Main > Reviews

turnarcades and ultimarc review

<< < (2/5) > >>

UKShark:
Currently stripping down the cab to start again.

Ill post some pics once the Plexiglas, bezel, the paintwork and the monitor are replaced (Monitor looks like late august....maybe).

Steve

Turnarcades:
As a vendor rather than a hobbyist in this instance, I've refrained from commenting online until now but as I've always maintained, I am primarily an enthusiast so thought I would just add my only comment now and not shy away from this complaint.

Rather than be drawn into an argument over the timescales, events and what was said (or omitted), I feel it right to share with my fellow BYOAC members that I did agree with the customer on several points but at the same time stand by many of my comments regarding our other work and normal procedures. A fact of being a vendor (particularly in a niche field like this) is that a) not everyone will be a happy customer, and b) occasionally problems will arise that may or may not be your fault. Unfortunately it tends to be those ones that people remember so in this instance I have conceded somewhat as I do believe we were at fault in some respects and have now offered nearly £200 worth of help to the customer (which incidentally is more than the profit margin on this particular build) so hopefully this demonstrates to members who had former respect for me/us that we remain committed to our work and customers.

For those who were wondering, here is a picture of the cabinet in question to get an overall impression of the cabinet as it was at completion, which is consistent with the overall results of our other cabinets (if not the attention to finer points that were highlighted in this case):



This is the only place I will be posting this picture/comment as this is the only online community I have been an ongoing active part of, and hence where I feel I owe my input to fellow friends and previous supporters of our work. I have extended my apologies personally to this customer for his negative experience with us and hope the help we have offered will help bring the cabinet up to the standard he expected, so he gets maximum enjoyment from it as we all do with our own personal machines. Thanks to all our previous customers for their positive input on their experiences with us and supportive messages I received from BYOAC forum members.

Ginsu Victim:
Nice post, Craig. I've never questioned your service. If you were local to me, I'd do business with you.

Cheers.  :cheers:

Epyx:

--- Quote ---Nice post, Craig.
--- End quote ---

Always two sides to every transaction and if the cabinet you sent out looked as it did in the picture then it was certainly as advertised (minus the issues you admitted).  I think if a vendor is willing to work with you through issues as you appear to be doing then you are dealing with a vendor who cares.

Turnarcades:
It's been a while in coming but as this incident has now finally reached conclusion I now feel I need to set the record straight about this, as a few customers have asked me about this and as I've now had chance to review all my records of the incident and the online comments. Some of this conclusion is based on assumption but for any members or potential customers who come across this I'd like to now give my feelings on the subject as I believe the truth was intentionally bent from the start.

Basically, when the customer approached us it was explained that he was on a budget and as much as we try to flex you all know the material cost of a build is high and we do not buy in bulk. The basic shell he paid for was only £450; the reason it amounted to just under £900 was because of the sheer number of extras like the trackball, acrylic overlay,  lights, coin door and (currently hard to come by) 21" CRT monitor. At several stages after payment was made the customer requested late additions and already admitted they were 'over budget'. Straight away this rings alarm bells as this strategy has been used before by many attempting to get discounts and free late additions. It says on his blogs that it was a cabinet for his sister but there was no mention of this to me.

The big thing that concerns me was the comments on my apparent lack of communication; this is something I pride myself on and many previous customers can vouch for my excellent e-mail communication. Much of what was said was omitted from the online posts made and any delay was only a few days due to us breaking up for the Summer, which all customers are made aware of by our schedule. I actually experienced longer delays for replies but never complained about it. Another point to mention is that the online attacks and forum posts were all posted when he knew we would be on our break and when I was on holiday, so I would be unable to defend our work.

The big thing though is that although the customer reported problems, we did offer to help from the very start and actually gave benefit of the doubt as we had no evidence of supposed damage. It was reported that the acrylics were damaged, certain fixtures were inadequate, that controls were not working, the monitor was unusable and paintwork was seriously inadequate. As mentioned in my last post, I offered several times with replacement parts but they were either ignored or refused, every time asking for 'some money back' to set things right or 'to reflect the quality it actually is'. When I quoted the terms and conditions, it was only to re-iterate the statutory conditions all consumers should check and all customers have to check our terms before purchase. It sounds harsh, but the fact is that all custom items (not just our cabinets) are subject to different laws as by their very nature, the results are unexpected and they are not returnable as they cannot be re-sold at the same value.

It was after my first offers of replacement parts that the online attack started and the repeat message seemed to just be aimed at getting money back. He would have found that custom items are not covered under paypal policy, so when I refused to give money back he threatened a chargeback and with a delayed reply explained he'd already taken steps to do it, even after the £200 of help I offered as mentioned in my last post. I had read about chargebacks and for those that don't know, it is the one major pain all online sellers face as in some circumstances, banks can reverse payment without an item being returned so the person gets the item for free and their money back, leaving the seller seriously out of pocket and unfortunately certain people have made a hobby of abusing this system. Thankfully, I have taken several steps to protect against this type of fraud so we would not be caught out, so I explained that if he were to do this I would have to have the cabinet back (which his bank confirmed) and that as we had met our obligations to offer replacements, he would lose and the chargeback would be reversed, leaving him out of pocket and without a machine.

Finally, not wanting to put him out of pocket (although by now I could have), I offered to buy back the machine at a cost reflecting how he'd honoured 'duty of care' whilst he had it. He accepted, I sent him the full cabinet amount (which again suspiciously went to a different Paypal account they requested), and here's the funny thing: THE CABINET HAS ARRIVED BACK WITH NO FLAWS, THE ACRYLIC IS NOT SCRATCHED OR BROKEN, THE CONTROLS ALL WORK, THE MONITOR IS ABSOLUTELY FINE AND THERE IS NO EVIDENCE OF ANY PAINTWORK PATCHES MISSED OR OF ANY RE-PAINTING DONE AS WAS CLAIMED. After all this it came back pretty much exactly as it went out except for a pilot hole for a power cable at the rear, can you bloody well believe it? We've now put the finishing touches on the machine and the proof is indeed in the pudding as the videos below show:



Can you see any flaws? No, me neither.

My conclusion of this whole experience is that there was an intention at some point to try and get one of our hard-worked products for cheap or even free, and that an online attack would force a response. It is also possible it was a potential competitor attempt to rubbish our work. Either way, they have not obtained a free cabinet and have had to foot delivery costs and all this effort for nothing. We are a small operation but I've checked my rights as it's essential when you're protecting a business with little financial backup. Then again, it could just be someone whose expectations were too high (not knowing what goes into a hand-built cabinet), overspent and realised too late, or just found it was too much effort to finish off themselves, but I won't ever know for sure. My only regret is that this build filled a slot on our limited schedule that another excited customer on our waiting list could have had, and could be playing their machine right now.

Thankfully members of the community and previous customers did jump to our defence and our long-term reputation has helped us. Our expansion is continuing as a result and the fully-completed machine is now up for sale at a reduced price with no waiting time, so some lucky customer will soon be playing on a bargain Turnarcades machine!

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page