Tell us your worst audio dealer or mfr. experience.
Please tell us the worst experience you've had with a Dealer, Manufacturer or both and what actions were needed and what the outcome was. I'm sure there are many interesting horror stories. Interested to hear all.
calvinj, did you buy the Ayon thru Audiogon and did USA Tube ship it to you directly? That's too much money to spend to be ignored. I ask because I just bought a preamp from them, the sale went fine, and the item was shipped from the manufacturer.
@lowrider57 my cd2s was a demo piece. I bought it from USA tube audio themselves. You should be ok. My sale ran smoothly and the guy was nice at first. Then the problem came with the remote. Then I felt like he could have suggested something with a warmer signature but he flat out did not care because he got a 4000 plus sale and didn't care about getting me taken care of. It is one of the things where I learned that some folks don't care in high end. Would be careful from this point on.
I think you ought to visit Stereo Exchange in NYC - perhaps the last store on earth you can "just walk into" without an appointment. Besides, it's in a cool part of town, too.
I count myself as pretty lucky. I have never had a bad experience with either a manufacturer or a store. I bought my first hifi gear 40 years ago, and yes, there have been a few repairs now and then, but everything has been handled very well.
This has also been my experience across other industries too. Once I sent something in for repair. I received a phone call telling me my item was accidentally damaged. They were very sorry and asked if I would accept a new item in its place.
Only once did did I have a bad vendor experience - 16 years ago in buying a refrigerator. I wound up suing the store because they refused to refund an overcharge.
zavato- it is a shame that you had to sue the store to make a wrong situation, right. Good to read that the item was an appliance and not Audio gear. Happy Listening!
My stories are mild in comparison to some I have read here. I say mild because it didn’t cost me anything. There is a Paradigm dealer in my State that has a pair of Paradigm 9H’s on the floor. I had read a lot about this speaker and wanted to hear them. I called in advance to let them know I was coming and they were very accommodating. When I arrived, I was told that it was the "audio" guy’s day off (they sell other products) but they could allow me to hear them. After much fooling around with equipment and trying to figure out the software on their store system, I was able to listen to a download of a live concert. The quality of the feed was obviously not up to the task of demonstrating these speakers. My system would have blown theirs away and I paid $3000.00 for my speakers.....used!
As I recall, in the past they had a pair of Revel Salon II’s connected to the same system. I remember thinking after the listening session that I really appreciated my system. Obviously the house system they are using is not capable of demonstrating the quality of any speaker. If I were Paradigm I would pull the line from them. No one would pay the asking price of those speakers based on how they were presented. Thankfully as I stated, it didn’t cost me any money.
My other experience was with a dealer who represented a line of amplifiers. The "problem" is, the amplifiers are not inexpensive and the owner ran his store more as a hobby than a business. He did not have any of this manufacturers amps in stock so it was impossible to listen to them. He would be happy to order one for me based on his verbal description of its performance however. Needless to say I declined. I contacted the factory Rep. and was allowed to purchase product from an out of state dealer who was very helpful and had product in stock. I didn’t get to listen to it but was assured I could return it if I wasn’t happy. I would love to support a brick-and-mortar local dealer if I could listen to the product I’m interested in AND it was presented in a manner that the product deserves.
Odyssey Audio. I had wanted a Stratos amp for a long time. When I finally succumbed to the hype ( big mistake) it was an awful experience. I had hum, spurious noise and static noise from the Stratos, the Tempest and the newly designed Candela. Klaus was awful at getting back to his customers. It did not take weeks or months to get the gear fixed, it took well over a year. He was condensending, rude and dismissed my problem to power issues in my house. Later I found, on his own forum, there were many issues with his Tempest models. The same problem I had with mine. Eventually he bought the equipment back, at a big loss for me! I refused to sell his junk to someone else. I do not know why he has so many fans...
Audiofreaks is the stuff of legend in the uk. In fact Roy Gregory once had to answer a post about his bias to their imported components once. Hand in hand with that is the audio consultants - 15 years ago the owner was really rude and patronising and dismissed me as a time waster - over 20,000 worth of kit and 15 years later I saw him at a show trying to get me to buy kit off him - I politely said his equipment is great and would have bought it but for the way he was to me in the past and whilst he did not remember me I remembered him. He was surprised and belatedly apologetic...
The "Red Flag" to me was and always shall be, any dealer who, in discussing your present system, outwardly bashes it is a dealer to avoid. If he/she points out characteristics of your gear that he may be able to improve upon, without being demeaning about your present system in the process, is someone who may be worth working with.
GUY'S I got one better!! So i have 2 VTL Deluxe 120 mono power amps and i was concerned about them being on and wanted to send them back to VTL for any updates for safety concerns, then i started to get a bad humming from the amp, so i said ok let me give VTL a call. Man i got the RUN AROUND FROM HELL FROM THE OWNERS WIFE I think her name is Bea Lam operation manager of VTL, so i explained to her what my concerns were and that I needed the amp repaired so she told me that they don't have any paperwork for this amp to work on it. then she asked me did I have the amp MODDED and i said no, then she told me to take the bottom off the amp to PROVE IT TO HER!!! so i had to take pictures of the bottom of the amp and attach the pictures in a email, then she said she is going to china for a week and she will get back to me after her return, YEAH RIGHT heard that before, so i called her then she acted like she forgot about the conversation we had, OK so now i heard from her during the conversation that production is starting up and she don't know if she can do anything for my amp's But i can send them to her and and would have to go on the web site and start doing the PAPER WORK, so the paper work is like buying a new home and everything in that VTL contract is to protect VTL and not your interest the CONTRACT is 3 pages long and i think you have to pay a fee i think. long story short a old tube guy fixed the humming problem it was a bad switch.
I WILL NOT BUY FROM A COMPANY THAT DOES NOT STAND BY THERE PRODUCT FOR REPAIR.
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