ExtraEssay.net Overview: Do Non-Existent Ratings Constitute an Actual Problem?
Based on 24 reviews on SiteJabber, Extra Essay has a rating of 3.3 out of 5 stars. While the majority of customers are satisfied, negative reviews are worth the attention of prospective users because they focus on the low quality of papers. Extra Essay ranks 59th among the best academic writing platforms.
Given the overwhelming number of positive comments, we could’ve simply agreed with them. However, upon entering Extra Essay’s website, we noticed that the service proudly claims to have a 4.8 rating on Trustpilot. Upon checking Trustpilot, we couldn’t find the company listed there. Needless to say, that piqued our interest, and we started our investigation to present you with this Extra Essay review.
We found no reviews on Trustpilot, so we checked other review aggregation sites. We learned that Extra Essay had a great customer support team but poor-quality papers there. There were complaints that the writers often asked to extend the deadline, even if clients opted for the maximum one. Finally, there were claims that the service hijacked links on someone’s YouTube channel, whatever that means.
Is the 10/10 Customer Return Rate Far-Fetched?
When you enter the Extra Essay’s website, everything seems absolutely okay until you start noticing inconsistencies. For example, scroll to the middle bar of the home page, and you will see that Extra Essay has completed over 500 orders. Given that the service is rather new, it seems like a more reliable number of completed orders than most academic writing platforms claim...
Yet, when you scroll to the bottom, you see that the service’s writers crafted over 603,715 assignments. Are we talking about the number of assignments that they’ve written throughout their careers before working for the service?
Such inconsistencies may beg the question: is Extra Essay legit? The short answer to this question would be “yes.” But you definitely have to think twice before you decide to order from the service. Having 250 writers and more than 500 completed orders is possible. Yet, the claim that Extra Essay has a 10/10 customer return rate is far-fetched. Negative comments from past customers prove that.
As for our experience with the service, there were some things we liked and some things we disliked. Are we going to use it again? You’ll understand after reading the next sections.
When Non-Recycling Ethos Doesn’t Yield Great Results
You can find a lot of information on Extra Essay’s website regarding their claimed approach to work. One of the things we like about them is their promise of a non-recycling ethos. It means that the end paper will be 100% original.
Great, we thought, as throughout investigating various online essay writing services, we got pretty tired of plagiarized papers. But one thing made us wonder: did they mean “ethics”? Because if we dig into the meaning of the words, the beliefs of the service may not control an individual writer’s approach to work. But, whatever, we decided to test the guaranteed originality.
So, we opted for a more or less original concept. We tasked the writer with an undergraduate essay on the possibility that “the kid” and Judge Holden in Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridian; or, The Evening Redness in the West” novel are the same character. The novel has been frequently called unadaptable, we thought, but surely it won’t be unessayable for the advertised writers with Master’s and Ph.D. degrees in their respective fields.
Simultaneously, we ordered a different, more simple high school essay on the impact of social media on our outlook.
Spoiler alert: one essay left us unimpressed, while another disappointed us greatly.
Our Attempts to Communicate With Customer Support
Going through ExtraEssay reviews, you can find many complimentary comments regarding the customer support team: “Excellent communication,” “great support team,” “quick to respond,” and so on. Something we didn’t experience at all. Even prior to placing an order, we decided to chat with support. And we had no reply at all.
Next time, we tried to contact the support upon placing the order. And we left the chat window open for over an hour, expecting a reply.
After placing the order, we received an email from the customer support team. We pretty much expected that the email would contain an apology or at least an explanation regarding the non-responsive live chat, but no. So, replying to the email, we inquired about that and got a very interesting reply. To get VIP 24/7 live chat support, we needed to pay extra (more on that in the pricing section).
We asked whether it was possible to communicate with regular support via chat, but that question was pretty much ignored.
Writers: Another Point on the Seemingly Endless List of Inconsistencies
It seems that every step you take to explore ExtraEssay’s website leads to new inconsistencies. If you check the “About Us” section, you will find out that the writer’s team consists of native English speakers.
Cool, that explains the relatively small number of writers.
There are only 250 of them because Extra Essay cares for its customers and picks only native English speakers. But this claim pretty much diminishes itself when you are filling in the order form.
While you scroll through the seemingly endless additional features, you can learn that having your essay written by a native English speaker will add 30% to the final price. In other words, “best available” and “advanced” writers may not be native English speakers.
And if you wonder whether you have direct communication with your writer, the answer is no. All the communication goes through customer support.
Weeping Over Prices and Extras… and Some Discounts
When it comes to the per-page price, it’s rather high compared to other services but not budget-wrecking. A high school essay with a maximum deadline of two weeks will cost you $14.25 per page. If you need it in the four-hour frame, you’ll have to pay $27.55 per page.
An undergraduate essay will cost you $17.10-$18.05 per page for a maximum deadline and $29.45 for a minimum deadline. Master’s and PhD papers will cost you $20+ and $33+ for maximum and minimum deadlines, respectively.
Our 7-page undergraduate essay had cost us $353.78 with a maximum deadline of fourteen days. Our high school 4-page essay had cost us $148.20, again with the maximum deadline. In cases like this, extra proofreading goes to the total price. But that’s +30% for a native English speaker writer.
Getting writer’s samples in advance would’ve added $5, VIP support – $9.99. A plagiarism report would’ve added $9.99, and getting a draft of the paper – $30.
Oh, and we forgot to mention that whopping $353.78 and $148.20 are the costs with the 5% discount that we’ve got as new customers. We are so glad that we didn’t need those papers urgently!
At Least Revisions Are Free & Unlimited at ExtraEssay
Surprisingly, despite all the extra cost for additional features and constant inconsistencies of ExtraEssay, revisions are actually free. And did we need them for our “Blood Meridian” essay. Yes, it was original, but the writer forgot to make the point.
In the instructions, we made clear that we needed the writer to find evidence in the book that would support the idea that Judge Holden and “the kid” were the same person. And what did our writer do? The writer claimed there was no possibility that they were the same character.
For those who haven’t read the novel, the theory of these two characters being the same character is not that popular. Moreover, the paper felt extremely rushed, and we had to go through two revisions before we were satisfied with it.
As for the high school-level essay, it was unimpressive, to say the least. Yes, we opted for a generic topic, but it shouldn’t have resulted in a generic essay. No new ideas. No interesting perspective. Just your average essay on how “social media makes our existence in the post-truth era more difficult.” Yes, that is the actual quote from the essay.
Should You Expect Your Essay On Time?
The maximum deadline is always the same — two weeks — for all types of assignments. The minimum deadline varies depending on the complexity of the task. For example, for high school and undergraduate essays (years 1-2), the minimum deadline is four hours. For undergraduate essays (years 3-4), Master’s, and PhD papers, the minimum deadline is eight hours.
But should you expect your essay to be ready on time?
Our high school essay arrived on time; actually, it was submitted to us one day before the deadline. As for our “Blood Meridian” essay, one day before the deadline, we received an email with the request for a one-day extension. We guess that the writer did nothing with our order for two weeks and then wrote it on the last day, hence the hasty vibe of the paper.
Judging from our experience, as well as the comments of past users, you can expect timely delivery when it comes to simple essays. But when it comes to more complex tasks, expect delays.
Are ExtraEssay’s Papers Plagiarism-Free?
Going through user reviews, we found some complaints about the papers containing significant amounts of plagiarized material. So, upon receiving our orders, we ran them through several plagiarism checkers and AI content detectors.
This time, our undergraduate essay fared better. Depending on the checker, it was between 93% and 97% original, and no AI-generated content was detected. The high school essay also had no AI-generated content but contained only 73%- 75% original material.
So, on the one hand, we have a highly original essay, and the writer misinterpreted our instructions. On the other hand, we have an essay that is as generic as its topic but contains 25% plagiarized content.
We requested a refund, and that is one of the claims by which ExtraEssay truly stands. You can get the full amount back by requesting a refund within five days after order completion.
Analyzing the Pros and Cons
So, our ExtraEssay review comes to an end. You can expect timely delivery of a simple essay. With more complex tasks, expect a request to extend the deadline.
The quality of the papers is subpar at best. All additional services come at an extra price. And even the per-page price is higher than most services offer. At least you can get a refund.
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