid cc account.


Nope, not at all. It was a bone-fide fraud scam charge. The fake company name used to charge me is 12th on the list of top 25 fake companies/domain names reported in these scams just for the month of July 2004 alone. I've been able to only trace the domain name registry to someone with a Russian name at a physical address in New York City, probably all fake also. No other contact info is available and the particular domain registrar themselves who issued the domain, seems to be a very shady outfit who caters to spammers and far too many legitimate customers complaining about them all over the web.

The $9.95 per charge credit card scam seems to be a rather (in)famous one, there's a ton of info about it all over the web, along with some very recent warnings about a new wave of them. The FTC, FBI and the entire banking profession is all trying to chase down these scammers right now. The fraudsters' goal is to make thousands of these charges to try to see how many get overlooked. The bank's investigator I spoke with instantly recognized the characteristics of the charge, reversed it and automatically forwards this info to the federal authorities.

I protect my credit card info with great zeal, am exceedingly cautious when doing online business (I even do a "netstat -a" to check all open connections before hitting the "submit" button on the browser) and was rather surprised to see a bogus charge suddenly show up on my account right out of the blue. That could mean one thing and one thing only: Somebody got my credit card data from a vendor's customer database, there were only two vendors who had this information....well, possibly ATT's or NewEgg's credit card processing service companies too... Hmm, I didn't think of that until just now.

Augh!!!! if the numbers got stolen from a credit card processor instead of an online vendor, that means that no use of a credit card is safe anymore, even if you only ever use it in person!!! Holy Cow!!!

What a lovely day it is turning out to be. I think I'll go crawl back in bed and hide from the world.

[Miralcos]

Augh!!!! if the numbers got stolen from a credit card processor instead of an online vendor, that means that no use of a credit card is safe anymore, even if you only ever use it in person!!! Holy Cow!!!

What a lovely day it is turning out to be. I think I'll go crawl back in bed and hide from the world.

I was gonna just pop in and say this kind of fraud was happening long before people started buyin online. I had the same thing happen to me once and I had never up to that point bought one thing online. There are all sorts of ways they could have gotten the acct. number. Just hope that's the only time this happens to you. Some people get ravaged financially over stuff very similar to this. It's always good to be cautious, but remember, if yer usin plastic, it's possible to get ripped off. I would still use newegg because they are a valid place to purchase. Good luck!!! :)

[el]

Newegg is still tops in my book. But seems like the really good deals go OoS real fast and it becomes I kind of trick to get you to look and then find the item OoS. CompUSA always does this with their 10 piece of item in their flier.

[buddhafumes]

I suggest getting a card called a NetSpend, you put however much money you want on it, and you spend it whenever you want. So, you put the amount of $$ you want to spend on it say, a couple hours b4 you order so its hard to get scammed. I think there is a high chance at&t did it also, because recently qwest has beene toying with the dsl and phone. Both are corporations with probably as equally greedy people in them. I think newegg would be a little easier to hack customer credit card numbers and such, becasue AT&T is so large.

[NiTrO bOiE]

buddha, that sounds like my Visabuxx card my dad gave me to order stuff online. He controls how much money is on it, and I could care less if someone got the number to it because there is never over $10 on it, because he only adds money when he knows I will spend it in the next 5 minutes :). And since it's not a credit card, you can't buy anything that is over the amount on the card...

Back on topic. I think newegg is here to stay. They won't be going out fo business for a while. They might get bought out and change their name to something like newgear or something but not out of business.

[MitchV]

I never really understood all the hub-bub over CC security. Lets be real... there is VERY little security when it comes to CC's. I remember working at gas stations when I was in college and every night I would include a stack of CC slips several inches thick in my final safe deposit.

I knew the CC numbers, the expiration dates... hell, I even knew the customer's SIGNATURE. I could check the back to compare the customers signature and get the damn safety code myself.

So now people are worried about somebody recording their keystrokes, probing their PC to retrieve CC info, getting into company databases, etc.

The fact is, if you use your CC, it is not secure. If you don't use your CC, what is the point in having one though?

Fortunately, if your CC number is used fraudulently, you are usually liable for $50 or so. I suppose it depends on your arrangement with your CC company though.

The worst thing I've seen is what happened to my brother in college. An ATM machine ate his debit card and his bank issued him a new one. Somebody in his dorm stole his card from his mailbox (not sure how, but that is what happened). The moron went on a spending spree and depleted my brother's checking account. My brother reported the activity to the bank, who promptly got the police involved... they tracked down the moron, who spent a lot of the money at a local bike shop. The bad thing for my brother was that this process took weeks and he didn't have access to his cash for that period of time. It ended up costing him $50 and I think the bank had to eat the rest. The saddest thing is that whoever stole the card was somebody my brother KNEW... my brother told the police that he didn't want to know their identity.

I guess my point is that nobody should *really* feel safe with their credit card. The number is VERY accessable and VERY insecure. The good news is that you most likely aren't liable for a large sum of money if somebody uses it fraudulently... and that small risk is more than made up for in the benefits you receive using a credit card.

[buddhafumes]

Theres no need to use credit cards. Get a card where YOU put as much money as you want on it- the netsped. It is fairly safe, and right now, I think there is $17 on ours so its useless to get the numbers for. I hate to look like I'm advertising, but anything like that should be as safe.Newegg has been recently.... lets say cranky, but at least customer service is still good. Visabuxx is the same idea as the netspend (netspend is just made by mastercard), I think.

[mrgreenjeans]

I also thik the recent media campaign to raise the 'fear' issue of identity theft fuels the situation. As stated, every cc compmany i've got accounts with will cover the debts ran up fraudently. I've been bombarded recently with invitations for "identity protection" for a low rate of $18.00 a month, and I doubt I would ever use the service. I put it in their with their "payment security" plan for a low percentage or a flat $99 a month fee they'll take care of my bills while incapacitated. I signed up for one once in my earlier years and figured after about 3 years I had paid them in excess of $3,000 and had nothing in return. I cancelled the program, 8- 9 years ago and have yet had a need for it. I would've paid upwards of $20-30K by now had I left the 'service' in place. I'm sure someone would've benefitted form the program, but I didn't feel the need to pay for it! I agree with the statement, you use a card you're open to theft, but you're open to theft if you write a check. Theives are a part of soceity, get used to it. Identity theft, there's some days I'd pay the sucker to take my stuff on, he'd be welcome to it!

[Mr. Chambers]

I've spent upwards of $20,000 @ newegg over the years and have NEVER had a problem. I think that pretty much speaks for itself. However with a company that deals with thousands of orders a day, slip-ups are not unheard of.