Poor service

[Mike Thomas]

Not sure if this counts as poor service or NO service! I have been looking for a Switch rod for some time and I wanted to try to buy one from one of the sponsors of faol I already have one of there spey rods and love it. I have tried twice to contact them through the web site but have had no response, Phoning from NZ really is not an option, but what is the point of having a great web site promoting your latest and greatest products and then not responding to questions generated from your own site? I guess they just do not need my money.
Sorry to rant but it is frustrating.
All the best.
Mike.

[Eric-WD]

Mike E-Mail is a wonderful thing, unfortunately it isn't a perfect thing. as your coming from NZ the email may have gone into the junk email filter or may not have arrived at all. We also have a bit of a problem with a lot of sickness here lately they might just not have caught up.

Don't write them off.

Eric

[sagefisher]

Mike,

If you want you can send me a PM with your email address and the info on who it is you are trying to contact and what you are looking for. I will call them tomorrow (Monday) and tell them about you trying to contact them.

Larry ---sagefisher---

[kbproctor]

My guess is that the email did not get there. Many web developers block emails from other countries and it is quite easy to do. The company in question may not even know it has been done.

[Normand]

what is your expectation of the time when you sent the email to when you should hear an answer. if you are expecting an instant reply, you're probably not going to receive it.

if they have a "contact us" email address, it probably got there. its possible that someone who handles your specific problem is out on vacation or out of the office for some other reason.

feel free to ask your particular question to the members of this board. there's alot of informative folks here.

[flyguy66]

I'm all for helping out a bro and all of these excuses are valid explanations of common reasons why companies don't answer emails in a timely fashion, but...

In this day and age, any company interested in doing international business has no excuse for blocking foreign email domains. Furthermore, n company interested in staying in business has any excuse for not answering all emails within 24 hours with a quality response.

If a company hasn't figured out by now that the Internet...more specifically social networking sites...is where their buyers are getting most of their information, and that about 40% of all commerce is now conducted electronically, then they're WAY behind the curve and probably on the way out.

Unfortunately, there are a LOT of companies in the fly fishing industry like that. But there are some that are right up there on the cutting edge of info tech, too. We'll see who is left standing in a few more years if the old dawgs don't learn some new tricks.

THE standard of customer service for email is a 24-hour response time.

[Mark Vendon]

I'm all for helping out a bro and all of these excuses are valid explanations of common reasons why companies don't answer emails in a timely fashion, but...

In this day and age, any company interested in doing international business has no excuse for blocking foreign email domains. Furthermore, n company interested in staying in business has any excuse for not answering all emails within 24 hours with a quality response.

If a company hasn't figured out by now that the Internet...more specifically social networking sites...is where their buyers are getting most of their information, and that about 40% of all commerce is now conducted electronically, then they're WAY behind the curve and probably on the way out.

Unfortunately, there are a LOT of companies in the fly fishing industry like that. But there are some that are right up there on the cutting edge of info tech, too. We'll see who is left standing in a few more years if the old dawgs don't learn some new tricks.

THE standard of customer service for email is a 24-hour response time.

I totally agree with this. There are quite a few one man operations out there also that seem to have no trouble at all getting back to you in a very timely manner via email, shipping stuff out, and doing anything else related to their business. I've done practically all of my purchases regarding fly fishing or tying through the internet.

No or slow responses to emails, super long wait times for products ordered, or never receiving what you had ordered just doesn't cut it if you want to stay in business in this day and age. Just one example that I've had was with a trout shop that used to be located in Avis, PA. His catalog had all kinds of fly tying stuff that you couldn't easily get, or get at all from other places. I'd call in an order since a lot of places then didn't have cart systems. It would take weeks to receive the order and I'm the next state north of him! He went out of business years ago.

Regards,
Mark

[kbproctor]

In this day and age, any company interested in doing international business has no excuse for blocking foreign email domains. Furthermore, n company interested in staying in business has any excuse for not answering all emails within 24 hours with a quality response.

You get no argument from me on this point. HOWEVER, if Mr. Fly Stuff Businessman outsourced someone to set all this up, which is most likely the case, then he may not know there are any restrictions in place.

Someone needs to contact this guy and let him know business is being lost so he can figure out why and fix it.

If he is simply ignoring international biz, he is a fool. It is too easy to protect yourself these days. Take PayPal and you are covered, even with international sales, as long as you follow the guidelines.

[Betty Hiner]

OK ... we're dealing with electronics, cyber space, machinery, and ... lo and behold ... PEOPLE. Sh*t happens. Everything fails at one time or another, usually when we are expecting so much more, and it's about US! Give the company another chance. Have someone closer contact them and explain the problem. I'm going to guess something somewhere just got screwed up ('spose?). See what, if anything, they're willing to do to remedy the problem. The sponsors here on FAOL are a great group. They're not going to intentionally ignore you.

[Sully]

THE standard of customer service for email is a 24-hour response time.

The standard for ANY company is "Do it right the first time"...but how many of those have you seen lately???

FARRRRRR too many "small" companys ( in various fields of endeavor) that emply 2; 3 or 4 employees that by the time "orders" are actually filled and ready to ship...deliverys are made ( UPS..etc) and checked...material thats been delivered is put "on the shelves"...telephone calls are taken and maybe orders taken by phone; email questions are answered and also email orders are printed to be filled the next day...to "get around to it"..that is answering emails in 24 hrs.

I deal with SOME..that you wont get an answer back from for many days. If sent on Monday they will TRY and reply to you by Friday... THATS the nature of the business!