What’s with companies I have to chase down to give my money to?!
Ha ha ha, despite mentioning I was writing this, I forgot it was in my drafts folder!
For my birthday last summer, Valerie gave me this super cool tank with the NYC Marathon course on it.
I don’t think any race will ever surpass NYC as my favorite marathon, so this was a very special gift. And I love maps (and map graphics), so having one on a shirt excites me. Ha ha.
Since I loved the idea of this type of tank so much, I decided to get one for Erin, either for Christmas or her January birthday, of her hometown marathon course, from the company that made this tank, Runskin. I remembered when Valerie posted about Runskin on her blog, she mentioned they will add a new course, even if they don’t have it. I saw that they already had a sticker with Erin’s hometown course on it, so I figured it would be feasible to add it to a tank! And if I contacted them early enough (Valerie had told me how long they took to send the NYC one), they’d get it done in time for either Christmas or Erin’s birthday !
No.
Here is when I contacted them:
- November 28 (Thanksgiving) – I fill out the form on their website. It’s Thanksgiving, so I expect it will take a week to reply. I hear nada.
- December 13 – I send them a Facebook message and ask who I can contact about the custom shirt. Hear nothing back.
- December 14 (getting too late!) – I reach out to Valerie and ask for her personal contact at the company and email him. I never hear from him.
- December 19 – Try Facebook again.
Note – there was no phone number on their website, otherwise, I would have called them.
I was kind of disappointed. I felt like I did everything I could to reach out to them, and heard nothing back.
But, eh, consumerism, not the end of the world, right? There are a million other things in the world to buy. And when I shop online, I don’t want it to be a pain, like this.
This just made me think “Why do I have to chase you down to give you money?!” This is NOT the first time I have encountered this, AT ALL… but I won’t list every instance, out, here.
Have you ever been in a situation where you felt like you had to “chase someone down” to give them your business?
Funny thing, I clicked on their website today and saw this:
Ha ha, you can email them, but they probably won’t respond.
I wonder what is going on. The last time they updated their Facebook page was December 2nd. I really hope all the people that placed holiday orders with them, actually got them! And that they are more responsive when they open up shop, again.
Note: unresponsiveness makes me NUTS. Maybe this just bugs me. If I email you with a question… please respond. At some point. On that note, I booked a venue for my snister’s bachelorette party yesterday and the lady was SUPER responsive and helpful! I thanked her for that a few times.
Themocracy
Most likely they got overwhelmed and didn’t know it would be so popular. Either they’ll come back or they won’t. They contacted me about doing a posts on stuff and I never responded. I should have jumped when I had the chance!!
That’s fine if that is the case, but they are not creating a very good reputation by not responding to simple inquiries. But maybe they think when people don’t respond to their inquiries, they don’t have to, as well? That doesn’t seem like good business logic, imho.
I agree! It’s unfortunate that people don’t understand good business skills.
I think I am hyper aware since we have a small business and Steven works really hard to respond to everyone.
I know a site with really good CS! 😀
But in all seriousness (not that what I said isn’t true!) that sounds SUPER frustrating…you contacted them 3 more times than I would have, to be honest. There are lots of places to spend money. (Really, I’m good at finding them. …a little good, haha.)
😉 😉 😉
I just wish I could have found another place that did this. Maybe I should have looked! Research, ugh, I hates it.
OMG. I am super into quick responsiveness, and I find it unbelievably frustrating when companies do this. You want money, I want to give you money, make it work. I think it’s difficult, too, when there was so much thought in the gift.
It’s sort of weird that they went dark so quickly. I got quite a few emails from them soliciting reviews/giveaways. I think if you are going to blitz like that, you need to be ready.
Man, so many commenters are saying they reached out to them, it makes me wonder what the heck happened?!
Interesting you posted about this company. They contacted me a while ago offering me a product to review and I was late (about 2 weeks) to respond. When I did I was incredibly apologetic and asked if they offer still stood to review a product and I never heard back from them. I didn’t think much of it because it had taken me a long time to respond to them too but I guess it’s possible that they are just bad at responding to e-mail? I wonder if I’d have received a product had I responded right away?
Wow! I would think after two weeks they would still respond to your email. Man. I am really starting to wonder about them! Another commenter posted this, which is interseting! outsidetime.net/blog/2014/2/13/runskin-matt-hawkins-giveaway-fail
I’ve seen a few things about this company not delivering. Most recently, over at Outside Time…
outsidetime.net/blog/2014/2/13/runskin-matt-hawkins-giveaway-fail
It really is frustrating when you don’t hear back from people!
Ooo, thanks for sharing that! I used to read that blog, I should add her back to feedly. Makes me feel better I wasn’t the only one but it’s so awful for the winner of her giveaway and the people who didn’t get their orders!
Agreed, it would be so disappointing to have actually placed an order and then not receive it. I don’t have any experience running a business myself but not responding to customers/potential customers seems like a bad way to go.
For Brian’s 40th birthday, I did some research (or so I thought) and found a bottle of french wine that was bottled in 1973. Cool, right, since he was born in ’73 and it was his 40th birthday….I ordered it nearly 2 months early since it was coming from the UK, and paid my $95.00 promptly. Yeah…that was the last I heard…I emailed the site, the company, more times than I can count, and no wine-and no money back. So in this instance I was chasing them down to get what I PAID for…bah. Never again will I buy anything international online unless I KNOW I can count on receiving what I bought. rant over. lol
Darn darn darn!!! No phone #, either?!
This is a disappointment. I thought their products looked cool and had in the back of my mind that someday I’d like to get a Chicago Marathon related something, like an iPhone cover. That would have been quite motivating for me this year, while training for that race. Oh well. Thanks for letting us know. Outside Time’s post was especially disappointing.
Funny you mentioned this. I had a problem with the very same company. I had won a giveaway from Valerie and when I went to redeem it, there were two different prices for the tank I wanted. Of course the more expensive price was on the order form. So I tried to get in touch repeatedly and failed. And gave up. Frustrated. Because it really is a cool tank/product.
DANG! That stinks! 🙁 And I bet it made her feel bad, too! 🙁
Marcia, I’m SO sorry to hear that 🙁 I can’t imagine how frustrated you were…sounds like this company isn’t very well equipped with a good customer service program…absolutely ridiculous.
Oh I hate this! Working as a concierge it would fuel me with fire when our vendors (companies who we had established relationships with!) or others would not respond to emails! Especially when my email was some like “yes my client would like to order $2,000+ of catering (details and niceness)”. Like…you cannot respond to that at all?! I had to call and I got the lady’s voicemail and left a message and then 2 days later called the main number and asked if she had been off…nope, she’s been here and we have the order confirmed.
I got a ton of emails from these guys and now that I think of it, I responded to one and never heard back. And I was really interested in their stuff too.
GRRR! Yes! What is with that?! We have had similar issues placing orders for our business… confirming them, getting people to respond… wth?! We are not joking around! Why won’t they get back to us!
Darn! I am surprised to hear this happened to SO many! Makes me feel a bit better about my experience though!
maybe you can try 262apparel.com They have shirts with the course for Los Angeles and Houston; maybe they will do a custom one.
Thanks for the rec! 😀
Nina’s comment reminds me of when I was wedding planning. We had a meeting with a caterer, talked about everything we’d want/need, told him our date, and he said he’d follow up with a quote. Never heard anything. Never. We didn’t even try to contact him again because we changed venues and no longer needed a caterer. Plus, we kind of wanted to see what happened when the date came if he would contact us afterward. Nope. It’s so bizarre!
But, hey, thanks for trying for me!!
Gah! What the heck? Did they figure it was too much work for them? I do wonder how businesses decide when to bid on something and when not to (as I deal with that at work) but… if you met with him… derp!!!!
Maybe I will have better luck next year!!! 😀
Wow, that’s insane!!
I like a response too. Maybe not if I didn’t ask a question, but if I do…you better respond!! It’s just good manners, you know?
That is a cool shirt, but I’m not so sure I’d order one now!!