AQuarium Depot reviews

dandrews40030 · Mar 19, 2016

Just spent nearly $100 at AQUarium Depot. Now of course I'm having some doubts about what I just did. Are they a good seller? Is all my stuff going to show up dead?

philfree · Mar 19, 2016

From what i gather, "Aquarium Depot" is "Reef2Go", just with a new name. Some googling and yelping and youtube videos will show that reef2go was a horrible company. Which is likely why they felt the need to change the name. Id stay away from them.

Anirban · Mar 19, 2016

He he ......it depends what u ordered???? Good with pods but others stuffs not credible enough.....and also when get the shipment dont dump their water into your tank or sump. Its full of bad critters...

dandrews40030 · Mar 19, 2016

I never ever ever use their water since I have fantastic water. Well, hopefully this works out. Ugh.

dandrews40030 · Mar 25, 2016

Well my shipment came in. My gorgonian looks happy, two of the acans that I got look a little rough, but I think they'll make a good come back. My war coral and hydnopora both look really happy. All the macro that I got looks pretty good aside from the halemedia which is trying pretty hard to die. But I think it'll make it. It just spent a little too long in bad water. The pods I got are HUGE.

philfree · Mar 25, 2016

good to hear.
did you do their free 3day shipping, or did you pay for overnight?

dburkart · Mar 26, 2016

philfree said:
good to hear.
did you do their free 3day shipping, or did you pay for overnight?

I have ordered quite a bit from them and have been quite pleased with both their service and the corals as well as great cuc and pods. They do a great job and I usually order something that gives me free shipping.

Dave

philfree · Mar 26, 2016

dburkart said:
I have ordered quite a bit from them and have been quite pleased with both their service and the corals as well as great cuc and pods. They do a great job and I usually order something that gives me free shipping.

Dave

Glad to hear that!
I heard some very mixed reviews, and many horror stories from hobbyist when they were Reefs2go.
Perhaps theyve up'd their game in response.

dandrews40030 · Mar 29, 2016

philfree said:
good to hear.
did you do their free 3day shipping, or did you pay for overnight?

I did the free shipping. I imagine things would have been different had I paid for the over night. I emailed them about all the dead macro algae. They are reshipping me all the macro, including some more pods, which is awesome. Hopefully this goes well.

dandrews40030 · Mar 29, 2016

My corals are doing awesome though

stevo01 · May 31, 2016

This is an old thread but I want to add to it. My aquarium depot shipment came in on Friday. Ordered $140 of coral and CUC. A lot of the corals are dead or struggling to survive. The CUC is fine. But that was only $20. Pictures of death to come. For now is the picture of the corals after I got them out of their bags and into some of MY clean water within an hour of arrival. In addition the shipment took a full 48 hours to arrive. The cardboard box looked like it was sent over enemy lines, thanks UPS. No labels saying "live animals" or "this end up". Just a single label "leave at door". Inside the box were some wet paper towels, and loosely packed were my bags of "life". All the frags were on the plugs upside down and attached to the closed end with fishing line. All bage were crimped with metal bands. It seems they anticipated the box getting tossed around yet use metal bands inside the box.

The livestock - 12 polyp frag of red people eater palys were broke off the plug. Most of all the corals I ordered were zoas/palys. 10 polyp frag of Blue eyed monster are mostly good shape, there are a few dying polyps. 10 polyp frag of PeaPie palys 2 have opened up, and it's looking like the rest are going to melt. 30+ polyp frag of fruit drop zoa 5 that have opened, several that are melting, and some that haven't opened or started melting. On a frag of 5 yellow polyps I see one that might survive. The 10 polyp frag of Barney zoas are all healthy, oddly. The 10 polyp frag of long hair green eye girls has one polyp that opens and looks healthy. The 30+ polyp frag of morning glories have about 8 that look healthy, a few that are melting, and a bunch that are closed. This is odd, on the morning glory frag are an additional 4 yellow polyps one of which does not look well. The single sps a green slimer acro arrived dead. A 1"x1.5" orange and blue Australian chalice looks to be ok for now.

That's the current status. Keep in mind this tank is or at least was perfectly healthy and all live was thriving/growing. No tank issues. I also did a slow acclimation to water and light.

stevo01 · May 31, 2016

Here is an auto response email sent from Aquarium Depot.

If you are reporting a DOA - Please follow the steps as listed below.

Please place item(s) being reported onto the packing slip received with your package.
Please provide a picture for each problem reported - so if you have 3 problems reported please provide 3 pictures.
If possible, please make sure the order number is viewable in picture as this will help the customer service agent better assist you.

Please provide the following information in your email:
1. Name order was placed under
2. Order ID
3. Clear description of animal reported and count on all items (instead of saying "coral" - please indicate - the blue acro coral

Delays in response occur from the following issues:
1. DOA claims without a picture
2. Claims made without an order ID to reference or claims made that come from an email address other than the one used to place the order.
3. Unclear information regarding the item in question. We often see an order of 15 corals and 1 reported DOA with a generic claim of Coral.
4. Unclear information regarding the counts. "Some snails were dead" when the customer has received 80 different types of snails is very difficult to interpret.

We appreciate your help in making this process as seamless as possible. We strive to resolve this email in one response, your assistance will insure our success in resolving the matter as efficiently as possible.
If this auto responder has been deployed in error and your question has not been answered - Please reply back to us and post your question again.

Doran · Sep 18, 2016

dandrews40030 said:
Just spent nearly $100 at AQUarium Depot. Now of course I'm having some doubts about what I just did. Are they a good seller? Is all my stuff going to show up dead?

I did not read the string but in my learned opinion Aquarium Depot aka reefs2go is unquestionably among the worst in our hobby...probably the most horrid shop in the industry .....period. My experiences were many.....I erred early with coral.....then kept going only buying pods. They screwed up every second or third order.....then they are angry at you because they screwed up the orders.....a great example is whenever they offered the buy 1000 pods for 20.00 and get another 1000 free, I'd always order 5 sets......last time they shipped one and Actually showed that I ordered 10 and they shipped one. This was at least the sixth order they skewed up. Previously they said they would send the missing items if I paid shipping again....blackmail. This time I refused. They said good luck, I files a dispute and they showed a ship label for the empty order and laughed......

Great group.....

If they are your only source for the hobby I'd recommend a different hobby.....

Doran · Sep 18, 2016

Ps..... Still to this day I buy pods every month, but never rom them......
....this all ignoring the parasites etc......

RobBaglieri · Sep 23, 2016

I have ordered from aquarium depot about 5 times. I only had one DOA and they replaced it within a week. The frags are pretty clean, very little debris in the bags. When they have a question for me, or if a coral is not available or doesnt look healthy, they always call on the phone.

The Rook · Sep 23, 2016

Most of my corals and a coral banded shrimp arrived dead from them. Definitely do my homework in the future. Chalked it up to learning experience as well.