Just when you think the Amazon Saga about the $799 DJI Mavic 3 Pro Promotion cannot get any crazier or more frustrating, I just got an email from a DroneXL reader who has received a FULL refund from Amazon. Yes, he received the drone for free!
The person in question is Gavin Birchell, President of White Hawk Drone Services. Like many of you, Gavin jumped on the $799 DJI Mavic 3 Pro Promotion. Initially, Gavin’s experience was very similar to that of many other readers. First, his order got canceled for no reason. Then Amazon told him to buy the DJI Mavic 3 Pro again for the full retail price, and he was instructed to contact Amazon again once he received the drone to recieve his refund.
Gavin’s First Email to DroneXL
On March 27th, Gavin writes to DroneXL:
Hello,
I read your article regarding the success of a pilot getting the $799 deal on the Mavic 3 Pro. I too was a pilot that made the order and was disappointed with an unexplained cancelled order by Amazon. I contacted Amazon a couple days ago via their chat and was told they would only be able to give me a $500 gift card. I refused and said they could not give the sale price to a few select customers. I ultimately did not get anywhere with that supervisor/customer service rep that day. I decided to give it another go today and I immediately asked for a supervisor. I then explained the situation again, notifying them I am aware they are giving the sale price to select customers and that I was contacting them to do the same. I was immediately transferred to a phone call with their Price Matching department and they honored the sale price! I have to order the drone at full price, then I have to contact their customer service once the drone arrives and notify them, then at that point they are refunding the difference. I figured I would pass on another success story and encourage others to do the same.
See screenshot of email below from my phone conversation.
Thanks! Gavin
Right away, I responded to Gavin’s email, saying that his story sounded very familiar. I said I hoped he would get a better response from Amazon than what I and others had received so far. I also asked him to keep me posted.
Gavin’s Response and Amazon Conversation
Gavin responded with the following on March 28th:
Will do! I posted about this in Commercial sUAS Remote Pilot’s group on Facebook and heard similar stories. I went back to Amazon customer service to get confirmation on what I was told over the phone. I mentioned the $1505 refund specifically and they were in agreement with it. Hopefully, this will be good back-up ammo if I run into any issues. I will let you know what the outcome is!
Gavin included most of his conversation with Amazon in his email to DroneXL.
Gavin’s follow up
Then I didn’t hear back from Gavin for a few days, until today, when he wrote the following:
Well……What a whirlwind of struggle and pain in the b…!
I encountered issues as you had as well. I called in once I received the drone and they flat out told me they were not honoring it. I told them that I wasn’t calling to negotiate, that this was already approved by a manager. They told me to try and call back in and talk to someone else if I wanted to, but I was as high as I could go in that department and he wasn’t going to help me. I called back in and this time they said the best they could do was $200 off and again, if I wanted to call back in, maybe I would have the luck of being transferred to someone who could do more for me. I tried a couple more times and each time the entry level customer service rep said “price matching department is normally available 24/7, I have sent them your info but no one is responding, try calling back later”. I was convinced they just didn’t want to deal with me anymore.
I resorted to putting a post on X and tagging Amazon as a last ditch effort. Someone immediately reached out and asked for more details about my complaint. They told me they would escalate my case and would get back to me in 2-3 days after assessing everything.
Gavin receives a FULL refund and gets a FREE DJI Mavic 3 Pro!
Then today, Gavin wakes up to amazing News from Amazon. He writes:
This morning I woke up to this email!! God worked in my favor and blessed me with much more than the $1500 refund. they refunded the entire amount and I did not end up paying a cent for the drone!! Persistence, persistence, persistence.
Amazon had sent Gavin the following email:
Hello, Gavin.
This is Ella, a Resolution Specialist with the Amazon Social Media team. We received an update to your escalation. A refund was issued to your MasterCard on 4/1/2024 for $2,383.17.
In most cases, once a refund has been submitted, the issuing bank will post it to your account within 3-5 business days. You can view details of the completed refund on your Amazon.com account.
No return is required for the full refund issued. Your escalation has now been resolved.
We hope this helps! Best regards, Ella C. Amazon.com
Amazon Puts ONE Customer First!
Over the last few weeks I have been in contact with tens of readers from DroneXL, either by email, text, phone, etc. Almost all people who had jumped on the promotion had the same frustrating experience that Gavin and I had. Cancelled orders. Empty promises from Amazon and many, many hours spent on the phone or chat with Amazon Customer Support to no avail.
Most people simply walked away from all this Amazon mess, as it simply wasn’t worth their time. Some people got lucky. I believe about five people or so received discounts toward their purchase price to bring the price down to the advertised $799, or at least close to it.
Myself, I have received a credit or refund of $476.64 towards the drone and a number of smaller refunds as a sign of goodwill. It all added up to about $600, well short of the $1,505 refund that I was promised.
Gavin, clearly took the “Grand Prize” in the Amazon Saga, received a FULL refund on his DJI Mavic 3 Pro and got a completely FREE DJI drone from Amazon as a result!
Incredible! Congrats to Gavin! And hats off to Amazon for doing the right thing (and then some) for ONE of its customers.
In our private conversation, Trent, a member of the Amazon Support for Social Media team, asked me to submit my details on a special Amazon form, which I did.
Amazon said they would get back to me within 12 business hours, so fingers crossed!
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