D.O.A. = Dissapointed on Arrival

jennie8200

New Member
Let me start by saying that my husband and I have had a saltwater fish tank for the past 6 years. In those 6 years my husband has tried to talk me into ordering fish online, and I have always refused saying how would they ever make it to us alive. After much research he discovered saltwaterfish.com and saw that many people were happy with their purchases so finally I caved and we placed an order this past weekend.
The order left florida yesterday evening and showed up on time this morning less than 24 hours later to our house in Illinois. My husband met the delivery man at the door and got the box from him before it even hit our porch. My husband and I were as excited as kids on Christmas morning as we opened the box. First he pulled out the Clarkii Clownfish, right away I could tell it was dead, still I ask, "Is it dead?" My husband doesn't answer me but pulls out the other fish we had bought, a Lunar Wrasse, again I can tell but I ask anyways, "Is that one dead too??" He feels the bags and finally speaks telling me that the water is ice cold. He searches through the box, no heat packs at all. We live in Illinois, it is the middle of winter, and was 20 degrees outside when the fish arrived, why in the world would they send these poor fish with no heat pack?
So my husband calls the phone number and a rather rude lady tells him to go online and fill out the DOA return form and to attach a picture. We start the process but I tell him that I really don't want the refund I want the fish. So he calls back and talks to a much nicer lady who says to fill out the form and then we will be contacted about options and that usually they would rather keep a happy customer and send us more fish. So we do the form and an hour later the money for the fish only was refunded to my paypal with no contact from saltwaterfish.com about options.
What really gets me is that we totally understand that fish die and that if by some act of god one of the fish didn't survive the trip here that we would be out the shipping, we were accepting of that. But this was not an act of god, this was shipping error that someone at saltwaterfish.com packaging made. By not putting heat packs in the box they were signing those fish's death warrants, they were most definitely sending us dead fish. Where is the customer service in this. Had they appologized to us, and either refunded the whole amount or resent us live fish, we could have gone on and bought many more fish and corals from them in the future. I am so appalled at saltwaterfish.com's service that I will never make a purchase from them or recommend them to anyone as it stands right now.
 

nwdyr

Active Member
wow...I have been on here off and on for a couple years. Met allot of really nice people on the forums. I never ordered anything from them , but did talk to them about a mantis shrimp last week and they were very nice to me. I am sorry for your loss , I see people here talking about the good experiences they have with swf.com Don't give up , I think if they see this , they will make it right
There is always at least one "rude lady" somewhere! Usually where ever I call! lol.....good luck , I hope this works out for you
 

king_neptune

Active Member
Ive had a couple DOA orders too. I never had problems on the phone with customer service.
I went online, submitted a shot. Thats very clearly posted everywhere. Paperwork and processing is a natural way of society. They need a photo of a dead fish as evidence. I cant think of a better method myself.
Show them a picture of a piece of meat practically, and you get insta store credit. I'm sure it leaves them vulnerable to a lot of fraud. So for them to go on a complete refund with simply a photo put into an attachment Is about as good as it gets. Even 15 days! WOW! No LFS I have will go past a few hours.
My beef that disappoints me, is my store credit was lost after the new year. And who wants to pay shipping twice for the same fish

Out of the dozen or so orders. I had 2 DOA's. Thats good I think for something flown in from Florida.
 

swimmer4uus

Member
That's always heartbreaking. I'm sorry. I myself do not order livestock when I know the weather outside is questionable. Whether or not the even put heatpack in, I just don't risk it.
 

jennie8200

New Member
Yes we did understand about submitting a picture and knew we would have to do this, and that was not a problem. We felt she was rude with her uncaring attitude and she seemed annoyed even talking to my husband. The second lady we talked to was much nicer and lead us to believe that we would have some options since there was not a heat pack in the box. That is where the problem lies. They should acknowledge that there was a shipping error and reship the fish we wanted properly, or a complete refund, at this point they have only refunded the money on the fish and not on shipping. So we paid $35 to have dead fish shipped to us that we are not getting back. I understand there policy on dead fish is not to refund the shipping fees and we accept this, but we feel like it's a little different when it's shipping error. I have read several posts on here from people living in cold areas and they say there is always heat packs in the box, so why was there no heat pack in our box??
 

fibinotchi

Member
I'm sorry to hear your experience. I know they had a few issues changing over to their new site and things were a little hectic this last month and a half. I would hope they would check the weather before they ship and the heat pack may have gotten missed. I talked to a guy, I think his name is Tom Glanz, or something close to that, and he was very helpful when I ordered something that was out of stock and I needed a substitution. I would bet if you talk to the right person, they will make it right. I understand your frusteration, no one wants to see a poor fish dead that didn't have a chance.
 
Jenni
I could have written your post word for word. I had exactly the same experience. Box arrived cold, no heat packs, two dead fish. My order was also in the winter, but that is no excuse. I have never ordered anything from them since. My credit still sits there in my account, but why should I come up with more shipping costs only to have the same experience Again.
 

king_neptune

Active Member
Originally Posted by Jennie8200
http:///forum/post/3230375
That is where the problem lies. They should acknowledge that there was a shipping error and reship the fish we wanted properly, or a complete refund, at this point they have only refunded the money on the fish and not on shipping.
..... but we feel like it's a little different when it's shipping error.

Thats not cool. A shipping error should be SWF fault, not fedex, and not at the cost of the customer.
I cant comment onthe "Rude" service rep, I've heard polite peple called rude, because the customer didnt get thier way.
Ive been lambasted by angry customers that didn't like when I had to tell them: "No, its not company policy.Im sorry, I cant do anything about it"
People often shut out that other humans feelings are to be taken into acount. Same is for both parties. Since I didnt have privy to the conversation, only you know how things were handled.
If you were treated poorly, that's poor business. And sorry you had to eat $35 to find out. For the most part im a happy customer myself, but I only use online purchases as a last resort, if I cant find what I want in the local area.
 

deejeff442

Active Member
must be a weird business.in my line of work if i or anyone who works for me messes up i redo the job at my cost period.pay twice for shipping on an arrive alive guarantee?no way.
i would be mad also.
i dont want to bash this site because i enjoy the forums but have never ordered anything here.for all the times i do perfect work and get paid good money .i dont mind to eat a mistake once in a while .
bad business=no more business these days.
come to think of it i had a banner made for my company after a month the letters were falling off.i took it back and they said something was wrong.they called me when the new one was ready .i got there they showed me the thing.it looked great.then they said that will be $80 for tax .i told them to eat the banner.i aint paying tax twice.
wont ever go to them again.
 

flower

Well-Known Member

I have ordered many, many times from SWF.com and the only thing I ever lost was 1 of 3 emerald crabs. I live on Wisconsin and Illinois border.
I agree with you that it was their fault for no heat packs, but to be honest from LFS you can buy $100.00s of dollars worth of fish and leave the store, if they die before you even get home...you wont get your money back period.
With SWF you have 15 days...the $20.00 spent on shipping is a small price to pay if things go bad. I hope you give them another try, they deserve it.
 

nwdyr

Active Member
cant believe they have not chimed in yet..... Kinda glad I ended up not ordering my Mantis shrimp from them
I put a deposit on my mantis at a LFS , he called me today when it came in. The owner went to the box opened it up , we looked at it , it was alive and looked good so I paid the balance and left. If it was dead , even though it was a "special order" I would not expect to pay for it....at all! Still hope they do the right thing here!
 

nwdyr

Active Member
this really dont compare to shopping at the LFS , there is no "shipping" when you go there and buy it
other then YOU taking it home. A box with no heat packs in the dead of winter is a no brainer....now I AM getting upset! I cant imagine your frustration
 

flower

Well-Known Member
Originally Posted by nwdyr
http:///forum/post/3230414
this really dont compare to shopping at the LFS , there is no "shipping" when you go there and buy it
other then YOU taking it home. A box with no heat packs in the dead of winter is a no brainer....now I AM getting upset! I cant imagine your frustration


Please don't misunderstand me. I agree, no heat packs is absolutely terrible, all I was saying is that 15 days to make sure your fish and coral are healthy is quite a good guarantee. I also would love to see them return not only the price of the fish, the taxes but also the shipping…it was their fault the fish arrived dead.
I have lost fish from the LFS to my home. They put critters together that should have been in separate bags...too bad for me. They get their critters shipped just like SWF sends them...so the poor fish are double stressed unless they have been in the LFS for a while and you never know.
I would like those who were disappointed to give them another try, even at the cost of $20.00 shipping again. That’s all.
 

saltwaterfish.com

Administrator
Staff member
Jennie8200:
It sounds like there are a lot of issues in play here. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. Please PM me with the details of your order and we will privately fix this to your satisfaction. Alternatively, you can email me directly at shughes@saltwaterfish.com. I'll need your name or order number to investigate this.
Thanks
Scott
 

nycbob

Active Member
i hv never really had an issue with swf.com myself. most orders i placed here were very good when compare to other sites. ordering during temp under 45 is always a risk, but no heatpacks is just unacceptable. i am sure swf.com will work something out with u.
 

jennie8200

New Member
Thank you to everyone for your responses. It helps that other people understand and feel our pain. Especially thanks to Scott for taking the time to read my post, I will be in contact with you.
 
Originally Posted by Jennie8200
http:///forum/post/3230375
So we paid $35 to have dead fish shipped to us that we are not getting back. I understand there policy on dead fish is not to refund the shipping fees and we accept this, but we feel like it's a little different when it's shipping error. I have read several posts on here from people living in cold areas and they say there is always heat packs in the box, so why was there no heat pack in our box??
I have had good record with my shipments with them so far, and live in the north. However, IF you plan to never order from them again I would suggest you call your credit card company or bank and dispute the charges. It was obviously an major error on their part, they need to accept this as a company and 'do the right thing'. IF you are thinking of ordering from them again, well they can just apply that shipping credit to your next order and start all over again. I am really surprised given the lack of heat packs! I remember reading and speaking to a rep about shipments to the north, they said they watch the weather and if it is going to be too cold or bad weather in the area they will not ship, which i think is great! I would rather have safe fish than dead fish! Best of luck!
 

meowzer

Moderator
Sounds to me like a human packed the box.....I highly doubt no heat packs was intentional.....have any of you ever made an error before?
I am sure (as they stated) that SWF will take care of this....BUT stop beating someone up for making a mistake
 
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