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Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

tomshardware.com

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Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#11

Post by wzdd »

smnrchrds wrote: post #3
theowaway213456 wrote: post #2

Here's a (flawed) thought experiment: imagine that 100% of customers' RAM suddenly goes faulty at the same time, and RAM prices have suddenly skyrocketed to infinity at the same time. Which outcome is ideal? Which one is morally correct? (A) the retailer refunds every customer, loses all of their profits and probably goes bankrupt (B) the retailer is forced to go into massive debt in order to replace everyone's RAM,…

According to the article, the law says B. If that makes for bad law, it's up to the legislature to change it, not up to the retailer to unilaterally decide to stop following the law.

Actually, the article says the law says A or B. From the article:

> In a simplified form, retailers are responsible for warranty claims and must replace or refund the defective item

The choice is at the retailer’s discretion and the refund is obviously of the purchase price.

This is a non story. The retailer is acting lawfully. The only curiosity is that normally it is in a retailer’s best interests to replace goods, but in these circumstances they are better off refunding them.

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#12

Post by john01dav »

hananova wrote: post #8
theowaway213456 wrote: post #2

Here's a (flawed) thought experiment: imagine that 100% of customers' RAM suddenly goes faulty at the same time, and RAM prices have suddenly skyrocketed to infinity at the same time. Which outcome is ideal? Which one is morally correct? (A) the retailer refunds every customer, loses all of their profits and probably goes bankrupt (B) the retailer is forced to go into massive debt in order to replace everyone's RAM,…

The law is, and should be, B. Retailers that wish to avoid future hardship can prepare by pre-stocking some replacement parts like in C, but I don’t think laws should protect retailers from their poor financial choices. The law should strictly, and extremely, protect the consumer.

There is a lot of merit to this view, but there is also a major problem: rules like this make it substantially harder to start a new business due to increasing overhead and complexity, which is bad for everyone long term. Such comparatively more complex and burdensome regulation is why so many (but not all) startups go to America or Israel instead of Europe.

To address this I prefer ultra low friction and ultra low cost regulations over complex and performative schemes. For example, GDPR requires the appointment of a "data protection officer" in some cases, which is mostly just an extra fee for small companies. Instead, it should only regulate the rights (such as to be forgotton, etc.). Appointing such an officer is mostly performative.

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#13

Post by addaon »

theowaway213456 wrote: post #2

Here's a (flawed) thought experiment: imagine that 100% of customers' RAM suddenly goes faulty at the same time, and RAM prices have suddenly skyrocketed to infinity at the same time. Which outcome is ideal? Which one is morally correct? (A) the retailer refunds every customer, loses all of their profits and probably goes bankrupt (B) the retailer is forced to go into massive debt in order to replace everyone's RAM,…

As discussed elsewhere, the law says (a) or (b). Both of which lead to a bankrupt company, and maximum possible recovery for customers. Which seems like the best possible outcome for dealing with a company that sells 100% faulty product, no?

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#14

Post by Cpoll »

> When confronted by Goran, Umart went to the trouble of quoting the Australian Consumer Law but made a seemingly byzantine and twisted interpretation of it, reiterating that a refund at the original price was the proper remedy.

Have I been living in a country with weak consumer protection for too long? I can't see refunding the product as byzantine, and I've never heard of anyone getting a refund at the new price.

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#16

Post by nyeah »

dmajor2 wrote: post #7
theowaway213456 wrote: post #2

Here's a (flawed) thought experiment: imagine that 100% of customers' RAM suddenly goes faulty at the same time, and RAM prices have suddenly skyrocketed to infinity at the same time. Which outcome is ideal? Which one is morally correct? (A) the retailer refunds every customer, loses all of their profits and probably goes bankrupt (B) the retailer is forced to go into massive debt in order to replace everyone's RAM,…

I don't see anywhere where the manufacturer or retailer/distributor is required to perform one of the actions based on what the customer wishes of returning or replacing the item. I also fail to see where anyone would expect the current purchase price to be refunded to them instead of the original paid purchase price. If the regulations require making the customer whole, then I could see an argument for current fair…

So possibly the warranty may say "replace or refund at supplier's option." In that case, it's clear. But if we don't know what the "fine print" says, then I don't see how we can figure out who was wrong or right.

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#18

Post by smnrchrds »

wzdd wrote: post #11
smnrchrds wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the article, the law says B. If that makes for bad law, it's up to the legislature to change it, not up to the retailer to unilaterally decide to stop following the law.

Actually, the article says the law says A or B. From the article: > In a simplified form, retailers are responsible for warranty claims and must replace or refund the defective item The choice is at the retailer’s discretion and the refund is obviously of the purchase price. This is a non story. The retailer is acting lawfully. The only curiosity is that normally it is in a retailer’s best interests to replace goods,…

According to the link posted above, the choice is up to the customer, not the retailer: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47366595

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#19

Post by whatevaa »

theowaway213456 wrote: post #2

Here's a (flawed) thought experiment: imagine that 100% of customers' RAM suddenly goes faulty at the same time, and RAM prices have suddenly skyrocketed to infinity at the same time. Which outcome is ideal? Which one is morally correct? (A) the retailer refunds every customer, loses all of their profits and probably goes bankrupt (B) the retailer is forced to go into massive debt in order to replace everyone's RAM,…

In this case it would have been best to allow customer to get his product back not-replaced/not-repaired so he could seek other options, like repair. It is likely that only one of the sticks was bad, and a single good stick is worth 2x refund price. Buying a single not matching stick would have been better than this.

Re: Retailer denies memory replacement due to 4x increase in DDR5 pricing

#20

Post by tomwheeler »

The article title ought to name the company (Umart). I assume they didn't because they want the clicks, but I'd argue that giving Umart the bad publicity they deserve would make companies reconsider whether to implement anti-customer policies like this.
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