Above and Beyond

[Tully Mars]

If you're anything like me normally when you write about customer service you're usually complaining. Or maybe I'm just odd and bitch a lot. I find myself in the surprising position of writing about how happy I am with a company and its service.

I've been diving for about 15yrs. and until recently purchased most, if not all, of my gear from local shops and in person. A little over a year and half ago I moved to Mexico and just recently found myself in need of a repair for my Zeagle Ocoto+ (turns out that yearly service actual is a good idea, who knew?) So after drifting into dive shop after dive shop up and down the Costa Maya here in Mexico I gave up trying to find anyone capable of servicing any Zeagle product. I got on-line and found "Scuba Toy's" advertised they're an authorized Zeagle shop. I contacted them and they gave instructions on shipping and requesting repairs/service. One thing they said was to make sure I included a note stating what I wanted done, contact info etc... I headed off to my nearest Fed-Ex office with my unit (No, not that unit, perverts! My Ocoto+ and Regulator) and a note detailing what I needed done. I shipped it off. A week or so later I found the young lady at the Fed-Ex office stapled my note to my receipt. So I e-mailed Scuba Toys and within a day "Joe" responded "I will take care of it." A couple days later I was informed the service was completed. Since the Ocoto was leaking I kind of figured there would be a repair charge as well as the normal annual service. Nope! Just the service fee I was quoted. I honestly can’t remember the last time I ended up just paying the cost I was quoted for anything. There’s always some extra charge added for something it seems. Being in Mexico some items are either hard to find or very expensive. I decided I wanted to purchase some things and e-mailed in an order. I thought going outside of the normal on-line ordering system might cause problems. Nope again! Not only was my order processed immediately but they e-mailed me to verify colors and sizes. Nice. They shipped it out within a day or two and e-mailed me an invoice. All very professional.

Sadly that’s when the problems started. Scuba Toys uses UPS which is somewhat new down here in Mexico. After I received my tracking number I noticed my order was being held in Mexico City by customs. Over the next 10 days I was told several things including- “it's the shippers fault (Scuba Toys), it’s my fault for not responding to e-mails, it's on its way, it's not on its way, it's being sent back to the states due to being in customs too long. It will be released if I deposit 635 pesos (about $50usd) in a UPS bank account. I need to fax them the form (repeated questions as to what form they needed were answered with "the form... over and over "the form, the form.") It's on its way, again. It's not on its way, again. I need to send them the form, again. I failed to answer my phone. The shipper has failed to provide an invoice showing some Chinese items are not worth just 16.99 but at least 18.00. I never made a deposit in the UPS account. It's being return to the Kentucky. Someone will call or e-mail me within an hour. “The facts are I did make the bank deposit and I was never phoned or e-mailed by UPS, ever. The only contact I ever had with UPS in Mexico or in the States was me contacting them. Several times I waited for hours by the phone because I’d been told they would call me back within an hour or two and they never called. Nor did they e-mail. When I called UPS Mexico I got a different answer every time. Whenever I called the UPS in the US I was told “it’s been released, say’s it’s been released.” According to the tracking number and the on-line tracking service it was released no less than 5 times, yet it remained in Mexico City for nearly two weeks.I contacted Scuba Toys and ended up dealing with “Rick.” Mexican customs can be notoriously difficult. Seriously they held up my order because one item (a pair of booties) was, in their opinion, worth $1.01 more then was listed on the invoice. I must say Rick went way, way above and beyond in dealing with this issue and getting my order release. I have no idea the amount of time he spent dealing with this issue, but if it’s anywhere near half of what I did I’d guess they actually lost money on my order. In fact I’d say every contact I had with everyone at Scuba Toy’s was very professional and extremely excellent customer service.

I highly recommend them for any of your scuba needs and or fixes.

Tully Mars

[Queen]

You're absolutely right about Scuba Toys...best in the business.

Welcome to ST Tully.

[Tully Mars]

Originally Posted by Queen

You're absolutely right about Scuba Toys...best in the business.

Welcome to ST Tully.

Thanks for the welcome and yes I will be ordering from ST again. Only this time I think I'll just have them ship to my Houston drop box and Fed-Ex it from there.

[Vercingetorix]

I believe ST will FedEx if you request it. I'm uncertain if there is an increase cost for doing so. I doubt it.

I'm fortunate in that ST is my LDS (15 minutes from my house). Their service is always top-notch.

FYI: Joe is the manager and head-honcho. He's a huge, imposing figure. I believe he's an ex-boxer. You just don't mess with Joe. Period. I've purchased several things from Rick. He's good people. Gave me a great deal on a 2mm shorty wetsuit.

[Tully Mars]

Originally Posted by Vercingetorix

I believe ST will FedEx if you request it. I'm uncertain if there is an increase cost for doing so. I doubt it.

I'm fortunate in that ST is my LDS (15 minutes from my house). Their service is always top-notch.

FYI: Joe is the manager and head-honcho. He's a huge, imposing figure. I believe he's an ex-boxer. You just don't mess with Joe. Period. I've purchased several things from Rick. He's good people. Gave me a great deal on a 2mm shorty wetsuit.

It's odd because I had ordered some PADI DM Crew Kit materials from another on-line store out of Florida, which shall remain unnamed. Take everything I just posted above regarding ST and reverse it. That's the experience I had with them. E-mails, unanswered. Phone calls were mostly crappy "muzak" and hold followed by a "yeah, it's going out soon, bye, click."

Good customer service makes or breaks a business in my humble opinion.

I know I will order from ST again and won't be doing any business with the other unnamed store.