Today I decided to buy a new screen for home. It is an AOC, and is the worlds thinnest IPS Screen. 23 inches of perfection in a stunning aluminium casing.

 

So I do a shopping search, and find it for sale at the best price+p&p on Pixmania.

 

I go through the entire order process, which is several pages long, yet after the part of the process where my bank verifies my details, I was simply presented with a blank screen.

 

I tried again, with Paypal, but a blank screen again. Essentially, their order process doesn't work. Which is ridiculous, because it means they're losing business, possibly a significant amount.

 

Even worse, upon raising the issue, they didn't sort it out for me, call me up to sort out my order, nothing. They just told me to place the order again. But it didn't work. Again. Now hang on a minute, do you want my business or not? If I was Pixmania, I'd be straight on the phone to the customer, apologising for the technical glitch, offering £10 off the order and I'll take your details now and get it sorted.

 

So I gave up, and tried eBuyer. eBuyer has an equally stupid process, because when typing in my card details, they force you to put in an "initial" and a "surname". But my card is my full name including salutation. So my card got declined, twice. I then rang them up, only to never get through. They also wouldn't let me change to PayPal, and Google Checkout would only deliver to my billing address. Another complete waste of time then.

 

I then tried More Computers. Again, the order process is broken, again, a blank page after bank verification, followed this time as well by an ASP error.

 

Time spent trying to order: 1hr 28 minutes

 

So after all that, I ended up back on Amazon, giving them my money. It's all well and good people having a problem with Amazon being so successful, but when all these other businesses just have poorly put together websites, painfully complex ordering systems, and order systems that are broken altogether, it's not effing wonder we all end up on Amazon.

 

Time spent trying to order: 3 minutes

 

So. Ebuyer. Pixmania. MoreComputers. If you're wondering why you can't touch Amazon - here was why.

Edited March 14, 201214 yr by brightonmike

Frustrating isn't it? Some of the biggest businesses are the worst when it comes to doing the simple stuff...or really doing anything right.

 

And while Amazon may be perfect for the customer, trust me, it's anything but perfect for a retailer trying to list their products and actually sell on there.

Even worse, because the eBuyer website failed my transaction because of their fields, it triggered a Fraud Alert which blocked my card and stopped my transaction working on Amazon, and I've just had to spend 20 minutes on the phone to my bank getting it all sorted.

 

What a load of ****. Sorry, no other way to say it. Unbeleivable.

Where Amazon falls down is the process of ordering from Amazon and Amazon Marketplace sellers in the same order.

 

I had an utter nightmare with them the Christmas before last - there's no transparency about who's adding what to the postage charges, so I had to go through my basket removing items one by one (4 or 5 pages back and forwards each time) til I found the one that was trying to charge me £50 to ship an £8.99 toy.

Ha. I remember trying to buy gift bags before Xmas off a gift wrap website. The bags were £3, and to ship two of them they wanted £15. Laughable.

 

Edit: It just amazes me that popular well known e-commerce websites still have these issues. Many of them have had 5/10 years to refine their systems and websites, and they still get it wrong.

 

Why oh why don't eBuyer allow you to just enter your god-damn card name? Why force people into typing in ONE initial, then a surname only?! Who's idea was that?! If I was head honcho, I'd fire whichever eejit made that decision. Stupid little things like this must cost theses businesses significant revenue.

Edited March 14, 201214 yr by brightonmike

It was probably the head honcho. They're the ones that cause the most problems.

I need to calm down. In rant mode. Got a headache. Need lemsip.

 

The good thing is, I finally bought it, and here is a picture of, in my opinion, the most beautiful monitor in the world.

 

I believe it is also currently the thinnest you can buy. I think there is a Dell that is 0.1mm thinner.

 

Shes a beauty, I haven't seen these monitors before. Hopefully it's worth the pain and agony in the end.

I feel your pain, also the unknowing fact of 'Has my money been taken? am i getting charged twice etc"...

 

i know for a fact when making my e-commerce site i had problems with the checkout process... but sure enough i worked days on end trying to fix it.

 

Dont see why a business wouldn't. Its like saying "Our shops closed, you can look through the windows though"

I've never had a problem with Ebuyer... my card has my first name in full.

 

Amazon just kills me with all the postal charges.

 

I'm a Tad jealous on the monitor, mine's just bulked out by the million i/o ports stuffed into the back. Kinda wish my ports were in the stand now...

If you don't like the postal charges, get Amazon Prime. For £40 a year, I get free next day delivery on any Amazon-shipped product.

 

Considering how much I buy off them it works out superior value for money.

 

eBuyer are good on some fronts, but their system wouldn't allow me to enter my full name. They got my card blocked, which is unforgivable IMO. Having a website that triggers fraud alerts on peoples card is in my mind pretty much the highest level of stupidity in design, and more than enough reason to not want to do business with them.

 

P.S That screen is a snip btw, it's £150ish. Should be delivered today! Excited.

Edited March 15, 201214 yr by brightonmike

I need to calm down. In rant mode. Got a headache. Need lemsip.

 

The good thing is, I finally bought it, and here is a picture of, in my opinion, the most beautiful monitor in the world.

 

I believe it is also currently the thinnest you can buy. I think there is a Dell that is 0.1mm thinner.

 

 

Quite pretty. I assume because of the thickness there's no VESA mount? That would put me off a bit.

Quite pretty. I assume because of the thickness there's no VESA mount? That would put me off a bit.

 

This is where it is rather clever. The base folds backwards and upwards, sort of behind the screen, and on the bottom of the base there is indeed a VESA mount.

 

It wouldn't be ideal to attach to an arm, but you could certainly wall-mount it.

 

Edited March 15, 201214 yr by brightonmike

Ha! That's really clever. I'd be looking to attach to an arm, but that's really good product design - no wonder you like the damn thing so much.

 

Reminds me of the first ultra-slim laptop, the Voodoo Envy (this was before VoodooPC were bought out by HP). It was too slim to have an RJ45 network port, so they put one in the power brick along with a personal WiFi hotspot.

Just arrived at work. Really impressive bit of kit, the aluminium makes it look stunning.