Questions regarding MSI's RMA claims.

[TheZmajCap]

I had sent my Gaming X 1080 TI in for RMA as it has been a constant defective problem card. I RMAed the first card and it was replaced with a completely different Gaming X 1080 TI, to which I had to RMA that card twice due to fan control issues and finally due to the temperatures thermal throttling even with fans at max. I sent it in and now MSI offered to give me a flat 400$ for the card. This feels like a massive spit in my face considering it has been a problem card ever since I got it new. After all I need a card and even getting a second hand 1080 ti on Ebay of the same make would be more than 400$. I had heard some members of the board were given model year newer replacements via RMA before and I wanted to know if I am stuck with the partial refund they gave me or if I can pursue a card replacement from them? It's beginning to make me lose more faith in MSI than what I already had considering they allowed for scalping of their 3080s.

 

[jj9987]

First, check your local consumer laws. I don't know where you are located, so I can't give a definitive answer.

How old is the card, when did the previous RMAs happen?

If I recall correctly, EU consumer laws allow you to request full refund, if you had to RMA the device twice for the same issue.

[TheZmajCap]

34 minutes ago, jj9987 said:

First, check your local consumer laws. I don't know where you are located, so I can't give a definitive answer.

How old is the card, when did the previous RMAs happen?

If I recall correctly, EU consumer laws allow you to request full refund, if you had to RMA the device twice for the same issue.

Im in the USA and so far I can't find much to help me with the situation. 

[Gohardgrandpa]

If they gave you $400 I’d take it and try to get a 3070 next week. I wouldn’t buy a used 1080ti for that price. 
The 3070 is supposed to be equal to a 2080ti. If you can snag that card at launch I’d do it in a heartbeat. You’ll get a brand new card with a full warranty for $500 and avoid msi, go with evga if you want good service after buying. 
 

Im glad you posted this, I don’t see enough rma stories to really judge companies. This is enough for me to avoid msi, they could of easily given you a 2080 Super instead of $400 but at least they gave you something. Id imagine most companies would give you a 2060 as it’s worth $400 new and that would of been down right disrespectful. 

[TheZmajCap]

18 hours ago, Gohardgrandpa said:

If they gave you $400 I’d take it and try to get a 3070 next week. I wouldn’t buy a used 1080ti for that price. 
The 3070 is supposed to be equal to a 2080ti. If you can snag that card at launch I’d do it in a heartbeat. You’ll get a brand new card with a full warranty for $500 and avoid msi, go with evga if you want good service after buying. 
 

Im glad you posted this, I don’t see enough rma stories to really judge companies. This is enough for me to avoid msi, they could of easily given you a 2080 Super instead of $400 but at least they gave you something. Id imagine most companies would give you a 2060 as it’s worth $400 new and that would of been down right disrespectful. 

I decided to give them a counter offer and see if we can meet somewhere in the middle. Also am scheduled to talk to an RMA supervisor about the problem as well since this is a repeat failure card. So far until MSI makes this right I can firmly say to shy away from MSI. Between this and them literally allowing for scalping of the 3080s...they are a bit yikes atm.

[dilpickle]

That is actually a pretty good offer from them.

[Gohardgrandpa]

1 hour ago, dilpickle said:

That is actually a pretty good offer from them.

That's what I was thinking. Throw another $100 on it and get a 3070 when they come out

[TheZmajCap]

17 hours ago, dilpickle said:

That is actually a pretty good offer from them.

Not in the least. The card was a constant failure and even to get the same thing second hand would be around 500$. If the card ever got more than 3 months of use without having problems, maybe, but not when they RMA replaced my first card with a new 1080 ti that also failed and needed to be replaced.

[dilpickle]

$500 for a 2 generation old video card? I don't know where you are shopping. $400 is more than a fair value for this. You can easily find them for less than that on ebay. Trust me I know because I am selling 2 of them right now.

[TheZmajCap]

2 minutes ago, dilpickle said:

$500 for a 2 generation old video card? I don't know where you are shopping. $400 is more than a fair value for this. You can easily find them for less than that on ebay. Trust me I know because I am selling 2 of them right now.

I was literally just on ebay. Only buy it now prices are to be counted when it comes to buying anything or refund amounts. Secondly, a Gaming X 1080 TI's lowest buy it now is 470$. Please don't say "trust me I know" when you are factually incorrect. Just because you are selling a differing model at a lower price does not mean that the card I am speaking about is that price. 

[Tanaz]

10 minutes ago, TheZmajCap said:

I was literally just on ebay. Only buy it now prices are to be counted when it comes to buying anything or refund amounts. Secondly, a Gaming X 1080 TI's lowest buy it now is 470$. Please don't say "trust me I know" when you are factually incorrect. Just because you are selling a differing model at a lower price does not mean that the card I am speaking about is that price. 

I have no idea how prices in the US are like but I'll take your estimate at face value. First let's take the obvious out of the way - MSI are a trash company and it's been demonstrated numerous times. I have the exact same GPU and I count my lucky stars every day that it's not deffective even though the factory thermal paste was trash and I had to replace it in order for the card not to run at 91C and 100% fan speed.

 

Okay now to the issue at hand - let's assume you're right and your GPU costs 470$ on Ebay right now and MSI are offering you 400$ out of pocket. We don't know how the market will fluctuate by the time you go through all the hoops to get YET ANOTHER  replacement. How long will it take? 3 weeks? A month? What if the 1080Ti Gaming X drops 70$ by then which it very well might with the release of Big Navi and the 3070 + the announcement of lower end Nvidia Cards. (3060 will probably be faster than 1080Ti). If that happens you'd have wasted a month and then you'd have to still list the replacement card for sale and compete with other offerings. It's up to you man and MSI are jerks for doing this but I'd personally take the money.

[TheZmajCap]

11 minutes ago, Tanaz said:

I have no idea how prices in the US are like but I'll take your estimate at face value. First let's take the obvious out of the way - MSI are a trash company and it's been demonstrated numerous times. I have the exact same GPU and I count my lucky stars every day that it's not deffective even though the factory thermal paste was trash and I had to replace it in order for the card not to run at 91C and 100% fan speed.

 

Okay now to the issue at hand - let's assume you're right and your GPU costs 470$ on Ebay right now and MSI are offering you 400$ out of pocket. We don't know how the market will fluctuate by the time you go through all the hoops to get YET ANOTHER  replacement. How long will it take? 3 weeks? A month? What if the 1080Ti Gaming X drops 70$ by then which it very well might with the release of Big Navi and the 3070 + the announcement of lower end Nvidia Cards. (3060 will probably be faster than 1080Ti). If that happens you'd have wasted a month and then you'd have to still list the replacement card for sale and compete with other offerings. It's up to you man and MSI are jerks for doing this but I'd personally take the money.

Now I agree with your overall look on it and, rest assured, if I could snag a 3080 atm I would take the money in a heartbeat. My main point is that MSI should be offering the same type of compensation they do in other regions. But yeah I agree that if I COULD get a GPU I felt was able to fill my needs for an appropriate price I would just take the money. Though the likelihood of me getting a 3070 at launch is probably going to be around getting a 3080 at launch, unfortunately.  

[Tanaz]

3 minutes ago, TheZmajCap said:

Now I agree with your overall look on it and, rest assured, if I could snag a 3080 atm I would take the money in a heartbeat. My main point is that MSI should be offering the same type of compensation they do in other regions. But yeah I agree that if I COULD get a GPU I felt was able to fill my needs for an appropriate price I would just take the money. Though the likelihood of me getting a 3070 at launch is probably going to be around getting a 3080 at launch, unfortunately.  

Doesn't make a difference either way. If you did ask MSI for another replacement you would still be stuck without a GPU by the time it arrives and if you took the money you'd still have to wait for the new cards to release. So in any case you'll have no GPU for the next month or so but only in one case you'd be in a position to buy a new card.

[-rascal-]

I haven't had the need to RMA or refund a GPU yet (knock on wood).

 

However, I *DID* have to RMA a Intel i7-6800K CPU -- this was earlier this year.

After about a week of back-and-forth is their tech support, and RMA department, they dude no ETA on availability on another i7-6800K, we settled on a refund.

Given Intel isn't even MAKING Broadwell-E CPUs anymore, I probably won't be getting a replacement LGA 2011-v3 CPU.

Intel straight up told me they will refund me the MSRP price, even after sending them a copy of my purchase invoice.

Even though I bought the CPU when it was on sale, below MSRP.

 

IMO, I think MSi should refund the price you paid, or the MSRP cost like what Intel does.

[FaxedForward]

2 hours ago, TheZmajCap said:

I was literally just on ebay. Only buy it now prices are to be counted when it comes to buying anything or refund amounts. Secondly, a Gaming X 1080 TI's lowest buy it now is 470$. Please don't say "trust me I know" when you are factually incorrect. Just because you are selling a differing model at a lower price does not mean that the card I am speaking about is that price. 

On the r/hardwareswap subreddit, 1080ti’s are selling for about $340-380 right now. eBay is not a good reference for market price.

 

I only paid $420 for my EVGA 1080ti XC2 there over a year ago and it still has the EVGA warranty through mid-next year.

 

Here is the exact card you are talking about, sold for $350 two days ago. 

 

[Tanaz]

38 minutes ago, -rascal- said:

I haven't had the need to RMA or refund a GPU yet (knock on wood).

 

However, I *DID* have to RMA a Intel i7-6800K CPU -- this was earlier this year.

After about a week of back-and-forth is their tech support, and RMA department, they dude no ETA on availability on another i7-6800K, we settled on a refund.

Given Intel isn't even MAKING Broadwell-E CPUs anymore, I probably won't be getting a replacement LGA 2011-v3 CPU.

Intel straight up told me they will refund me the MSRP price, even after sending them a copy of my purchase invoice.

Even though I bought the CPU when it was on sale, below MSRP.

 

IMO, I think MSi should refund the price you paid, or the MSRP cost like what Intel does.

It's not about what they should do though it's about what they're willing to do. A regular customer doesn't hold enough weight to pressure MSI into paying the full MSRP of the card. Only option is if somehow this blows up from a big tech reviewer calling them out or in a more realistic scenario from legal action. But even that is not realistic because of the legal fees that will come with it. Best thing OP can do is take the 400$ and speak with his wallet from now on by never purchasing an MSI product again. A lot of people have been disgusted by them and that got even more traction when Steve from GamersNexus did the killshot video and with the recent scalping scandal. Buy from brands that are reputable and always remember that those brands can change. For me right now as far as GPUs go it's ASUS and EVGA as far as great customer support and quality products go.

[TheZmajCap]

So I want to create an update to this. MSI got in touch with me, an RMA supervisor called me and wanted to try and work something out. What they worked out is sending me a Gaming X Trio 2080 TI. Soooo I got a very happy conclusion to this and MSI has regained a happy customer.

[logan vo]

On 10/7/2020 at 9:45 PM, TheZmajCap said:

I had sent my Gaming X 1080 TI in for RMA as it has been a constant defective problem card. I RMAed the first card and it was replaced with a completely different Gaming X 1080 TI, to which I had to RMA that card twice due to fan control issues and finally due to the temperatures thermal throttling even with fans at max. I sent it in and now MSI offered to give me a flat 400$ for the card. This feels like a massive spit in my face considering it has been a problem card ever since I got it new. After all I need a card and even getting a second hand 1080 ti on Ebay of the same make would be more than 400$. I had heard some members of the board were given model year newer replacements via RMA before and I wanted to know if I am stuck with the partial refund they gave me or if I can pursue a card replacement from them? It's beginning to make me lose more faith in MSI than what I already had considering they allowed for scalping of their 3080s.

 

Hi I have the same problem with you too! So I send my RTX 3070 for RMA to fix it. After they can't fix this, They gave me an option which is $490 for the card. But according to my receipt, I bought this card for $630 and having only $490 as a refund would be a financial lost for me.

[Smurfmaster2000]

On 12/17/2020 at 9:56 PM, logan vo said:

Hi I have the same problem with you too! So I send my RTX 3070 for RMA to fix it. After they can't fix this, They gave me an option which is $490 for the card. But according to my receipt, I bought this card for $630 and having only $490 as a refund would be a financial lost for me.

I'm in the same situation. My RTX3070 Ventus X3 OC failed within 1 week. I got it at the end of November from Best Buy. After sitting on it for 3 weeks I was offered $475. I told them no. Fortunately, I have a long time in the tech industry and as a lawyer I know what is standard practice in this situation.

 

Standard practice is that the *consumer* has the choice for full MSRP refund...even years later (doesn't have to be original purchaser, doesn't have to show receipt) or can accept an equal/better product. Everything moves forward in the tech industry so it's not reasonable that they would always keep "reserve" stock of a given model, so long as they offer to substitute it with a better model that's fine. Price is not necessarily indicative of a better model (case in point, the 20-series still cost a ton), but rather product specifications. I had Lenovo Executive Relations call me when they couldn't replace the screen on my $5500 dual screen laptop. I accepted their top of the line $3500 offering, but they DID also offer $5500. Because I could see they were trying and because it took no work or acrimony or threats to get to that point (which is what impressed me the most) I took their best non-MSRP cash offer in the form of product. But again, it was my choice and they made that clear.

 

My own company I work for, when we can't replace a defective laptop with that exact model or repair it, then we bump it up to the next model as a replacement and don't even blink twice.

 

In MSI's case, after rejecting their $475 and rejecting their offer to "compromise" and try to get me the purchase cost refunded I transmitted them a 48-hour firm offer (legalese meaning I committed myself legally if they accepted my offer) to forego any claim under the warranty to drop DOWN for an RTX 3060TI Gaming X Trio as a replacement product. Why? Because I'm not a jerk, despite honestly being offended at their $475. Also, it has the benefit of making them look really, really, bad when they don't accept it if I have to pursue it further with their superiors or in court. The 3060TI is a 7% slower card, but close enough and objectively a reasonable compromise on my part even (though it's on me 0% to compromise at all).

 

Most importantly, this is still an ongoing situation, but in general companies shouldn't be given a free pass when it comes to things like breach of contract and merchantability. Mistakes and defects happen, even miscommunications and oversights happen, and I'm still hopeful things will be resolved with MSI. Reading TheZMajCap comments above makes me hopeful it's just a front-line person making a bad call.

 

I hope to update here once I (hopefully) have some good news. As these cards hit their time in the wild of being out and used for a few months some will inevitably start to go bad. But if there's no way to honor the warranty this is going to be an increasing problem for consumers which makes me feel more obligated to pursue it since the average person will feel very intimidated into thinking that they better take it, or may get nothing. That's what really upsets me the most just reading up this thread... people feeling pressured into that... especially on a new card.

 

This whole RTX30 market is a rare instance where the value of the cards and MSRPs are going UP so there's a built-in incentive for manufacturer's (all of them, not just MSI) to simply buy out defective products at a fraction of the old price knowing much more money can be made simply diverting what would otherwise be non-profitable service replacements to the new retail market.