|
Ah, the love hate relationship I have with the Internet is a prickly one at best. One day it is all poppies and lollipops and the next it is a vicious beast that can rip your heart out and swallow it whole. It can be the answer to your dreams or the launching pad for all of your angst and frustration.
In particular when you are venturing into that vast shopping wasteland that is becoming more and more attractive, especially when you have the luxury of time on your side for the waiting period that customarily accompanies an on line purchase.
The vendors on line really know where to hit us where we live, that being the pocket book. In this day and age of ever-rising costs in every aspect of our day-to-day lives, like gasoline and utilities for example, even those with the deepest pockets are looking to save a buck. Sometimes it is not even the monetary aspect, sometimes it is the fact you can’t find it in any brick and mortar establishments anywhere near you.
So when you start surfing the never ending landscape on the Internet of places to buy and see the rock bottom prices that are available, the temptation to whip out that piece of plastic and place that order can be overwhelming. With Internet stores being open 24/7, you don’t even need to get dressed or get in your car. Getting there is only a mouse click away.
But buyer beware, there can be evil flying monkeys in those forests lurking behind every tree. We think that when we see a pretty and well put together web site, that the company we are dealing with is reputable, smart and there to serve you all the way through your transaction. Sadly, as anyone who has had a bad experience with the lesser beings that inhabit the Internet underworld will tell you, that is not always the case.
Many times you find out from the get go that who you are dealing with is, how should I say, not trustworthy? Not reputable? Idiots? Scum of the earth? Oh what the hell, all of the above. When you spot the red flags, like testimonials from shall we say 175 people or more, warning you that you are about to step into a pit of quicksand, you may want to pause. That is usually a pretty good indication that you should put that credit card back in your wallet and keep surfing.
Other times we are lulled into a false sense of security by what appears on the surface to be good customer service, when in reality it is only their computer talking to your computer. This is all fine and dandy as long as you don’t have a problem, but if one crops up, be prepared. I just got sucked into that false sense of security void and just like Dorothy in the Wizard of OZ, I found out that the man behind the curtain wasn’t what he seemed to be.
Let me set the stage a bit in this cautionary tale. In my patio area I have set it up like it was in my youth, to resemble a sports bar of sorts with games of pool, ping pong, and darts ready to go at all times. The main users of this area have become my 16-year-old son, Alex, and his friends.
They are, as most teenagers are, hard on the equipment. When Alex has what he refers to as “one of his Epic parties”, that being a get together of more than the usual suspects, Montenegro, Ouellette, and Frattasio, I spend the next week repairing the darts, pool table, and pool cues that have become the victims of the good times they have had.
Not having had any luck finding the gaming supplies that I needed at any stores that are even remotely close to me, down the yellow brick Internet road I went. Of course I couldn’t find everything I needed at one spot so I ended up buying them from two different suppliers. One was billed as “The Billiard Superstore” which in reality is a company called “Mercantila.com” the other was a company called Ozone Billiard Supply.
The Billiard Superstore, which from this point forward we will be referring to as Mercantila, did not live up to any of their promises. First, they said that they would be forwarding the tracking number of the carrier they used within 48 hours. When the tracking number didn’t materialize, strike one, I tried e-mailing them numerous times and got no response, so I had to call them.
The person who answered didn’t sound close so I asked him where they were. I was shocked, well not really, to find out they were in India. I asked where my tracking number and order was, and he said he didn’t know. They would have to contact the manufacturer to find out. “Wait a minute”, I said, “your web site said that the items I ordered were in stock and would be shipped out in two days from your warehouse in San Francisco.”
“No Sir”, my Indian contact told me, “We call the manufacturer of the products and they ship them directly to you.” Strike Two! “So where is the manufacturer?” I asked. “Massachusetts” was the response.
Well there goes my two-day UPS shipping time frame, which is the usual amount of time it takes to get a shipment from San Francisco to LA. Strike Three! They told me they would be sending me a tracking number within 24 hours. Yeah I’ll hold my breath waiting for that to happen. Two days later I got this cheery little e-mail telling me that my order had finally shipped.
When I went back to Mercantila’s web site to check on my order, I spotted a link from an outside company that said “Rate This Company”. So I went there and remember me mentioning the 175 complaints about a company? Yep, this was the company.
Obviously Mercantila has pissed off quite a few people and most of their stories were very similar to mine. I wish I had known this from the get go, because I never would have ordered anything from them.
The Ozone was a different slant. They initially responded to me immediately, well their computer did. Quickly followed by a tracking number the next day. Now that is the way it is supposed to work, I thought, and within a couple of more days I had my order. Yes, this is a good company to deal with. They will stay on the list. I then discovered that Ozone carried dart supplies. I guess it was time to place another order.
Again, remember my mentioning being lured into a false sense of security? It’s the proof of that which was coming, because when my second order arrived the curtain was about to be pulled back on my “good” company to expose just who I was dealing with.
The problem was a simple one. One the darts out of the two sets I purchased was threaded improperly. To those unfamiliar with darts, they can be disassembled by unscrewing them and modified to your own personal likes or needs. You can change out the shafts or flights; flights are the things that look like a feather on the end of the dart. I could not do this because of the threading problem.
Sounds pretty simple right? Well it is. Unfortunately this concept was completely lost on the person I was dealing with in the Ozone. After multiple self-explanatory e-mails, the wicked witch of the Ozone, Robyn, requested a verbal audience with me for further explanation. I wondered how more explanation was possible given the length of the e-mails I had sent her. If she couldn’t read, I knew that the conversation would not be pretty.
I wasn’t wrong. Though she steadfastly swore she knew all about darts, it was obvious that she didn’t. She argued with me non-stop and couldn’t grasp the concept that someone would want to put different shafts and flights on a new set of darts. This, even though they had sold me the replacement shafts and flights on the same order. The point she was missing during her idiotic little tirade was that she didn’t need to understand, it was completely irrelevant to the problem.
She was lucky she was 3,000 miles away because had she been in front of me at a store exhibiting this type of rude customer service I would have stuck the darts in her forehead and then poured water over her to watch her melt. OK, scratch Ozone off the list as well. As a matter of fact, after this I really need to reevaluate my Internet buying.
There may be no place like home, I just wish it always had what I needed.
|
