My bad experience with Circle K

[coffinwisdom]

(posted in ERG for relevance)

Now, let me preface this by saying that these strings are awesome. Definitely some of the best strings I've ever used. Also, this is only my PERSONAL experience with Circle K. If you've had a better experience great but here's what I've had to deal with:

So I ordered a 6 string balanced set for my bass. 3 or 4 days later I get a package in the mail from Circle K. Sweet. I open it up and they only sent me a 5 string set. No big deal, I'm not in a hurry and I've heard their service is great.

I fire off an email immediately after I open the package explaining my situation. I sent them a picture of what I received in the mail. It was clearly packaged as a 5 string set from the beginning even though on the Priority Mail package it says CKS-136S6BH referring to the 6 string set I paid for. I also forwarded them the email receipt they sent me confirming that I did order and pay for a 6 string set. This isn't some weird set of strings I ordered, this is a set they sell as a set under their "basic sets" page!

2 days later no response. Still a reasonable time for a business to reply to an email but just to be sure I sent the same message to their customer service email. (The first email was sent to their shipping email address.) 5 days after the second email I sent a third email. It's now been a week since my first email and I still have not received any response.

This is totally unreasonable considering the owner of Circle K actively posts on message boards and has posted on TalkBass multiple times since I started attempting to get in contact! I have been forced to dispute the transaction via PayPal. I don't even want a refund I just want my string.

It's too bad because this is a great product but due to their customer service I could never rely on them for anything except when I need extremely unusual string gauges. Even then I will hesitate to order from them in the future.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

Did you try calling the number on their website?

 

[coffinwisdom]

No to be honest I didn't understand what Google Voice is and I thought it was just connected to his email. I'll remember that.

Still, a week is more than enough time to respond to an email.

 

[Cloudy]

I'd give em' a call before writing it off as bad CS, maybe your emails are going to his junk folder?

 

[MaxOfMetal]

No to be honest I didn't understand what Google Voice is and I thought it was just connected to his email. I'll remember that.

Still, a week is more than enough time to respond to an email.

Unfortunately, email isn't perfect. It's ease of use and proliferation have lead it to be the number one source of spam, thus email clients with strong anti-spam filters can occasionally snag something that isn't spam.

The worst part, if all their support emails are on the same system, all emails from a "flagged" address will go right to the junk folder.

That's why ALL issues should really be handled via phone, as there's no excuse to not pick up.

 

[coffinwisdom]

Okay fair enough guys I will call.

I didn't mean this as slander against Circle K. They are truly a company I want to believe in and stand behind. I figured I should just share my experience. I've personally dealt with so much bad communication from sellers lately it's been incredibly annoying.

Feel free to close the thread.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

Okay fair enough guys I will call.

I didn't mean this as slander against Circle K. They are truly a company I want to believe in and stand behind. I figured I should just share my experience. I've personally dealt with so much bad communication from sellers lately it's been incredibly annoying.

Feel free to close the thread.

No one (all two of us ) is saying that you're in the wrong here.

If after calling them they're still not talking to you, that's BAD.

 

[coffinwisdom]

Unfortunately, email isn't perfect. It's ease of use and proliferation have lead it to be the number one source of spam, thus email clients with strong anti-spam filters can occasionally snag something that isn't spam.

The worst part, if all their support emails are on the same system, all emails from a "flagged" address will go right to the junk folder.

That's why ALL issues should really be handled via phone, as there's no excuse to not pick up.

Regarding this, wouldn't my email already be in their contacts list or at least not flagged because they had to email me a receipt and tracking from their orders@ email?

 

[ixlramp]

They've occasionally had problems before with emails not getting through. Their tech guy is sevenstring member knuckle_head, i guess you could try a PM but he's so busy he may not see it. They have a facebook page but i get the impression that is not checked often. Let us know how you get on. I hope they're coping okay since David Brummett left, i think there's just 2 of them now. I've talked with k_h on forums for 10 years or so, seems like a genuine and decent guy who wont let you down and will sort you out eventually, however occasionally they do get overwhelmed by their success and get behind, especially around NAMM time.

 

[Go To Bed Jessica]

I have had this happen to me with a different company in the past - in the middle of a conversation about diagnosing a problem with my amplifier. It happens.

If calling is not an option for whatever reason and you don't get a response to your email after a couple of days (especially if that person is usually good at responding), it is ALWAYS worthwhile to try again from a different email address (different domain, if possible - ie. no response from my gmail account, try again with my yahoo account). This has worked for me one more than one occasion. It's not ideal, but it's a quick and easy way to find out whether you've been spam filtered or not.

 

[MF_Kitten]

Before making public complaints about any dealings with a company, always try more than just email. Calling them and trying their facebook page would be a better idea.

 

[FollowTheSigns]

I ordered a 11-76 set, got a 11-67 set. Dyslexia got the best of whoever was packing it

 

[coffinwisdom]

Before making public complaints about any dealings with a company, always try more than just email. Calling them and trying their facebook page would be a better idea.

They're trying to run a business if they provide email as their primary form of communication they should make sure it's working correctly. It appears this isn't the first time this has happened. They also didn't double check a really simple order which led to this. I haven't had any previous trouble emailing a customer service line especially not one that has already emailed me before.

But yes I know I left a voicemail yesterday

 

[vansinn]

The topic title is too harsh. The unresponsive time frame mentioned is too short for calling bad experience.
Though I haven't bought from Skib as yet, he's been responsive, though with a delay, which he excused.
Also, remember the old man went away, and since then Skib has further been expanding his productline; it all takes time..

I'm an IT pro, and servers do cause problems at times, or someone are simply too busy.
I lost a website and forum with 2000 members due to stress, coupled with a server located in another country going bad.

 

[coffinwisdom]

Since when is a week too short of a time frame to expect a response? It's 2013.

Keep in mind I like the product quite a bit but this is obviously a problem that has existed for a while and still needs to be fixed. You can't cut businesses slack on this shit I don't care how much you like them. It's as simple as double checking the package to prevent something like this! It was as basic of an order as it could have possibly been. Now I'm hearing other experiences of people missing strings or incorrect string gauges. His website is still out of date and the homepage is broken.

If he hooks me up with my string and apologizes then yeah of course that makes up for a lot of it but he still has a lot of issues that have apparently existed for a while. I'm trying to provide an objective perspective.

 

[TheEmptyCell]

Circle K is (I believe) 2 guys. Do you run a business where you wind every ....ing string by hand? No. So calm down, and call them on the phone. Everyone is so quick to hide behind a screen name and an email address, and pussy out when they could get on the phone and have their problems solved.

 

[coffinwisdom]

They have my full name and home address I'm not hiding behind anything.

I don't care what their business model is. The fact of the matter is they have some areas in which they could improve and no one seems to be pointing these out to them because they have apparently existed for a while! If I'm paying almost $50 for one single pack of strings they can at least get my order correct in the first place.

 

[InfinityCollision]

They're trying to run a business if they provide email as their primary form of communication they should make sure it's working correctly.

This is not realistically possible. They are not running their own email servers with their own custom-designed filters. I doubt they have the expertise to do so and I'm quite sure they don't have the time or manpower. Shit happens, what really matters is how they handle the aftermath. Take a deep breath and consider holding silence on the matter until you've properly explored other avenues of communication. Hopefully they'll be able to make good on your order and address whatever might be going on with their email.

 

[Drew]

Since when is a week too short of a time frame to expect a response? It's 2013.

You know, I know Circle K is a well-liked brand around these parts, but he's right - even if this does come out to be something as simple as his messages were getting flagged as spam, email is a totally valid form of business communication, and if Circle K has a customer's email getting flagged as spam, that's something that they should be concerned about.

I wouldn't call this bad customer service until Circle K has been given the chance to make up for it (and that will probably involve having to try to call them or communicate in some other manner than email), but especially for a company that does do business internationally, not being able to get a response out of them via email for five days after they sent him the wrong set of strings is definitely something that the OP shouldn't feel guilty for talking about, you know?

 

[MaxOfMetal]

You know, I know Circle K is a well-liked brand around these parts, but he's right - even if this does come out to be something as simple as his messages were getting flagged as spam, email is a totally valid form of business communication, and if Circle K has a customer's email getting flagged as spam, that's something that they should be concerned about.

I wouldn't call this bad customer service until Circle K has been given the chance to make up for it (and that will probably involve having to try to call them or communicate in some other manner than email), but especially for a company that does do business internationally, not being able to get a response out of them via email for five days after they sent him the wrong set of strings is definitely something that the OP shouldn't feel guilty for talking about, you know?