My current workstation and gaming PC is slowly disintegrating. I built it myself from components some 6 years ago and it’s simply wearing out. Several USB ports don’t work and Windows sometimes bluescreens with errors that suggests bits of the motherboard are getting tired. I don’t really have the spare time needed to build a high-end PC and make a great job of it, so I decided to treat myself to a pre-built custom system. After hunting round, I settled on Overclockers as the company to buy from.
Their system configurator didn’t quite give me what I wanted, so I contacted them and asked if they could customise further which they could. I put together my list of requirements, they send back a price. I paid, cash wired to their bank account, upfront and sat back and waited for my new shiny liquid-cooled PC to arrive.
The system shipped. It shipped to the wrong address. I had provided Overclockers with a billing address and a shipping address. They shipped to the billing address which is almost guaranteed to be unoccupied during regular working hours.
A simple mistake. It happens. I contacted the courier who were unable to redeliver again that day, but promised they would deliver it to the shipping address the next day.
Next day, my new shiny PC arrives. I opened the smaller of the two boxes, one for spare components and so on, and immediately see a problem. The spares and cables and whatnots are not branded with anything I specified, wrong motherboard and wrong graphics card. I call Overclockers who suggest that the component boxes may have been mixed up and can I please open the main box and check. I do. It’s someone else’s computer. I later learn that my system has been shipped to somewhere else. Overclockers’ mistake? Courier’s mistake? It doesn’t really matter. Overclockers have a courier come and pick up this system.
Meanwhile, my system makes its merry way back to Overclockers’ HQ and I, confusingly, get an email asking what I’d like done with it. I suggest shipping it to the shipping address and could I please have an AM delivery so I don’t potentially waste a whole day. I offered to pay for whatever that was going to cost. Overclockers said it was no problem. Super.
My PC finally showed up at Friday 8pm. The more astute amongst you will spot that 8pm is not exactly an AM delivery. Overclockers’ mistake? Courier’s mistake? I have no idea, the question has not yet been answered.
I unpack my new PC. The first thing I notice is that there is a bolt rolling around in the bottom of it. Stuff can come loose in shipping, so what. I find that the bolt belongs to a radiator housing in the bottom of the case, there’s a hole, a loose radiator and tool marks around the hole. Not ideal, but the system’s not going to be moved around much so no big problem. Despite being an SLI system, there was no SLI cable installed linking the graphics cards. Simple to fix, but a silly thing for an expert system builder to miss.
One of the customised things I asked for was the pre-cabling of some SATA drives bays: one for a blu-ray writer and two for a pair of big SATA disks I use for bulk local storage. None of these were done. I call Overclockers about this, and the loose bolt, and they say there’s not much that can be done without returning the system to them. As I’ve no interest in another game of couriers, I grumble a bit but then do the cabling myself.
Over the next day or so I had almost no chance to really push the new system. It ticked over happily, was lovely and quiet and lovely to look at too. On Sunday night, though, the headphones went on, the office door was closed and I got on with a bit of GRID 2, with all the visual effects turned up to maximum. I settled down for a couple of hours of hard racing. After about an hour, the screen froze, went black, and all the system fans kicked into life.
I powered off, reached for my mini-torch and opened the case. What I saw sickened me: liquid coolant leaking from the CPU block, down onto a graphics card and spilling on to the motherboard. It was impossible to tell whether the CPU had simply thermally shut down or if the coolant had shorted something expensive. It kind of didn’t matter.
The next morning I called Overclockers who arranged to pick the system up. I asked if they could sort of the cabling and the loose bolts while they were at it. They agreed.
A couple of days later, I got an email saying the system had been repaired and was on its way back to me. The next evening I get a call from the owner of the billing address saying that a courier had tried to deliver something with my name on it. They had shipped to the wrong address. Again.
I had now run out of patience and I asked for a full refund. To their credit, Overclockers didn’t argue on this and they said one would be arranged. As it was convenient for me, I asked to keep the Windows 8.1 licence and the SSD. As it was convenient for them, I agreed to pay for these again separately, they would then issue a refund for the full amount of the original transaction. I didn’t ask, but I kind of expected they would simply wire the cash back to my bank account.
After 3 days or so, nothing had showed up, so I called and they said that processing a refund might take up to 7 working days.
Today, 10 days on, nothing had showed up, so I called them and they said a cheque had been issued on the 4th and had been sent to……. you guessed it, the wrong address. The owner of the address had not had a cheque arrive.
They offered to send a new cheque to the right address. I suggested they simply wire the money to my account, I was told this was impossible due to the people who would have to do that being in Germany. No, makes no sense to me either. I asked if the cheque could be sent by special delivery, for which I was happy to cover the costs. This was, of course, not possible.
So, 5 weeks after placing a cash order for a high-spec custom PC from Overclockers UK, I have no PC and they have a large amount of my money.
Please consider this post next time you’re thinking of ordering from them.
(Update: 15/4/2014: A handwritten cheque arrived from Overclockers this morning. )
I think the moral of the story here is to pay on credit card and have the consumer credit act on your side
That all sounds unfortunate, although they seemed to deal with it at a customer service level ok, if not at an actual service delivery level.
As an anecdotal response, I have bought my last 2 full PC builds and several upgrades in between from them and never had a problem.
On my last delivery in Feb this year I was able to track the delivery in real time to my door. OTOH, I have always ordered parts, maybe full builds are delivered from a different place.
Another unhappy “Ex” overclockers customer here. Ordered a custom computer and had EXACTLY the same issue. Asked for a refund – no cheque arrived :-S Why a bank transfer cannot be done or even a refund on the card I do not know!!!
I’m at the 4.5 week mark now so hopefully my magic cheque will arrive shortly, your update give me positive hope. Amusingly enough I took my business to http://www.ukgamingcomputers.co.uk – this one didn’t leak and arrived in around a week. So custom made PC in a week, a cheque 4.5 weeks and still not here. meh!