Posted by SEADOG on October 05, 2001 at 11:32:33:
This is the only part of my job I truly hate, thankfully this is the ONLY time I've ever had to do this. What I'm referring is having to respond to an unhappy customers post on a BBS.
Mr. Carter has falsely accused us of trying to scam him. Below are the definitions of "scam" and "mistake".
Scam: a fraudulent or deceptive act or operation.
Mistake: 2 a : to misunderstand the meaning or intention of : MISINTERPRET b : to make a wrong judgment
of the character or ability of
3 : to identify wrongly : confuse with another
intransitive senses : to be wrong
In no way imaginable were we being "fraudulent or deceptive", we are deeply hurt and offended by Mr. Carter's post on 9/21. We did however make a mistake, just like everyone else in the world, except for Jesus. The part number for our octo is 1211-00 and the part number for the regulator ordered is 1111-00, obviously our newly hired shipper made a mistake when packing the order. I
would also say that Mr. Carter has made a mistake by "making a wrong judgment of the character" of our operation. If we were trying to defraud Mr. Carter and run off with his money, as he claims, why would we send the tank, the tank boot and the valve cover he ordered? Of course he makes no mention of the majority of his order we did get correct nor any mention of the wetsuit he purchased and we delivered in August. To be honest this isn't the first mistake we have made, how we have handled those mistakes is what is important. We have always generously compensated the very few customers whose orders were not fulfilled correctly. In fact any customer of ours who has been at the receiving end of a mistake has ALWAYS come out of the situation well ahead than if we had fulfilled the order correctly. For example, when we contacted Mr. Carter regarding this error we told
him to go ahead and keep the octo free of charge and of course told him we would ship his regulator out immediately, which we did.
As for the undeliverable e-mails, I have no explanation, other than our company was receiving e-mails all day long on 9/21 and no one else has contacted us regarding undeliverable e-mails sent to us on that day or any other day for that matter. It may be Mr. Cater's ISP that is to blame for the undeliverable e-mail's. As for the phone messages he left, they were left on Friday at 5:21 pm and 7:30 pm EST. We normally return calls during working hours within minutes of receiving voice mail. On Friday, 9/21, we were short handed at the company and we could not return Mr. Carters call untill 8:00 am the following Monday. We left messages via voice mail and e-mail for him to contact us and we finally got through to him around 8:00 pm EST. He was obviously upset and unwilling to accept the octo we offered as compensation for our mistake.
What upsets us the most is that we pride ourselves on our customer service and the high quality of our gear. I have received, literally, hundreds of e-mails praising our customer service efforts, our gear's quality. In fact I would like to challange anyone reading this message to try and find ANYTHING posted on the internet that
gives our company poor marks for our customer service and products delivered. Our goal is to set ourselves apart from all other SCUBA equipment manufacturers and retailers by offering high quality gear at resonable, affordable prices accompanied by great customer service. If you make the gear more affordable, the diving community will grow, that's an economic fact, just as making gear too expensive will drive people out of the dive community. When you sell more volume you make more money, Costco is a fine example of that, their margins are smaller than their
competition but they sell a heck of alot more. We are not Costco, obviously, but we do believe in their business plan.
We are posting this message to clear the air regarding our company's credibility and business performance. The fact remains that we DO provide high quality gear at the MOST affordable prices, accomanied by great customer service, before, during and after the sale. See for yourself www.seadogsports.com
To date we have not received the octo that Mr. Carter "refused to accept", but we did receive the following message recently "Hello - I just received the SE regulator that I ordered from you. How can I get a schematic or exploded diagram of it? Also, do you sell o/haul kits or parts when the time comes for service? Thanks....CTC" He doesn't seem too upset with us anymore. Anyone who's ever owned a company knows what we're going through, you can't make all the people you serve happy all the time, but I promise you this, we sure try our best too. May all your dives be fun and safe.
Best regards,
Mike Geck
Database Manager/Customer Service/Web Developer
SEADOG Sports - "Great deals on great gear!"
www.seadogsports.com
13691-A Danielson St. Poway, CA 92064
Ph: 858-486-8900 Fax: 858-486-8912