Ok love buying for Adorama I recently bought a refurb body and a month later it started acting up, no problem I call them got the return info. So I shipped it off and today they received it and today they sent out the replacement now this is great service can't beat it

Mike

Shouldn't this be in the miscellaneous sycophant forum?

Yes they are!!!!

+1. They have great service. My only problem with them is the amount of time it takes for them to process the return (over a week). Apparently items get shipped to NJ and then processed in NY.

Sarsfield wrote:
Shouldn't this be in the miscellaneous sycophant forum?

I thought the Canon forum consisted of the union of the sycophants, the haters, and the few of us that are sane.



[joke]

and the few of us that are sane.

You can say that again. I was just saying to myself, oh, never mind...

Adorama is the best in the business IMO. I had an issue with a very expensive used lens and they stepped up in an extremely impressive manner, including paying for the return shipping and giving me a great deal on a replacement that was brand new.

Adorama's return policy dictates that you pay for return shipping back to them AND their 'free shipping' cost. For exchanges, you pay return shipping. They have no advance shipping policy that i can tell; you have to wait for the RMA process to complete before they send you a new item.

For these reasons, I never order lenses from Adorama if Amazon has the same item at similar pricing. I've received too much defective-out-of-the-box glass to order from a company who puts the burden of exchanges on the customer.

tanglefoot47 wrote:
Ok love buying for Adorama I recently bought a refurb body and a month later it started acting up, no problem I call them got the return info. So I shipped it off and today they received it and today they sent out the replacement now this is great service can't beat it

Mike

Delighted to hear it! Thanks so much for taking the time to leave your feedback

datousteve wrote:
+1. They have great service. My only problem with them is the amount of time it takes for them to process the return (over a week). Apparently items get shipped to NJ and then processed in NY.

Our DC is in NJ, but the distance between that and the office in NYC shouldn't have any effect on the time taken to process and refund a return, and I apologize that this has been your experience.
In future, if you email me your tracking number together with your order number - post-holiday periods excepted - I can request priority processing.

Helen Oster
Adorama Camera Customer Service Ambassador
Helen@adorama.com

alexdi wrote:
Adorama's return policy dictates that you pay for return shipping back to them AND their 'free shipping' cost. For exchanges, you pay return shipping. They have no advance shipping policy that i can tell; you have to wait for the RMA process to complete before they send you a new item.

For these reasons, I never order lenses from Adorama if Amazon has the same item at similar pricing. I've received too much defective-out-of-the-box glass to order from a company who puts the burden of exchanges on the customer.

I can understand your reluctance to order from Adorama if you feel you will want to return items, and I'd like the opportunity to clarify a couple of things.

If an item is received damaged or defective and you contact either our CS department or me directly, before returning your item, we will cover the cost of return shipping. If you return an item because you simply change your mind, then yes, we wouldn't be able to cover the cost of you returning it to us.

The free outbound shipping on some items is the equivalent of offering a 'free' gift with an order - of course it isn't actually 'free' because WE pay for it! If you return the item, and it isn't damaged or defective, then we state on our website that the original cost of shipping will be deducted from your refund:

http://www.adorama.com/catalog.tpl?op=faq#returnPolicy

"Items that qualified for free shipping that are being returned will have our standard shipping charges deducted from refund or credit. The return shipping cost (the cost to send an item back to us) is not refundable."
"Items that qualified for free shipping that are being returned will have our standard shipping charges deducted from refund or credit. The return shipping cost (the cost to send an item back to us) is not refundable."


In the past, we would cross-ship replacement items; right up until the number of house bricks that our returns department were unpacking made this financially unviable.

We would LOVE to be able to offer the same terms and conditions that Amazon can, but to put it into perspective: Amazon, is the world's largest Internet retailer, with fulfilment centers in 12 US States, PLUS, 3 locations in Canada, 4 locations in Scotland, 5 in England, 3 in Wales, 5 in France, 4 in each of Germany and Japan, 3 in China, and 1 in each of Slovakia and Italy.

Adorama is a family business in NYC with a single distribution center in New Jersey!

> If an item is received damaged or defective and you either [contact?] our CS department or me directly, before returning your item, we will cover the cost of return shipping.

This is contrary to your website. Your page does not distinguish between returns and exchanges; all are expected to have freight prepaid. Do CSRs provide exchange shipping labels on request as standard practice?

Adorama's 'free shipping' policy is at odds with the meaning of that phrase in the rest of the industry. I've never encountered another store that subtracts that amount from returns. Free is free, with the assumption that the shipping cost is rolled into the price.

As to Amazon: Adorama may have good reasons for the nature of their return policy, but that has no bearing on Amazon's advantages. Adorama may be smaller than Amazon, but it's a lot bigger than me. You're in a much better position to bear the risk of defective product than any individual customer. It would surprise me if the number of returns, fraudulent or otherwise, was so high as to make the more lenient policy untenable.

Helen, you just can't satisfy some people no matter what.

All I know is adorama just ran a 1 day eBay sale on the 5D3 for $2749. They sold over 800 of them and mine was delivered in 2 days. Amazing deal.

MDJAK wrote:
Helen, you just can't satisfy some people no matter what.

Nonsense. I've listed precisely what makes one store more competitive than another in a specific area. This isn't some nebulous concern unique to me. Your comment about the 5D III confirms only that you can be bought. How fortunate for the retailers you frequent.

Adorama sent me a UPS shipping label all i had to do is print it out

I returned an item to Adorama last year, as with Tanglefoot, they sent me a UPS label that I printed out and attached to the box, money was in my account about a week later, good enough for me. I've never had any issue with Adorama, I happen to prefer their website to most others, so I do most of my business with them.

No big deal in my mind... Shop where you're comfortable.

I ordered an 3 hotshoe accessory for a camera and it was made very poorly...crooked screw hole......I told them about it and it was only a $10.00 item so I didn't want to pay $7.00 to ship it back....I was a bit irritated. Then, to my surprise,they said to keep the old one and they sent me a new one which didn't have the problem. That little gesture on their part made me very happy to continue to do my business with Adorama. Very nice customer service Helen (from Adorama) on the forum seems concerned about people and I like that also.

Now all they have to do is let you know something is on back-order 'before' you place your order..

when did you find out it was on back-order, Ed? I was just getting ready to order something over there.

tony

Sarsfield wrote:
Shouldn't this be in the miscellaneous sycophant forum?

Looks like it got moved. I'm not sure why you consider this to be the sycophantic forum. It's a good word and deserves to be used on occasion, however.

Ed Peters wrote:
Now all they have to do is let you know something is on back-order 'before' you place your order..

I agree with you 100% that it would be great if we could show immediate stock updates and apologize for any frustration or disappointment that this has caused. Unfortunately, because we sell via so many affiliates such as BizRate, buy.com, and Amazon - as well as making sales via our own website, on the 'phones and in-store - it is complicated. If we are already low on inventory and then receive several orders within just a few minutes via the various portals, it isn't immediately obvious to our stock-keeping system which customer is going to be disappointed.

Had this project come to fruition in summer 2011 as we were promised, http://www.prweb.com/releases/prweb2012/9/prweb9875018.htm we would by now have a much better stock-keeping situation. We are still committed to doing this, but as we are actually a family business, it is going to take us a lot longer than we'd ever dreamed (or budgeted for)