My Amphotoworld.com *Rant* and *Warning* to future customers

[T2T III]

About a week ago, I was seriously shopping for a Canon G2 camera. I encountered a very nasty salesperson from Amphotoworld.Com - a camera company based out of New York. After dealing with them, I noticed a link to a comments/complaint E-mail address on their site, so I took the opportunity to vent a little based on my sales issue that I encountered. I sent them the following:

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Your sales staff has to be about the biggest and dumbest pieces of sh!t
I've ever talked to. I called your company a week ago to inquire about the
Canon G2 for $479.00. Quickly, it was determined that the camera just
included the the body - no compact flash card, no lens cap, no battery, no
charger, etc. I was just in the process of asking questions so that I
could make a proper purchase when your salesperson (don't remember his
name) said "goodbye" and hung up on me.

I'll never, ever, ever purchase anything from your company for as long as I
live. Also, I make lots of recommendations on companies to friends, family
members and co-workers. I'll recommend that they avoid your company like
the plague. Additionally, I will search for as many review sites as I can
so other potential consumers can read about my horrible experience in
dealing with your company. After you realize that you don't have any
customers purchasing from you anymore, maybe you'll have enough sense to
treat a potential customer with some respect and like a human being.

If you're going to scr## someone - at least use some vaseline!!

Your business manners and practices stink!!


****************************************

I received a response toay from the earlier E-mail that I sent to them:

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Dear Valued Customer,
Thank you for showing interest in AM Photo World.
For the latest prices and updated product information, please contact our
sales department at 800 825 4269 and we will gladly assist you. For
international and local callers please contact us at 718 338 1787.


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Yeah, I may have been a bit harsh. However, I didn't care to be treated like I was some schmuck by one of their salespeople. I didn't write my comments to them until two days after my experience with them - so, I did allow a bit of a *cooling off* period before I told them what I really though.

Regarding the comment below: "they could have given you some kind of discount on the accessories or even the camera" - Yeah right!! Most of the N.Y. camera stores simply exist for the intent of selling you cheap cameras, but then jack up the prices on their accessories. By "jack up", I don't mean a simple 10% mark-up. It's more like a 100% mark-up. For example, quite a few of the N.Y. camera shops are selling 128 MB Compact Flash cards for $128. I can purchase a 128 MB Sandisk Compact Flash card from my local Costco for $55.00. How could I lose out by giving up some silly 25% discount on accessories when they jacked the price up over 100% to begin with? Also, for the G2, they wanted $199 for the battery and charger. If you head over to Batterybarn.com - you can find the charger and a battery for this camera in the range of $100 - $110.

 

[Jzero]

Even if someone actually did read e-mail sent to that address, I doubt they'd bother giving you the time of day. Take comfort knowing that they probably tacked it on their wall as the "Flame of the week."

 

[bmacd]

you didn't exactly leave the most mature message yourself. I certainly would have taken a different approach to that based on your ONE experience with the company. For all you know, they could have given you some kind of discount on the accessories or even the camera. It's too bad you lost here pal.

-=bmacd=-

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: bmacd
you didn't exactly leave the most mature message yourself. I certainly would have taken a different approach to that based on your ONE experience with the company. For all you know, they could have given you some kind of discount on the accessories or even the camera. It's too bad you lost here pal.

-=bmacd=-

Very good advice. Being a jacka$$ when writing your letter is not a cool idea - instead, waiting until you settle down a bit, and then writing a polite but firm letter is a much better idea.

 

[diskop]

I don't think it was a good idea to start with your first line. You could have put that at the end of your message and it would have made more of an impact and less of a "lets throw this letter out."

 

[rahvin]

Originally posted by: bmacd
you didn't exactly leave the most mature message yourself. I certainly would have taken a different approach to that based on your ONE experience with the company. For all you know, they could have given you some kind of discount on the accessories or even the camera. It's too bad you lost here pal.

-=bmacd=-

Actually based on what the description of what they were selling they were probably selling "grey" market cameras. These are imported from other countries and are NOT the US model and have NO US warranty. In fact if the camera breaks it will more than likely cost you 2-3x what it would cost on a US camera to fix it because the repair shop will screw you on the foreign status. You shouldn't touch a grey market digi cam if you life depended on it, they are a BAD BAD deal.