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1.0 stars
"I am rating the company as a whole."
Pros: None at all.
Cons: Ava Direct is a Con. Selling defective merchandise, and charging a restocking fee for returning.
Summary: Using AVA Direct was most certainly, the worst mistake i have made when choosing an online retailer. In fact, i consider this experience to be a $210 lesson. For a college student, this is a significant amount of money.
My Story:
I had purchased the msi gx720 (MS-1722) barebone laptop with the high resolution option. Assembly of the laptop took two weeks (which is standard for a custom laptop). Upon receiving the laptop, i added my hard drive and memory (**less expensive elsewhere**).
I turned the system on and booted to my vista cd. As i was setting up the Operating system, I noticed that the vibrations from my fingertips, gently touching the keyboard to enter the system name, had caused the crystals in the display to displace (similar to pressing on an lcd screen). Needless to say, this was unacceptable for a brand new laptop. Either the screen was defective or of exceptionally poor quality. The following day, I contacted my AVA Direct sales representative Joe, and i explained my situation. I asked for his advice, and he instructed me to contact MSI for repair under warranty.
I called MSI directly after speaking with the Rep., and they had told me to ship the laptop to them "as a barebone system", otherwise they are not responsible for damage(s) to the additional parts (processor, wireless, etc.).
I was not about to pull apart this brand new laptop, and pay for shipping both ways to MSI (**It takes 7-10 business days for MSI to diagnose and repair the problem**).
The following day i contacted the same sales representative, and i explained MSI's requirements for warranty repair. He could not offer any additional suggestions. Finally, i asked to him to give me an RMA number, to send the laptop back (Denoting a "RETURN" of the defective merchandise).
Prior to sending the laptop back, I also checked the AVA Direct site for warranty information, and "Terms of Sale" link located on the same page. Apparently the AVA Direct website is not Mozilla compliant, because i could not access the link (I also took screen shots of faulty link, which i cannot access to this day, from several different locations.). I decided to just send the laptop back.
The day following after the package was scheduled for delivery; i called Joe, to confirm that they had received the laptop, and he did. Additionally, I asked; when i could expect my card to be credited. The clerk was surprised by my inquiry, believing that i had sent the laptop back for repair (which was never offered to me). He then proceeded to explain, that there was a 15% restocking fee.
I was certainly surprised to find out that the return of my defective laptop was subject to a 15% restocking fee. Most importantly, I was not informed of this restocking fee, nor did i have the ability to retrieve this information from the AVA Direct website (I later determined that link was only faulty using Mozilla). I explained this to Joe that the "Terms of Sale" portion of their website was down, and he told me that "he would note this in the return request".
Upon receiving my credit, it was $210 short. (The so called ?Restocking fee") deducted from the refunded amount. I called Joe and asked him why they deducted the fee. He told me that "he had his web team check to see if the site was down the day i went to check the terms of sale, and the site was operational". (**First off; in order to check that, there is a great deal of historical logs to review for that particular date. Second; he did not know the date that i attempted to access the site.**)
After arguing my case, Joe told me that he would have to consult his manager Misha, to refund the remainder of my refund. (Apparently, Misha was not in the office for several days, so Joe was not able to submit my request. Finally, when he was able to get a hold of Misha, Misa had quickly dismissed my request).
Naturally, i asked for Misha's contact information. I left him over 7 messages, with no return phone call (**?great customer service?**). It wasn't until i asked for Alex Sonis, the President of AVA Direct, was Misha made immediately available.
Needless to say, my conversation with Misha was not pleasant. His reasoning for not returning my restocking fee was a "lack of communication on both sides", and company policy. (A policy that is ethically questionable for selling defective or low quality merchandise).
I write this detailed synopsis of my experience with AVA Direct, as a warning to those considering a future purchase with this company.
