Disappointed in recent WWC order

[adrianr514]

Okay I don’t know where else to post this but I am pretty disappointed in my recent @WWC order.

I am going to start things off by nothing that I have ordered from @WWC in the past. Multiple Coral Club orders, frag packs and other things.

Because of these orders I Garnered enough points to get $50 off an order. (Second time I’ve used $50 off from points)

I decided to throw that at a Mystery 5 piece SPS pack that they sell for $100 that is supposed to be at least a $200 value and also go on to say in their description that it can be valued at well over $200 dollars.

okay cool so I go and take the plunge on it and with shipping it’s a little north of $75 purchase.

When I received the corals I was well underwhelmed to say the least and one of the corals was in pretty bad shape.

The corals themselves were also just down right bottom of the barrel coral.

If I had to guess it was coral that just doesn’t move because no one is buying these things.

Birdsnest

C3PO Lepto

Crimson Stylo

Disco ball Lepto

Spongodes Montipora

Now idk about you but my LFS has Birdsnest and Spongodes for $10/$20 frags

the Crimson Stylo is probably the only one I haven’t seen locally

the C3PO has two areas that can be seen where it’s missing flesh and had hair algae before I remove it.

the Disco Ball Lepto was in terrible condition and as you can see is missing flesh in varios places.

now I wasn’t expecting any high end frags but these frags just feel pawned off on me.

some may argue that wel I used points and got it half off but the usage of points shouldn’t matter and should not affect the coral that was chosen. I earned those points from spending money and should be treated as full currency when used.

IDK maybe I’m just ranting but I do not see the value here in these coral nor do I see the value in doing any future purchases from @WWC in the future.

point of the post is I am disappointed with the coral not the service.

 

[adrianr514]

Well I took your guys advice and emailed their support.

I pretty much just copy and pasted it into an email and reworded the post to be directed at them instead of the format of me talking about them.

I guess I was more worried with seeming entitled over anything else.

I’ll keep the thread updated with their response.

 

[adrianr514]

Here’s an update with their reply.

Good morning Adrian,

Thank you for all your recent purchases with us, we greatly appreciate it. I'm sorry to here you weren't 100% satisfied with your SPS pack and we appreciate you bringing this to our attention. We value our customers a lot and want everyone to be able to purchase with 100% confidence.

At this time we would be more than happy to replace any frag you feel isn't of value or up to your standard and have it shipped with your next coral club shipment. Please let us know how we can best help you.

I look forward to hearing from you and cant wait to make this right for you Adrian.

Kind regards,
Moises

So pretty much hey, spend more money and we will send you replacements.

Typical answer, not sure what I was expecting.

 

[adrianr514]

My response

I appreciate that but I am not sure a spend more money and we will make it right is an option for me.

As of now, because of this recent pack, I am not planning on making any future purchases to include Coral Club packs.

What I would definitely consider is a replacement pack that’s definitely decent and worth it and I’ll pay the shipping for it and then reconsider my stance on continuing being a customer.

If that’s not possible then I understand and it has been a pleasure doing business with you.

I don’t think that’s too demanding or outside of reasonable.

Will update with a response.

 

[adrianr514]

Update: They made some clarifications.

Good afternoon Adrian,

The reason i suggested we have the replacement corals shipped out to you with your next coral club subscription is because you have a coral club subscription box auto renew that is ready to be shipped out at the beginning of July. I can go ahead and ship the replacements out separately from your coral club but then you would have to pay shipping and I was trying to avoid that and save you $24.99 by adding it to the same coral club subscription box.

If you would like to have it sent out separate all you have to do is pay for the shipping invoice i sent to your email and i can get it out to you at your earliest convenience next week (Tuesday - Friday).

Please let me know how you would like to go about this so i can best assist you. I really want to help you our the best that i can Adrian

I look forward to hearing back from you.

Kind regards,
Moises

By all intent and purposes it looks like they are trying to make it right.

I paid for the shipping and I will update once again once I receive the new pack.

Note that I also cancelled the renewal of my coral club and let them know that my continued coral club membership will be dependent on this resolution.

 

[WWC]

We appreciate the feedback and we will always try to do our best in making our customers happy, no matter what. We will ALWAYS bend over backwards to so. Ask anyone who has ever purchased from us. That is how we have the reputation that we have. We are responsive and helpful to a fault.

However, we cannot do so unless notified of the situation. We state on our website that we guarantee that our customers will be 100% satisfied with their order. Therefore any coral / invert you are not satisfied we will replace or give credit for that item. End of story

So please, if there is anyone who is unhappy with the items they purchased from us, feel free to contact us within the 10 day guarantee so we can right the wrong.

Thanks again,

Chris Turnier
Web Manager

 

[adrianr514]

So the day finally arrived and I have to say I wasn’t surprised.

This has to be some kind of joke for @WWC

Here’s the list.

First off if you go back to one of the responses from @WWC they said they added notes so that it wouldn’t happen again and that I would get a higher quality pack.

Well those are the notes.

I’m not sure how that describes the issue in its entirety to allow the picker to know what they need to get or should get.

Now let’s start off with each individual coral.

1. JF Burning Banana Stylo.

Okay decent coral, absolutely tiny in size, frags of this size at my LFS go for $30. I know because I volunteer there on Sundays.

@WWC sells these for $99.

however as you can see they are bigger and fully encrusted.

As such the value of the one I was sent can be easily cut in half.

By comparison here’s @TSA Corals WYSIWYG pricing to one similar to the one I received.

2. Spearmint Montipora

okay so I couldn’t find any in stock on their website however my searches from previous stock showed this and others that were all priced at $20 and either sold for $20 or sold for less due to it being on sale.

nothing more to say on that one.

3. Muy Verde Birdsnest

“Hey you know what would be funny? Let’s send him another birdsnest” is what I could picture them saying.

On their website they are selling these for $29.

4. Tyree Flower Petal Monti

Normally not a bad Coral. I see these between 30/40 all the time from online retailers.

However on June 5th of this year I purchased a $185 Monti frag pack that included one of these.

You can see my order here.

Here you can see what it consisted of.

This is what that one looked like.

My question here is, why do you not check previous purchases to reduce the chance of duplicates. Even more so why not now that you’re trying to correct an issue??

5. Neon Polyp Montipora

come on @WWC you sell these for $35 on your site.

Add that all up and that’s not even hitting your $200 Value again.

Needless to say I am not renewing my coral club, I am not paying shipping to “make things right“ again and I will not be making any further purchases from @WWC and I hope that for anyone reading this you also stop making purchases from them until they can actually start delivering on their promises.

 

[WWC]

This is unfortunate. We sent out an entirely new pack when it wasn't completely needed as several of those frags were closed when photographed (as you just received them) and were not given a chance to open up. And now, you are doing the same thing with the replacement corals to fortify your argument. But, as we do, we try to make everyone happy.

We are after all talking about a random $99 pack here. The corals in this pack have a retail value over $200. Both times, we sent you retail priced frags valued over that amount. Let's be honest, are these absolutely amazing frags? Probably not, did you get a couple of pretty nice frags, absolutely! This is a pack for those that are beginning their reef tanks. Discerning and more advanced customers should look at purchasing WYSIWYG corals or specific packs to get exactly what they are looking for.

So to give you an idea how popular our packs are, we have sent 193 SPS packs so far this year and you are the very first one to complain.

Also, the prices you are referencing are live sale coral prices for both the Burning Banana and Spearmint Montipora. So these prices cannot be considered and throwing these up here on this thread is a smoke screen.

After all this, it looks as though you are just looking for a reason to complain. We have completely refunded you, so you should have nothing else to worry about.

All the best to you in your reefing experience.

Chris Turnier
Web Manager

 

[adrianr514]

Probably the last update to this thread.

After emailing them back what I posted in the thread I received a full refund for what I originally paid.

At this point I wasn’t expecting a refund or any other form of concession.

How ever I do want to speak on this.

As of writing this I have not received any communication back from WWC after sending them what I put in my last update post but these are my takeaways.

1. If the initial coral would have been good to begin with they would still have me as a customer and this thread would have read differently.

Something has to be made at a fulfillment level to ensure this does not happen. How many others are there that have been single time buyers because they received their coral and felt the same way I did and did not post about it on a forum or think about emailing them about the issue? I myself wasn’t going to email them until others in this thread urged me to do so.

2. If I would have received a refund after the first one I would have less of a bad taste in my mouth and would have most likely used that money for my coral club renewal.

3. Promises in this instance were made which left a high expectation. I wasn’t expecting $100 acros but definitely not what I received. So when I then receive this it just breaks all hope and expectations. Which lead to bad reviews, or recommendations against buying from them.

4. The refund after the fact and the two packs of corals doesn’t feel like them trying to right a wrong but more of a here’s your money back, quit complaining and see you never.

5. They probably don’t care, I am but nothing more than a drop of water in their lake of revenue. So really they probably don’t care. They’re still making bundles from live sales, online sales and in store sales so what is it to them that they lose me?

If they do ever reply I will update with that and or respond to any questions they or anyone may have.

 

[adrianr514]

It looks like they responded to the thread while I was making an update so here we go

This is unfortunate. We sent out an entirely new pack when it wasn't completely needed as several of those frags were closed when photographed (as you just received them) and were not given a chance to open up. And now, you are doing the same thing with the replacement corals to fortify your argument. But, as we do, we try to make everyone happy.

We are after all talking about a random $99 pack here. The corals in this pack have a retail value over $200. Both times, we sent you retail priced frags valued over that amount. Let's be honest, are these absolutely amazing frags? Probably not, did you get a couple of pretty nice frags, absolutely! This is a pack for those that are beginning their reef tanks. Discerning and more advanced customers should look at purchasing WYSIWYG corals or specific packs to get exactly what they are looking for.

So to give you an idea how popular our packs are, we have sent 193 SPS packs so far this year and you are the very first one to complain.

Also, the prices you are referencing are live sale coral prices for both the Burning Banana and Spearmint Montipora. So these prices cannot be considered and throwing these up here on this thread is a smoke screen.

After all this, it looks as though you are just looking for a reason to complain. We have completely refunded you, so you should have nothing else to worry about.

All the best to you in your reefing experience.

Chris Turnier
Web Manager

1. Open or not that does not change the type of coral that it is, it’s size or what was sent.

2. You mention that these frag packs are beginner packs.

Nothing in the description says and or mentions in any way shape or for that this is considered a beginner pack with beginner coral.

Maybe that should be updated to reflect that.

Sometimes even intermediate or experienced reefers like to be surprised by ordering a mystery pack.

3. you mention that the prices I reflected where live sale prices For the spearmint Monti and the burning banana are live sale prices.

That may be what the spearmint was but the burning banana price I showed from TSA that is similar in size to the one I received is not a live sale price as they are doing any.
You can see the regular price of $30 and sale price of $27. With other similar frags equally priced.

JF Burning Banana Stylo - WYSIWYG SPS Frag - Top Shelf Aquatics

WYSIWYG Piece

topshelfaquatics.com

4. All the other prices are straight from your website and do the prices do not add up at all.

lastly your second to last paragraph reiterates what I said in post #23 that it doesn’t seem like you guys truly cared to make things right and that your refund is a Heres your money stop complaining.

I’m sharing my experience and sharing my valid concerns with everyone else as to how my individual experience went.

I didn’t care for nor did I ask for a refund after I again reached out in regards to this pack.

I said thank you but I would no longer be purchasing from you again and that was that.

you decided to give me a refund which is appreciated but wasn’t needed nor asked for.

I hope others learn from this experience as well as you.

A couple of posts ago you were so about making things right and reassurance and now this reply screams that it was a façade to attempt to keep people happy and feeing like you cared.

again, all the best to @WWC and those that continue to purchase from you.

 

[adrianr514]

Email I received shortly after my last reply.

 

[adrianr514]

You expect too much.

On the contrary, if you read through the post in its entirety I didn’t expect much. It was them that made promises and reassurances that were not kept.

Vendors are allowed to defend themselves when being attacked. Dude got his money back and a bunch of free coral, he should have nothing to complain about anymore.

Yes I totally agree that there are allowed to respond however I never once attacked them. This thread was highlighting my experience. All messages and responses were share publicly as to be as transparent as possible.

Not once did I make any kind of demands.

Your right, I did get free coral and my money back but let’s get things straight. I never asked for my money back and I never demanded a second pack.

They sent a second pack to try and “‘make things right” and when I was just as unhappy with the second one as I was the first one they refunded my money. I didn’t ask for it nor expect it.

Just like they have a right to “defend” themselves I have a right to voice my opinion which I did not just for myself but for those following the thread wanting to know the outcome.

If you believe that’s complaining then that is fine but it’s a far cry from it.

 

[adrianr514]

Since apparently it was an issue here are the pictures with the polyps extended. Not sure what that changes.

 

[WWC]

The very first thing you said on your response to the 2nd shipment you received is and I quote....

"So the day finally arrived and I have to say I wasn’t surprised.

This has to be some kind of joke for @WWC"

If this isn't complaining I'm not sure what is. This is a good way to set a company off. I always try to play it cool, and those that know me as I've been in the industry / hobby a long, long time know that I (and WWC) always try to make it right. But when we try to make it right and we do a reasonable (not perfect, I admit) and you still publicly bash us for doing so, that's where I have to try the line.

The issue here is that those that troll our success jump in here and have all sorts to say whether it's valid or not. So with you opening this can of worms I am forced to fight back.

I am truly sorry we couldn't make this right as I really wanted us to do so. This is such a rarity for this to happen that I hate it when it does. I wish you could see how amazing our corals actually are. We really are trying to do the best for this industry with all these 100,000 + frags we are farming. It's a sight to behold. It truly is.

I'd love to show you around WWC if you are ever in the Orlando area. It's pretty amazing. I hold no grudge, only love from this side.

All the best,

Chris

 

[revhtree]

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