Monday, November 03, 2008

Beware Canadian Paintball

I ordered something online from Canadian Paintball. The shipment arrived on Friday - and one of the products (the most expensive one of course) had a small but important piece broken off. I looked in the box for it and it was not there. It is obvious that this product was broken before it was shipped.

I emailed them immediately, with no response. Today I emailed their Sales asking for directions to return it for new product or to get a refund as this item is totally unusable without this part. Their website has all sorts of guarantees to make you think they are a legitimate business yet when faced with this type of problem their response was it's not their responsibility, it must have happened during shipping and the best they can do is advise me to file a claim with Canada Post.

This post might evolve as the interaction with this "company" unfolds. Obviously I will file a Paypal dispute as I am tired of internet rip off artists taking my money (hundreds of dollars in this case). Anyone considering buying online with Canadian Paintball - my advice would be to pay a little extra and actually go someplace reputable where you can see the product before you pay for it. Buyer beware!

Update: Canadian Paintball informed me today that they have no intention to participate in the Paypal dispute and have ended it. There will be no refund or exchange. I shall leave Canada Post to it's investigation of the the situation regarding the insurance AND surprisingly enough I am starting to find others on the web who have had issues with this company.

Last Update: We will never use Canadian Paintball again. For anyone looking for Paintball products and materials in Edmonton and area I wholly recommend PaintBall Action Games where we had wonderful hands on client service and they fixed up everything that was wrong with our faulty marker, for free!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Their policies state that they do not offer a warranty. When an item is shipped new, in a sealed box it is not possible for the retailer to know it is broken. You receive a manufacturers warranty with your purchase, and you should have contacted the manufacturer to have it exchanged under the warranty. Unfair in my opinion to post a buyer beware blog post, when in reality it was your fault that you did not read their policies.

If you read the policies on the majority of paintball websites, you will see that the large majority of them have the same policies. I am sure they did not intend on sending you a broken marker, but sh*t happens. All you had to do was contact the manufacturer and you would have received a replacement.

Posted by another paintball retailer.

Allie Wojtaszek said...

Well maybe your paintball site you ship items from the manufacturer in a sealed box but this was not the case with our purchase that came from Canadian Paintball.

The marker we purchased came in an oversized cardboard box with the marker and object packed with an small irregular assortment of styrofoam pieces. It was obviously not packed by the manufacturer and it was not sealed. In addition, it was broken and the piece was missing (not in the box) meaning it was packed like that.

You can read Canadian Paintballs warranty right here. It states "CanadianPaintball.com repairs almost everything it sells. We either repair it in shop, or we will send the product to the manufacturer for repair or replacement as deemed necessary by the manufacturer."

However when I first contacted them I did not receive any helpful directions on how to resolve the issue at hand (repair, replace, refund, etc). It is not my experience that they are willing to stand behind the product they sell or care about the service they provide.

In un-signed emails to me "they" were rude, clearly unprepared to find a resolution and called me a liar (insisting that the product was not broken).

We purchased a product online, in good faith, that we paid for (and payment was accepted) and when we received it we discovered it was broken and unusable. After contacting the company we purchased from we were unable to get the product fixed, replaced or our money back. That's an unsatisfactory experience.

I think that our experience is EXACTLY the kind that calls for a "buyer beware blog post." I have every right to describe to people my experiences, especially if it can help someone else from having the same experience.

I sincerely would not recommend that anyone use this company. We will never do business with them again.

Eventually we found a local Paintball company who fixed the marker for free (they agreed that it was shipped to us broken). This paintball store has received all of our business since then - a great investment on their part.

Every time someone asks for a place to buy, rent or play all things paintball, I suggest this place and I tell them why.

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