Carbatec need to really rethink their customer service

[Evanism]

Ill just stick to the facts.

There is a thread I started earlier on the unsurpassed AWESOMENESS of Kregs service. In short, I had a bent router plate. I wrote Sunday night, by Monday morning 9.10am...yes AU time, another was posted. I RECEIVED it Thursday... from the US.

AWESOME.

Now, let me show you UN-AWESOME:

Friday 27 June 10.55am, contacted Carbatec (with their OWN ONLINE FORM!!!) to see if I ordered 3 items whether they would ship that day (Veritas Frame clamp, Veritas plug cutter and countersink set, I specified the items)..... waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting.... bugger it, ordered it from the US Sunday*.

Friday 4 July 12.55am... a FULL WEEK... 7 DAYS LATER...Carbatec writes: "the quickest way to get an order processed and dispatched is to phone it through with the product codes cheers"

That was it. One line.

WWWHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!??????????

I must be stupid. Here is a website with stock. I want to buy. I use the website THEY provide and use the contact mechanisms THEY stipulate and this is the brushoff I get?

Is this company for real? Is this all some sort of elaborate joke? Is this the way Mr Carbatec CEO wants his business protrayed?

Well. It goes right to the soul of the whole "Australia Tax" problem. Pure arrogance. If it isn't arrogance, its incompetence, but it can't be, for this MUST be a deliberately designed system. A manager has approved this process. The CEO must be aware of it. It is designed to frustrate me into buying overseas! That must be it! I'm yet to see how this benefits a local business by ignoring customers, but since this is the design - it MUST be true.

It worked! I was ignored enough to take my order OS, received fantastic service and I saved a ton of money.

My lesson is learned.

* I suspect the items will be here this arvo.

[artme]

I shake my head in despair at the lackadaisical attitude so often displayed by Carbatec.

I wanted two items from them at the wood show in Bris. They had neither there in stock but were good enough tto take one off the display board, a set of 75mm spigot jaws for a Teknatool chuck. Great, I thought!

I also wanted a set of power grip jaws for the same chuck. Not in stock. That's OK,. Can I order them here? No, just ring us u[ when you get back home!!!

Well, bugger!! I have figured I can do without the jaws! Had they been more amenable I would have spent somewhere near the $100 mark.

Now they have missed a sale and I am $100 better off.

Another time I was in the store in Bris and some mates were going through the ceramic tiles for making pot stands. They were told by one of the staff not to pick and choose as others also bought these!!
I was flabbergasted and simply left without buying what I had intended to.

[kyaden]

I had the same experience, I emailed about some vertical clamps I needed for some jigs. No reply, I ended up ordering the same size for $12 ea cheaper from Hong Kong which arrived in only ten days. Oh well, their loss, my gain. I tried to buy Australian first!

[Morbius]

I've just had two disappointing experiences on my two most recent attempts to purchase gear here in Australia.

My first was with Carba-Tec. I phoned to check on an order that I had been waiting for a couple of weeks for. I got the auto response, after selecting which area I wanted to go to, got put on hold and waited. Ten minutes later it just hung up on me.
That was Sydney. I tried Brisbane, I figured I might have better luck. Same again. I was pretty cheesed off, so I tried Adelaide. And again, after the ten minute wait, they hung up. I didn't bother about Perth.

All during working hours on a week day. Not a public holiday in each of these states at the same time.

I suggested to Carba-Tec that they at least change their message if the stores are shut so that they don't waste their potential customer's money:

Hi Craig,

We apologise for any inconvenience which we may have caused you.
Your order is still on backorder. Hopefully, it will be in stock by end of July, but it hasn't been confirmed yet from our supplier.


Your patience would be greatly appreciated on this matter.

No explanation, or promise to fix the problem that is wasting customer's money.

Still,

Not as bad as another recent effort by another Australian dealer (who I won't name). I was looking for the Robert Sorby Deluxe Universal Sharpening System. It retails in the US for $140 US and in the UK for about 89 pounds. I expected to see a price of approx $200. At first the dealer told me:

we don't have those in stock .
We can get for you .

We have a local version made by Vicmarc

That seemed to be at odds with the literature on the dealer's very own website for the Vicmarc gear, which stated that Vicmarc had a unique design. So, I tried to clarify again and get a price.

The response I got was:

The Robert Sorby unit only does the fingernail style grind. $397.71

The Vicmarc allows you to do all your chisels and is easy to set up and use

Yet the Sorby web site claims:

The Universal Sharpening System allows the woodworker to sharpen a host of regular shaped tools - like parting tools, scrapers, tips, plane irons, bench chisels. It construction means that its is adjustable for height so it may be used in conjunction with 6" or 8" bench grinders with equal ease.

I should point out that the Deluxe model, which I made very clear was what I was after and even provided a stock number for, also includes the fingernail jig.

Even if I give the dealer the benefit of the doubt here, the fingernail jig, by itself retails for about 67 pounds or US$114 which makes the price disparity even larger. I can only assume this was a tactic to persuade me to buy the Vicmarc instead.

Allowing $50 for postage from the US, with every accessory available for the universal jig I could still purchase it cheaper from overseas.

I was after a jig, but instead nearly got a gouge, and not the kind I could use in my shed.

I deliberately went for an Aussie dealer for the Sorby gear because if I wasn't buying Australian made, then I could at least support an Australian business. I may buy other gear from that dealer in future, but it won't be before I really do my homework and if it is worth my while financially to buy from him rather than from elsewhere, including overseas. Given the apparent markup, and the misinformation, I don't like his odds of seeing my cash.

Australian businesses need to do business smarter and respond better to customers. It's not the 70's anymore and we can shop around on the internet, and shipping from the US by freight companies is a lot cheaper than postage.

Word also gets around thanks to forums like these.

Craig

[Tonyz]

Not putting anyone down here but we can gripe and moan all we like but I'd guarrantee the owners of Carba-tec MIGHT start taking action or doing something if we channelled our complaints their way.
Mind you have just done a ABN search and theres 16 hits for Carbatec

So can some learned fellow kindly provide a email or snail mail contact to the CEO of their head office, that way he may wake up to the purile service they are providing.

Yes yes I know most are franchised out but someone surely must care,

or do they (Carbatec) think themselves so high and mighty that the customer can get ............... jumped on.

Stop belly aching here go to the source.

[FenceFurniture]

Yes yes I know most are franchised out but someone surely must care,

Good luck....

[specialist]

I agree, after a month of trying to talk to someone on the front counter by phone and failing every time. They did return one call which I missed, they never bothered to try again, even saying in an email that I needed to provide a better phone number. I just happened to be out of phone coverage at the time, I am sure that everyone has missed a call in those circumstances.... I found the email to be abrupt and bordering on rude. I did wonder if they do indeed want to sell anything by mail order at all.

I get to brisbane quite often, but find that getting out to wakerly is a chore as it is so far out of my way, so mail order is the preferred way to trade for me.

Rob

[chook]

I suppose everybody who has ever bought many tools has a Carbatec story. I have had a few incidences of appalling service myself, things which made me wonder why I went there at all. But I live in Brisbane and I want Carbatec to prosper and succeed. It suits me to be able to get into my car and buy good quality tools and I would not be pleased if they were not there. I have come to terms with the internet and shop online when it suits me but there are many times when a trip to the local shop,is the best option.

There is a chap who works for them who is one of the best salesman I have ever meet, an older man and he is brilliant. And there are others too who have gone out of their way to help me. I do not say that this excuses some of the things that happen but for every bad experience I have had I have had many good ones.

[cava]

Unfortunately, my bad experiences outweigh my good experiences with them.

[specialist]

I suppose everybody who has ever bought many tools has a Carbatec story. I have had a few incidences of appalling service myself, things which made me wonder why I went there at all. But I live in Brisbane and I want Carbatec to prosper and succeed. It suits me to be able to get into my car and buy good quality tools and I would not be pleased if they were not there. I have come to terms with the internet and shop online when it suits me but there are many times when a trip to the local shop,is the best option.

There is a chap who works for them who is one of the best salesman I have ever meet, an older man and he is brilliant. And there are others too who have gone out of their way to help me. I do not say that this excuses some of the things that happen but for every bad experience I have had I have had many good ones.

I absolutely agree with your sentiments, I too like the idea of having a place where one can buy good quality tools, however, should they rely on the fact that they have a shop full of quality gear to make up for the appalling service that is provided on the whole. I too have had some good experiences with them, but that was years ago, it has progressively gotten worse over time. There are some good people there, but it seems that the culture of bad service has been allowed to flourish, and I guess that stems from management, not the people on the floor who obviously try to help as best they can.

Rob

[Big Shed]

Unfortunately, my bad experiences outweigh my good experiences with them.

Yes, that goes for me too, BUT, the one really good experience I have had with Carbatec goes some way to making up for the many bad experiences.

When I was in the market for a tablesaw a local forum member alerted me to a special that Carbatec had going on the TL10S, a brilliant tablesaw.

As soon as I heard about this special I rang Carbatec in Melbourne only to be told they were all sold and no more were in Oz and no more would be imported.

As I had experienced the assembled Melbourne knowledge before I decided to ring Brisbane and got on to a chap who was extremely helpful (I am sorry to say I have forgotten his name).
He told me that there was one left and I ordered it there and then, he then offered to freight it to my place in Bendigo free of charge. As I didn't have any facility to get it off the truck I asked him to send it to Melbourne instead and I would pick it up from there.

This he duly did and I was stoked.

I won't relate the rest of the story of how this was then handled in Melbourne, suffice to say that experience matches virtually every experience I have had with Carbatec Melbourne.

[_fly_]

Yes, that goes for me too, BUT, the one really good experience I have had with Carbatec goes some way to making up for the many bad experiences.

When I was in the market for a tablesaw a local forum member alerted me to a special that Carbatec had going on the TL10S, a brilliant tablesaw.

As soon as I heard about this special I rang Carbatec in Melbourne only to be told they were all sold and no more were in Oz and no more would be imported.

As I had experienced the assembled Melbourne knowledge before I decided to ring Brisbane and got on to a chap who was extremely helpful (I am sorry to say I have forgotten his name).
He told me that there was one left and I ordered it there and then, he then offered to freight it to my place in Bendigo free of charge. As I didn't have any facility to get it off the truck I asked him to send it to Melbourne instead and I would pick it up from there.

This he duly did and I was stoked.

I won't relate the rest of the story of how this was then handled in Melbourne, suffice to say that experience matches virtually every experience I have had with Carbatec Melbourne.

Your probably lucky they didn't sell it to someone else here in Melbourne when it arrived. more than likely would have told you they needed it to swap under a warranty.

[delbs]

We had a huge thread regarding this topic a while back which neil shutdown because it was turning into a winge and moan thread instead of something constructive. Not wanting or trying to offend people but if carbatech didnt listen 6 months ago with the last thread I dont think they're going to now.. id just go shopping where you know will treat you well and prices are good etc. I wouldnt bother trying to flog a dead horse.

[_fly_]

id just go shopping where you know will treat you well and prices are good etc.

SO, do you know somewhere then?
Are you keeping secrets?

[delbs]

Not keeping any secrets. Depends what your after obviously but I shop all over the place. Not really loyal to just one large store like carbatech. Not going to post my whole favourites list on here of what sites I visit I just mean that we all know carabatechs website/ inventory system is rubbish along with customer service so why not just shop elsewhere instead of going back when its still the same.

On 2nd thought lll post a few that i visit pretty frequently and have been very happy with in the past. These arent equivalent to Carbatech in the fact they are a large store and have everything, they have select tools but are just so much better with customer service and shipping and i cannot complain about prices because of the before mention reasons.

Some or all of these links you will have come across at some point. this is just where i go or google around until i find what i want, i pretty much never go to Carbatech for any Veritas stuff anymore, always lee valley.
.
Hopes this helps someone think outside of the Carbatech box

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