Fender P-Bass s/plate - Problems but no refund from Absolute Guitars in Bristol.

[whimsy23]

Whatever happens, it's shocking customer service. It's a pickguard for f*** sake, and they are only going to lose future custom if that is how they treat customers.

[xilddx]

[quote name='whimsy23' post='631257' date='Oct 20 2009, 12:13 PM']Whatever happens, it's shocking customer service. It's a pickguard for f*** sake, and they are only going to lose future custom if that is how they treat customers.[/quote]
I agree mate.

[b][i]Anyway, here's what I sent back to them ..[/i][/b]

Hello Chris,

The problem with the adhesive was only apparent once the film had been removed. In addition the film was mis-aligned by about 3mm or so when I received it, suggesting it had perhaps been removed and reapplied before, or maybe it was stored next to a heat source sufficient to melt the adhesive, this is more likely as the pickguard was warped. I didn't think much of that at the time as fitting it should alleviate any problems but now this becomes significant. The pickguards I have received in the past have been completely flat.

The issue with fit is serious. There is no indication on the packaging or on your website that the pickguard will not fit a MIJ '62 RI Precision correctly and not properly cover the electronics route. It is not fit for purpose in this regard.

I am deeply disappointed that my first purchase with you has gone so badly. I am not one to complain about minor issues, I simply got on with cleaning it up and fitting it, only then discovering the larger problem. I concur that I should have checked for correct fit first.

Although I doubt you would disagree my situation here is unfair and that I am over £40 out of pocket for no benefit whatsoever, I can see from the tone of your message there is no hope of you acceeding to my request for a refund or exchange. I find your lack of consideration for a new customer misguided. You have guaranteed I will not shop with you again, nor can I now recommend your outlet to other bassists on www.basschat.co.uk (Europe's largest bass guitar forum with over 7,000 members) on which we are currently discussing this.

With kind regards,
Nigel

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

Hang on - you didn't mention earlier that it was warped

I'll take back what I said earlier. As its warped I think that is better cause for returning it than "it don't blummin' fit!" - packaging removed or not. There's a chance that a warped pickguard would have shrunk as well, which in turn could cause it not to fit.

[xilddx]

[quote name='Jean-Luc Pickguard' post='631325' date='Oct 20 2009, 01:52 PM']Hang on - you didn't mention earlier that it was warped

I'll take back what I said earlier. As its warped I think that is better cause for returning it than "it don't blummin' fit!" - packaging removed or not. There's a chance that a warped pickguard would have shrunk as well, which in turn could cause it not to fit.[/quote]

I didn't really think much about that TBH and I forgot about it. I hadn't considered it could shrink

The warpage takes the form of a convex dome. I shall post pics this evening, you'll see what I mean.

[Geek99]

That changes things somewhat

[OldGit]

Good letter.

[xilddx]

[quote name='OldGit' post='631354' date='Oct 20 2009, 02:23 PM']Good letter.[/quote]
Cheers
[b][i]
I have a response ..[/i][/b]

Hi

I’m sorry that you feel this way but I don’t really understand what you expect us to do.

We are always happy to provide advice either by eMail or Phone and would have happily advised on the fit of a USA pick guard to a made in Japan instrument. We can not state on our web site which instruments pick guards will or will not fit as there are simply too many variants, however we are always happy to give advise if asked. At end of the day a USA pick guard is for USA instrument.

Our returns policy does state that to return an item the film most not be removed or if there is a fault that it is returned to us in 7 days. The fact that you have attempted to repair the fault simply means that we cannot do anything with it. I am sorry that you are out of pocket by £40 but if you would have returned it without repairing it we would have been able to have refunded or exchanged it. However under the circumstances we would not be able to re-sell or return it to Fender and would therefore be out of pocket by the same amount. The situation is no different to any other area of retail and you can not expect to return an item after it has been repaired or alter by an unauthorised person.

I would suggest that in future if you are unsure about a product you ask advise before purchasing and never attempt to repair a faulty item, simply return it.

Regards
Chris
Absolute Guitars
---------------------------------------------------------

Here are some pictures of the offending item .. you can see actually it is quite badly warped. God only knows how or why they would want to resell it!

Also, the quality of the cutting on the holes and pickup route is very poorly finished and is burred. It is about 2mm smaller all round than the original too.

[attachment=34827:IMG_1016.jpg][attachment=34828:IMG_1020.jpg][attachment=34829:IMG_1022.jpg]
[attachment=34830:IMG_1028.jpg][attachment=34831:IMG_1029.jpg][attachment=34832:IMG_1032.jpg]
[attachment=34833:IMG_1024.jpg]

Edited October 20, 2009 by silddx

[Musicman20]

Hi Nigel

Im truely disappointed that they didnt just lose their 'cost' on this item and refund you.

I actually think they have sold you a faulty item, and I would contact Fender UK asap. They have an email address on their website.

Make sure you tell them who sold you it for a start, and then say you want something doing about it.

I mean, whats £20-30 for a business compared to 7000 ppl on here never going back to them.

Disgusting.

I am currently in dispute over something at the moment and Im hoping it gets resolved, otherwise I will be doing the same and putting it on here. I dont think its fair for the customer to lose out of faulty goods....EVER!

Cheers

[xilddx]

Thanks Gareth, appreciated.

I am going to contact Fender I think. I can't believe they won't take a part back from a shop just because it's been opened.

The bass looks beautiful with a dark tort PG BTW

Thanks again mate,
N

[alexclaber]

[quote name='silddx' post='631570' date='Oct 20 2009, 05:45 PM']I am sorry that you are out of pocket by £40 but if you would have returned it without repairing it we would have been able to have refunded or exchanged it. However under the circumstances we would not be able to re-sell or return it to Fender and would therefore be out of pocket by the same amount.[/quote]

Well that's not true for starters, unless they're running a unique zero profit margin business model...

Alex

[xilddx]

[quote name='alexclaber' post='631591' date='Oct 20 2009, 05:58 PM']Well that's not true for starters, unless they're running a unique zero profit margin business model...

Alex[/quote]
Exactly Alex. Quite a funny part of his email that

[OldGit]

He's a twit..

[bumnote]

I have two CIJ precisions one fitted with a fender tort us scratchplates, and another fitted with a us aluminium plate, and a Tokai also fitted with an aly plate. While the plates are not interchangable, they were not that difficult to do.

In both cases you will have to drill additional holes, but these will always be hidden under the new plate.

IIRC I removed the 4 screws holding the pick ups so they were free to move.
Remove the pots and socket, and lay the new plate on the body, hopefully you can line the plate up with the neck, I think i had to file a bit off to make sure it fitted the neck. I was able to move the plate around sufficiently that it didnt have the gap shown on your picture.

Dummy fit the pots and jack plug socket and double check that it all lines up.

Once you have the plate in the right place, you can mark and drill new holes to fix the scratchplate.

fill the old screw holes for the pickups with cocktail sticks or matches and pva. Re drill and refix the pickups.

Doesnt help with your argument with the seller but I doubt you will easily find an off the shelf replacement even if they did refund you so are stuck with modding the bass or having a copy made from your existing plate.

Good luck

[xilddx]

[quote name='bumnote' post='631949' date='Oct 20 2009, 11:23 PM']I have two CIJ precisions one fitted with a fender tort us scratchplates, and another fitted with a us aluminium plate, and a Tokai also fitted with an aly plate. While the plates are not interchangable, they were not that difficult to do.

In both cases you will have to drill additional holes, but these will always be hidden under the new plate.

IIRC I removed the 4 screws holding the pick ups so they were free to move.
Remove the pots and socket, and lay the new plate on the body, hopefully you can line the plate up with the neck, I think i had to file a bit off to make sure it fitted the neck. I was able to move the plate around sufficiently that it didnt have the gap shown on your picture.

Dummy fit the pots and jack plug socket and double check that it all lines up.

Once you have the plate in the right place, you can mark and drill new holes to fix the scratchplate.

fill the old screw holes for the pickups with cocktail sticks or matches and pva. Re drill and refix the pickups.

Doesnt help with your argument with the seller but I doubt you will easily find an off the shelf replacement even if they did refund you so are stuck with modding the bass or having a copy made from your existing plate.

Good luck[/quote]
Thanks for that, and I think that's how I'll go tbh. I am NOT going to shell out £40 on a piece of f***ing plastic again!

Cheers!

[xilddx]

[b][i]My final message to the guy.[/i][/b]

Hello Chris,

I really doubt you paid Fender's distributor £40 for it! I read your policy and nowhere could I find anything mentioning plastic film.

I'll contact Fender UK and see what they think, but just to show you the amount it was warped I have attached a couple of photographs I took today. I think it must have been stored for quite a while next to a significant heat source. The plastic cover is also wrinkled around the PG shape. The advice I have had is that you supplied me a faulty PG and that I should have simply returned it.

I'm sorry you don't feel you can even give me a discount on a replacement if I return it, out of goodwill. But that's UK customer service for you. I'll stick to my suppliers in the States and put this down to experience. If you are interested in your potential customers' perception of this particular situation, this is the Basschat thread [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=63900&st=0"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=63900&st=0[/url]

Thanks anyway.
Nigel

[skankdelvar]

Well, you had to remove the film to find out that there was gunge underneath. So, according to their policy, you couldn't have returned it anyway! Trouble is, it's all got diverted into being about your 'incorrect' choice of pickguard, rather than about the inherent faultiness of the item.

Well, they have a policy. On this occasion, it's going to cost them considerably more in future business than the £20 or so quid they could have sucked up for a dodgy guard. They could make a realistic assesment of this potential loss and do the right thing, but hey...

Hi, Chris from Absolute! Can you see my hand? Can you see what it's doing? It's waving goodbye.

Edited October 21, 2009 by skankdelvar

[OldGit]

Hi Chris from Absolute.
Read this thread, (all the way through)
[url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=63731&hl=andertons"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=...mp;hl=andertons[/url]

That is how to recover from a potentially disastrous customer service situation (as you have here)

[observer]

I feel sorry seeing bc-er loosing money, but on this occasion I think the shop customer service is right. You can't just try to repair thing on your own and then send it back.
Sorry, that's my opinion
Kris


[quote name='OldGit' post='632150' date='Oct 21 2009, 10:12 AM']Hi Chris from Absolute.
Read this thread, (all the way through)
[url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=63731&hl=andertons"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=...mp;hl=andertons[/url]

That is how to recover from a potentially disastrous customer service situation (as you have here)[/quote]

[OldGit]

[quote name='observer' post='632312' date='Oct 21 2009, 12:50 PM']I feel sorry seeing bc-er loosing money, but on this occasion I think the shop customer service is right. You can't just try to repair thing on your own and then send it back.
Sorry, that's my opinion
Kris[/quote]

Yes but how different this thread would have been had they said ," humm well you shoudln't have done that, really, but here's a tenner off a new one and you can keep the bent one as we'll just throw it in the bin anyway"

[observer]

You absolutely right, it would be nice but..
what's a point to be nice to a guy who made a mistake, and then calls all the world, by starting this topic and making complaint to Fender, how bad is company behavior.
Hope that's clear what I trying to say, and sorry to Nigel, that's nothing personal
Kris

[quote name='OldGit' post='632318' date='Oct 21 2009, 12:55 PM']Yes but how different this thread would have been had they said ," humm well you shoudln't have done that, really, but here's a tenner off a new one and you can keep the bent one as we'll just throw it in the bin anyway"[/quote]

[Deep Thought]

[quote name='observer' post='632335' date='Oct 21 2009, 01:14 PM']what's a point to be nice to a guy who made a mistake, and then calls all the world, by starting this topic and making complaint to Fender, how bad is company behavior.[/quote]

Because he is a customer, whom they supposedly want to come back, and to tell his friends to come too. The business with the fit is understandable I guess, different Fenders need different scratchplates, especially when one's made in Japan and another the US. The fact that it's warped is not forgiveable, and neither is the glue nonsense-it shouldn't be like that, and to say you can't send it back because you've taken the film off, when you could only find out about it by removing the film, is not on IMHO, and at least some concession should be made. OK, Nigel shouldn't have tried to fix it, but it doesn't alter the fact that they could come out of this looking a darn sight better than they do, by allowing a bit of leeway. I for one will not be doing business with these guys in the future, and after seeing this thread, I doubt I'm alone. That's a fair bit of potential business gone West over the price of a scratchplate. The ones you go back to are the ones who will go a bit further to see the customer is satisfied, even if they're somewhat in the wrong, rather than simply saying 'you tried to repair it, you're not returning it'.

[OldGit]

[quote name='observer' post='632335' date='Oct 21 2009, 01:14 PM']You absolutely right, it would be nice but..
what's a point to be nice to a guy who made a mistake, and then calls all the world, by starting this topic and making complaint to Fender, how bad is company behavior.
Hope that's clear what I trying to say, and sorry to Nigel, that's nothing personal
Kris[/quote]

Well, lets see....
First rule of retail. Tehcustomer is alays righ. Why? well one happy customer will tell a few people how great the service was and maybe a few people will come back and maybe the music shop will continue to be able to compete against the likes of Dolphin, GAK and Thomann who are generally wiping out the high street shops by being very competitive AND providing outstanding customer service.

One unhappy customer will tell 100 people how crap the shop's attitude is.

The bricks and mortar people have to really pull out the stops these days as their good personal service will counter the cheapness of the online warehouse people. If they can't do that then there's no future for them in music retail, other than selling Christmas guitar packs to hassled parents.

So are you going to risk buying something frm Absolute Music now?

I would bet these people sopend hundreds of punds a year on advertising yet the best possible advertisment is "tell a friend". They have lost that and big time, all for £20 worth of bent scratchplate ....

Edited October 21, 2009 by OldGit

[observer]

My only point was, that, there's a general rule - if you trying to repair anything on your own - you loosing your warranty. And doesn't matter that's 99 pence volume pot, £40 scratchplate or £2500 amp.
I'm not going to argue with you anymore, as I feel really sorry for Nigel, and all this topic is going to be more about marketing than bass.
Regards
Kris

[cheddatom]

We sell a product which is metal with a film on it for packaging. One time a guy called me up to say that it was bent. I told him to bin it and I sent a replacement. I didn't even bother asking about the film. If the initial letter had been "Hi, I bought this scratchplate and it's warped, look at the attached pictures" I reckon it would have turned out differently.

[OldGit]

[quote name='observer' post='632388' date='Oct 21 2009, 02:21 PM']My only point was, that, there's a general rule - if you trying to repair anything on your own - you loosing your warranty. And doesn't matter that's 99 pence volume pot, £40 scratchplate or £2500 amp.
I'm not going to argue with you anymore, as I feel really sorry for Nigel, and all this topic is going to be more about marketing than bass.
Regards
Kris[/quote]

Kris
You are completely correct.
If you try to fix it, rather than return it as broken on delivery, or whatever, then sure you forfiet the chance of returning the goods as faulty. Of course because you could have broken it in the process of trying to fix it. That's fair enough.
Not exactly the case here is it?

Tom's right and I'll shuddup now