Although this post/thread was inspired by seeing a thread praising Shearwater, I promise I am not referring to Shearwater. I am actually talking about more than one product here. In fact, as I edit this post I keep thinking of more examples with different products, so please don't try to guess who I am talking about.
Scuba equipment is expensive, and if you, like me, purchase a lot of it, you are a careful consumer. You look for great value, meaning high quality at a reasonable price. You also look for signs of service, and some companies, like Shearwater, have great reputations for their quality service. You see posts attesting to that regularly. In contrast, if you have been around long enough, you have seen examples of the opposite, where people regularly complain about service from certain companies. When I get bad service on something in any area of my life, that company gets no more of my business, and people hear about it. I had a company flat out lie to me about a drysuit repair they had made, and that experience completely soured me on them.
In this thread I want to talk about a different problem, where great service recommendations is a actually a sign of trouble.
A product has been around for a long time, and lots of people have raved about the company's willingness to fix problems with the product. If you condense the phrase a little, it comes out to "lots of people are having problems with the product." In one specific product, I personally know a lot of people who use it, and most of them use it because I have recommended it to them. I know some people who are in the market for that product now, but they are not even considering that company because they see those people regularly sending it in (and paying the postage to do so) so they can get that great service, service that would not have been needed if the product were better made.
I recently purchased a certain product that will go unnamed. It did not work out of the box. I contacted the company (famous for its service) and was told to send one of the parts in (at my expense) for repair. It was repaired, and that repair fixed a problem that that should have been identified before the product was shipped. (Don't you think you should check to see if a product works before you put it in the box?) Now that I had it working, I was able to use it, and when I did, I was thereby able to learn that another part did not work out of the box. I contacted the company and was told to send it in (at my expense) for repair. Again, it was something that should have been caught before shipping.
Early in my tech career, I noticed the same problem with drysuits. I was not happy with mine, in part for the service experience mentioned above. Certain experienced tech diving acquaintances raved about their brand and the service they received, but I noticed they only had their suits with them on about 2/3 of the dive trips because they had to send them in for repairs so often. I decided I would never own that brand of drysuit.
There really isn't much to talk about in terms of discussion. I am just warning people to look carefully before purchasing expensive equipment. Lots of testimonials about great service can be a good sign, but it can also be a red flag.
Scuba equipment is expensive, and if you, like me, purchase a lot of it, you are a careful consumer. You look for great value, meaning high quality at a reasonable price. You also look for signs of service, and some companies, like Shearwater, have great reputations for their quality service. You see posts attesting to that regularly. In contrast, if you have been around long enough, you have seen examples of the opposite, where people regularly complain about service from certain companies. When I get bad service on something in any area of my life, that company gets no more of my business, and people hear about it. I had a company flat out lie to me about a drysuit repair they had made, and that experience completely soured me on them.
In this thread I want to talk about a different problem, where great service recommendations is a actually a sign of trouble.
A product has been around for a long time, and lots of people have raved about the company's willingness to fix problems with the product. If you condense the phrase a little, it comes out to "lots of people are having problems with the product." In one specific product, I personally know a lot of people who use it, and most of them use it because I have recommended it to them. I know some people who are in the market for that product now, but they are not even considering that company because they see those people regularly sending it in (and paying the postage to do so) so they can get that great service, service that would not have been needed if the product were better made.
I recently purchased a certain product that will go unnamed. It did not work out of the box. I contacted the company (famous for its service) and was told to send one of the parts in (at my expense) for repair. It was repaired, and that repair fixed a problem that that should have been identified before the product was shipped. (Don't you think you should check to see if a product works before you put it in the box?) Now that I had it working, I was able to use it, and when I did, I was thereby able to learn that another part did not work out of the box. I contacted the company and was told to send it in (at my expense) for repair. Again, it was something that should have been caught before shipping.
Early in my tech career, I noticed the same problem with drysuits. I was not happy with mine, in part for the service experience mentioned above. Certain experienced tech diving acquaintances raved about their brand and the service they received, but I noticed they only had their suits with them on about 2/3 of the dive trips because they had to send them in for repairs so often. I decided I would never own that brand of drysuit.
There really isn't much to talk about in terms of discussion. I am just warning people to look carefully before purchasing expensive equipment. Lots of testimonials about great service can be a good sign, but it can also be a red flag.
