WARNING: To any one thinking of buying Vizio Laptops

I just got my Vizio CN15-A1 laptop in mail and the trackpad was slightly loose. Between the trackpad, keyboard and the weight of the laptop, there is no reason to keep this for the price. The screen is nice but that's about it.

So after 5mins of playing with it, I called Vizio support. The rep told me .... wait for this ..... there is going to be a 10% restocking fee ($95) ...... if I had to return the laptop. I was shocked and I told them no other company does this for a return. He said he can try and waive one of the shipping fee or the restocking fee. So after 5 mins of waiting, he comes back and says ....... wait for this ........ since the return shipping is going to be more expensive than the restocking fee, they will waive the shipping and keep the restocking fee. For a moment I thought I would have to ship back to China and that's why the shipping would be so expensive but turns out it is only going to CA. :thumbsup:

Here's another curve ball. The rep told me that once they checkout the item
on return it will take them upto one month to issue a Check
I asked for a refund directly to my CC and he said he can try and someone will contact me tomorrow.


I am really shocked and amazed at what just happened. Atleast the warranty is transferable since I got it directly from Vizio.

My advice: DO NOT BUY FROM VIZIO.

 

With the quality issues ive seen with notebooks lately (4 returned zenbooks before giving up, 1 returned s9 just in the past month for me) I ALWAYS check the return policy before buying from an outlet. Even doing that I got stung a bit with walmart.com since it turns out walmart stores will process no hassle returns of walmart.com products but they won't do exchanges. So when my first vizio had a pixel stuck on in the center of the screen I had to return it and buy another one instead of doing a simple return. I can say that my second ct14-a0 has been really great.

In my experience its almost always worse dealing with the manufacturer directly then a retail outlet or online store like amazon.

 

At least with buying with Walmart they will return full amount and give it instantly vs 1month.

I have had better luck buying from small sellers on ebay than the big vendors. Never will I buy directly from a manufacturer. That's for sure.

 

Many online stores charge a restocking fee. As for the 1 month return on your money, that is garbage. Returns usually take one week to get your money back.

 

Vizio is not a store. It is first a manufacturer who should be taking responsibility for selling half backed products. If it were on a sale I would understand but I paid full retail price.

 

Vizio likely has a separate entity to run their online store much in the same way that walmart.com is NOT the same as walmart stores and target.com is actually part of amazon.

Also, the primary means of distribution for Vizio is through retailers so if they have an online store of their own that store would be viewed as kinda that catch all so people without access to another retailer can still buy their products. As such, the store wouldn't have the best prices (list versus discounted) or terms (restocking fees) because they don't want to compete against their retailers who are the lions share of their business.

The bottom line is 'buyer beware'. Always check out return policies, restocking fees and prices before buying anything. It can save you alot of money and grief along the way.

 

Update: I got my full refund after 2 weeks of sending it back. They put it back on the cc.

 

For the past couple of years, I've bought my laptops from amazon.com(make sure amazon is the seller as well). On a couple occasions I've had to send a laptop back -- It's easy as pie and costs absolutely nothing (they even cover the shipping).