BarnSour
New Member
- Location
- San Joaquin Valley, Kalifornistan
Recently I purchased a new toilet for our motorhome. The original was plastic and hard to keep clean. I bought a new porcelain one online, but the purchase did not go well. In hindsight, it was a true comedy of errors, but at the time, not so funny.
To save a lot of time and detail, I will just paste my letter to the original online store, and delete their name as I'm sure my experience was not usual for them. I finally bought from another supplier, and wound up with two toilets, one free due to the seller's endless mistakes. Enjoy a chuckle or two:
I request that this note be read by and responded to by an owner or manager of the business:
...and the circus continues regarding my simple order of a toilet way back on July 27. Let me review for you:
July 27: You received my order.
July 31: I received a notice that my order had achieved "In Progress" status - whatever that was supposed to mean.
So I emailed asking if it had been shipped and my inquiry was ignored.
Aug 3: I emailed again, asking for the minimal courtesy of a reply to my email of July 31.
Later on Aug 3 I received an automated notice that my order was updated to status of "Packaging Warehouse D" whatever the heck that was supposed to mean. Still, there was no response to my two inquiries.
So I called and talked to Wes in customer service. After an argumentative and sarcastic conversation about not having been shipped after a week of waiting, I received an email from him with a very kind apology. He stated that he discovered that the order was back ordered and that no one let me know, which he was wrong and not how things are "normally handled" at ------. I would discover that everything having to do with my order would be done wrong.
Also on Aug 3 I emailed back, accepting his apology and asking to complete the order. I asked that he keep me posted on the re-order and any delays.
Aug 4: I received an email acknowledging the re-order and a copy of an email sent to Dometic asking to ship that day, and a copy of Dometic's email stating that it would ship that day.
Aug 7: I emailed Wes asking for a tracking number or at least a delivery date. I received a tracking number that showed it was shipped. I tracked the shipment and discovered that the shipment had been received. I emailed Wes and advised that something was wrong, again, as I had not received it.
I received a reply from Wes stating that the order was shipped in error to some store in Texas and was received there. Wes also volunteered to cancel the order and refund my credit charge. He tried calling but we did not answer. By the time I got the email offering the refund you were closed. I replied by email that would be best and gave up.
Later that same day I ordered the same toilet from (another online store) in Arizona.
Aug 12: I received TWO toilets via UPS; one from (another firm) and one from (first order). Now... how could that happen?! Is there no end to the mistakes made by (deleted store name) and its suppliers?
I refused your shipment and UPS returned it to you.
I also note that besides my dispute of your charge, and the resulting reversal of your charge by my credit card company, that (first store) also reversed the credit card charge. So... I am presently credited $176.80 by you as well as having the original charge reversed. As if that wasn't bad enough, you or your supplier still sent the toilet! Essentially you folks have paid me $176.80 to accept a free toilet. There is not much of a future for you doing business in this manner.
I am truly amazed at how badly this honest attempt at doing business with you folks has unfolded. I have ordered online for many years and have experienced nothing that would remotely compare.
Their reply:
Hello Dale, than you for the email. I am kind of up to date on what is going on here. I want to assure you, this is not the way things usually happen around here. We have been in business for many many years, and have tens of thousands of satisfied customers all over the USA and Canada. Once in a while, we get an order where things seem to go wrong, and it is sometimes on some of those orders, everything seems to go wrong, this does happen to be one of those cases. We have Dometic drop ship all of our toilets, because they are so fragile. We used to ship them all from Texas, and a lot of them were winding up in pieces by the time they got to the customer. Now, we have Dometic drop ship all of them for us, they ship from a closer warehouse, and when we have Dometic ship them, we are kind of at their mercy. They are supposed to tell us when they are on back order, but sometimes this just does not happen. We do have someone making sure these orders are kept up with, but the week that happened we were short handed, and that is also why you received the delayed reply, and I am really sorry for that. When Dometic did ship the item, it was to be shipped to you, but as you know, they shipped it to us instead, for reasons unknown, I looked at the PO we sent to them, and it clearly stated it was to be drop shipped to you. I really am sorry for all the inconvenience this has caused you. I also see we refunded you, we wanted to do this to make you happy, as I imagine you had lost all confidence in us by this time. I also have seen the chargeback notification from our credit card company. Please advise how you would like to proceed.
(I had my credit card company reverse their credit.)
Amazing, eh?
-Dale
To save a lot of time and detail, I will just paste my letter to the original online store, and delete their name as I'm sure my experience was not usual for them. I finally bought from another supplier, and wound up with two toilets, one free due to the seller's endless mistakes. Enjoy a chuckle or two:
I request that this note be read by and responded to by an owner or manager of the business:
...and the circus continues regarding my simple order of a toilet way back on July 27. Let me review for you:
July 27: You received my order.
July 31: I received a notice that my order had achieved "In Progress" status - whatever that was supposed to mean.
So I emailed asking if it had been shipped and my inquiry was ignored.
Aug 3: I emailed again, asking for the minimal courtesy of a reply to my email of July 31.
Later on Aug 3 I received an automated notice that my order was updated to status of "Packaging Warehouse D" whatever the heck that was supposed to mean. Still, there was no response to my two inquiries.
So I called and talked to Wes in customer service. After an argumentative and sarcastic conversation about not having been shipped after a week of waiting, I received an email from him with a very kind apology. He stated that he discovered that the order was back ordered and that no one let me know, which he was wrong and not how things are "normally handled" at ------. I would discover that everything having to do with my order would be done wrong.
Also on Aug 3 I emailed back, accepting his apology and asking to complete the order. I asked that he keep me posted on the re-order and any delays.
Aug 4: I received an email acknowledging the re-order and a copy of an email sent to Dometic asking to ship that day, and a copy of Dometic's email stating that it would ship that day.
Aug 7: I emailed Wes asking for a tracking number or at least a delivery date. I received a tracking number that showed it was shipped. I tracked the shipment and discovered that the shipment had been received. I emailed Wes and advised that something was wrong, again, as I had not received it.
I received a reply from Wes stating that the order was shipped in error to some store in Texas and was received there. Wes also volunteered to cancel the order and refund my credit charge. He tried calling but we did not answer. By the time I got the email offering the refund you were closed. I replied by email that would be best and gave up.
Later that same day I ordered the same toilet from (another online store) in Arizona.
Aug 12: I received TWO toilets via UPS; one from (another firm) and one from (first order). Now... how could that happen?! Is there no end to the mistakes made by (deleted store name) and its suppliers?
I refused your shipment and UPS returned it to you.
I also note that besides my dispute of your charge, and the resulting reversal of your charge by my credit card company, that (first store) also reversed the credit card charge. So... I am presently credited $176.80 by you as well as having the original charge reversed. As if that wasn't bad enough, you or your supplier still sent the toilet! Essentially you folks have paid me $176.80 to accept a free toilet. There is not much of a future for you doing business in this manner.
I am truly amazed at how badly this honest attempt at doing business with you folks has unfolded. I have ordered online for many years and have experienced nothing that would remotely compare.
Their reply:
Hello Dale, than you for the email. I am kind of up to date on what is going on here. I want to assure you, this is not the way things usually happen around here. We have been in business for many many years, and have tens of thousands of satisfied customers all over the USA and Canada. Once in a while, we get an order where things seem to go wrong, and it is sometimes on some of those orders, everything seems to go wrong, this does happen to be one of those cases. We have Dometic drop ship all of our toilets, because they are so fragile. We used to ship them all from Texas, and a lot of them were winding up in pieces by the time they got to the customer. Now, we have Dometic drop ship all of them for us, they ship from a closer warehouse, and when we have Dometic ship them, we are kind of at their mercy. They are supposed to tell us when they are on back order, but sometimes this just does not happen. We do have someone making sure these orders are kept up with, but the week that happened we were short handed, and that is also why you received the delayed reply, and I am really sorry for that. When Dometic did ship the item, it was to be shipped to you, but as you know, they shipped it to us instead, for reasons unknown, I looked at the PO we sent to them, and it clearly stated it was to be drop shipped to you. I really am sorry for all the inconvenience this has caused you. I also see we refunded you, we wanted to do this to make you happy, as I imagine you had lost all confidence in us by this time. I also have seen the chargeback notification from our credit card company. Please advise how you would like to proceed.
(I had my credit card company reverse their credit.)
Amazing, eh?
-Dale
We've had Dometic refrigerators in our campers, but luckily have never had to order a replacement. We have a cassette toilet in our pop up truck camper, not sure of the brand, but I hope it never breaks. You sound like a very patient man.