FastTech = Hitting your head against a brick wall or just a weird business model?

LED Flashlights – General Info
1

Thought I’d share this, not because I have any real beef with FastTech (I’ve ordered lots of things from them). But mostly because I found this all rather strange, funny and downright bemusing.

I truly can’t comprehend the business model they seem to be stubbornly adhering too. But it’s one that in this instance has certainly cost them part of product and the cost of it. PayPal were very helpful and resolved the issue with a simple phone call.

Basically I ordered a Convoy S4 host kit, which they sent out with a missing pill.

No probs I thought….

Raised a support ticket requesting that they either send the missing part, entire replacement host kit or a refund. And that I didn’t want a ping pong of messages debating this and that. And if they couldn’t do this, I’d raised a PayPal dispute instead and deal with it that way. This was 19 days ago, after having waited 4/5 weeks for the item to arrive in the first place.

FastTech responded with, if you buy something else we will send the missing part. So I raised a PayPal dispute. Which I think was quite fair and within my rights.

FastTech then stubbornly refused to do anything unless I close the dispute. But the thing is, if you close a dispute you can’t re-open it. Why should I risk them not sending me the missing part, or sending out the wrong bit. I did inform FastTech that it is against PayPal T&C’s to force a customer to close a dispute before they will do anything. I did mention, that there was sufficient time for them to send the missing part out still and that when I received it, I would close the dispute.

But no, they still refused to do anything. So escalated to a claim, where PayPal refunded the money. And FastTech lost out.

I contacted FastTech again telling them what had happened and said that if they still wanted to send to missing part out, I’d happily pay for it once it was received. I thought this was kind of fair, as I was never after the item for free.

Obviously FastTech don’t monitor PayPal very well as I then got a reply saying PayPal won’t refund without me sending back the item first. And basically said they’d do nothing else.

I did send one more message back letting them know that PayPal had already acted on it and I’d already been given a refund. And that I’d still happily re-pay for the item if they wanted to send the missing part out.

But no, the last replay in a chain of 12 messages was. You must repay for the whole item if you want us to send out the missing part.

I know many folks have gotten on ok with FastTech, me too on past orders and once I received the PayPal refund I went and ordered another S4 host kit (hoping they get it right this time).

But I truly cannot comprehend their customer service, I only ever got the impression that they didn’t want to help and only wanted to run me circles. End result is:

-it cost them a host kit + the price of it.
-I know that should I have an issue again, I’ll not bother with their customer service at all and just deal with PayPal. It’s truly not worth the effort.

2

I imagine they have only a couple CS staff members who are using google translate on emails, and that they rely very much on automated list generation and printing of shipping labels. Unless they prove otherwise the best form of customer interaction is the paypal dispute and claim.

3

yeah I dont get them either….

I’ve had relatively good experiences with them… about a dozen or so orders and all have shown up in a reasonable amount of time (1-3 weeks)… EXCEPT one.

I ordered a 4 pack of NCRB batteries a while back which didnt show for 40 days. I sent them a message saying if I didnt receive the batteries or the tracking number didnt update (It never worked to begin with) - that I would file a claim…. no answer.

Claim filed on day 44…. another 3 or 4 messages sent that week, no response. I escalated to a dispute.

I finally got a return message saying that if I close the dispute they would “look into the matter”… yeah no…. I got a refund and the batteries never showed up.

Weird.

4

You might look at it from their pov. If you make $4 a day, the cost of $5-$50 is quite a bit. Not much for you. But a hardship on them. Just ordering another product from them seems fair, if you look at it from their perspective.

I could be wrong in giving them the doubt. Still, a consideration.

5

For what its worth, there is also a sheer amount of ridiculous paypal claims and support tickets for them to possibly comprehend each individually despite the language barrier, Your issue was legit nevertheless. For a rich and prosperous online business they definitely can afford a better CS department.

6

I went through something similar recently, made no sense at all, resolved by PayPal. Like most here, I’ve placed many orders with them without any problem but should a problem arise don’t waste your time with customer service.

7

The last “missing” item I had, from any source, turned out to be on my table, I just hadn’t found it or remembered unpacking it. I have also gotten refunds for failures that turned out later not to have originated in the products in question. In addition, I am sure there are customers who enjoy the game of seeing what they can swindle out of Internet stores. Most American companies have a higher markup on larger products and can afford to assume the customer is right, in spite of that often not being the reality of the situation. But maybe companies like the one in question can’t afford that, or the time to make more accurate evaluations.

8

May for 4 each cr123as xtar batteries and 2 each Panasonic 3400 mah s when I opened a ticket with Fasttech cs all I got was it takes longer due to surface delivery, my question is surface of where ,Mars? So now it’s too late to file a paypal dispute. I’m really not getting Fasttech either.

9

No, sorry I don’t see how that is fair at all. I’m sure there is no culture were it is acceptable to make someone pay for something else, just to get the thing they have already paid for.

The thing that baffles me is, it’s just so obvious what would happen. I even mentioned in my original ticket that I’d claim through PayPal if they messed me about or couldn’t resolve it sensibly. So they know PayPal will do this.

FastTech list the missing pill (out of stock), but it’s $1.21 + free shipping at retail price. This means, they could have sent out this missing part for under a dollar most likely and problem solved with the CS person having to spend almost no time sorting it out. And the item still being a net profit overall. I’m also a repeat customer, so most businesses I’d have thought would have the sense to ‘keep it simple stupid’.

They basically forced a PayPal claimed to happen. Which instead of costing them under a dollar, cost them 1x host kit + $14.57 and wasted the time of CS person.

If you were in retail, which option would you want:

a) item of stock down. Refunded retail price of stock. Member of staff wasting time for no result. Unhappy customer.

or

b) Reduced profit on item, but still making a net profit. Staff member utilised time for positive outcome. Happy customer.

Seems like a no brainer to me.

10

Longevity is not part of the modelling process. When the time comes, FT will be known as Smiling Rainbow Megamart…

11

Ft became the worst dealer from china. I think nothing would be wrong, if theye were banned from here…

12

I was in a similar situation with Fasttech but it was satisfactorily resolved without Paypal. They said they would include the missing part with my next order.
I already had some items in my cart. I placed the order and told them the order number. They included the missing item as promised.
I went through their ticket process without making demands but looking for an amicable solution.

From my experience they have a fine business practice in place. They trust customers who trust them. They try to keep costs down.
You may be misrepresenting what they said or misinterpreting. I was not told to buy something else but that the missing item would be included in my next order.
You indicate that you would not negotiate a mutual agreement but insisted that meet your terms.

I have even had them refund for a delayed battery order without having to make a request or Paypal dispute.

You obviously wanted an adversarial relationship. They are probably better off without you as a customer.
Although you live in the UK, you have adopted American attitudes towards another culture as shown by your unwarranted slagging them off.
Patience and understanding are values appreciated by the east but are foreign to the westh

13

I had an item missing on an order, and contacted CS. They said that they would include the missing item in my next order, and they did. I just had to put my order on hold after making it, and contact CS and give them the order no.

I think that it was resolved perfectly OK.

So far I have no reasons to complain about FT or their CS.

14

wrong.

only the host kit.

you basically got a free host kit

15

The problem as I understand is partly that only senior CS staff can access the Paypal disputes emails. For a while it has been standard procedure to ask customers to close disputes.

16

(being European) I do agree with the patience part :tired: , but I never found much understanding with Fasttech. They actually have difficulty understanding issues of customers and do not make an effort trying to understand them. What they basically do is try to solve the issue in a way as cheap as they can get away with. Disagreement with their standard way of solving things (sending missing parts with the next order is one of their standard solutions, offering to buy a wrongly delivered item -that you do not want- for an insultingly low discount is another one) results in fruitless discussions with them not picking up any of your reasonable arguments. Trusting their returning customers and building up a long-term relationship is alien to them. I suspect that they use their different culture to avoid proper customer support.

That said, they are one of the more reasonable chinese vendors, and for the prices I pay for their products I am still satisfied with that they at least have some customer support.

But to call them 'understanding'....no!

17

The sad thing here is, you evidently haven’t read everything I posted in the op. sigh….

I’d like to pick up on a point you make:

“They said they would include the missing part with my next order.
I already had some items in my cart.”

I did not have anything ‘in the cart’ and was not planning to buy anything from them until next pay day. This means that I’d have to have waited maybe another 8 weeks+ to get the missing part when you factor in delivery time. And then I’d have to be praying they actually managed to send to correct part out (it happens, people get it wrong!). Waiting this long would also waiver the 45 day PayPal period. You may not care about your money, but I do and this is simply too much risk on my part.

Another point I’d like to point out:
“I went through their ticket process without making demands but looking for an amicable solution.”

I did not make demands, I simply informed them that if they couldn’t sort it out, then I’d use PayPal instead. The aim here was simple, I didn’t want to piss about wasting my time with meaningless communication and still not get anywhere. As it happens there have been 13 communications and nearly 3 WEEKS! of f*cking around. With good fortune the missing part would have already arrived if they’d just done a sensible job and sent it out when I reported the problem.

From there it was a simple case of they would do nothing unless I closed the PP dispute, which if you read PP’s T&C’s is a clear breach of them. And again places all risk on me.

Patient and understanding are great things, hence why not using PayPal firstly. But you come across as a complete and utter ARSE!

18

That’s great “if” you are ordering something else. I wasn’t.

19

That’s fine, so long as they have actually addressed the issue. But refusing to do anything “unless” you close the dispute first isn’t. In the UK I don’t even think such practices would be legal for a company (a form of entrapment or removing a customers statutory rights).

20

If they do realize they are handling international business they should hire people who can read and write english. Language barrier can never be an excuse for them to not deliver quality CS, because they know who they are dealing with already! With 1.3 billion population don’t tell me you can’t find a suitable person for the job. Although most of them cannot use english but I know there are people who can speak pretty excellent english in China.

Sometimes I suspect they pretend as they don’t know english (while they actually know) to get away from disputes.

I will still order from Fasttech, Banggood… some of these infamous Chinese companies any day because they have good selections of product with good prices, but since we all have good or bad dealing experience with them we know what to do to protect ourselves. For examples with Banggood I will always ask them if something is really in stock before I place my order, never trust their product listing status (lesson learned).

Always keep in mind that they are thousands of miles away from us. It is very easy for them to get away from disputes or ignore your problem at all, and you really can’t do anything with them. Our only upper hand is on Paypal if anything happen. If we can’t change their bad service and attitude, we can at least change ourself to become smart consumers.