American has questions about DV247 Music

[acid bass]

Hello from the USA!

 

Getting straight to the point, I'm interested in grabbing a Sandberg Forty Eight 5-string bass. These are turning out to be incredibly difficult to find, especially over here. There are a couple of Victor Brandts available, but I don't like the P/J config so much. While scouring the internet for one of these I came across a couple of options, one of which is DV247 music. I've never heard of this place, but researching this forum and other places it seems legitimate enough. I'm a bit torn on how to interpret the reviews though. There's a lot of negative reviews, especially about their responsiveness and lack of customer service.

 

A bunch of negative reviews isn't a problem in itself, the same thing happens to Guitar Center. It's a big box store that does a lot of business; they get a lot right and a little wrong, but the most vocal people on the internet are the people who got wronged. I've dealt with them a lot and they're fine. Not perfect, but fine. Curious whether DV247 falls into this category as well or if there's really a more systemic problem that isn't worth dealing with. Every thread complaining about them has at least a couple people saying they've ordered a ton of stuff and had no problems. That's basically the same as any Guitar Center rant I've seen. My only other options now are to keep waiting or try ordering from another UK seller on Reverb with only 1 review (good review, but still only 1).

 

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Bunion]

Apologies I’ve never dealt with them, just thought I’d say it’s gone midnight over here so you may not get to many answers until tomorrow. 
I’m sure someone will be along though to answer this 

and welcome 

[hiram.k.hackenbacker]

Personally, I've not has an issue with them, although as you say, I'm sure there will be someone along soon enough to state the opposite.

The biggest purchase I've made from them was a £2-2.5k bass which although advertised on their site, was not in the UK.

I discovered this through a phone call with one of their online agents. They offered to get it shipped over from Germany so that I could look it over at a local store, which I did.

It was a great bass which I paid for there and then and took home with me.

Obviously you're not going to be able to that, but I can only speak from my experience which was positive. 

I've bought a lot of other stuff from them, but no where near as expensive, all without issue.

Hope it works out for you.

[tegs07]

Welcome aboard. I’ve bought via DV247 before. Fairly low cost item (Schaller MM Machine heads). I had no problems. Usual fairly impersonal internet transaction. Click, pay, email confirmation, stuff is delivered.

Its certainly a legit company.
As with a lot of companies these days though you can only really find out how good are bad they are when things go wrong. If there is no way of getting hold of a human with the wit, will and ability to sort out the issue at hand the low cost element and slick UI all become window dressing hiding the rot! Someone may post with a horror story or outright praise but my transaction was smooth.

[Maude]

Yes I've bought from DV247 too. Can't remember what now, I think it was my doublebass bag, and other small bits over the years. 

I've never had any issues though so couldn't say how they handle things when they go wrong. 

 

I seem to recall a recent(ish) thread on here about some folks having problems with them, I could be wrong though. 

I'll have a search. 

🙂👍

[Maude]

He you go. 

I haven't read it all but it might give you the info you're after. 

 

 

[Tokalo]

I’ve bought a G&L Tribute Kiloton, a Guild Starfire I and some Thomastik flats over the past 5 years, all with no issues (shipped from Germany to my address in England).

[Aidan63]

I bought a couple of basses from them in the past, 6 years ago, just like Thomann at the time, no issues at all. Don't forget that some of the problems reported recently are possibly linked to both the UK brexit effect in trade with europe and also the pandemic which has effected many companies, and the courier companies for example have taken the opportunity to change how they do customer service and accelerated the introduction of more mechanical handling and AI and other electronic transactions and done away with the humans who could deal with the 0.01% of things not going exactly to plan. Retailers have done the same too.

Ring them up if you can and try and get a point of contact for your purchase, for a big ticket item you should be able to get decent service and backing from Sandberg in the US, maybe worth talking to the US distributor too if you can.

[yorks5stringer]

Just be aware  if you have a warranty claim, the US Sandberg Distributor ( and I have no precedent with Sandberg) may say you have to sort it out with the retailer which will mean returning it to DV247 in Germany/UK. I bought my first Markbass rig from a German retailer years ago and when I had a warranty claim I had to return it to Germany as the UK distributor would not (understandably) entertain me!  I'd definitely check with Sandberg distribution in the US as to where you would stand if there is an issue before buying from DV247.....!

Edited April 7, 2022 by yorks5stringer

[joeystrange]

I’ve bought a few things from them over the last few years with no problems. 
 

I recently bought a pedalboard which they tried to deliver whilst I was out. Didn’t leave a card or anything so I didn’t know they’d been until I check the tracking the next day. All that said was that it had been delivered to a loc Post Office, which wasn’t especially helpful.

 

Of course this is a courier issue but, as I didn’t know who the courier was (tracking site was an unbranded German thing), I contacted DV247 who looked at the info and told me exactly where it was to go and pick up.

[Bassassin]

They are - or at least were - very much the same sort of deal as Thomann was, pre-Brexit at least. I've not used either since the UK undertook its noble journey towards third-world status, but I have previously bought a guitar from DV247. Excellent, fast service and the instrument arrived in perfect condition with a good, perfectly playable setup straight out of the box.

 

I'd happily use them again, if they offered the best deal on something I was after.

 

[Phil Starr]

As the OP of the 'more problems' thread I'll try and save you the bother of reading it all.

 

This was at the beginning of our self-inflicted departure from the EU trading area arrangements. I ordered a number of parts from DV247 in three separate orders. There were problems with all three separate orders but i did eventually get what I ordered (more or less anyway).  I think it's fair to say that Brexit played it's part, their customer service has always been poor and there was an earlier thread about this hence the 'more problems'.

 

I took the attitude at first that the big box centres are bound to have more complaints even if statistically the proportion of mistakes was the same as a local store. I'd just been unlucky. However they repeatedly lied to me and made promises they broke. It became apparent that their tracking systems were almost non-functional and their staff demoralised. The honest ones were pretty honest.

 

My experience was that delivery could be great but if anything went wrong there was no system in place for correcting it. the UK base was helpful but powerless to affect any German response if the computer said no.

 

It may all be fixed now as the immediate pressure of Brexit has diminished but my belief is that there was an underlying management issue with their staff and customers being kept in the dark and fed horse manure. If there is an issue between the UK and the parent company I suspect there may be the same lack of care between the USA and the parent. I have no evidence of this but personally would be careful. Dealing with warranty issues may be problematic.

[Bassfinger]

I've used them a few times, never had an issue before, during or after the B word (which seems to have passed me by entirely).  I'd use them again if Thomann don't have what i'm after.

[Yango]

You may have already considered this, but import taxes, duties and brokerage fees. There’s also the shipping to think about too. 

These often overlooked fees can be as much as the instrument you’re importing. 

 

I have been burned a few times buying from the USA (I once ordered a pedal from Chicago, and paid more in import duties, brokerage fees and shipping than the pedal cost!🔥)

Last year I ordered a motorcycle jacket from Europe—the price was good, and they offered free shipping to me. Perfect. Until I got an email from customs that I owed import duty on it… then when the jacket didn’t fit properly, I contacted the seller about a return and found out that they wouldn’t provide me with a return shipping label—sellers get low rates due to their volume of shipping  (I even offered to pay for it). So the duty and return shipping cost me more than half of what the cost of the jacket was. 
 

Live and learn. I’ll never do that again. 

Edited April 7, 2022 by Yango

[acid bass]

Thanks all for your feedback! Very valuable, especially since I hadn't considered how warranty claims might work. I think the first step will be to reach out to one of the US distributors and have a chat with them.

 

FWIW, I ordered a bass from Thomann several months ago and it was incredibly smooth, easier than some of my domestic transactions. Was hoping it might be the same here, but this bass is quite a bit more money and warrants further investigation.

 

9 hours ago, Phil Starr said:

As the OP of the 'more problems' thread I'll try and save you the bother of reading it all.

 

Too late, I read the whole thing before posting this. 😉 Didn't want to be that guy who posts something that's been asked about a million times. However, your thread is the one that gave me the most pause because it wasn't purely a matter of being unlucky. It felt like there was a systemic problem with the organization; when something went wrong you couldn't contact anyone, when you finally did it was some teen jockeying the retail counter. I can understand a place messing up your order, but not even having staff to answer customer service calls is more alarming. Seems like a lot of things do go right, but if something goes wrong it goes very wrong.

[Phil Starr]

12 hours ago, acid bass said:

FWIW, I ordered a bass from Thomann several months ago and it was incredibly smooth, easier than some of my domestic transactions. Was hoping it might be the same here, but this bass is quite a bit more money and warrants further investigation.

I've found the same with Thomann. they had a short hiatus when Brexit happened but sorted it and are back here. Obviously that was a local problem that wouldn't apply over there.