Hi all,
First time on the forum, long time user of WD products. North America region (Canada). Scroll down for pictures and TL;DR.
A few weeks ago I had a drive start to have problems in one of my RAID (ZFS) arrays. 3.5 year old WD Gold drive. For my service these usually have been lasting >5 years but I started the RMA process anyway. Turns out it was a loose cable - cool, no big deal, cancelled the RMA.
Later I get an email that I am being offered 20% off at the WD store up to $400 max purchase for “registering my product” (did for the RMA). Sweet deal, I need a couple more spares to have on the shelf anyway. Up until now I have never ordered direct from WD, usually Newegg or Amazon.
Pull up the WD store website. I want 2 TB WD Gold drives, they are back-ordered. Will have to wait a few weeks. I guess that is ok if I am saving some money. Order 2x WD Gold 2TB drives on Sept 23 / 2024.
They finally get shipped and show up on October 25th (4 weeks later). I am not around but someone (trusted friend) receives them on my behalf.
I get back and open the box on November 4th - this is what I found in the box:
No packing material, two pairs of protective end caps for the drives but no sign of the exact sized box that the end caps are supposed to center the drives in… oh and the ONE drive is just laying on the bottom of the box. Second drive not present.
Immediately contact customer service. CSR is nice & helpful (Rachel S.). She escalates this to whoever she has to. After a few days, I get a message that WD is “willing to make an exception” and give me an RMA for the one drive I received, and they will give me all my money back. That’s it. I waited 4 weeks for server drives that were thrown into a huge box like oven mitts, and they’re going to bend the rules to give me my money back.
For some background, I have purchased at least 25 WD drives in the last 15 years, RMA’d two of them for legitimate failures. Have a huge stack of dead ones in the corner of my computer room (died of old age after a long fruitful service life). I am not a scammer and they could easily take a look at the stuff I have registered to figure that out. Best they can offer me is my money back so that I can order the same product from a third party retailer.
So I ordered the same drives from somewhere else for $40 more in total, and they’re going to be here early next week.
Years ago, I had a drive fail in it’s infancy right around the time that the floods hit Thailand and the drive prices quadrupled overnight (if you could even find drives, this was around 2011). The drive I lost was a 1 TB. Contacted WD service, received a phone call apology and they sent me an apology and a 2 TB drive from a better product line within only a few days.
Around 2018 I had arrays of WD Black drives. One drive failed late in the warranty period (4.5 years into 5 year warranty). When I RMA’d it, I asked for a $50 credit towards buying a WD Gold drive to try out instead of the customary “late in the warranty period” refurbished drive that I wouldn’t trust anyway. Got emails that my request was escalated 3 or 4 times - then I got a phone call from the Western Canada sales manager, who asked me why I wanted a credit instead of the refurb drive. Told him I am considering switching to WD Gold drives and a refurb doesn’t really do me any good. Guy sent me a brand new gold drive for nothing. Told me if I like it, I should buy more. That is the kind of customer service WD used to provide. & you better believe I bought A LOT of gold drives since then.
TL;DR: WD store ships server drives by tossing them loosely into a box, and forgets to box up half my order. CSR gives personal apology, company has nothing to offer as far as a discount on products or expedited shipping on what I actually ordered - just an implied suggestion that I order elsewhere.
Don’t buy internal drives from WD store. Buy them anywhere else.
Thanks,
- Jay
