Josh Sherman
The of saga continues…
First my phone stopped connecting to the cellular network.
Then I casually reset my phone, unknowingly locking myself out of my Authy account.
Then after pulling the trigger on a new phone, the Pixel 3, the Googs ran a promotion to get 200 bucks off a new phone.
I generally don’t have buyer’s remorse, but man, I was a little miffed that I missed saving 200 bucks. Especially only missing it by days, on a purchase I really didn’t even want to make right now.
You see, my O.G. Pixel phone was actually still serving me quite well. The software improvements to Android were still bringing me new and exciting features so I figured, may as well ride this out.
So yeah, the price dropped less than 10 days after I had made my original purchase. I hadn’t even have the phone in my possession a full week yet either.
I think what really added insult to injury is that I found out about the promotion, on my Google News Feed, on my new phone, the day before my birthday.
Like any red-blooded American, I did the most logical thing I could think of…
I searched the Internet to see if Google offered any sort of price protection on purchases.
What I found was mostly related to Google Play Protect stuff, and not a ton about actual purchases from their physical goods store.
There were some forums that discussed the topic, but seemed like it was a mixed lot of outcomes. There was also one article that explicitly talked about Google offering price protection from over 5 years ago and cited that there was a 15 day window of opportunity.
The article linked to a Google FAQ page but the page lacked any information about any sort of price protection. They did talk about situations where you receive the wrong item, or it’s damaged or whatever.
What’s a guy to do?
Reach out to support and ask about getting a partial refund, of course!
I reached out to customer service from the orders page on Google. I went with the chat option and typed out a friendly inquiry regarding potentially receiving a partial refund on my recent purchase.
Less than a minute later I was on the horn with a customer service representative. They immediately understood and acknowledged my plight, and took a few moments to figure out if there was any recourse for said plight.
The interaction took maybe 10 minutes in total. By the end of it, I was blessed with the amazing news that I would be receiving a “courtesy refund” for the $200, which ended up being $212 (I assume because of an offset on the tax).
Google did good.
The process was extremely painless, and the representative was prompt, friendly and professional.
Will the process of reaching out and asking for a refund work for everybody?
That I’m not entirely sure of. The fact that the customer service rep had to see if it was possible tells me that YMMV depending on your time of purchase and such. The mixed experiences that I had read about on the web somewhat confirms that there is a varying level of success available.
With that, it’s absolutely worth a shot in my opinion, especially if you’ve purchased with Google within 15 days of the price adjustment.
The moral of the story is that it never hurts to ask. Just don’t be a fucking asshole when you do ;)
Also, comment below if you thought “Wu-Tang, Wu-Tang” after the opening line of this post!
