Bought a NON-GENUINE stick of Mushkin. Now I am mad.

Hey guys, thought I would share this with you all.

I am building 5 computers for a client so to speak and we ended up with the Mushkin Blue series to fill the 512mb requirement. All sticks but one have the BP B6U815 PCB, but there is a stranger. One has no markings at all. No, it is not a Mushkin Enhanced PCB. No, it is not a different color. In fact, it looks STRANGELY like my Kingston Value ram! So upon close inspection, the Heatspreader sticker has been torn off and re-applied. There are silver scratches in the anodized blue heatspreader. Most of all, they have MICRON MEMORY CHIPS ON THEM! The blue series never came with Micron. It was either Mosel, or Winbond chips. I lifted the heatspreader to see a code starting wtih Mt. Someone, not sure who, re-applied heatspreaders onto this module that is NOT a Mushkin module. To anyone who does this sort of act, I hope you get caught, and I hope the punishment is severe.

Anyway, has this happened to anyone before? I am not really that upset, since it isn't my computer and all. The client just wants a working 512mb stick, but you can bet your arss that if this were for my rig, I'd be back in frys, demanding that they look up the serial number and WHO returned it.

-Collin-

Man,

That blows! Now, I am beginning to wonder what Fry's return policy is? Do they take the merchendise you return and restock it or do they send it back to Mushkin?

Thanks for sharing this with us.

NinjaZX6R said:

Hey guys, thought I would share this with you all.


Anyway, has this happened to anyone before? I am not really that upset, since it isn't my computer and all. The client just wants a working 512mb stick, but you can bet your arss that if this were for my rig, I'd be back in frys, demanding that they look up the serial number and WHO returned it.

-Collin-

Click to expand...

Collin, I'd be at Fry's SCREAMING!! And, I wouldn't give up, until they found the scumbucket responsible, and fired him(her).

Then, I would be screaming at Mushkin, for even dealing with such a dispicable dealer. And, again I wouldn't give up, until Mushkin fired Fry's.

Putting the wrong stick in a storage bin, is one thing. Removing the marking, to defraud the customer, is another. Mushkin doesn't need that kind of reputation, and Fry's already has that rep.

And, if they can find the "customer" responsible, jail! That is fraud!

steve

Do something about it. Mention lawyers and they'll get scared. Talk to a manager and be really ****ed off. When right away you sound mad ****ed as if someone stuck a firecracker up your ***, they'll do whatever it takes to fix the problem. Mention the Better Business Bureau and tell them you're going to file a complaint. They hate that ****. Goodluck.

That's really s**tty man

I don't believe Mushkin would ever do anything like this, and honestly, I believe this as nothing to do with Mushkin AT ALL!

The only thing that Mushkin did, that was wrong, was choosing a questionable retail outlet.

The only thing they need to do, is to fire Fry's.

If you check Fry's ref with the BBB, you'll see that they really don't care about it.

steve

Well, I'm going to let this one slide for a few reasons.

1) The time and energy required to go through the return line is not worth it, as this is a working stick of 512mb of ram.

2) This may sound ridiculous, but I do not wish to "wear out my welcome" at frys. I have been doing business with them for years, and their return personnel are not trained to notice the difference between modules like we may be. I am not mad at anyone but who returned this stick. I don't think it is frys/mushkin's fault. After all, it took me a good 20 minutes to realize this myself.

Just a heads up for y'all.

-Collin-

Chill out people. I used to work at Fry's, and trust me when I say that there would be absolutely no reason for Fry's to pull a switch like that. On the other hand, we have customers that try to return "switched-out" products like this all the time, and sadly, some of them get past the loss prevention guys. If you've ever returned anything at Fry's, you might notice that before the customer service guy can print out your green sheet for your store credit, the product must be inspected by another person, and that would be the loss prevention guy. It's their job to catch stuff like that, but sometimes they don't.

So let me reiterate, Fry's would have no reason to switch it like, and there's good reasons why. Firstly, when we have to return a defective product to the manufacturer, that store in particular doesn't do it directly, we send it off to a single Fry's location, and they deal with sorting everything back to it's rightful owner. Secondly, if my store was one of the best of the Fry's and even OUR returns guys would rather just put a sticker on and then ship it off rather than going to the trouble of switching out heatspreaders/stickers on ram, than I know none of the other stores people would do it either. It just doesn't make sense when all anyone would have to do is stick a "return to vendor" sticker on it and throw it in a bin. Trust me, no one cares THAT much, and they get paid the same.

If you are going to take the time, all you need to do is go back to the store, talk to the P.I.C., the Person In Charge, and explain to him what the situation is. At the VERY least, it would be no problem at all just to exchange the stick for another, but if prove your case you should get your money back no sweat.

NinjaZX6R said:

Well, I'm going to let this one slide for a few reasons.

1) The time and energy required to go through the return line is not worth it, as this is a working stick of 512mb of ram.

2) This may sound ridiculous, but I do not wish to "wear out my welcome" at frys. I have been doing business with them for years, and their return personnel are not trained to notice the difference between modules like we may be. I am not mad at anyone but who returned this stick. I don't think it is frys/mushkin's fault. After all, it took me a good 20 minutes to realize this myself.

Just a heads up for y'all.

-Collin-

Click to expand...

Maybe at the Frys on Hamilton Ave. but the Fry's in So Cal is very anal retentive. I had a bad set of blues and they busted out the magnifying glass just to verify the B6U815. Worst part is, if it happend to you here in So Cal they might not even take it back since it's "against the law to accept merchnadise that they don't carry" even though it is their fault.

skou said:

The only thing that Mushkin did, that was wrong, was choosing a questionable retail outlet.

The only thing they need to do, is to fire Fry's.

Click to expand...

To add on...

The thing you don't understand is Mushkin needs Fry's a LOT more than Fry's needs Mushkin. Mushkin is probably one of Fry's LEAST sold brands that they carry, but I bet they still do enough to hurt Mushkin if they decided not to retail with Fry's. About the only time they sell Mushkin is when it's put in the advertisement, most likely losing money anyway. Trust me, they have plenty of other brands that can fill that spot.

apu318 said:

Do something about it. Mention lawyers and they'll get scared. Talk to a manager and be really ****ed off. When right away you sound mad ****ed as if someone stuck a firecracker up your ***, they'll do whatever it takes to fix the problem. Mention the Better Business Bureau and tell them you're going to file a complaint. They hate that ****. Goodluck.

Click to expand...

Good luck trying that. If my store was any indication, the more you scream, the less they hear. I've seen my managers blow off customers that were trying to bull**** us out of money PLENTY of times. The bigger the scam they were trying to pull, the more they yelled. If you want the manager to actually hear you, don't scream is damn head off, try talking to him like a human being. Give him some respect, and you'll get some in return.

If you want an even better example, I've seen customers try to return merchandise that was WAY out of return policy, and in HORRIBLE condition, wanting full money back. The manager would have given them STORE CREDIT even when they didn't even deserve that, but instead they scream their head off, and then end up leaving with nothing.

NinjaZX6R said:

Hey guys, thought I would share this with you all.

I am building 5 computers for a client so to speak and we ended up with the Mushkin Blue series to fill the 512mb requirement. All sticks but one have the BP B6U815 PCB, but there is a stranger. One has no markings at all. No, it is not a Mushkin Enhanced PCB. No, it is not a different color. In fact, it looks STRANGELY like my Kingston Value ram! So upon close inspection, the Heatspreader sticker has been torn off and re-applied. There are silver scratches in the anodized blue heatspreader. Most of all, they have MICRON MEMORY CHIPS ON THEM! The blue series never came with Micron. It was either Mosel, or Winbond chips. I lifted the heatspreader to see a code starting wtih Mt. Someone, not sure who, re-applied heatspreaders onto this module that is NOT a Mushkin module. To anyone who does this sort of act, I hope you get caught, and I hope the punishment is severe.

Anyway, has this happened to anyone before? I am not really that upset, since it isn't my computer and all. The client just wants a working 512mb stick, but you can bet your arss that if this were for my rig, I'd be back in frys, demanding that they look up the serial number and WHO returned it.

-Collin-

Click to expand...

Colliin

Sorry bout the trouble. I will put u in touch with the Corporate customer service manange. This is why we are tightening our policy with resellers. That is why we are changing some of our policies. You will see soon. We get TONS.... Literlly TONS of parts that come back that are NOT ours. M to M Memory, Partiot, Kreton, Wintec, MALABS etc. all of them fail in our testing. To protect you, the consumer and Mushkin, we will be making some drastic changes and I can already see other vendors following in our example.

Duonger

JudgeDredd said:

To add on...

The thing you don't understand is Mushkin needs Fry's a LOT more than Fry's needs Mushkin. Mushkin is probably one of Fry's LEAST sold brands that they carry, but I bet they still do enough to hurt Mushkin if they decided not to retail with Fry's. About the only time they sell Mushkin is when it's put in the advertisement, most likely losing money anyway. Trust me, they have plenty of other brands that can fill that spot.



Good luck trying that. If my store was any indication, the more you scream, the less they hear. I've seen my managers blow off customers that were trying to bull**** us out of money PLENTY of times. The bigger the scam they were trying to pull, the more they yelled. If you want the manager to actually hear you, don't scream is damn head off, try talking to him like a human being. Give him some respect, and you'll get some in return.

If you want an even better example, I've seen customers try to return merchandise that was WAY out of return policy, and in HORRIBLE condition, wanting full money back. The manager would have given them STORE CREDIT even when they didn't even deserve that, but instead they scream their head off, and then end up leaving with nothing.

Click to expand...

In December I was given a $200 gift cert, from Fry's. I still have MOST of it left, just because MY PERSONAL return rate, on electronics, is too high. Think 75%.

In the long past, it was from me buying MARKED re-packaged products. In the near past, it was from buying NON-MARKED re-packed products, or most of the manufacturers leave parts out, in Fry's shipments.

This year, I buy things that don't have any electronics involved, like AS5, hand tools, DVDs, blank optical media, paper, ink, well, you get the idea.

So far, I haven't been burned, but I always expect it.

I have had those discussions, with the manager, when I went to buy a cheap internal modem, and I opened the box, at home, and had a well used, cheap sound card. Would have been more expensive than the modem I wanted, but I couldn't get on the internet with it. When I took it back, I was given another modem. This one had no driver disk. I checked at the store, lucky. Go home and download the drivers, you might say. But, I had no modem, that worked!

This is a typical Fry's experience, for me.

I have NEVER had problems like this, from the 'Egg, so they get a LOT of my business.

I wonder why Newegg doesn't have the same "missing stuff" issue? They are selling the same brands, and the same models.

I hate to say it, but CompUSSR has better quality control. (Unless you buy the house brand silver thermal grease!) And, you can imagine my opinion of them.

steve

Yeah, sadly I have heard that customer service really sucks in the California stores, very strange since that is where home office is. The things like getting a sound card from a modem box are exactly the stuff that shouldn't happen, if some associates would do their job. The return guidelines that associates are supposed to follow state that they must open and inspect each and every box to be returned, even if it looks brand new and non-opened. It's because they don't follow this as to why you get situations like this. To make things worse, some of the people up in returns also have no idea what they're doing, and some of them probably couldn't tell the difference between a sound card and modem.

However, these are the same reasons why Fry's wouldn't be responsible for the switched memory. One, other customers trying to rip off Fry's. Two, because the returns people couldn't tell the difference. Finally, three, because everybody's too damn lazy that if they did notice, after it had been returned, it'd be much easier and waste less of they precious time if they just stuck a sticker on and threw it in the "return to vendor" bin.

If you think someone switching out a stick of memory is bad, you havn't seen anything yet.

What I want to know is how can "bad" memory end up back in the cage?

JudgeDredd said:

Yeah, sadly I have heard that customer service really sucks in the California stores, very strange since that is where home office is.

If you think someone switching out a stick of memory is bad, you havn't seen anything yet.

Click to expand...

Oh, Tempe Arizona is in Arizona, not California. Thought you'd like to know.

And, that story was big news, in the vendor discussion area. Thread was started by Gnerma. Seems he knows the guy.

steve

fldrice said:

What I want to know is how can "bad" memory end up back in the cage?

Click to expand...

Because it's Fry's. Their quality control isn't!

steve

fldrice said:

Maybe at the Frys on Hamilton Ave. but the Fry's in So Cal is very anal retentive. I had a bad set of blues and they busted out the magnifying glass just to verify the B6U815. Worst part is, if it happend to you here in So Cal they might not even take it back since it's "against the law to accept merchnadise that they don't carry" even though it is their fault.

Click to expand...

Mate,
If they pull that stunt on me, I will bad mouth them for as long as I live! Ofcourse, a BBB, Attorney Generals Fraud prevention office and other relevent agencies would recieve a written complaint.

Collin, you should let them know that this has happened. Then they will be aware of scammer's tactics.

That sucks Collin. I'd at least let Fry's know so, if they are inclined, they can track down whoever returned it. Also, I guess that answers the question about whether they resell returned sticks.

CJ

Yep, they sell return sticks. They pretty much have to, otherwise they would lose a ton of money. Like I said before, it is a perfectly fine working stick that will be running stock its whole life, I just don't like the idea that there are people going around doing this.

-Collin-

Did they even put an open box sticker on the package?