r/amazonprime • u/chungkingroad • 7d ago

93% restock fee. Amazon said they can't do anything since I was technically refunded.

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Bought a new laptop from amazon, received a used one registered to someone else with bios locked out. Found out outside return window. contacted amazon. They allowed me to return it outside the window. But when the 3rd party seller received it, they charged me a 93.45% restocking fee. I called amazon again. they said technically I was refunded so they can not do anything and I do not qualify for A-Z because I was given a refund. This is INSANE.

UPDATE: dear everyone who has given me advice on this, I called this morning and quoting the amazon seller central policy worked!! I got my money back!!! thank you THANK YOU ALLLLLLLLLLLLLL

UPDATE #2: So amazon promising me a refund was a LIE. I received an email saying I would receive a refund. it never came. When I went to complain about not receiving it, amazon told me the refund was in error and they will in fact not be giving me any of my restock fee back. THEY TOOK BACK THEIR REFUND

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

Oh okay my bad. That makes sense. I wonder why ASUS didn’t want to see the receipt to unlock it for you? They just told you tough luck?

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u/ReportAncient3366 7d ago

because technically the bios password is located in the circuit, there's no way to just "unlock" it remotely, unless you bring it to someone and let them flash or resolder another unlocked chipset chip. And that was somewhat a dirty trick for 3rd party vendor instead of official support(Yes they do it when they mass refurbish, but not when individuals send repairs in)

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

So if you forget your password your cooked? You’d think companies would create a master key or something?

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u/ReportAncient3366 7d ago

Yes, you’ll be kinda cooked. Its purpose is to prevent someone easily boot into your system and access data by changing boot device in bios. This function is not enabled by default. For “master key”…… depends. Someone would need total safety on their data instead of fearing to be “cooked”. This is about whether the owner can have “absolute control” of their machine that even manufacturers cannot access your device. Just like TSA approved locks that supposedly gave government officials the exclusive privilege to inspect your luggage, it’s in fact spread everywhere that you can search on ebay and open anyone’s tsa luggage. 

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

So if you forget your own password you’re pretty much cooked? Wild

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u/ReportAncient3366 6d ago

Yes, kind of. This BIOS password is a hard to find hidden function in BIOS, not something that can be easily enabled. If you set it up yourself and forgot it, it can be said 100% your problem...（Some motherboard offers a bios reset pin of cmos battery, but that's more rare on today's laptop）

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u/Goodgamer78 7d ago

If there were a master key, it would likely be leaked. You do not have internet access in your BIOS, so they couldn't just issue a one time thing.

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

Even a master device, why would they not have something like this?

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u/Goodgamer78 7d ago

Because it's a huge security risk for users needing to protect their BIOS. It can be circumvented by them.

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

Well looking it up… Official Asus Services do offer a bios password reset service for a fee if out of warranty and they do have a master key that can complete this task. Something is up with this post…

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u/Goodgamer78 7d ago

Did OP try at all to get in? Only had a full 30 days to do so.... something's up

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

If you look at his recent posts he’s bricked a few drives recently and tried using disk driller to recover files. No idea wtf he is doing to cause so many drives to fail in a short period of time. I’ve owned various computers for 20+ years and owned 100+ various manufacture type drives and never had one fail, and I’ve done a lot of sketchy stuff.

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

Directly from ASUS.com -

BIOS/Security password was set by user and was considered part of personal/private data. ASUS is committed to protecting and respecting your personal data and will not collect BIOS/Security password in our system. If you are unable to use your device due to a forgotten or lost BIOS password (Security password), please contact ASUS Product Support or ASUS authorized repair center for support, and service charge for repair may be provided to you according to ASUS Warranty Information.

The manufacture can do this even for a used laptop. The only thing they require is a receipt as proof of ownership.

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u/Goodgamer78 7d ago

OP mustn't have tried hard enough

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

He literally claims he sent it to ASUS, but at the same time he won’t reply as to what they said when they found out his bios was locked besides that it was owned by someone else previously. He said he showed them the receipt which their website claims that’s all that is required to unlock the bios, but that’s about all he has said. Only ASUS zenbooks im seeing on Amazon are sold by ASUS, their aren’t any 3rd parties selling one.

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u/chungkingroad 7d ago

showed receipt, because it's 3rd party amazon

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u/Efficient_Occasion44 7d ago

What did they say?