Last summer I bought a pair of Powerstorm Canon NB-4L equivalent
batteries from ukdigital.co.uk, and the first one recently started
giving poor performance although I think it's only been through 20 or
30 power cycles.

So I opened the second one to use as a backup and both sides are
bulging so it won't fit in the charger or camera.

I've e-mailed the company about returning them. They're supposed to
have a 1-year RTB guarantee, so I don't expect to have any trouble
returning them.

But I do need a spare battery --- should I ask this company to
exchange the pair of dodgy ones in part-payment for a (more expensive)
genuine Canon NB-4L?

Will a genuine Canon battery be significantly better in the long run?

Is ukdigital.co.uk generally a good supplier?

Thanks,
Adam

On 2007-03-22, John Bean wrote:

>>Is ukdigital.co.uk generally a good supplier?
>
> They're good people, I've been to their shop and bought from
> them often. I have no opinion of their batteries but I doubt
> they'll give you any hassle. Give them a ring.

I e-mailed them and they said I could send the batteries back for them
to examine. I decided to upgrade to the genuine Canon, so I told them
so by e-mail and asked them to e-mail me back when they'd examined the
batteries (rather than just sending replacements), then I returned the
batteries (with a print-out of the e-mails) and ordered (and paid for)
the Canon battery.

Unfortunately they ignored that and sent replacements! And they still
haven't answered my e-mails of 23 April and yesterday asking about the
matter.

(So for the moment, I've paid for a Canon battery, which I'm using,
and two imitations, which are still unwrapped and which I don't want.)

>>>Is ukdigital.co.uk generally a good supplier?
>>
>> They're good people, I've been to their shop and bought from
>> them often. I have no opinion of their batteries but I doubt
>> they'll give you any hassle. Give them a ring.

Unfortunately I've got a very poor impression of their customer
service. They told me I could send the batteries back for them to
examine; I made it clear I wanted to "trade up" to a genuine Canon
battery so I ordered one and asked them to e-mail me when they'd
examined the batteries. They ignored this and sent replacements
(imitations again) without telling me.

Then it took several e-mails to get another reply, which included the
cryptic comment "Please bear in mind that the batteries bought in kit
form do not have the mormal implied value." (Is this an admission
that the non-Canon batteries are supposed to be crap?)

I sent the unwanted batteries back and waited almost a month, then
e-mailed them. They claimed --- falsely --- that they had left me a
message because my credit card had expired (true), then refunded only
the original price, leaving me out £5.48 (postage in the original
order plus my costs of returning the batteries twice by recorded
delivery).

I'm going to contact them one more time about this, then ask my card
issuer to do a chargeback for that amount. Based on their bad
attitude and communication, I wouldn't recommend this company to
anyone else.

Adam Funk <a24061> wrote:

[..]
> e-mailed them. They claimed --- falsely --- that they had left me a
> message because my credit card had expired (true), then refunded only
> the original price, leaving me out £5.48 (postage in the original
> order plus my costs of returning the batteries twice by recorded
> delivery).
>
> I'm going to contact them one more time about this, then ask my card
> issuer to do a chargeback for that amount. Based on their bad
> attitude and communication, I wouldn't recommend this company to
> anyone else.

In the end, they refused to refund the postage costs and claimed the
Sale of Goods Act was not relevant. Fortunately my credit card issuer
was cooperative and did a chargeback for the postage costs.

I recommend avoiding that company.