AAAAAArrrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!

[Limey]

I AM SO ANGRY I JUST GOTTA LET OFF SOME STEAM...........

Early last December I ordered and paid a deposit on an Uberti Cattleman single action revolver......four and three quarter barrel........357 calibre.....plain Jayne ordinary blue and standard grips........

I was told ''2 months wait'' by the guy in the shop.....so, I've been waiting.....and I don't do waiting very well at all!......so today was 2 months....I call the shop.....

''is my gun in?''

''No...I'll call the importer then call you back''

Two hours later I get a call

....'I've called the importer....only thing they can offer you is the seven and a half inch barrel in that calibre....if you want the four and three quarter you will have to wait until May''...

...please note, this conversation is taking place in French....not my native tongue....but boy!....by this time I am getting VERY fluent and very hot under my collar!

....''MAY.....WHAT DO YOU MEAN MAY?....that means I will have been waiting seven months for this gun!''

...''Sorry, but that's what the importer told me''.


By now I am incandecent.....I crank up Uberti's webpage....find a phone number and call the factory in Italy.

...'Hello'' I say....''Sorry I cannot speak Italian, can you speak English?''

...''Sure, no problem''

So I tell this lovely lady the whole tale and she say's:

....''I will check my computer....no, I have not recieved an order for that gun from France....we have them in stock....if I get an order it will be in France within the week.....our factory was shut for a month over Christmas due to lack of orders so we will be happy to sell you a gun....',sadly I cannot sell you a gun directly, because of the import laws it must go via the official importer''

Now.....I am ballistic with frustration....I call the gun shop again and tell them the whole story......they were perplexed....''but the importer tells us it is not possible until May''

...I say '' the importer is lying''

....he says he will call again and let me know...I say goodbye....the phone goes dead at their end!!!!


By now my wife is throwing buckets of cold water over me as she thinks I am going to explode!!!!!


You guy's in the 'States are so lucky.....a gun shop on every street corner.....plenty of choices to go and buy from so they HAVE to be on the ball and competitive....here in France anything unusual is like trying to find rocking horse dung......and believe me, a single action cartridge gun is a hard thing to find here and well out of the ordinary.

Having had a couple of hours going over this afternoons events in my head my 'gut' is telling me that the importer cannot shift that seven and a half incher and is hoping that I will cave in and take that rather than the long wait for the four and three quarter...........if I'm right....I hope his mum and dad get married soon!

Phew!....that feels a whole lot better off my chest....a problem shared and all that.........now I've stirred up a hornets nest with the factory, the shop and the importer we'll see what happens.....I will let you know.

Safe shooting,


Limey

[mike in co]

not bad for a limey.....
( me thinks you have it nailed)
call the factory back, ask for a list of importers...ask your dealer who he is using ....then go to someone else!

mike in co

[Vly]

Good rant! I give it 9.5 on the 10 scale. The fact that you are being lied to makes it all the more compelling. Hope you get it sorted quickly.

....rocking horse dung. Gotta remember that one. :)

[missionary5155]

Greetings Limey
How I Understand ! And do the Frogs have a term for " Mañana "... which really means "Any future date of our choosing" ?
"Brew up--- 4 RTC Brew Up".. How I used to enjoy hearing that on the FM radio standing in my tank turret.
Mike

[monadnock#5]

I AM SO ANGRY I JUST GOTTA LET OFF SOME STEAM...........
....I hope his mum and dad get married soon!
Limey

I'm glad to see you haven't lost your sense of humor! Don't let the bustards get you down! :drinks:

[Maven]

"You guy's in the 'States are so lucky.....a gun shop on every street corner....."

Limey,

Must be a different U.S. than I live in as there isn't a gunshop within my city's limits and damned few in the county as well. While it's true that I can drive 5 miles to the local Gander Mtn. and purchase a pistol, I won't and haven't since their prices are out-freakin'-rageously high. Indeed, I purchased my last pistol from a guy on Gunbroker.com and couldn't have been be happier with the price and service. However, I do understand why you're frustrated and understand completely: Somebody's not telling the truth or there's been a gross lack of communication between Uberti and your dealer. No one likes being manipulated like this. Bummer!

[3rptr]

Maybe that's what happened here in Kalifornia. We got frenched.

[trickyasafox]

Sorry to hear it! hopefully it gets straightened out sooner than later.

[Tom Herman]

You guy's in the 'States are so lucky.....a gun shop on every street corner.....plenty of choices to go and buy from so they HAVE to be on the ball and competitive....Limey

Don't count on it! I've had my experiences... One gun shop told me they sent my revolver back to the factory for service. Several months went by, and nothing.. I called the factory, gave them the S/N of the gun, and they said they never got it.
Talk about being incandescent! It took me ELEVEN MONTHS to get the gun back from them. Guess who has never seen any more business from me?

Then there was the local shop that handeled a Gunbroker.com purchase transfer for me. It took FIVE WEEKS from the time I paid the seller before I could pick it up at the store.
The kicker was that once they finally gave the seller enough info to actually ship it, they LIED to me about not having it! I had to confront them on the tracking info..
The conversation went something like this:

Me: Is the gun in?
Them: Nope, haven't seen it.
Me: Well, I have the tracking number in front of me, and you people signed for it Monday a week ago at 1:52 PM...
Them: Let me look for it (sound of paper rustling) (30 seconds of big silence). Well what do you know! It's here....

I was in the previous week and they LIED to me then as well about not having it.
These guys are OK to deal with IF the item is on the shelf, but God help you if you ask them to special order anything....
I've had to take the attitude that if it is not on a local shelf, it may be weeks before I get an item, and it will inevitably be broken, or the wrong size, color, or caliber, and it will be months before I finally get what I actually ordered and get it right.

Yes, we have it good here, but some things like idiots and poor service are universal...
Best of Luck getting your SAA!

Happy Shootin'! -Tom

[monadnock#5]

Hey Tom, just out of curiosity, was that a toll call? There's been a bunch of times over the years when a gun shop has had an order come in for me, but wouldn't call to tell me it was in. It seems to be an industry wide thing. They're allergic to toll calls.

[jhrosier]

Tom,
I believe that some guys open a gun shop to make easy money and just don't give a thought to customer service.
I have worked part time in two different shops over the years and the owners of both were too lazy to bend over and pick up a dime. Both would take money for special orders and then wait weeks to place the order. I can't begin to imagine why a simple phone call could be so difficult.
Both shops were out of business as soon as they 'used up' all of the new customers in the area.

I will have to say that the internet has made things easier nowadays. My current dealer runs his store with customer service in mind. When I ask for a non-stocked item, he steps over to the computer and orders it while we are talking. He gets orders form his main suppliers every week and from Brownells every couple of weeks. It is so convienient for me that I don't mid paying him a couple of buck extra to make the order. This small sporting goods store has been around since 1947, in the same family.

Jack

[Bent Ramrod]

Limey, if it makes you feel any better:

Around last Election Day, taken by that tide in the affairs of men, I decided to order a 4-3/4" Cimarron with the "old style" frame and ejector and the "fire blue" finish. No particular reason, except I had a 7-1/2" with the straight blue already and I wanted the short barrel and the extra finish this time. As far as I am concerned, the 7-1/2" barrel is the SAA, but I just wanted something different. It was in their catalog as a standard offering.

A month or two after the order went in, I heard from the dealer that the "fire blue" finish is ordered so seldom that the manufacturer does not do it themselves anymore, preferring to outsource that particular finish to somebody somewhere. Whoever this is apparently has yet to get that "fire" started. I have heard nothing of the whereabouts of that revolver for the last month, and heard plenty of "it's on the way" assurances for the two months before that.

Meanwhile, of course, the delay has meant that my official Mordor-under-the-Palms Kalifawnia Handgun Safety Certificate has gone out of date, and in order to satisfy our Governor that I am Safe with the revolver I will have to retake the Official Handgun Safety Test at another $25 (or whatever it has gone up to) a pop. And when it does show up, another two weeks to "let me cool off and change my mind" as the old stereotype goes.

If I got back all the time I've spent waiting for other people to get their act together, I'd live to 150 for sure.

[Buckshot]

................Too bad guys. No problem getting guns, just a buttplate for the last one :-) I go into the gunshop and say, "I wanna buy..................". The guy looks in his computer and says, "Hmm, not one in the warehouse, hold on while I do some checking". After some ticky tacking on computer keys he says, ah okay so n so has one. You wanted set triggers right?" I affirm. He taps a couple keys and says, "Okay we can start the paperwork. I got the serial number and it's supposed to be here in 4 days.

Or I can go to Turners and even THOSE boneheads can look in thier computers (when I was looking for my Savage 10FP) and tell me how much it will cost and when they'd have it.

..................Buckshot

[Limey]

....Me and Mrs. Limey were out all day cutting down trees and clearing somebody elsies garden.....really good job...we get paid plus we get to keep all the felled wood as well!....so we were not at home to take any calls today......

(....we actually run our own small holiday business here in France....8 years ago we both turned 45 and were so p'd off with the UK, it's draconian laws and the 'rat race' in general we sold everything we had and came here to France start our own business....now with the world going to hell in a hand cart and nobody spending any money or not taking holidays we have to do what ever we can to turn a dollar to put food on the table.....check us out at www.la-janais.com)

....anyway, we get home.....and guess what?....there is a message on the phone from the gun shop...

it goes like this....

......''Hi....it's Nicolas from the gun shop......I've heard from the Uberti importer for France....(sadly, one guy is the sole importer for the whole of France)....he tells me that he is ''now'' receiving a package of 2 or 3 guns in early March and your gun will be available between the 15th or 20th of March''.....


......So I'm guessing my 'Flame Mail' conversation with the Uberti factory yesterday has lit a fire under his tush with the factory asking him why he hasn't placed an order with them for this gun.......I really hope it was very hot and extremely uncomfortable for him!!!

Even still....I'm going to have to wait for another whole month.......(Mrs. Limey is preparing a cold compress for me even as I am typing it out!)

Just what is wrong with people?.......they say business is tough .......yet when somebody wants to spend some money with them they find it hard to even lift a finger to place an order!!!!....I wonder just what I would need to do to become the Uberti importer around here????

Now my 'gut' is saying to me that the importer has to pay the postage of the deliveries and it's clearly more cost effective if he is placing an order for several guns and not just one......but hey!....if you are an importer you import right?......

Thanks for your understanding, comments and support guy's........I feel I am no longer on my own with this........'Brother in arms' ....prehaps that should be 'without arms!' .......

I will keep you posted with progress!

Safe shooting,

Limey

[RayinNH]

Limey, I went to your web site. It looks and sounds very charming indeed. Your own little slice of heaven.:drinks:...Ray
P.S., sorry about your troubles.

[NSP64]

Limey, I thought with France being an EU member, you could catch a train to Italy and pick one up.






:kidding:

[madman]

I feel for all of you. Brothers in arms? Rest assured. I am going through the same thing here.

[Tom Herman]

I'm frugal, but I'm not a cheap SOB... If it costs him to FAX the other guy an FFL and talk with him on the phone, I don't mind paying for it. I'll GLADLY do that, but I despise poor service, and don't take too well to being repeatedly lied to.

Happy Shootin'! -Tom


Hey Tom, just out of curiosity, was that a toll call? There's been a bunch of times over the years when a gun shop has had an order come in for me, but wouldn't call to tell me it was in. It seems to be an industry wide thing. They're allergic to toll calls.

[Tom Herman]

Yep, these people are lazy. I complained to the owner, and he said the guy that messed up was his best employee!
What burns me up even more is that I ordered a set of Pachmayrs for the gun at the same time I started the transfer fiasco. I never did get the grips. Once a shipment of grips came in, and the sarcastic little pile of excrement just smiles at me and says that they all came in except for mine, but they should be in shortly... I gave him a reasonable amount of time to produce them, and they still didn't come in.
Finally I ordered direct from Pachmayr (Lyman products, IIRC), and I had the grips weeks before the gun came in.
The only time I buy anything there now is if it's on the shelf.
I'm so sick and tired of poor service. In this economy (or anytime), they should be grateful for customers and want to keep them happy and coming back.
It's their loss, not mine.
I'm glad you have an outstanding store near you!

Happy Shootin'! -Tom


Tom,
I believe that some guys open a gun shop to make easy money and just don't give a thought to customer service.
I have worked part time in two different shops over the years and the owners of both were too lazy to bend over and pick up a dime. Both would take money for special orders and then wait weeks to place the order. I can't begin to imagine why a simple phone call could be so difficult.
Both shops were out of business as soon as they 'used up' all of the new customers in the area.
Jack

[BOOM BOOM]

HI,
On the bright side at least you can buy & posses a gun in France, unlike merry ol.
I lived in england for 2&1/2 yrs. ,1960, when they took your guns for your safety.

[MtGun44]

Limey,

Is it possible to purchase a handgun in Italy face to face or does the EUization
not extend to firearms?

Sorry to hear of your problems, come on over to Kansas and enjoy the smell
of freedom. Handgun sales between individuals are cash and carry, not different
than buying a hammer. Dealer sales require our "instant check" which usually
is instant, amazingly enough. Some competition, but mostly I order special
items through friends that are part time gun dealers. Sometimes have my
gunshop do special stuff, and they are pretty good, too.

Any good gun museums in France between Normandy and Paris? Going to be
vacationing March 22-28 and the main plan is Battlebus tours of Normandy, then
Mt.St. Michel, then Paris (again). Looking for interesting places to visit on the
way - driving a rental car.

Bill

[Limey]

Well. 3 months and 3 weeks after ordering my gun it finally turned up.....

After 3 months waiting I was on the point of telling them to stick it where the sun never shines......Mrs. Limey actually had to wrestle the phone out of my hands!!!!!

.....she sent me out to the barn to cool off.....so while I'm outside she calls the shop......

....a few minutes later she then walks down to the barn......''You ain't going to like this,.....the factory in Italy sent your gun to the importer this week.....and the importers have now sent it to the wrong gun shop!''

.....''They've what?......just how incompetent can they get?'.......(well, thats what my swearing, shouting tirrade translated too!).......

Now, in France, when they send a gun via post/courier it has to be broken down into major sub assemblies and sent in seperate packages so no one can steal a complete gun from the system or have a whole gun turn up at a wrong address.

So, all this seperate parcel stuff takes a bit of time but I am glad to say that finally yesterday......yes, that's correct......April Fools Day........I collected my gun.

It's the bog standard, plain Jane, bottom spec but I am really pleased with it........the fit, finish and quality are very good......I got a Cowboy Action Shoot in two weeks time so I better get practising....

....and as a bonus, it a beautiful fit into the holster my son bought me for Christmas for my Python.

Safe shooting,

Limey

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/lambris/P1020117.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/lambris/P1020123.jpg

[MtGun44]

Rich,

CONGRATULATIONS!! :drinks:

What a pain, but you are past it now. Those are really beautiful pix, too -
lots of nice accessories, great lighting. I've done just enough of that to
know how difficult it is to do.

I got the pic of the coins nailed to the post - a permenant reminder for me
of a nice, but too short of a visit. Stay safe and have fun.

Bill

[oleycow]

Happened to me,

I ordered a Stoeger Coach Gun in October of 2005 was told 2-3 weeks, didn't get the gun until Late April of 2006.

Lets count 7 MONTHS!!

I am a patient man however, grouse season came and went with no POW POW

I went hungry dear friends

I did however talk the dealer into throwing in some perks after receiving the gun.

[Limey]

......I know how you feel oleycow!

.....but I have to say....the guy in the shop where I bought the gun didn't need any prompting for perks......he started putting extra's on the counter without me saying a word.......

......but maybe....just maybe.........he was a mind reader....either that or the demonic gleam in my eyes and my clenched fists encouraged him to throw a few sweeteners in my direction!

To be fair.....it was not the shops fault but the guy was clearly embarrassed about the whole sorry tale. It was the importers mis-handling of this order from day one that meant the long wait.......sadly this importer has a monopoly on importing several major brands of guns into France so he can clearly be complacent in his actions and behaviour.........I hope his mum and dad get round to 'tying the knot' one of these days!!!

......and true to form the importer promised to send me a super dooper perk ......a ''collectors grade'', limited edition....(yeah, yeah!).....Uberti keyring...(wow!).......and yep....you've guessed it.....nothing as ever turned up!!!!....leopards and spots?

.....enjoy that double now you've got it.

Safe shooting


Limey

[Limey]

Well, give them their due, the importers finally did send me ''the super dooper collector grade Uberti keyring''..........


.....but to be honest, even that's delivery to me was convaluted.....got a call from the gun shop.....

...''Hi, it's the gun shop here, we have a key ring for you from the Uberti importer, can you pop in and collect it?''

.....(now the gun shop is a 100mile round trip for me......normaly not a problem, always love to visit a gun shop and it's a good excuse for a motorbike ride........but, for just a key ring?.....)

So the conversation went like this...

....''Can you post it to me?''......

...''You want us to post it?''....

...''Yes please''....

...''Sure you can't pop in?''...

...''I'm sure''....

....''Well, Ok then''

...''Thank you, bye''


.......it was like extracting teeth!....anyway, attached is a piccy of the ''Super dooper etc etc''

.....it's nice, but not three and a half months wait nice!!!


Safe shooting,


Limey

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/lambris/P1020133.jpg

[Gerry N.]

I hope his mum and dad get round to 'tying the knot' one of these days!!!

Limey


Umm......... can a brother and sister get married in France?

Gerry N.

[MtGun44]

Nice key chain. There are, however, easier ways to get one of
these things. ;-)

Bill