Getting things from Digikey that were not in the order.

Mar 02, 2012 12 Replies
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Digikey is one of the sources of components used at work and lately we noticed that they seem to through in a few extra things here and there. At first, I thought it was just promotional junk however, today I got the see one of the invoices, since I don't do the actual finance transaction part I normally don't see this information but, it seems that these items are on the invoice as if I did order them and billed.



I also do moon lighting work at home and abrode, and by from digikey but I have never gotten items I didn't order and charged for. I have gotten some one else's order that was completely not mine that had the paper work inside that was not mine and packing slip on the out side that was mine..



We are going to look deeper with in our own organization but these items that get sent to us, are things we most likely would never use!



Has any one experience suppliers doing this to you ?


Jamie


I wonder if you put something in your cart one night, forgot about it, then did an order the next day.

I've put stuff in the cart as a placeholder rather than jot down the item of interest elsewhere.

Digikey is in a sparsely populated area and have been growing very rapidly- especially as the economy expands you can expect the odd glitch. They generally do pretty well, but the fact that the stuff they supply is generally needed urgently tends to amplify the issues.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward" speff@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com

Generally the stuff isn't that expensive that gets put in however, the other day, a $300+ programming package was in there. That got sent back because it for something that none of us had any idea what to do with.

Jamie

Were the extra parts actually ordered? Maybe somebody in purchasing added stuff to your requirement.

John Larkin, President Highland Technology, Inc jlarkin at highlandtechnology dot com http://www.highlandtechnology.com Precision electronic instrumentation Picosecond-resolution Digital Delay and Pulse generators Custom laser controllers Photonics and fiberoptic TTL data links VME thermocouple, LVDT, synchro acquisition and simulation

"Jamie" wrote in message news:i_c4r.34280$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe10.iad...

My last order from Mouser had the correct parts I had ordered, but it had someone's else's pick sheet/order in the box. Poor German guy's probably never got their order on time.

Cheers

It shows they were order from our place however, these items that got order are things that either are no longer used on most of our stuff or they look to be samples for uC's, serial memory and things of that sort.

I did some checking around the other day and most of us don't see much of an interest with the items that appeared on the list.

Now, it maybe possible some sort of problem is happening with our other locations also ordering from Digikey. We do have an account with them for all our locations in the USA. This would only mean that some poor guy else where, maybe in one of the other locations set up to do R&D like we do are, is not getting their parts.

Jamie

I have gotten cases where that has happen where I have had both my parts and some one else's in the same box with both packing slips.. I don't remember who that was from, but I would venture to say it could've been Digikey..

I don't normally complain if I get my stuff and not charged for other items in there that I didn't order.

I remember once getting 2 different orders at our place where there was a bag of common mode chokes for AC line filters, something easy to solder to the AC plug inside. There were actually two different types in there, A bag of loop stick type and PC board mount types. I think some one must of had some line noise problems :)

Jamie

I had a problem with Digi-Key mostly in 2010 and maybe a little into

2011 where they were frequently shorting me on orders. If I ordered 500 pieces of some SMT part on cut tape, I'd get 250 pieces or something like that. Now, maybe the cutting the tapes used the ruler for the wrong component pitch. But, it was really consistent, always short, never extra. It got to the point I had short shipments FOUR times in one month! (They also have a really annoying way of dealing with shortages. They send the parts to correct the order, and send you both an invoice for the correction and a separate credit memo. So, you have to go to extra paperwork to apply the credit memo to the invoices. I suspect they do this to confuse the customer and home you lose the credit memos and pay twice for the missing parts.)

Well, this problem stopped suddenly, maybe in early 2011. I assumed they fired the guy who had been stealing yards of taped parts, but maybe they just re-engineered the way they managed the cutting of tapes and eliminated some kind of systematic error in the process.

So, that's all I know. I enter the orders myself online, and the invoices and shipping documents always match what I order. I have occasionally gotten some completely wrong part from them, too, but that was a pretty rare thing. That was just the part picker grabbed the wrong item.

Jon

Oh, yeah, I can see how this could happen EASILY, if you have multiple locations placing on-line orders through ONE digi-Key account. I've done it to myself on occasion when I was ordering parts while working at a remote location and forgot to change the deliver to address. Or, possibly somebody using the account to check parts availability and pricing, and accidentally leaving it in the shopping cart.

Jon

On a sunny day (Fri, 02 Mar 2012 18:53:28 -0500) it happened Jamie wrote in :

When I order from conrad.nl, and get to the final page (long list usually), they add TONS of things I did not order, but with the little box unticked that activates it. It is extremely annoying as the lists become very hard to read. I could imagine somebody in a buying department to be fooled easily, For example if I order battery clips, then they may add all sort of batteries to the checklist. Probably the idea is that you then think "Oh yes I need batteries too". Usually I use a spreadsheet, and cross checking their lists is a pain.

Is it legal? I dunno.

On a sunny day (Fri, 02 Mar 2012 18:53:28 -0500) it happened Jamie wrote in :

When I order from conrad.nl, and get to the final page (long list usually), they add TONS of things I did not order, but with the little box unticked that activates it. It is extremely annoying as the lists become very hard to read. I could imagine somebody in a buying department to be fooled easily, For example if I order battery clips, then they may add all sort of batteries to the checklist. Probably the idea is that you then think "Oh yes I need batteries too". Usually I use a spreadsheet, and cross checking their lists is a pain.

Is it legal? I dunno.

That is a shocker. Some companies are really nasty about returned software since they assume you hacked it.

It just takes one clown to make a company look bad. I never had a problem with Digikey, but I don't make a lot of orders.

As a rule of thumb, if you are designing a chip and it takes components not available from Digikey, you think about it. Digikey is that important to small companies that you try to work within their eco system.

I don't know this for a fact, but I have been told that some small chip companies will pay Digikey to handle their parts, just to get the exposure. It is kind of like paying extra to put your potato chips on the edge of the shopping isle.

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