your good (or not so good) customer service interactions of late

[jayhawk]

I ripped a hole in the seat of some Sitka pants awhile back (darn barbwire). They were out of warranty, but they patched them up free of charge and sent a hat with the repaired pants! Gotta love that.

 

[Customweld]

Cameraland is great. I called to get a tripod and head recommendation. I thought I had unrealistic requirements, but they put together a setup that I use for mountain hunting as well as almost daily at work. If I recall correctly they lined up a bunch of rebates for me and even had the rebate forms printed in the box with my stuff when it arrived.
I made a completely blind tripod decision based off the recommendation of some guy in NY. After a year and a half of hard mountain use I'm still stoked every time I use this tripod setup, and it's costs me less than a dollar a day at this point.

The Last Stand is a company out of Boise that makes pretty innovative target hangers that are great for field practice. I learned about them from this forum. I recently bought a big setup from them locally and they were great to work with. They gave me a discount for a small blemish on an AR500 plate. Which is funny, given I was fully planning on, you know, shooting it.

I've had to use the Vortex warranty a lot. I wouldn't buy a rifle scope or alpha glass from them, but it is nice to be able to have a pair of cheap binos I can hand over to an eight year old without worrying about consequences beyond paying shipping.

I order all of my glass from Doug or Joel. For a couple of guys from NYC, they are alright! I’ve called them with questions about bingos, scopes and cameras and they are always helpful and will usually cut you a great deal.

 

[Brownrice]

My 55” LG tv stopped working. There was no tech within 100 miles. LG sent us a check for the full price of the tv after FaceTiming diagnosed failed, can’t complain about that.

 

[BurtMacklin]

I bought a Exo mountain gear pack last year. I realized that some of the plastic clips were missing and reached out to them. I received a shipping notification quickly and had the missing clips in my mailbox within a few days.

 

[Banded_spooney]

Cameraland is great. I called to get a tripod and head recommendation. I thought I had unrealistic requirements, but they put together a setup that I use for mountain hunting as well as almost daily at work. If I recall correctly they lined up a bunch of rebates for me and even had the rebate forms printed in the box with my stuff when it arrived.
I made a completely blind tripod decision based off the recommendation of some guy in NY. After a year and a half of hard mountain use I'm still stoked every time I use this tripod setup, and it's costs me less than a dollar a day at this point.

The Last Stand is a company out of Boise that makes pretty innovative target hangers that are great for field practice. I learned about them from this forum. I recently bought a big setup from them locally and they were great to work with. They gave me a discount for a small blemish on an AR500 plate. Which is funny, given I was fully planning on, you know, shooting it.

I've had to use the Vortex warranty a lot. I wouldn't buy a rifle scope or alpha glass from them, but it is nice to be able to have a pair of cheap binos I can hand over to an eight year old without worrying about consequences beyond paying shipping.

I did the same with my tri pod and head, got them as recommendations from cameraland. Been very happy with performance. The plate release knob sheared off on a hunt a few days ago. Hard use but not abuse. I was able to use a leather man to change from binos to spotter but it was a pain. I’ll call them Monday and see if they have parts for it. Will report back on my experience. Likely something I’ll have to talk to the manufacturer about though.

 

[tony]

Amazon - Studying for my general HAM license, bought a particular study guide and thumbed through a few pages and didn't care for it started a return, Amazon said keep it. I actually feel guilty about it.

LL Bean - years back I bought a backpack and put it in a gear bin. I found it about a year later, still brand new. On a chance I called LL about maybe just a credit, as they didn't list it anymore. CS person I spoke with not on refunded the money, they sent a label for free. She said they would just put it in the outlet store

Eddie Bauer - is pretty much LT warranty on everything

Wal Mart - their outdoor line of products, I bought one of the pelican knock off dry boxes and the lid latch broke. I called the CS and they said email a pic. I did and had a new box in a week.

Not so good
Grey Ghost Gear - ordered a range bag, they took the money and never sent my bag. No returns to my emails or phone calls. Did a charge back with my credit union. About a week later I get an email.
"hey anyone ever contact you? That color you want is out of stock." I got my money in a day and never answered them. They also have never responded back.

Apple - I just bought the newest gen iPad pro. I sent my old one in for a credit. Received an email stating it was bent. I baby my electronics and my ipads are always in some sort of hard case. $20.00 instead of $105.00. To be fair I need to call them Monday and see what I can find out.

Gear America - they sell off road recovery items mostly made in china to their "specifications". I bought a shackle recovery point that slides into the trailer hitch, more for the "cool factor". One thing they have is this lock that keeps the shackle from being stolen. Well, some how my lock got loose and fell out. I contacted them about getting just the little lock cap and was honest, said I'm not sure if this would be part of the LT warranty or not? I lost the lock.
Nope, made me buy the whole pin that holds the shackle in place. Seriously, I just bought it from them in Feburay, and you can just sell me the cap?

 

[thinhorn_AK]

Bad:

Silencer shop/usps

I ordered a thread protector like 18 days ago. According to the shipping, it’s moved about 15 miles From silencer shop so far.

 

[DakotaBPNW]

Not so good- Sitka: had a core lightweight hoody arrive and it already had a bunch of pulls/runs in the sleeves. I wore it one day under a jacket and then sent them a picture explaining that it arrived like that. While I understand it’s going to be delicate, I’d prefer to not have those issues on something that’s never been worn. They basically told me to kick rocks

 

[thinhorn_AK]

Shaen rifles A+++

 

[SteveAndTheCrigBoys]

Shoutout to Fix-It-Sticks. Had the magnet in the long end of my t-handle come loose. Couldn't get it out because it wedged itself in the pretty good. Contacted them and they sent me a new t-handle real quick. Love that kit with the 65 in-lb torque driver, handy at home and it goes in the truck anytime my guns come with.

Shoutout to Phelps game calls as well. I trimmed the reed down too much in my PD-1 duck call and posted on another forum about where I could get some new reeds. Jason responded there and told me to email them. Same day response from the C/S team and they're sending a few (edit: also same day) free of charge. Top notch stuff!

 

[UtahJimmy]

Outdoor Vision Gear! @GPATTI stands behind his products!

Sent from my Pixel 6 using Tapatalk

 

[thinhorn_AK]

Kinda outta their hands once it ships isn't it?

That’s why I mentioned usps.

 

[NMframed]

Had been using my Athlon Cronus 20-60x86 for a couple years now and had been very happy with it. Used it on a Barbary sheep hunt in October and was perfect as always. Following weekend I pulled it out of my pack to look at some deer for a client and it was rattling and could see a tube shape moving around inside and no visibility through the scope(luckily the client had a spotter too). Called Athlon and was told that they had discontinued that model and the Gen2 wouldn’t be out until next year. They said they could either give me the Ares model which is the next step down or give me store credit. I told them I wasn’t interested in either option unless they wanted to send me the Ares until the Cronus Gen2 came out and then do an exchange. Customer service put me on hold to talk to management then got back on the phone and told me they had some Cronus Gen2’s available and that if I’d send mine back to them they’d replace it with the Gen2. Sent mine in and about a week and a half later had a brand new Cronus Gen2 20-60x86. Overall positive experience with Athlon Optics

 

[lifeisgoodsteve]

Had a pretty darn cool experience when I called Schnees to ask some questions on their pac boots. The receptionist passed me off to a guy who was very helpful. He took the time to answer my questions and knew what he was talking about, which is rare and much appreciated nowadays.

Admit that when I was in the area and visited the actual shop the salesperson was also super helpful and knowledgable.

At the end of the call the guy casually said his name is Curt and is the President of the company. Was very cool to see a President actually answering calls and talking to customers.

 

[mtnbiker208]

just a general observation

Remote work customer services suck for customers.

 

[ODB]

.

At the end of the call the guy casually said his name is Curt and is the President of the company. Was very cool to see a President actually answering calls and talking to customers.

That’s very cool…and I would suspect rare. Even knowledgeable sales people are hard to find these days.

I will say I was very disappointed in Apple support regarding one of my Macs. It’s a couple years old and from day one was absolutely dog slow. I mean 15 minutes to boot. Pathetic. I called them and did everything they suggested. Nothing ever worked.

Then I read across a random page referencing the same issue. Apparently the 1 TB 5400 RPM Fusion Drive was the culprit. It simply could not keep up with the OS. The suggestion was to hang an SSD off the USB-c port and use it as the boot drive instead of the internal drive. It was a Festivus Miracle. The machine is literally 20-30 times faster than before.

Apple should have recalled the machine or provided an SSD to those of us who got crap machines.

 

[TX_Diver]

I had a similar experience with one of there Xlite pads. It developed a small leak that I couldn’t find, so I contacted them to see if I could send it in to get repaired, and they just said don’t bother, and sent me a new one.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

How are you getting ahold of them? I went through the warranty claim form on the website and it said it'd be up to a 12 week turnaround time. I haven't even mailed it in yet!

I've had great service from gohunt recently on some large orders and answering questions. Easy to get a real person on the phone or to reply to an e-mail.

 

[switchback7]

Ordered some food from black ovis and when it came in one meal was missing even though it showed on the ticket with the package. Couple emails and they had the missing meal on the way. Could have easily and understandably fought me on it but they didn’t.

Big thumbs up to black ovis customer service.

Sent an old pair of leupold binoculars in to fix a cracked eye cup and had a brand new pair of the current equivalent model within a couple of weeks.

Big thumbs up to leupold customer service.

Years ago I sent some bent broadheads to Magnus to test their warranty…had brand new heads in the mail and I think a personal email from mike to boot.

Big thumbs up to Magnus customer service.

yep, another +1 for Mike and Magnus!

 

[matpc1]

Had a recent great experience with leupold when they not just replaced, but upgraded a pair of binos for me.

Horrible experiences lately with cabelas - horrible! Already twice that I ordered something for store pickup and my order never came in. Went I to the store and the product I ordered was on the shelf... Both times. Both times Cabelas would not let me take them and told me I had to wait for my order to arrive

 

[ewade07]

Had a recent great experience with leupold when they not just replaced, but upgraded a pair of binos for me.

Horrible experiences lately with cabelas - horrible! Already twice that I ordered something for store pickup and my order never came in. Went I to the store and the product I ordered was on the shelf... Both times. Both times Cabelas would not let me take them and told me I had to wait for my order to arrive

Cabelas blows. Ordered some powder to be delivered to the store 2 weeks ago, still not in.