MacMall

Full review
I have dealt with MacMall for small purchases off and on for 5 years, and never had a really hard time, but the camel's back has been broken.

This summer, I purchased over $5000 worth of hardware, including two new computer systems from them, and to my chagrin entered into a comedy of errors of Shakespearian proportions: they
1) charged TWICE the shipping I was quoted,
2) Placed TWO holds PLUS the actual charge on my credit card causing several automatic transactions that should have cleared to bounce (you try to have $15,000 showing as 'outstanding' on your card!)
3) 'neglected' to tell me that two of the items I ordered were back-ordered and would be shipped separately (and at additional cost!)
and the icing on the cake:
4) refused to do anything about any of these situations when I called to complain.

Credit Card Shenanigans
They refused to fix the problem at all when I called with the credit card issue because 'it was a holiday and their accounting people were out'. Am I being unreasonable here? After all, if they were open to take orders shouldn't they need to be open to deal with complaints too?

When I finally DID get someone from the accounting section, they promised to remove the hold WITHIN 48 HOURS. I expressed dissatisfaction with this time-line as it only took 2-3 minutes to place the charge and holds, why should it take two days to remove them. I got no-where with logic.

If you take nothing else away from this review, take this idea!
The kicker here was that when the promised 48 hours had passed and nothing changed (I was still bouncing credit transactions because their holds were still in effect) I called again, and conference called Discover Card in on the discussion . (Consider this trick a "really good idea" (tm) and use it all you want. Pitting service reps against one another was good sport, and quite entertaining!)

Now mind you, the customer service rep from Discover Card was a bit taken aback by all this, however, I explained the situation, and assured him that it was the merchant I was upset with, not them, and I needed their help to resolve this. I then had a bit of fun watching the MacMall salesman in India squirm so to speak. They claimed to have sent the notice to Discover during the conference call, and the Discover Rep. was able to call them on the spot: 'no sir, we don't have any record of that'. It was perhaps one of the best calls I've made -- I was pleased I thought to use the conference call!

And the Bottom Line?
The bottom line was that the credit problem was eventually resolved, however, it was DIscover Card fixed the problem for me (when their service rep realized what was really going on) -- not because of anything MacMall did, I've still been overcharged for shipping -- with no relief -- and it took over 5 weeks to receive an order that was promised in three to five days. The only positive part of my experience with MacMall is that I eventually (it took 10 weeks!) got the promised rebate, which I gather isn't something that always happens.

UPDATE January 2007
Shortly after writing this review, I decided the overcharging of shipping was going to stick in my craw unless I did something about it. I filed a BBB complaint about the overcharge and deceptive practices on the 800 line. It took over 6 months, however, I not only got a response from the BBB, but also from MacMall/PCMall, and in late December, I also got a check for the overcharge in shipping.

Although I EVENTUALLY got the deal I thought I was going to get, I had to work way too hard to make the peices fall into place. I strongly encourage anyone to take their business elsewhere. While it is true their prices tend to be a few dollars less than other stores, the hassle is NOT worth it!!!