Purchasing from WD seems to be painful. Digital River seem useless.
Hey folks
Trying to buy a stack of WD Elements Desktop 10TB drives from the WD UK store, with a plex pass discount.
I'm after 17 drives, they have 16 - stopping me ordering as my discount is single use (Boo!)
Just got off the phone with customer services who couldn't tell me: IF they'd get more stock. When that would be. how many they'll get. They also can't offer back ordering or any other helpful workaround.
Surely if you're entire premise is selling other people's stuff, your only goal is to be able to box shift?!
Anyone had to contact them for any particular reason like returns etc.
Not getting the basics right makes me concerned if any of them arrive DOA then I'm going to be having a fight.
Thoughts welcome! /rant
Posted Feb 6, 2019, 6:19 PM UTC
First off, customers don't normally order 17 drives at a time. This is more business level type orders.
Also, your getting these drives at a discount.
You're not entitled to these drives, so I wouldn't act like it.
WD normally has good customer service. If you want to make it easier for yourself, buy as a business at full price.
For reference too... (I missed the buy as business)
Red Pro they only have 1 in stock.
Red seems to have no restriction on stock, or they have a normal amount. Stopped me at 10000.
Ultrastar disks they've only got 1 and 2 TB disks in stock.
So I'm guessing either a huge sale somewhere or they do low volumes through WD's "own" store.
The discount is irrelevant. As I can't order them with or without the discount.
Check the sub you're in. There's plenty of people who order large amounts of drives. Internal or external.
It's not a sense of entitlement it's just sheer poor customer service. For example.
"However, if you need 17 copies, we may suggest to visit our website regularly for further updates regarding the availability of the product. Because as of now, that is only the information that we have for the product"
Again. If you're a company that all you do is sell other people's products. How can you not know when you'll be getting more stock. Basic retail process would be I sell X over Y days, so I've got A days inventory.
This isn't WD. It just makes WD look bad because the company they chose to sell their products 'Digital River' seem pretty clueless. This isn't some one man band company, they do physical and digital sales for huge companies... From their site...
"With nearly 25 years of industry experience and offices on four continents, we've mastered the ins and outs of global commerce"
But basic inventory, or back ordering, or any sort of help obviously isn't commerce
I've never had such difficulties spending money. You'd think an order over £3,000 they'd snap your hand off.
If you feel they aren't handling things correctly, then just take your business elsewhere man. "Vote with your wallet" as they say. Not sure I really agree with the anger/frustration here. It's like going to a grocery store and demanding to speak with the manager because they don't carry a specific brand or flavor or something (which plenty of people do). It blows my mind, just go somewhere else that does offer what you need. They'll change their ways if they need to. This is why monopolies are so bad
I agree. My point is surely you'd expect the company front of their own product to be decent?
Either sell your own stuff, or stick to distribution. I'm trying to think of another manufacturer that sells "directly".
I'm not trying to come across as the bullish arsehole because they don't have what they want. The complaint is they don't have any idea when they'll get stock/how much etc. And their support just go round in circles when spoken to.
Have you considered that you're the least important customer to them right now? For the last 10 years, hard drive companies have had government and global scale companies buying thousands of drives each. Consider all the datacentres for apple, google (Gdrive anyone??), amazon, the NSA, cloudflare, et al.
Also consider that WD bought out most of their competition, save two companies. In the end, you are irrelevant now. As is anyone who doesn't have a public following or millions of dollars. When they're rushing to fill 10TB orders in the thousands vs your tiny 17, who do you actually think they'll cater to first? The seagate 3TB drive fiasco is over, so their drives can be trusted again, and nothing is stopping you from buying from Best Buy. Geez man, just be thankful you can still find drives, unlike a lot of graphics cards for the last three years... Hard drives have NEVER been a bulk purchase option (see 1 vs 20pk drive prices), and for a WHILE NOW, we the individual consumer have NOT been important to WDs bottom line. Lick wound, buy seagate, move on.