CoolHand and Logic Paintball

[ApexAZ]

After a very long dialog with CoolHand in regards to recent problems with his Alpha Rail shipments, I decided to cancel my order.

I thought about posting the email here, but figured it was to long and no one would want to read it in it's entirety.

What started all this was an inquiry to him about my order which to no surprise to me now, he had lost.

Long story short, he promised Alpha Rails in the dealers forum and couldn't deliver. He ran into some troubles with the annodizer which caused delays which is understandable. Then he went on to say he finally had them in stock and days later informs us that he doesn't actually have them in stock.

I understand that most of the dealers are pretty small shops and things happen. What I don't understand is how CoolHand went about dealing with it. The thing that irritates me the most is how he did not keep us fully informed and the constant stream of excuses instead of just owning up to his mistake. He basically told his customer base on a public forum that he had finally had inventory in stock, then a few days later explains he doesn't have it in stock after all without any real explanation as to why other then his annodizer fell through. So the question that comes to mind for me is: If his annodizer fell through and he knew he didn't have the inventory, why would he tell us he did. What he failed to mention at the time is that he believed he had them in stock, but had not counted his inventory before he told the public that they were available. He basically didn't open the box with the rails in them. Or possibly, he simply didn't have them and was just trying to appease his customers. If he had just come out and said that, I would have been totally understanding. Instead, I had to find out the hard way through a difficult series of emails between us.

Then, he basically responds to me saying I should have read his website which was dated 3 weeks earlier then recent correspondance from him on the AO forums. I immediately construed this as him shirking responsibility and placing the blame on ME. At this point I'm noticing a trend of constant excuses and no solid information from CoolHand and I'm getting irritated. So, I quoted the hell out of him in an email and pretty much blasted him. Of course his response was blasting me in return.

On top of that, he lost my order. So I'm already disappointed that he 'overlooked' my order and now he's being totally arrogant with me as if I was somehow in the wrong because I listened to current communications that he posted on the forums instead of information on his website that was more then 2 weeks old.

I'm sorry, but if you have my money and you tell your entire customer base that you have the product in stock along with extras, I expect that product to be sitting on my doorstep a few days later. I don't care what your website says. You said different on the AO forums.

Then he goes on to tell me that he doesn't owe me any information or any sort of time frame and that I don't dictate his time/life. Yes, he actually said that I don't dictate his time after I suggested it would have been appropriete to give us more information.
I'm sorry that you feel I don't deserve any information from you regarding my shipment after I've already paid you in full. I requested more details on the delays on the ORIGINAL paypal order and you never responded to me. You see, I work hard for my money and when things like this happen, I tend to get upset about it.

The ONLY positive thing about this experience is he did not make me wait to refund my payment.

It's pretty rare that you meet someone with such poor customer service as CoolHand gave me. He totally could have avoided this with better communication.

I will not be doing business with Logic Paintball in the future. The only decision I have to make now is if the pneumag is worth it because it sounds like it will be using a logic frame. Right now, I'm pretty irate with him and I think I might just go with a devilmag instead of giving Logic Paintball any more business, even if it's indirect.

All of this could have been avoided with proper communication.

[gibby]

UGH! That sucks. Well, as long as you got your money back it wasn't a total loss besides your time. Dunno what else to say but just let it go and move on. Hopefully both parties learned from this.

[MiniSpdRcr]

Yeah Im waiting 3 months on my trigger now...but I keep bugging them and they are getting to it...hopefully

[CoolHand]

OK, that is for the most part true (What he posted that is), but to say that I sold a bunch more rails knowing I didn't have them in stock, is a lie. That's right, I get to call you a liar this time.

I told Bob that I had black rails extra. That was wrong, I in fact did not. I didn't realize this until last week or somthing like that (you can go look in the Alpha thread for the exact day I posted the stock).

Now, that was bum info, and I am sorry that it was not correct. But to totally disregard what is on the site, and to then choose to be indignant about it is a little dull whitted to say the least.

If you selectively decide what info you take as current, you will end up in these kind of situations. I wish I had went and counted the damned things the second they showed up, but I just assumed that they would all be there. They were not, and the crap storm ensues.

You and I are obviously not going to ever see eye to eye on this, but I will not let you only tell what of the story you want to, in order to make me seem as though I just wanted to screw you out of your money.

Take this as you will, but if you are rude and make demands of me while simultaniously calling me a liar, you will not get the best customer service. If, on the other hand you had just been polite, and asked for your money back, I would have gladly done it (like I did for Bob), and never a harsh word would have been exchanged between us. You inquired and demanded something I couldn't deliver. I told you so, and asked why you disregarded the notice on the site, you blow up and have fit, ending here in the feedback forum.

This is not a one sided blow up by any means. Did I defuse it? Nope. Did I want to do business with someone so ill tempered and beligerent? Nope.

So I gave you your money back, and we are done. No one is screwed, though I am out a few hours worth of email composition, and you are out the services of your $80 for that week and a half.

Best we both collect our things and move on.

[gibby]

...Take this as you will, but if you are rude and make demands of me while simultaniously calling me a liar, you will not get the best customer service...

I dunno CH, this is where I would have to disagree with your business ethics. As someone who is providing a service or selling products, you need to have the "customer is always right" mentality. True, it's not pleasant but you need to put yourself in the shoes of your customer. You have to cater to them regardless of how difficult or irate they may seem, especially if they already paid you. It's what defines a good businessman, imo.

Also, to have someone wait 3 or more months for a trigger? If there was something holding you back on your end, it's your responsibility to keep your waiting customers up to date. From the sound of it, your customers have to bug you daily just to get some information from you. To leave them "hoping" is almost like having your customers wait on a promise that may or may not happen.

But you have to remember that some are just more patient than others. There are also those who can be pushed over easily to buy you some time while others demand top notch service. If information was misunderstood, then it was your failure to make it clear to everyone. Having information in multiple sources can make it very confusing and unclear especially if they aren't consistent.

Granted, I may not know the full details of the transaction...I can, however, spot a flaw or two.

[Archangel Zer0]

I dunno CH, this is where I would have to disagree with your business ethics. As someone who is providing a service or selling products, you need to have the "customer is always right" mentality. True, it's not pleasant but you need to put yourself in the shoes of your customer. You have to cater to them regardless of how difficult or irate they may seem, especially if they already paid you. It's what defines a good businessman, imo.

Absolutely not. No one should have to grovel to anyone else because of the "customer is always right" mentality. Guess what? They're not always right. Some of them are rude, obnoxious, and demanding. Someone that caters to someone regardless of how they act isn't a good businessman. That's a brown noser in my book. The type of guy that'll lie through his teeth to make you happy. Not the type of guy I'd do business with.

I have to say this about Coolhand. I'm in the process of having an ETAC morlocked with an eye install, and he's never mislead me as far as time is concerned. I ordered it originally with the eye install, cancelled the eye install, and then reordered it. He didn't bat an eye. He's been nothing but helpful to me, answered my emails, and rendered his opinion when I asked. I bought another gun since I anticipate it will take quite some time to get done. I don't email him for updates daily, since that's a waste of both his time and mine. When he gets to it, he gets to it. That's not being arrogant, that's being honest.

[ApexAZ]

OK, that is for the most part true (What he posted that is), but to say that I sold a bunch more rails knowing I didn't have them in stock, is a lie. That's right, I get to call you a liar this time.

I told Bob that I had black rails extra. That was wrong, I in fact did not. I didn't realize this until last week or somthing like that (you can go look in the Alpha thread for the exact day I posted the stock).

Now, that was bum info, and I am sorry that it was not correct. But to totally disregard what is on the site, and to then choose to be indignant about it is a little dull whitted to say the least.

If you selectively decide what info you take as current, you will end up in these kind of situations. I wish I had went and counted the damned things the second they showed up, but I just assumed that they would all be there. They were not, and the crap storm ensues.

You and I are obviously not going to ever see eye to eye on this, but I will not let you only tell what of the story you want to, in order to make me seem as though I just wanted to screw you out of your money.

Take this as you will, but if you are rude and make demands of me while simultaniously calling me a liar, you will not get the best customer service. If, on the other hand you had just been polite, and asked for your money back, I would have gladly done it (like I did for Bob), and never a harsh word would have been exchanged between us. You inquired and demanded something I couldn't deliver. I told you so, and asked why you disregarded the notice on the site, you blow up and have fit, ending here in the feedback forum.

This is not a one sided blow up by any means. Did I defuse it? Nope. Did I want to do business with someone so ill tempered and beligerent? Nope.

So I gave you your money back, and we are done. No one is screwed, though I am out a few hours worth of email composition, and you are out the services of your $80 for that week and a half.

Best we both collect our things and move on.

CoolHand, look at your posts.

You replied to bob that you had a lot of extra black gloss rails. Even though you were replying to bob directly, it's not so wrong to assume that extra means you have extra rails in stock that do not have anyones name on them. Since you had already had my payment for roughly 6 days along with my shipping information, why should I not assume that I would be included in that shipment? Also, you are ignoring the fact that when I purchased a rail from you I included a message on my paypal payment to you specifically asking for more information on the annodizing delays and roughly when I could expect it to ship. You NEVER replied to that. Your communication with me has been very poor.

I was already irritated that you lost (Or how you like to put it, misplaced) my order and now it seemed as though you were trying to place the blame on me for disregarding information on your website. How does that look? We had already established that you had made a mistake and then you immediately tell me I was wrong?

You told me that your website was updated on 2/28/05 indicating that you were out of gloss black rails. Then you posted on AO on 3/10/05 that you finally had them in stock. Not only did you have them in stock, but you had extra gloss black rails.

I was already irritated with the news that you seemed to have 'overlooked' my order. Then your email stating that I should have adhired to your information on your website after you had already posted here on AO telling people they were available just set me off.

That's really what got me going in the first place. I paid you for a product. You post on AO that that product is now available. I have not seen anything arrive because I'm now assuming I'd be included in that shipment so I contact you and find out you lose my order. Then you try and justify that it didn't matter because your website says it can take 3 - 5 weeks for delivery when you have posts from 3/10 here on AO indicating that they were now available. It seemed to me that you were using cop-out excuses and trying to shift the blame to me. So that was the reason for my long winded timeline email. It was to explain why I had assumed I'd be included in that shipment. But don't get sidetracked here: The main reason I'm upset is that you shirked responsibility off on me. I'm not the one who should be assuring people they get their orders. That's you my friend.

If you had gone about it a different way, I may not have acted so harshly. But you tell me you can't find my order and that I should not expect a rail for another 3 weeks and that it's somehow my fault.

Liar is a bit harsh. I do not really believe you intentionally lied to people after you explained yourself (which you should have done for everyone in the first place). But you did misinform people.

I'm usually really easy going man, but you handled this very very poorly. You were unprofessional and rude. Of course I'm going to react to that.

Now, I will apologize for overreacting. Yes, I was rude. I probably should have slept on it before emailing you. I just hope you have some understanding on where I'm coming from here. Even though this has been a rather unpleasant correspondance, thank you for taking the time to explain.

EDIT: This was originally going into my final email to CoolHand and figured I might as well just post it here instead.

[gibby]

Absolutely not. No one should have to grovel to anyone else because of the "customer is always right" mentality. Guess what? They're not always right. Some of them are rude, obnoxious, and demanding. Someone that caters to someone regardless of how they act isn't a good businessman. That's a brown noser in my book. The type of guy that'll lie through his teeth to make you happy. Not the type of guy I'd do business with.

I have to say this about Coolhand. I'm in the process of having an ETAC morlocked with an eye install, and he's never mislead me as far as time is concerned. I ordered it originally with the eye install, cancelled the eye install, and then reordered it. He didn't bat an eye. He's been nothing but helpful to me, answered my emails, and rendered his opinion when I asked. I bought another gun since I anticipate it will take quite some time to get done. I don't email him for updates daily, since that's a waste of both his time and mine. When he gets to it, he gets to it. That's not being arrogant, that's being honest.

I'm not saying he needs to be a "yes man" or a "brown noser." There's a big difference between those and being smart about how you choose to handle your business. It's also another thing about lying and actually coming through with your word. Liars, in the long run, never last very long.

Also, not all transactions are handled the same or go a certain way. Sure, you might have had success dealing with CH and you hold him in high regards(which is obvious from your post). But it is possible for CH to mishandle a situation leaving the other party less than satisfied. So guess what? CH might not always be right.

[WenULiVeUdiE]

I think it is clear that there was a large miscommunication. Between Coolhand and the anodizer and CH and Bob. Both made mistakes, and were corrected. Running a business while attending college is no easy task. And slow anodizers do not make it any better.
Granted, he could improve on some things. It seems that he gives us too much information. We get the info, then something changes without us knowing. We then get flustered and let him have it. He has had some bad luck with anodizers, and we take it out on him.

I am in no way saying he is perfect. But it seems he is doing the best he can.

[CoolHand]

You are correct Gibby, in that I am not always right. I will be the first to tell you that.

However, you have to also realize that for every deal that goes sour like this one has, there are literally hundreds that go perfectly, but not many of those folks take the time to leave a glowing review. Conversely, every single one of the guys who's had a bad time, leaves a great long horrid review. I can count the number of deals like this one here on one hand, they just don't happen that often.

This whole deal, and basically every other bummed out customer I have ever had, can be boiled down to one root cause ----> That crappy anodizer.

I got hooked up with the anti-Christ of anodizers, and its all been down hill from there.

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel. A couple of helpful AO'ers have recommended new places. I have scouted them out, and decided that their work is as good or better than the anti-Chirst, and they guarantee their turnaround.

So, if all goes even remotely well, we won't be seeing anymore of these threads . . . . . . . . . unless I learn how to piss people off in another way.

Apex - Here is my formal apology to you: I was wrong. I should have checked the batch before I accepted any new orders at all. It was my fault, and when you became upset over the pushing back of the deliver date, I let you have it. For that I am sorry. I am a grumpy person by nature, and I do the very best I can to keep it contained, but every once in a while, the grumper jumps out and bites someone. It got you this time. I will do my best to shorten its leash.

[Archangel Zer0]

I'm not saying he needs to be a "yes man" or a "brown noser." There's a big difference between those and being smart about how you choose to handle your business. It's also another thing about lying and actually coming through with your word. Liars, in the long run, never last very long.

Also, not all transactions are handled the same or go a certain way. Sure, you might have had success dealing with CH and you hold him in high regards(which is obvious from your post). But it is possible for CH to mishandle a situation leaving the other party less than satisfied. So guess what? CH might not always be right.

I'm glad you agree with me. Some people just won't be satisfied no matter what level of customer service they receive.

[Lohman446]

You know.. I read these replies, and this goes so much better than most discussions on AO.

My take on this, is there was an error in communication, and likely from Coolhand, now he explained why, and face it things happen and go wrong, and he did tell you about it eventually.

Now that was simplified. I'm sure there is much more, but you have both acknowledged that your handling of the situation was not ideal, and that neither of you seemed to try to defuse the argument, remember it takes two to argue. I don't agree with the customer is always right, especially in low run custom orders that you still try to keep the costs low, he has every right to do work for whom he pleases. THat being said its not a defense

I congratulate both of you on your handling of this. You disagreed, you have both acknowledged that you served some of the fault in those disagreements, you have both seemed to note it was bad communication, and you are both willing to move on. It shows more maturity than most of the people on these boards have.

[ApexAZ]

You are correct Gibby, in that I am not always right. I will be the first to tell you that.

However, you have to also realize that for every deal that goes sour like this one has, there are literally hundreds that go perfectly, but not many of those folks take the time to leave a glowing review. Conversely, every single one of the guys who's had a bad time, leaves a great long horrid review. I can count the number of deals like this one here on one hand, they just don't happen that often.

This whole deal, and basically every other bummed out customer I have ever had, can be boiled down to one root cause ----> That crappy anodizer.

I got hooked up with the anti-Christ of anodizers, and its all been down hill from there.

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel. A couple of helpful AO'ers have recommended new places. I have scouted them out, and decided that their work is as good or better than the anti-Chirst, and they guarantee their turnaround.

So, if all goes even remotely well, we won't be seeing anymore of these threads . . . . . . . . . unless I learn how to piss people off in another way.

Apex - Here is my formal apology to you: I was wrong. I should have checked the batch before I accepted any new orders at all. It was my fault, and when you became upset over the pushing back of the deliver date, I let you have it. For that I am sorry. I am a grumpy person by nature, and I do the very best I can to keep it contained, but every once in a while, the grumper jumps out and bites someone. It got you this time. I will do my best to shorten its leash.

Thank you. I truely hope you find a better ano vendor. I know some things were out of your realm of control and I hope you have better luck in the future.