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A few days ago I contacted SM to point out hat their new website had a glitch (link that didn't work) and was contacted 2 days later with an apology saying it had been fixed - not much wrong with that.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

After singing SM’s praises earlier in this thread, last week my latest order arrived … without a tool I’d been waiting on that was holding up a customers job, and with a set of Waverley tuners that I didn’t order.

I emailed SM and it took 72 hours for them to reply. They offered to express ship the missing tool (which I appreciate) but said it was on me to organise return of the waverly tuners at my expense and they’d then reimburse me the shipping cost.

(They say since I’m outside the US their usual system of mailing out a merchandise return label doesn’t work.)

Now, I’m not expecting a free lunch here, but in my opinion it should be on them, the vendor, to organize and pay for fedex or whoever to come pick these tuners up. Why should I have to drive the tuners across town and front the cash to fix stewmac’s mistake?

Am I being unreasonable? Their email did land in my inbox pre-coffee

Is this getting to be a thing with StewMac?
Did they charge you for the tuners you didn't order? In some circumstances you can consider it free merchandise when a merchant sends you an item in the mail you didn't order. If you paid with a credit card you can dispute the charges.
https://lifehacker.com/you-re-allowed-t ... 1789443602

If StewMac keeps sending out stuff people didn't order and then expects customers to mail it back to them on their nickel they may be in for a rude awakening. I'm sure StewMac adds a handling charge - will they pay the customer a handling charge for the trouble of sending it back?

I was also wondering about whether they had charged him for the tuners. What leverage do they have to get the tuners back at all? Seems to me they should be going out of their way to get them back with absolutely no hassle for josh.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

This is not the StewMac of old. What a shame.

I don’t think I was charged for the tuners, they just ended up in the box along with all the other stuff I ordered.

I was certainly charged for the tool that didn’t arrive. But it seems like they’re fixing that and I get that accidents happen.

I have no intention of keeping these tuners I haven’t paid for. But I also have no intention of bearing the actual shipping cost plus the opportunity cost of time spent organising shipping, just to fix stewmacs error. My business isn’t huge but it’s still a business and time has some value. I guess we’ll see what SM says when I explain that.

Wow. That was low

If these items are not showing on an invoice, I wonder how many buyers are finding "extras" in the box and not mentioning it to StewMac?

I've done 3 orders from them this month, my usual combo of parts and the odd tool. The first two arrived on time and with the correct items. Third order should be here tomorrow so we'll see.

Edit: order #3 got here on time and with the correct items. Sounds like StewMac may have a bit of a hit or miss problem, maybe some untrained new people or ??

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I had an interchange with customer service a couple of weeks ago. It took 3 days for them to answer my request, but all was resolved satisfactorily with no problems. I would suggest cutting them a bit of slack. Business has not been as usual for a year and a half now. Folks are meeting all kinds of challenges just trying to do what used to be easy. Many jobs are going unfilled due to the lack of applicants. It’s not ideal, but maybe just do them a favor and send the tuners back the next time you go across town.

Yeah, there's a problem at Stewmac IMO. I ordered one of of the ebony fingerboard specials they had recently, It was just thrown into a box, hardly any packing, not strapped to a support board and it arrived broken in half at the 7th fret. Oh,and it was also missing an inlay. Over the last 2/1/2 weeks I've tried several times to contact them via the contact us for "world class" customer support, no replies, no phone number listed anywhere, old phone number doesn't work. So it appears that I'm stuck with it thanks to their "world class" customer service. It wasn't a lot of money, but.. I will say that it was a nice piece of ebony and a very good deal. So if anyone scored some of those, way to go.
How you go from 5 star customer support to 0 star customer support overnight I don't know. This is more than a Covid problem, unless they're a one man show who has Covid. I don't think so.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Private equity firms often make changes to make a business more "profitable". That may be one reason customer service has changed for the worse. Another thing they sometimes do is cut employee benefits, which can create disgruntled employees who no longer take pride in their work and may do things like carelessly fill orders, leaving out some things and adding in other (un-billed) expensive items to get back at the company. This is all "speculative fiction" on my part - I have no real knowledge of what is going on at StewMac, but there does seem to be a trend of companies cutting real wages and benefits and then complaining they can't find good help.
I think the pandemic has shown people how they are truly valued by "business". Even the Chinese are dealing with "tang ping" - "laying flat". The younger generation is eschewing the rat race's hamster wheel that makes them run faster without getting ahead.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-lying ... s-by-storm

This is very discouraging. I think the first order I ever made to Stew Mac was in about 1992. I used to love to thumb through the catalog and the little tips sections they had in their for building and repair. I have literally NEVER had a problem with them and in fact they have been exemplary in every way.

Yes, they literally had world class customer service. We've been spoiled by our suppliers like Stewmac, LMI , Allied and the various other suppliers that pride themselves on customer service. Let's hope the others don't follow Stewmacs lead.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Maybe I should cut them some slack. On the other hand, I’m running my little business during a global pandemic too - will they cut me some slack? The answer is, apparently not.

I’ve been very happy with SM over the years but our relationship is 100% transactional. I have paid a fair rate for every item I’ve purchased from SM. I get what I need, they make money. Neither of us owes the other anything - it’s just business.

I explained to SM that I thought it was fair if they took responsibility for organising return shipping on the item, so I wasn’t losing time and fronting cash to fix their mistake. I also mentioned that I thought they weren’t offering the same quality of customer service as in years gone by.

Their response was (and I quote): “thanks for the feedback, we definitely understand.”

But their position is mostly unchanged. They have now offered to front the cost for shipping if I organise it and do the legwork to get the item on its way. How generous of them.

I guess I’m just perplexed by this situation where I’m at work in the shop here, minding my own business when suddenly something I didn’t ask for lands on my doorstep and I now am apparently obligated to find time to run an errand for poor ol’ SM so they aren’t out the money on this piece of merchandise. Nearest shipping centre is about an hour drive round-trip.

I’ve only been an SM customer 10 years but this is the first time they’ve been anything other than fantastic. I use to marvel at how they’d get a package of urgently needed supplies from their warehouse in Ohio to my shop in Australia in under 72 hours. They never once made an error and email enquiries were answered within hours.

One reason StewMac has been successful is because of the added value of the little tweaks they make to the tools, the convenience of "one stop" shopping, and the superior customer service they gave. It's certainly not the pricing. It's not a business you can run with a Big Box Store mindset.
Josh,
Would StewMac have been aware of their mistake if you hadn't contacted them? As Bob mentioned, you don't have to make a special trip to send the tuners back, you can do it next time you happen to be in the area. That is what I would do.

I don't know about you guys, but I won't be buying from them until or if they fix this.

You likely know this, but you are under no obligation whatsoever to fix their mistake. If you feel like doing them a favor, you of course can do that, but it's entirely at your discretion. If it was me with that hour drive, I would tell them to step up and take care of it on their own, or write it off as a loss. Their choice.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

They wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t told them - the tuners were at the bottom of the box of goods, I hadn’t ordered them, they weren’t listed on the packing slip.

I thought I’d better let them know ASAP as i figured there must be some other guy opening his order to find out the tuners he’d been waiting on were missing!

Considering the cost of labor and interruptions to both the sender and the recipient, if I got a surprise addition to my order that wasn't on the packing slip, I think I'd add the freebie to my inventory and carry on. Not the same thing, but many times I've ordered stuff that needed to get returned, and I've been told to just keep it, we'll make the order right. Done. It may well cost a vendor more to negotiate the return of stuff sent in error than the item cost them in the first place.

I doubt that a vendor would inadvertently pack something really costly by mistake, but I'm not the one doing the packing.

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Peter Havriluk

Something similar happened recently with a USB cable I ordered for my Olympus E-P3 camera. The vendor stated that it worked with this model, but it didn't. When I apprised him of this, but that it did work for the OMD-em5 and 5ii which take a similar looking cable he said he would refund my money and to just keep the cable. Since it did work for the other cameras, I told him to just refund 1/2 the monies ($4) as I could use it as a spare. I'm still looking for a cable that will work for the E-P3 so I don't have to pull the SD card each time to download photos.
When a vendor sends me a return shipping label, I send the item back. It's a bit of a hassle but if they return my money it's only fair to send the item back.
Most vendors wouldn't intentionally send something really costly that wasn't ordered, but a disgruntled employee might! Many people wouldn't complain about finding extra stuff in the box they weren't charged for.

In case anyone was staying tuned for the thrilling conclusion - you will recall SM had sent me a set of tuners I didn’t order or pay for, and neglected to send me another item I did pay for. We’re still at stalemate on the tuners. But when I brought the missing item to their attention around a month ago they apologised and said they’d ship the it immediately.

Having still not received it after 30 days, I sent them a gentle enquiry this week. After the (now normal) 48hr wait to receive a reply, they got in touch to let me know that, whoops! turns out they had forgotten to ship the item *again*.

Assuming they remember to mail it this time, total wait time on my order of this in-stock item will be around nine weeks.

That is unacceptable.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I sure hope this is a one off kind of incident. I've had great luck with Stew Mac's service and products since the 70's. Things can change though...

Dave