Not using Anderton's again

thegummy

Hattigol said:

darius said:

SteveRobinson said:

Chappers, is that you?

No, but i did get a selfie with Rabea, Chappers and Lee in store once. It really made their day.

I bet it did. Did they get you to sing that Britney Spears song you did on Pop Idol?

Aw man I was going to ask if he was the "hit me baby one more... tiiiiiiiiime" Darius - you beat me! lol

Wazmeister

Interesting thread...

I think a Dealer really shows its colours when it comes to a problem or returns. Best for me has been Doug at Coda, who is simply superb in every way.

Distance selling regs has made returns much easier. The stores who excel at this, amd make the process hassle free and easy, are as follows;

Andertons

Gear4Music *

Thomann

Juno Records *

* will often post next day even up to 6pm, Juno 7pm !


Others that are really good;

GAK

GG


Avoid;

PMT

This above is based upon a LOT of (mainly pedal) purchases.


———————————————————————


Now buying guitars can be a whole lot different.

I have actually found one of the big boys, who are often quoted for good service, very poor when it comes to guitar returns. As such, I tend to avoid them....

Collings

A few months ago I was after a specific amp so had been watching eBay etc but seemed to just miss out on them so decided to bite the bullet and bye new from a dealer.

Contracted a dealer who confirmed they has one in stock of the spec I wanted so agreed a price.

After payment I then had major issues getting it shipped. They seemed to constantly tell me me the courier had failed to collect it. After a week of chasing it finally ships and arrives a day or so later. I unpack it and first thing I notice is it's not quite the spec they were advertising or we agreed. Then on closer inspection I think it looks very similar to a used on I,d missed on ebay. I go back and check the completed eBay listing and sure enough it's the same amp as the serial number is clearly visible in the listing.

Go back to to the dealer who claims a mix up on their part and we eventually agree I pay less that the eBay price.

When I do back and look at the other listings on eBay from the same account, which was a private account rather than a dealer/business account, they were listing loads of other gear which was also listed on the same dealers website as new along with loads of used baby clothes!

I got an amp at a good price but I won't buy from them again.

prlgmnr

I'm not entirely sure why but "a couple of guitars/amps plus numerous items of clothing" is always an Ebay red flag for me.  

Islandape

prlgmnr said:

I'm not entirely sure why but "a couple of guitars/amps plus numerous items of clothing" is always an Ebay red flag for me.  

I use my wife's account.  She sells on clothes our son's outgrown plus anything she can turn a profit on that she sees in charity shops - bit of a hobby for her I think.

Meanwhile I'm selling gaming PCs and camera equipment as I upgrade - and most of my guitar gear after I gave up for a while.

So not such an odd combination unless you've been stalking my wife's eBay account!

crunchman

Wazmeister said:

Interesting thread...

I think a Dealer really shows its colours when it comes to a problem or returns. Best for me has been Doug at Coda, who is simply superb in every way.

Distance selling regs has made returns much easier. The stores who excel at this, amd make the process hassle free and easy, are as follows;

Andertons

Gear4Music *

Thomann

Juno Records *

* will often post next day even up to 6pm, Juno 7pm !


Others that are really good;

GAK

GG


Avoid;

PMT

This above is based upon a LOT of (mainly pedal) purchases.


———————————————————————


Now buying guitars can be a whole lot different.

I have actually found one of the big boys, who are often quoted for good service, very poor when it comes to guitar returns. As such, I tend to avoid them....

I'd avoid PMT in the shop as well.  I've been lied to by their staff.

skullfunkerry

Islandape said:

prlgmnr said:

I'm not entirely sure why but "a couple of guitars/amps plus numerous items of clothing" is always an Ebay red flag for me.  

I use my wife's account.  She sells on clothes our son's outgrown plus anything she can turn a profit on that she sees in charity shops - bit of a hobby for her I think.

Meanwhile I'm selling gaming PCs and camera equipment as I upgrade - and most of my guitar gear after I gave up for a while.

So not such an odd combination unless you've been stalking my wife's eBay account!

I tend to list a load of stuff whenever there's a £1 listing offer, so it tends to be clothes, sunglasses, camera gear & tech, and guitar stuff. Having said that, I sort of agree with @prlgmnr, which I guess makes me a big ol' hypocrite

Nick

It's a shame, the website is doing an ever increasing amount of business when compared to the shop, but Andertons just does not have the capacity to expand their after-sales operation in their current premises. They have simply run out of office space and can only fit a maximum of around 10 or so people on the phones. During my tenure, those staff were at absolute capacity from 9am to 6pm, all day. The phones did not stop ringing, and the emails did not stop coming in. During the holiday periods, it was hell on earth. Even an honest phone call from a YouTube fan, enquiring as to whether Chappers was in the shop, was enough to break a man on most days.

Add to that the reliance on part-timers, and the fact that many full-timers were shared between shop floor and telephones based on the whim of one of the partners, what you ended up with was a bit of a lottery on whether your after-sales enquiry was going to be handled by the same person all of the way to its conclusion (or indeed, with complete care and competency).

What I will say however is that the majority of the staff there were good people and hard workers, but as it is with the retail industry, the best tend to move on if they cannot move up.

Whitecat

Nick said:

It's a shame, the website is doing an ever increasing amount of business when compared to the shop, but Andertons just does not have the capacity to expand their after-sales operation in their current premises. They have simply run out of office space and can only fit a maximum of around 10 or so people on the phones. During my tenure, those staff were at absolute capacity from 9am to 6pm, all day. The phones did not stop ringing, and the emails did not stop coming in. During the holiday periods, it was hell on earth. Even an honest phone call from a YouTube fan, enquiring as to whether Chappers was in the shop, was enough to break a man on most days.

Add to that the reliance on part-timers, and the fact that many full-timers were shared between shop floor and telephones based on the whim of one of the partners, and what you end up with is a bit of a lottery on whether your after-sales enquiry is going to be handled by the same person all of the way to its conclusion (or indeed, with complete care and competency).

What I will say however is that the majority of the staff there were good people and hard workers, but as it is with the retail industry, the best tend to move on if they cannot move up.

The amount of empty office space in and around Guildford is sky-high. I'm sure they could get a deal on a floor in a drab office block and install a small call centre team. Could probably handle most of the enquiries without having to even punch the call through to the shop floor. After all, the warehouse is off-site too and not particularly close to the shop, so what's another premises in the grand scheme of things?

Nick

Whitecat said:

Nick said:

It's a shame, the website is doing an ever increasing amount of business when compared to the shop, but Andertons just does not have the capacity to expand their after-sales operation in their current premises. They have simply run out of office space and can only fit a maximum of around 10 or so people on the phones. During my tenure, those staff were at absolute capacity from 9am to 6pm, all day. The phones did not stop ringing, and the emails did not stop coming in. During the holiday periods, it was hell on earth. Even an honest phone call from a YouTube fan, enquiring as to whether Chappers was in the shop, was enough to break a man on most days.

Add to that the reliance on part-timers, and the fact that many full-timers were shared between shop floor and telephones based on the whim of one of the partners, and what you end up with is a bit of a lottery on whether your after-sales enquiry is going to be handled by the same person all of the way to its conclusion (or indeed, with complete care and competency).

What I will say however is that the majority of the staff there were good people and hard workers, but as it is with the retail industry, the best tend to move on if they cannot move up.

The amount of empty office space in and around Guildford is sky-high. I'm sure they could get a deal on a floor in a drab office block and install a small call centre team. Could probably handle most of the enquiries without having to even punch the call through to the shop floor. After all, the warehouse is off-site too and not particularly close to the shop, so what's another premises in the grand scheme of things?

I'm sure they flirted with that idea. I imagine they didn't go with it at the time, as the whole operation was run very much with one of the partners in complete micro-management control - his desk was quite literally in there with the telephone team, with the rest of the admin team next door. Not sure if that is still the case, but I would be surprised if anything had changed.

MattBanshee

darius said:

SteveRobinson said:

Chappers, is that you?

No, but i did get a selfie with Rabea, Chappers and Lee in store once. It really made their day.

Was it the sort of selfie that ends up on OnlyFans?

DeepBlueWitch

Never had an issue with Andertons myself. 

mbe

DeepBlueWitch said:

Never had an issue with Andertons myself. 

Is this the Captain of the ship?

skunkwerx

I just bought a mic from Andertons at 13:30 hours. 

Can you believe that not only have they not yet delivered it, but they also made me pay money for it.. 

skunkwerx

skunkwerx said:

I just bought a mic from Andertons at 13:30 hours. 

Can you believe that not only have they not yet delivered it, but they also made me pay money for it.. 

It arrived... its being replaced. Hopefully tomorrow. 

This is what karma I get for chatting preemptive sarcastic shite. 

Musicman20

skunkwerx said:

skunkwerx said:

I just bought a mic from Andertons at 13:30 hours. 

Can you believe that not only have they not yet delivered it, but they also made me pay money for it.. 

It arrived... its being replaced. Hopefully tomorrow. 

This is what karma I get for chatting preemptive sarcastic shite. 

hahaahahha

thegummy

skunkwerx said:

skunkwerx said:

I just bought a mic from Andertons at 13:30 hours. 

Can you believe that not only have they not yet delivered it, but they also made me pay money for it.. 

It arrived... its being replaced. Hopefully tomorrow. 

This is what karma I get for chatting preemptive sarcastic shite. 

haha what mic?

skunkwerx

thegummy said:

skunkwerx said:

skunkwerx said:

I just bought a mic from Andertons at 13:30 hours. 

Can you believe that not only have they not yet delivered it, but they also made me pay money for it.. 

It arrived... its being replaced. Hopefully tomorrow. 

This is what karma I get for chatting preemptive sarcastic shite. 

haha what mic?

Lol twas a Rode video mic pro.. 

It might work fine but the sealing stickers on the box have previously been torn off as the hologram shows void lol.. 

I just want a new one..

sbarker1978

roberty said:

Cols said:

That’s a shame.  Was it a hefty discount?

The case was discounted by £35. In the end they wanted to reduce the discount by £15 to £20. This was after lots of miscommunication and wasted time on the phone. It's petty but I would just rather not deal with them at this point. The original order was for more than £1.5k

On today's episode of "Man-Babies Whinging About £5 On The Internet" 

Dan_Halen

sbarker1978 said:

roberty said:

Cols said:

That’s a shame.  Was it a hefty discount?

The case was discounted by £35. In the end they wanted to reduce the discount by £15 to £20. This was after lots of miscommunication and wasted time on the phone. It's petty but I would just rather not deal with them at this point. The original order was for more than £1.5k

On today's episode of "Man-Babies Whinging About £5 On The Internet" 

On today’s episode of “Spot the newly created account that won’t be about for long”