Déjà Vu

After buying my Creative EP-635 Noise Cancellation in-ear ear buds, yesterday I got an opportunity to really use it.
The major positive things about it are

• The noise cancellation does what it is supposed to do, cut out all the external noise.
• Ear buds sound very good, good bass and very clear
• The buds fit in nice and snug.

All that said, the ear buds have quite a few shortcomings.

• The chord is very very short! when I wear the buds, the connector hardly reaches my belt buckle. This might not be a problem if you have a music player like the Creative Stone or Shuffle, but considering I use my Phone, which is no where close to the lighter side, the idea of keeping it dangling from the lanyard goes out of the window and into the trash can. What were you thinking creative? shouldn’t the chord be at least long enough to keep the music player in my pant pockets?
• The earphones are available only in White. You’ll end up with a dirty looking earphone pretty soon.
• The hideous twist and lock lanyard attached to the chord makes it inconvenient to store the earphones.

Verdict : Nice pair of earphones if you always wear a shirt with front pocket or you are a dork who doesn’t mind dangling his phone/music player from your neck. Although they sound good, I’m soon going to buy something else. An EP-630 or a pair of sennheiser buds.

I travel almost every weekend and music is my companion during the long journey. I use my phone to listen tomusic and since Nokia doesn’t care to bundle decent earbuds even with top of the line phones, I was pretty much stuck with a crappy pair of ear phones that keep falling off the ear. I have been wanting to buy a good pair of in-ear earbuds from a long time now. Initially I had decided on Creative EP-630 as it fit my budget and needs. I was simply looking for prices online when I saw that indiatimes.com listed Creative EP-635 also at the same price so I thought why not buy that. Buying it online saves me the effort of going around and bargaining, so went ahead and placed the order.

The site said it was deliverable throughout India at a flat shipping rate. I made the payment through credit card and the order was confirmed, one day later the status is changed to payment recieved, the transaction reflects in my credit card statement, so far, so good.

On the third day, I get a mail saying my order has been cancelled for refund because the shipping address is non-serviceable. This is very funny because the product page clearly said that it ships throughout India. But don’t fret yet! the funny part is yet to come! The mail then went on to explain to me this little *policy* of theirs.

For all orders below 2000 Rs INR, the refund would be given in the form of Gift Coupons! WTF! First, you don’t deliver my order, second you go ahead and bill my credit card and then you expect me to still shop with you?

I immedietly called up the customer care, went through the normal routine of yelling and getting the ‘this is a company policy’ crap. At this point of time I was really annoyed. By chance I poked around a bit on their site and found the email ID of the Operations Head. The comes the interesting part.

I sent a mail to the Operation Head from my work email. The place I work happens to be a big and well known IT company. I sent the same mail as a reply to the earlier cancellation mail I got on my personal email. Next day I get a reply from indiatimes.com and a phone call before i have even opened the mail. The caller informed me that he is sorry for the inconvenience and that he’ll personally ship my order in 3 days. The interesting this is that for the same mail, on my personal email, I again get a regret mail! talk about Brand value!

The order was then promptly delivered within 3 days. Overall, I’m very happy with the escalation and customer satisfaction part of their site but unimpressed by the policies. Will post a separate entry for the Unboxing and review.