[HN Gopher] Digitec Galaxus now displays warranty score and retu...
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       Digitec Galaxus now displays warranty score and return rate
        
       Author : faebi
       Score  : 506 points
       Date   : 2023-01-26 18:32 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.galaxus.ch)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.galaxus.ch)
        
       | dboreham wrote:
       | Presumably implemented with microservices.
        
       | kioleanu wrote:
       | I've seen this exactly in an online shop in Romania. Then they
       | tried refusing my return of a product citing a gross
       | misinterpretation of the law. They caved in after I threatened
       | invoking the great goods of consumer protection. Found out
       | afterwards that they're notorious for such gimmicks
        
       | sixhobbits wrote:
       | I love Galaxus! Most online retailers could probably increase
       | their revenue by xx% just by copying some of their patterns.
       | 
       | - price history so you can see when sales are fake
       | 
       | - one click "deliver to my closest branch and I will pick it up
       | and pay there so I don't have to muck around with online
       | payments" option
       | 
       | - automatic high quality translation of all product information
       | and reviews into all offered languages
       | 
       | - simple downloads on order page for invoice and receipt
       | 
       | And many other things. Some things are still annoying like they
       | don't accept cards from some countries, but they get a lot right.
        
         | TrueSlacker0 wrote:
         | > - price history so you can see when sales are fake
         | 
         | in case you were unfamiliar https://camelcamelcamel.com/ does
         | this for amazon
        
           | ortusdux wrote:
           | Cammelx3 is great. I like Keepa as well, especially the
           | chrome extension that embeds the chart on the Amazon page. It
           | also seems to have a bit more functionality.
        
             | Krasnol wrote:
             | The Firefox extension of keepa does the same btw
        
           | lobocinza wrote:
           | There's also keepa.com.
        
           | droopyEyelids wrote:
           | In response Amazon did a lot to reduce price transparency. If
           | you notice now most categories of items are constantly 'on
           | sale' and even if camelcamelcamel picks up that fact, there
           | are also 'coupons' available on-site for most amazon products
           | that only alter the price under certain conditions and
           | they're only applied at checkout.
           | 
           | This makes it difficult for a human being trying to buy
           | things to compare the prices, let alone a series of scripts.
        
         | huhtenberg wrote:
         | Their whole web UI is a masterpiece.
         | 
         | Super clean, very logical, everything exactly you'd expect it
         | to be, superb filtering system for searching through long
         | product lists, etc. It's also super-snappy, at least from
         | within Switzerland.
        
           | vbezhenar wrote:
           | Access denied. But it was pretty fast, I admit. Zero JS, no
           | weird CSS, just pure content. I almost liked it.
        
         | karamanolev wrote:
         | The price history going quite far back was a game changer for
         | me when shopping from Digitec/Galaxus. They don't have
         | _everything_ like Amazon, but the quality and the experience
         | are on a whole different levels. Few levels above, actually.
        
           | moffkalast wrote:
           | The pricing is on another level as well.
        
             | huhtenberg wrote:
             | Believe it or not, but theirs are the lowest prices in
             | Switzerland.
        
             | LargoLasskhyfv wrote:
             | Yes. Clicked around for a few things because I remembered
             | their german branch from a few years, nothing has changed.
             | At least not for the few parts I checked today.
        
           | chaostheory wrote:
           | > They don't have everything like Amazon
           | 
           | They didn't seem to reach Day 2 yet either.
           | 
           | If Bezos and company weren't being either disingenuous or
           | delusional, Amazon has reached day two years ago.
        
         | gesman wrote:
         | Just spent 400 CHF at Galaxus, same day no charge delivery. Ho
         | hassles.
        
         | nix23 wrote:
         | They where much better before the Migros takeover, especially
         | the two owners just wanted to make 10k/month the rest goes to
         | the customer, for a short time we had better prices as..well
         | ....whole EU.
         | 
         | But still it's the best we have...
        
         | ajsnigrutin wrote:
         | > - one click "deliver to my closest branch and I will pick it
         | up and pay there so I don't have to muck around with online
         | payments" option
         | 
         | I've started using this as much as possible, especially during
         | christmas. You find something, "in stock", supposed to be
         | delivered the next day or a day after, you order, then nothing
         | one day, two days, three days, then you call, "yeah, it's still
         | with the distributed, it'll be ready tomorrow", two more days
         | pass, you call again, want a refund, they "cannot refund now",
         | because the product is supposedly in the mail already, then you
         | wait, christmas goes by, and around 15. january you get a call,
         | that they cannot get the item you wanted, and try to upsell
         | some either more expensive or worse option.
         | 
         | Now I just order for physical pickup and "pay there" option..
         | and if it's not there, cancelling is easy, because they don't
         | have your money yet, and they cannot lie about the item being
         | already sent.
        
       | sschueller wrote:
       | The way they do warranty is really awesome and uncomplicated.
       | 
       | Recently I had a set of headphones fail after ~1 year and all I
       | had to do was find the item in my order history click a button,
       | answer a few questions and in this case they just credited the
       | amount to my account, didn't even have to send them back.
       | Instructions told me to recycle them.
       | 
       | There is a certain amount of trust in the system.
       | 
       | However it can also go wrong. Once I sent a GPU for repair
       | because a fan stopped working and it was still under warranty.
       | Sadly they or their repair center marked it as a no fix, recycled
       | the card and I was credited the amount I paid, sadly that was
       | during the GPU crunch and a card that had similar performance was
       | not available for even close that price. Replacing a fan I could
       | have done my self but I thought a warranty claim would be the
       | correct thing to do incase something else breaks.
        
         | config_yml wrote:
         | You can also re-sell a product you've bought there with a click
         | and answering a couple questions, right from your order
         | history. It's a pretty nice experience, just recently did so
         | with a Dell screen I no longer needed.
        
         | ddalex wrote:
         | > a certain amount of trust in the system
         | 
         | Switzerland operates on trust. You go to the car service, you
         | get the work done, you leave, you'll receive a bill in the mail
         | later. There is trust that they do the right work and not
         | overcharge you, and there is trust that you'll pay.
        
           | dguest wrote:
           | Go to an unoccupied mountain hut, drink the beer, eat the
           | food, use the wood for the stove, use the med kit (better to
           | leave the morphine...), sleep in the beds, take some of the
           | local cheese, and then leave your payment in the cookie tin,
           | using the other few hundred CHF already there to make change.
           | 
           | Just be sure to mark everything in the ledger, so the hut
           | warden can replace it easier.
        
             | moonchrome wrote:
             | Considering how many of my Balkan countrymen moved there I
             | doubt this works.
        
               | bauruine wrote:
               | They are only reachable by multiple hours hiking high up
               | in the mountains. That's a lot of "work" just for the
               | chance of a few hundred CHF.
        
               | moonchrome wrote:
               | This is true - hikers are usually self selecting that
               | way. But the sentiment doesn't hold in general I'd say.
        
               | lwkl wrote:
               | Switzerland is pretty effective at assimilating second
               | generation migrants thanks to the dual education system.
               | The kids of your countrymen are probably all in middle
               | class jobs and raising a family.
        
             | nerpderp82 wrote:
             | In NZ and Australia I really enjoyed the farmers selling
             | items along the road in little boxes. Carrots, fruit, etc.
             | All on the honor system.
        
             | aliqot wrote:
             | Is this a thing? People do that?
        
               | agys wrote:
               | On the country side you can buy fresh fruits from small
               | unattended shops on the side of the roads: you take a
               | fruit basket and leave the money in a jar. (I only saw
               | this in the Swiss German part, though).
        
               | aliqot wrote:
               | I'm familiar with the roadside produce and the honor box,
               | but for some reason an actual dwelling being open to all,
               | or to just be assumed that by default it is open to all,
               | I guess caught me off guard. Assuming something like that
               | would be open to all, here, would be a dangerous
               | assumption on my part. I don't think I initially took
               | into account the extreme weather conditions during that
               | time, which in retrospect makes a lot more sense.
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | alex_suzuki wrote:
               | Spending a couple of hours hiking up a mountain? Sure.
               | Short-changing or even robbing the warden? I hope not.
        
               | Schroedingersat wrote:
               | In reasonably prosperous societies that take care of all
               | their members and lack the cult of individualism, this is
               | quite normal. Visible inequality, corruption, systemic
               | persecution, and dire poverty tend to erode trust.
        
               | brainwad wrote:
               | Perhaps... But Switzerland is one of the most atomised,
               | individualistic societies I've lived in. Swiss social
               | trust mostly comes from an abundance of means, as far as
               | I can tell. When you've got a full belly and a roof over
               | your head, crime just isn't as attractive.
        
               | lolc wrote:
               | Sure, many cabins operate on a honor code. People hiking
               | in this harsh environment respect the hospitality. If you
               | don't have that kind of respect around the mountains, you
               | won't fathom going there anyway.
               | 
               | And yeah, it's a high-trust society. In some farms you'll
               | find a fridge where you can get local produce and leave
               | your payment in the box. Especially so in the mountains
               | where they make their own cheese. You'll find me lugging
               | a nice cut of cheese back home from a Sunday hike. That
               | box will be locked though, because there's more people
               | passing than at a remote cabin :-)
        
           | david927 wrote:
           | When I was living there, I was told that you could go to a
           | rug store, see a beautiful say, Persian Carpet worth
           | thousands, and they would say, take it home and try it out.
           | If you liked it, you came back to pay. They didn't take your
           | information, just your name. I didn't try it but I believed
           | it. Switzerland was very much that way.
        
           | kuboble wrote:
           | > absolutely that! Coming from a country with very low trust
           | both ways I was surprised that the swiss car mechanic (big
           | chain from vw) didn't allow me to pay at the shop and didn't
           | even tell me how much it will be because he'll calculate it
           | later.
           | 
           | Also the fact that most online businesses allow late payment
           | via invoice shipped with the goods feels crazy.
        
           | dguest wrote:
           | The best part is that the penalty for not paying is just a
           | bigger bill from the same garage.
        
             | layer8 wrote:
             | How much has your bill increased by now?
        
               | muro wrote:
               | They have a pretty efficient system to force payment if
               | you don't after multiple reminders.
        
         | lolc wrote:
         | Can confirm, I had that happen with a cable. I filed a warranty
         | claim and the response was "you dispose it, we credit it". When
         | a second cable broke (oh no) they wanted me to send it in
         | though.
        
           | lobocinza wrote:
           | I had this experience with Logitech and Anker.
           | 
           | Logitech actually ended up sending me two keyboards. First
           | they sent me the same model but with a different layout (but
           | still usable) and when I complained about the layout they
           | sent me a more expensive model with the expected layout. No
           | returns, few questions asked. Excellent RMA experience but
           | that being said their mechanical keyboards AFAIK all have
           | some sort of chronic issue and just aren't worth the price.
           | 
           | Anker didn't ask me to return the earphones but refunded only
           | 1/3 of what I paid (6m remaining in a 18m warranty). Mixed
           | feelings about it though the experience was positive. On
           | general I expect things to last a lot more than the warranted
           | period. Anyway I still have the earphones and they still work
           | (with reduced functionality) so let's say that I remained
           | with a residual + the refunded amount.
        
         | gambiting wrote:
         | >>all I had to do was find the item in my order history click a
         | button, answer a few questions and in this case they just
         | credited the amount to my account
         | 
         | Exactly the same as with Amazon here in the UK then. They have
         | every retailer in this country absolutely beat on their
         | approach to customer support - it's always no faff, easy, often
         | instant refund, none of this waiting 60 minutes on the phone to
         | speak with unhelpful CS for any of the major retailers. John
         | Lewis were the only ones approaching Amazon in the quality of
         | their customer service, but recently that has changed for much
         | worse and they are as hostile as everyone else.
        
           | _puk wrote:
           | As long as it's within 30 days..
           | 
           | Consumer laws give a much longer window, and the retailer is
           | responsible for resolving the issue [0], but any time I've
           | had to try and get something replaced after the time limit
           | it's involved going back to the original seller, hoping they
           | still exist in the world of random TM company names. Never
           | understood how Amazon gets away with this.
           | 
           | 0: https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/what-do-i-
           | do-...
           | 
           | "The retailer is responsible If what you've bought doesn't
           | satisfy any one of the three criteria outlined above, then
           | the retailer that sold it to you is in breach of the Consumer
           | Rights Act.
           | 
           | This means that your statutory consumer rights are against
           | the retailer - the company that sold you the product - not
           | the manufacturer."
        
             | gambiting wrote:
             | I've had Amazon refund me even a full year after purchase,
             | no problem. Basically you go on chat, say you have a
             | problem with some item, they say "please contact
             | manufacturer" to which you say "I'd like you to resolve
             | this problem under the consumer rights act as you are the
             | retailer who sold me this product" and 10/10 times they
             | just go "ok, would you like a refund or a replacement".
             | Then I have the refund 10 minutes later. I've had hundreds
             | and hundreds of orders from Amazon in the last few years
             | and this hasn't failed me once.
        
         | growt wrote:
         | I had the opposite experience. Bought a 75" tv there. It had an
         | extremely uneven backlight (clouding). Support told me to send
         | it in for inspection. Tv broke on the way there. They kept it
         | for three weeks and sent it back without mentioning that the
         | panel was broken on arrival. After that they refused to cover
         | it because it was my fault for not packaging it correctly. We
         | finally settled on 50:50, so I got half my money back
        
           | ROTMetro wrote:
           | The having to ship it back is a problem with a lot of
           | warranty these days. I have a BenQ monitor that started
           | failing after less than a year, but since I don't have the
           | original packaging I can't get warranty work. As TVs/monitors
           | get larger, are we really expected to keep all of that
           | packaging in case of warranty issues? I'm just eating the
           | loss and will add BenQ to my list of no-gos but there needs
           | to be a better system for this.
        
             | chmod775 wrote:
             | > are we really expected to keep all of that packaging in
             | case of warranty issues?
             | 
             | Depends on where you live and your consumer protection
             | laws. In some places there are laws/rulings stating that
             | no, you don't need to keep original packaging - especially
             | for statutory minimum warranties.
             | 
             | If there are no laws it's up to the discretion of the
             | seller.
        
             | modoc wrote:
             | With BenQ you can ask for a swap, they will put a hold on
             | your credit card, but will ship you a new display, you can
             | send your old one back in the new packaging, pre-paid
             | shipping label, and once they receive it, they release the
             | hold. Costs nothing and you don't have to go without a
             | display.
        
         | rconti wrote:
         | (In the US) I deal with the manufacturer for warranty claims.
         | How does the retailer know?
         | 
         | Is the system different in Switzerland? Or has this one
         | retailer decided to take on being a arbitrator of warranty
         | claims?
        
           | pifm_guy wrote:
           | In Europe, by law it is the retailer responsible for warranty
           | claims.
           | 
           | Many manufacturers will _also_ offer warranty service, and it
           | is up to you the customer which you want to use. Often
           | manufacturers try to persuade you to contact them first
           | because it costs them less than a refund would (typically
           | retailers just refund rather than attempt a repair or
           | replacement)
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | sschueller wrote:
           | The law requires the retailer to deal with warranty claims.
           | The law also requires a 2 year warranty minimum. Additionally
           | a retailer must take back old electronics and recycle them at
           | no cost to the customer.
        
         | acchow wrote:
         | This sounds like pretty much how we use our credit card's
         | extended warranty on purchases, except we do it via the bank's
         | website (Chase or Amex, our credit card issuer), instead of the
         | retailer. A couple clicks, and done.
        
       | greenthrow wrote:
       | This is just straight up an ad. This should be removed.
        
         | Too wrote:
         | Ad or not, I found this concept and the data very novel and
         | interesting.
        
         | faebi wrote:
         | Not really, I don't work for Migros, Galaxus or Digitec. I'm
         | just a happy customer who likes their moves to more
         | transparency.
        
         | mikl wrote:
         | Any product announcement is an ad. This happens to be an
         | interesting innovation in online retail, quite on point for
         | this site.
        
           | greenthrow wrote:
           | I obviously disagree. Reviews are not a new thing. Yes this
           | is a slightly different spin on it but ultimately it is less
           | information than reviews since we don't know _why_ things
           | were returned.
        
       | rrgok wrote:
       | Even tough I like this feature. The title is misleading. It
       | doesn't show the return rate of the product you are seeing.
       | Example,
       | 
       | Go here, randomly chosen
       | 
       | https://www.digitec.ch/en/s1/product/yamaha-rx-v4a-52-channe...
       | 
       | And then scroll down and click warranty and then click "Detailed
       | view", it says
       | 
       | > How often does a product of this brand in the <<AV Receiver>>
       | category have a defect within the first 24 months?
       | 
       | This doesn't mean what the title says, right? I'm not a native
       | english speaker, but I hope my reading skill is not that bad. I
       | read it like: Yamaha return scores in "AV Reciever". If Yamaha
       | had 100 product in "AV Reciever", it doesn't say almost nothing
       | to me regarding the Yamaha RX-V4A I'm seeing. It could be that
       | all 3% (example number) defect are Yamaha RX-V4A, or completely 3
       | (assuming Yamaha has 100 different products) different products.
        
         | sureglymop wrote:
         | Click on "Returns" instead of "Warranty".
        
           | rrgok wrote:
           | It says almost the same: "How often is a product of this
           | brand in the <<XXXX>> category returned"...
           | 
           | It doesn't says how often the product I'm seeing is returned.
           | But A product of the brand BBBB in the category XXXX is
           | returned.
           | 
           | I don't know, it is still a useful metric nonetheless. But it
           | is still a misleading title.
        
         | rippercushions wrote:
         | Identifying a "product" isn't as straightforward as it seems.
         | Large retailers insist (and get) custom product codes from
         | major manufacturers, which are just a different code slapped
         | onto the same box, but accomplish the goal of making price
         | comparisons impossible. And then you've got more legitimate
         | reasons for different codes, like the same physical product
         | ships with 27 different types of power plugs, warranty leaflets
         | etc for various countries.
        
       | sakex wrote:
       | Didn't expect to see Galaxus here, i buy all my stuff there
        
       | odysseus wrote:
       | I'd like to see Amazon do similar and make this data available
       | publicly on each product's page.
       | 
       | Some return rate data is currently figured into "Amazon's Choice"
       | labeling - for example, low return rate on an established
       | product, more likely to be labeled Amazon's Choice.
       | 
       | But I'd like to see if Amazon has the guts to just make it all
       | public.
        
       | j7ake wrote:
       | My experience with returning on Galaxus was very positive. Nobody
       | does it better!
        
       | mirekrusin wrote:
       | After moving from UK to Switzerland I was missing Amazon until I
       | discovered galaxus/digitech. It's great and feels so much faster,
       | amazon has tons of clutter and dishonest reviews. Historic price
       | is awesome, the whole thing is just much more honest.
        
       | aphroz wrote:
       | Interestingly enough, the culture of returns in Switzerland is
       | very different compared to the US.
       | 
       | Also the quality of service vs price makes it a very appealing
       | market but very hard to penetrate. This is why international
       | players have always had issues to do so. Swiss customers care
       | more about quality than price.
       | 
       | On Galaxus you can decide to chose slow delivery so you will not
       | necessarly receive your product the next day. But for the same
       | price: https://basic-tutorials.com/news/galaxus-and-digitec-now-
       | del...
       | 
       | Edit: added link
        
         | extua wrote:
         | A 'slow delivery' option is a great idea. There have definitely
         | been a few times when I've ordered something and would've been
         | totally happy for it to arrive any time within the next few
         | weeks. At the same time, it would need a different kind of
         | delivery service which isn't totally optimised around speedy
         | delivery.
        
           | amf12 wrote:
           | IIRC, Amazon has an option to delay delivery and you get some
           | credits.
        
             | jchw wrote:
             | One weird thing is that it seems like they play a bit fast
             | and loose with the actual meaning of this. Several times
             | I've ordered for "Prime day" because I didn't care and then
             | later got a notification because they just shipped it early
             | anyways. No real complaint per se, but it was still odd.
        
             | amerkhalid wrote:
             | Yes, you get digital credit. It is great for buying Kindle
             | books or renting movies.
        
             | LazyMans wrote:
             | Prime delivery day is awesome, especially sharing the same
             | house with someone that orders excessively. We tend to
             | order things throughout the week, then have to deal with a
             | mountain of shipping waste. Prime delivery day condenses
             | the orders as best possible. It's not like I need every
             | single item within 24 hours...
        
             | wendyshu wrote:
             | Oh, how?
        
               | crazygringo wrote:
               | You need to have Prime, and it usually requires you to
               | have 2-3 items in your cart.
               | 
               | But if they're items that would normally ship in 1-2
               | days, then it will provide a credits option if you have
               | an Amazon Day (day of the week for combined deliveries)
               | selected and that Amazon Day is at least 3 days in the
               | future. It will also sometimes instead show a "no-rush
               | shipping" option that is usually something like 5-7 days
               | out, with credits.
               | 
               | I'm not going to lie, I almost always select it (even
               | constantly changing my Amazon Day to be at least 3 days
               | out from today), and I'm pretty sure I make back my Prime
               | membership fee and then some. The credits are usually
               | $1.50-$4.50 per shipment, expire after 3 months, and can
               | only be used for digital purchases like Kindle and
               | videos.
        
         | cma wrote:
         | Seems similar to "Amazon day" delayed delivery.
        
         | amerkhalid wrote:
         | > the culture of returns in Switzerland is very different
         | compared to the US
         | 
         | I am curious, how is it different?
         | 
         | Here in the US, I have met seen whole spectrum where some
         | people will never return anything even if it is obviously
         | defective. And others who will return almost perfect items for
         | tiny issues or for not meeting their expectations.
         | 
         | I am not sure how I would define the US return culture.
        
         | jsnell wrote:
         | I've spent a five-digit sum at Galaxus/Digitec, and never
         | returned anything. So the typical product having a 3% return
         | rate is quite surprising.
        
           | oezi wrote:
           | As an avid user of Geizhals/Idealo price comparison sites I
           | wonder why you pick Galaxus over other reliable retailers.
        
             | bauruine wrote:
             | The filtering system was way, way better than everything
             | else we had for a very long time and they often also where
             | the cheapest. I write was because honestly I haven't
             | visited many other shops for quite some time. But whenever
             | I check on toppreise it's only marginaly more expensive
             | then the other shops. It's convenient to have everything
             | from the same shop where you know you have it the next day.
             | And the "Geiz ist geil" mentality just doesn't realy exist
             | in Switzerland.
        
             | _zoltan_ wrote:
             | because I care more about service than about 5 CHF.
        
             | jsnell wrote:
             | Their website - and tech in general - are way better than
             | the competition. Their prices are competitive (sometimes
             | the best, sometimes not, but rarely an unreasonable rip-
             | off). I often prefer local pickup over mail. They already
             | have my information on file, I don't need to futz around
             | with making an account.
             | 
             | Price comparison sites are fine if I know exactly the item
             | I want, less so if I just have an idea of the category.
             | 
             | It's not that I buy everything there. But it is my default
             | option.
        
             | layer8 wrote:
             | Not the GP, but for the products I look for Galaxus has
             | occasionally been among the cheapest.
        
             | tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
             | Because consumer protection is nonexistent and it's easier
             | to just go with Digitec/Galaxus where you already have an
             | account than figuring out if this dealer is trustworthy,
             | shipping in a reasonable timeframe, and whether they will
             | be a PITA to sign up with.
        
         | cosmodisk wrote:
         | I have a feeling not many Swiss buy a satnav, go on a two week
         | trip with it and then return just before the return policy
         | ends.
        
           | sschueller wrote:
           | Switzerland didn't have the kind of return anything for any
           | reason culture as the US has had for a long time. The fact
           | you can return a non defective item is something newer and
           | you still find retailers that will not take your item back
           | unless it is defective.
           | 
           | So you don't see people to go Jumbo (home depot equivalent)
           | buy a tool and return it a week later after the job is done
           | to get a full refund.
           | 
           | In fact even digitec/galaxus will charge you a 10% restocking
           | fee if you opened the item and it isn't not defective in
           | anyway.
        
           | gggggg5 wrote:
           | I have a feeling not many people buy satnavs in 2023.
        
             | cosmodisk wrote:
             | It was a reference to bygone days, but the practice wasn't
             | that uncommon in certain Western countries...
        
         | jb1991 wrote:
         | > Interestingly enough, the culture of returns in Switzerland
         | is very different compared to the US.
         | 
         | The culture of returns in all of the EU, too, is very different
         | than the US.
        
           | gggggg5 wrote:
           | How is it different?
        
             | jb1991 wrote:
             | For starters, EU law _requires_ the right to return no-
             | questions-asked within a minimum 14 days (many places honor
             | 30 days).
             | 
             | In the US, there is no such law, though many retailers do
             | it anyway. Some states, however, have implemented such
             | laws, but it's not nationwide.
        
               | sschueller wrote:
               | * if unopened and unused.
        
               | jb1991 wrote:
               | Is your asterisk intended for the EU or the US?
               | 
               | in the EU, you can return things after using them, no
               | problem
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | tremon wrote:
               | Depends on the goods. Not many places will accept returns
               | for opened/used underwear, for example. Same with digital
               | goods (dvd/cd/games), if the seal is broken the shop will
               | not accept a return.
        
               | jb1991 wrote:
               | True, there are some obvious exceptions. But suppose I
               | buy a vacuum cleaner and use it for a month and don't
               | like it, doesn't matter how much I used it, I can return
               | it in the EU.
        
       | stabbles wrote:
       | The largest shareholder in Digitec Galaxus AG is Migros [1],
       | which is a cooperative federation with more than 2 million
       | members.
       | 
       | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Migros
        
         | jibcage wrote:
         | It thrills me to pieces seeing Migros and Galaxus on here. I
         | wish there was something remotely similar to Migros in the US.
        
       | TomGullen wrote:
       | New attack vector for black hat product manufacturers to abuse
       | and compete on, hopefully it won't devolve into this level of
       | competition though!
        
         | lolc wrote:
         | Isn't that a metric you want manufacturers to compete on? How
         | could they fake this?
        
       | sys42590 wrote:
       | I really like this step... especially because they sell a mix of
       | "good" brands and stuff you could get on Aliexpress for a tenth
       | of the price.
       | 
       | One more observation:
       | 
       | If you look at the smartphone scores, you'll see that Apple
       | warranty rates are WAY below other brands. I assume the reason
       | for this is that for Apple you don't have to go through the
       | retailer you bought it to have it fixed under warranty. For
       | Samsung et al. there's little option to have your phone or tablet
       | fixed without reaching out to the place you bought it.
        
         | Tijdreiziger wrote:
         | Samsung has service centers too.
         | 
         | I don't know the situation in Switzerland, but in the EU, the
         | manufacturer warranty (whether from Apple or Samsung) is
         | usually only 1 year. EU consumer law mandates a 2-year minimum
         | warranty, so after the first year, you have to go through the
         | store.
        
           | Lukas_Skywalker wrote:
           | In Switzerland, the retailer must provide a two year
           | warranty. The retailers can not shorten that span, but
           | (strangely) can remove it entirely. The customer needs to
           | know this before buying though.
           | 
           | The manufacturers warranty is up to them and is not
           | mandatory.
        
           | sys42590 wrote:
           | 2 years ago, I went to an Samsung authorized third party
           | repair shop to to have a cracked screen replaced. They told
           | me it will take 5 weeks to have my phone repaired.
           | 
           | I then went to an unauthorized repair shop and they replaced
           | my cracked screen with an unauthorized replacement part that
           | only had 2 finger multi-touch (without telling me of course).
           | 
           | I don't personally own Apple devices, but from people close
           | to me I know first hand that Apple's service is usually
           | better than my experience two years ago.
        
         | sandworm101 wrote:
         | >> For Samsung et al. there's little option to have your phone
         | or tablet fixed without reaching out to the place you bought
         | it.
         | 
         | I've had my personal phones repaired a handful of times in
         | recent years (screens). All Samsung. I have never even
         | considered taking them back to the place I bought them. I have
         | always gone to whatever repair shop is local.
        
           | sys42590 wrote:
           | For free under warranty?
        
             | chronogram wrote:
             | I've not heard of phone screens breaking as a hardware
             | defect. You'd have to get accident insurance for drops.
        
         | sschueller wrote:
         | I believe the amount of apple devices sold in comparison to
         | other devices is very low as Apple has stores selling directly
         | to customers. Also you can probably get your apple device
         | repaired at the Apple store even if you purchased it at
         | digitec/galaxus. That may heavily skew the numbers.
        
           | layer8 wrote:
           | Apple stores aren't that widespread in Europe, and you can
           | usually buy Apple devices around 10% (or more) cheaper
           | elsewhere.
        
           | sys42590 wrote:
           | That's what I'm saying, for Apple it's much easier to contact
           | Apple directly (or any authorized repair shop) to have your
           | device repaired or replaced. It may be possible for other
           | Brands but their network is much smaller, so you usually end
           | up going to the shop you bought it.
        
           | jmole wrote:
           | This may be specific to the US, but Apple still sells a
           | majority of devices through carriers:
           | https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/12/23505822/apple-iphone-
           | sa...
        
       | crazygringo wrote:
       | Seems like this isn't per-product, but rather per-brand in a
       | particular category.
       | 
       | So while it seems like a big step forwards (great!), it's still
       | not going to tell you if a _particular_ item from a brand is a
       | big lemon. And in my experience, that 's often what happens when
       | a well-known brand starts putting out a few "budget" items.
       | (Happened to me recently on a blender that burned out on first
       | use, and going back to search the user reviews, it seems to be a
       | notorious problem for that specific model of blender, but not the
       | brand overall.)
       | 
       | Would be amazing if Amazon could display per-product stats on
       | returns, at least for items with >10,000 total sales.
       | 
       | (In contrast, warranties usually/always seem to be handled
       | directly through the manufacturer in the US at least, so Amazon
       | wouldn't even have that data.)
        
       | senthil_rajasek wrote:
       | Are the data used to generate this score and rate publicly
       | available ?
       | 
       | How does one verify they are true and not just another marketing
       | trick.
        
       | Kenji wrote:
       | [dead]
        
       | petodo wrote:
       | Is this really worth article? Czech online shops publish
       | reliability of products for years.
       | 
       | 2nd biggest shows reliability, for instance iphone 12 has 99%
       | 
       | https://www.czc.cz/apple-iphone-12-128gb-green/301129/produk...
       | 
       | the biggest shop does inverse how many (1%) used warranty
       | 
       | https://m.alza.cz/iphone-12-64gb-cerna-d6216436.htm
       | 
       | this is worth checking before buying something because 97%
       | reliability is for instance extremely bad compared to 99%, you
       | are 3 times more likely to get faulty piece
       | 
       | there is also monopolistic price comparison website heureka.cz
       | where you can check price history years back, compare all shops
       | and set price tracking with notification covering pretty much all
       | online shops
        
         | david927 wrote:
         | Wait... are you saying Jara Cimrman did it first?!
        
         | pifm_guy wrote:
         | When I buy from AliExpress I feel like perhaps only 80% of
         | items work properly for a reasonable lifespan...
         | 
         | I still buy there because I quite like the challenge of
         | repairing the things that don't work, and prices there are
         | typically half of what things cost on Amazon.
        
         | martyvis wrote:
         | Yes, I am have never heard of stores doing this. Please add
         | comments of more places where this is done. (I'm from Australia
         | - you only see similar things from consumer groups)
        
         | roesel wrote:
         | This might be true, but both czc and alza have much to learn
         | from digitec/galaxus regarding their website
         | useability/cleanliness/etc. Alza nowadays is closer to
         | Aliexpress than anything else with their endless dark
         | patterns/spam/clutter.
         | 
         | I wish we had something like Digitec/Galaxus in Czechia.
         | Mironet is probably the closest, but their product range is
         | limited and they're still not quite there.
        
       | raphaelj wrote:
       | Never heard about Galaxus, but looking at their e-shop, I felt
       | like being propelled 10y in the future.
       | 
       | Their UI is so much ahead any e-commerce website I ever seen.
        
         | Gigachad wrote:
         | Also surprised. The site is very refreshing and unique while
         | staying very functional.
        
       | mirabel-stephen wrote:
       | [dead]
        
       | r2b2 wrote:
       | I'd love to see re-purchase delay[0] and re-purchase rate[1] as
       | well. Useful looking at multiple highly rated products and
       | products that you go through more quickly (Eg. many bathroom
       | supplies).
       | 
       | --
       | 
       | [0] Time between a customer's purchase and re-purchase of a
       | product.
       | 
       | [1] Percent of original buyers that buy again.
        
       | Hamuko wrote:
       | Finnish retailer Verkkokauppa.com has had something similar for a
       | couple of years now. If I for example look up the 64 GB Apple
       | iPad (Wi-Fi), I can see that it has 0.43% repairs and 0.17%
       | returns, and that the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip3 has 0% returns and
       | 2.17% repairs.
        
         | mordae wrote:
         | Same here in Czechia for the major shops.
        
       | jasmer wrote:
       | Retail has long needed a shake up in the face of Amazon.
        
       | tr33house wrote:
       | imagine if this was on Amazon! I really hope this catches on!
        
         | Pxtl wrote:
         | Does it matter? Any shoddy goods on Amazon are immediately
         | pulled from the store, re-stickered, and then reintroduced
         | under a new brand name, possibly recycling the listing of a
         | popular and successful product using the shit-of-Theseus trick.
        
           | crazygringo wrote:
           | Sure, for no-name brands.
           | 
           | But people also buy _tons_ of brand-name stuff on Amazon,
           | where this can 't happen. I _absolutely_ want to know the
           | return rate for name-brand stuff.
        
         | XCSme wrote:
         | Meanwhile, on Amazon I ordered something with "same-day
         | delivery", and it hasn't even been shipped 5 days later by the
         | seller. There is no way to leave a review, because by their
         | policy if there were shipment issues, you can't leave a review
         | for the product (I tried once, when I paid for a shelf that I
         | really needed, and it took 2 weeks before the order was marked
         | as cancelled, I left a review that I never received the
         | product, it was deleted).
        
           | Pxtl wrote:
           | AFAIK you can complain about delivery stuff under seller
           | feedback, just not under product reviews.
        
       | ndsipa_pomu wrote:
       | That looks to be a great idea to me to replace faked user reviews
       | on well known shopping sites. I expect it could be games though
        
         | turtlebits wrote:
         | Indeed. Sounds good in principle, but how do you prevent
         | someone from repeatedly returning items just to hurt a
         | competitor and/or making frivolous defect/warranty claims
         | against them?
        
           | minsc_and_boo wrote:
           | There are hidden reputation and anti-fraud mechanisms at play
           | in a lot of consumer areas (incentives, reviews, etc.), it
           | would be trivial to apply them to this too.
           | 
           | Most fraudulent activity isn't attacking competitors, as it's
           | prohibitively expensive, but instead propping up their own
           | reputation. i.e. Amazon's fake reviews are mostly five-stars.
        
           | JumpCrisscross wrote:
           | > _how do you prevent someone from repeatedly returning items
           | just to hurt a competitor and /or making frivolous
           | defect/warranty claims against them?_
           | 
           | Seems like a subset of the fake-review problem. Except with
           | money exchanged, tangible costs to the retailer and more
           | documentation.
        
           | ThePhysicist wrote:
           | Faking a product defect is probably way harder than just
           | submitting a fake review. Eventually the retailer will notice
           | that something is off as you have to send the product back
           | and it has to be defective. How do you create a plausible
           | warranty defect in a TV, for example?
        
             | _trampeltier wrote:
             | And if it's not warranty, you have to pay it yourself. And
             | you still have to buy the product in the first place.
        
         | _trampeltier wrote:
         | Just maybe a product for boring people looks better, because
         | they are a bit more careful than a kind of same product for
         | teens. But still, I like idea, finally we have something from
         | "big data".
        
       | Spooky23 wrote:
       | When I worked retail sales you definitely saw different return
       | rates on different SKUs. I tried to collect data for a college
       | project but the sample size was too small. (My class was in the
       | spring, and sales boomed in the fall)
       | 
       | I was always surprised that the company didn't do that, as they
       | definitely lost alot of money to shrink and exceptions for high
       | fail devices. At one point the company self-funded warranties, so
       | a lemon had to kill profitability.
        
       | jjcm wrote:
       | I think this is great, and it serves both the interests of
       | galaxus and the user. The user will pick things that have less
       | returns, and in the process galaxus will (hopefully) have to
       | field less returns as well.
        
       | glanzwulf wrote:
       | That's a great policy. I've used them a couple of times recently
       | and was very impressed, now I might just use them even more.
        
       | bbojan wrote:
       | Product categorization on Galaxus is the best I've seen so far.
       | Light years ahead compared to e.g. Amazon.
        
       | matsemann wrote:
       | I actually don't care that much about these numbers, as they are
       | not my problem. 5 year warranty by law (no matter what the maker
       | gives you), makes it their risk if they make brittle products.
       | Compared to in a market with little consumer protection laws
       | (US), where what you buy is a uninformed gamble as to how it will
       | last.
        
         | luckylion wrote:
         | You don't want faulty equipment. Not because you won't get a
         | replacement, but because you'll have faulty equipment and will
         | have to spend time dealing with it.
        
       | zwaps wrote:
       | If you now add a "made in X" indicator, I guess I will order in
       | Switzerland from now on
        
       | ensignavenger wrote:
       | I wonder if the warranty information is correct? From some of the
       | comments, it sounds like they do warranty service in-house for
       | some items at least? I wonder if Apple really has that much lower
       | % of warranty issues, or if Apple owners tend to get warranty
       | service direct from Apple instead of going through Galaxus, and
       | so they don't have the data on Apple products?
        
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       (page generated 2023-01-26 23:00 UTC)