Last fall I had a rather disturbing experience with Five Star. They didn't tape the ends of the Priority Mail box they shipped my order in and when the Postman handed me the box out came pouring my adult dvds. I was pretty upset and reported the issue to Five Star. A prompt apology was offered by Five Star's President and owner.
When deciding where to spend my $30 Kickback certificate earlier this month I decided to give Five Star another chance. Bad move.
This time things have fallen apart before reaching my doorstep. First, I get a confirmation e-mail on 05/13 that my order has shipped. On 05/15 I get an e-mail from Ethan at Five Star telling me the order in fact has not shipped and is on backorder. Following day I see that despite my using the Kickback certificate correctly (as evidenced by the order's confirmation e-mail) Five Star has ignored it and charged my credit card full price. Ethan assures me my card is being credited right away and says the he will not charge me for shipping when the dvd finally goes out. That my card was charged before they even have the DVD in stock is another issue entirely.
One week later no credit has posted to my account. My bank confirms no credit is even on the horizon from Five Star. There is no excuse for such poor service and I am frankly wondering why this company is part of ADT family at all.
Spare yourselves a lot of aggravation and shop elsewhere. It's worth giving a few more dollars to a company that cares. Clearly Five Star has demonstrated to me, by their repeated careless actions, that they don't.
After posting this message I received a prompt reply from Ethan at FIVE STAR. I think it only fair to post it:
Greetings, we are refunding you for the complete order; we apoligize that the item was not instock and could not ship. The refund will not be for 30 dollars, it will be for 38.95. I read with interest your post at adultdvdtalk.com. We hope you choose to use fivestardvd again, please directly email me with a dvd choice and I will send it to you via UPS for free. This means that once the refund goes through today, you will have spent not a dollar and will be receiving any dvd of your choice for free. Instead of the kickback, you can choose a dvd of over 30 dollars and I will also cover the post. Again, we apoligize for the error in applying your kickback and the inventory error on the dvd ordered. I will handpick and pack your new dvd and you will note my signature on the delivery slip. Fivestardvd prides ourselves on speedy delivery, great product cost, and postive resolutions to problems if they occur. We would also hope you will note in a future post to adultdvdtalk.com that we followed up and resolved your issues. While mistakes can occur in an order, I will personally go the extra distance to fix or solve your issues.
Regards, Ethan Singer Customer Service Rep. Fivestardvd
My reply back to Ethan:
Ethan,
Thank you for your message. I have read everything you have to say but there have been "mistakes" at every juncture and little done to rectify them.
As far as your offer to send a DVD for free I have to be frank... it really isn't free because I have used the $30.00 Kickback in your store and will not be getting it back. You previously offered to ship the DVD on backorder for free when it arrived so my actual expense on the order would have been something like $4.00. After everything that has happened I hardly find $4.00 worth making myself susceptible to more aggravation.
Besides obviously crediting my card for the $38.95 I think the only reasonable solution is to credit my Kickback certificate back to my ADT account.
Maybe it's me who is reading Ethan's reply incorrectly. But it seems to me that as well as refunding you $8.95 more than he had to, and fulfilling your existing backorder, he is offering you an ADDITIONAL free DVD.
I don't know what more he can do to make you happy.
Rant time:
I'm starting to feel that the Shopping Info is turning into the worst part of ADT. Nobody seems to give the companies a chance to fix a customer service issue anymore. As soon as something goes wrong people come to the forum and posts: "This company sucks" threads.
Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with people pointing out when a store has bad policies or procedures that systematically cause problems (a search of this forum will see that I have done more of my fair share of complaining about retailer procedures).
But posting because something went wrong with your order without giving the retailer adequate opportunity to rectify the situation is just wrong (I don't consider one customer service contact, where the CS rep made an polite, yet unsuccessful effort to fix a problem "adequate opportunity)
Bill, I am not sure you read my post from the beginning and finished it. I am not using this Forum to rant and rave. On the contrary a clear pattern of order problems has been established here. I am a patient and fair individual. I don't think it is I who is jumping to conclusions. Let's all try and be fair. Thank you.
By the way, Bill, you did not understand Ethan's reply correctly. The offer was not an additional DVD. There was to be a refund and no fulfillment of my order though after I brought this to Ethan's attention he has offered to fulfill the order for free.
Still wanking after all these years. 8082 Posts 10/00
Posted - May 24 2002 : 3:03AM
Couldn't agree with you more Bill!
If jasfl really had to post something in the forum before contacting the retailer (and that's debatable), so be it, but it didn't warrant the gratuitous title "Five Star stinks!" title IMVHO.
Joey Starr wrote "...and that's debatable" That's an entirely uncalled for response from someone who doesn't know me. There is nothing in my posts that should question my integrity and I resent the implication. It's flippant and rude.
For the record there had been considerable communication between the vendor and myself. I used this forum as it is intended, to discuss shopping issues once I had exhausted all other avenues. Apparently these gentlemen wouldn't mind having their adult merchandise fall out in front of the Postman or have their credit cards charged inappropriately without promised prompt refund.
I make no apologies for sharing these experiences with fellow members. I hardly think anything here is worth chastising me for. I have to wonder if my initial post is being read in it's entirety. I have endeavored to remain fair by posting Five Star's responses. Note that only once I had posted the issue here did I get concrete action.
Okay, it looks like a couple wires are being crossed, and I hd to reread a couple of the posts a couple times to get it straight. I'll try to break it down here as what happened while pointing out some assumptions without trying to cast any blame. #1 - Customer places order using Kickbacks (assuming they were done properly) #2 - Something got screwed up so that the credit card was charged for the entire order rather than the difference between the order and the kickbacks #3 - Retailer told about problem, and say they will credit the amount ot the credit card to fix things, but it never goes through. #4 - Posts were made problems, with some history #5 - Retailer notices problems and offers to correct it by crediting the card not just for the amount of the kickback, but for the entire amount which is almost $10 more #5 - Retailer offers to make ammends by shipping out any DVD over $30 (the original amount of the Kickback), the person you've been dealing with handpacking it themselves, and shipping it for free. #6 - Customer whines about getting at the worst case, the same thing for free.
Okay, I completely understood jasfl's problem in his intitial post. He (assumption here again) wasn't complaining when he had an initial problem, but after he had a repeated problem. After reading the response from 5 Star and the corresponding reply from jasfl, I have to go completely to 5 Star's side. They admit that they made a mistake, and are giving jasfl back more than what he originally asked for. Note that 5 Star told jasfl to pick any one item OVER $30.
I'm going to step out on a pretty thick limb here to point out another assumption I gained looking at the last posts on the main forum page the other day. This is another thing that really makes me proud of 5 Star's service here. I'm assuming jasfl is ordering gay porn (which makes his worries about the porn pouring out in front of the postman even more of a worry if he's still in the closet) since I saw jasfl listed as the last post several times from the Gay Forum. As some might know, most decent gay porn normally seems to start at around $50.
So rather than just sending jasfl what was originally ordered for free, 5 Star has offered to send him anything in the store (which I assume is so something can be chosen that's in stock) knowing that there's a very good chance of it being almost or even over twice as much as the original order was going to be.
Sorry, jasfl, but complaining about this kind of service when a company is making a very good effort to try to make up for past problems only makes you look bad. 5 Star's customer service here shows just why they're such a great part of the Adult DVD Talk family. Keep up the great work guys and thanks for making such great efforts to keep the customers happy.
To the contrary, Astroknight, I have assured Five Star that as soon as they follow through on their promises I will post that here too. I challenge you to point out where I have complained about Five Star's response since the initial post as you claim. I have gone out of my way not to whine but rather give a detailed listing of the circumstances. It is other members who seem to be interpreting my stance as a rant when it is everything but that. Perhaps my communication skills are lacking.
You too haven't gotten the offer from Five Star correct nor the time line but that matters little.
As far as my being upset about the DVDs pouring out they were, as a matter of fact, straight not gay and to be frank why should it matter? Most people I know who order adult material consider their privacy essential and don't care to share it with the Postman or any stranger for that matter. Companies that cater to the adult audience build their reputations on their privacy policies and advertise rather vigorously their abilities to maintain consumers privacy. Every time I log on ADT in fact I am bombarded by Five Star's link at the top of the page blasting "DISCREET SHIPPING".
Since posting here I am very pleased with Five Star's response. I wish it would have come sooner. Frankly I am a little unsettled that it had to come at my expense in the form of misinformed ADT members.
I was under the misguided assumption that we were here to support one another. My mistake. I apologize. I assume, you assume...we both look like fools.
It has come to my attention that some members who masque as consumers are themselves Adult DVD company owners. I find their posts utterly disingenuous.
jasfl, My original “rant” following my initial reply to you was intended to be generic regarding the quickness that people have been taking general customer service problems (either ones that a company has attempted to rectify, or without even contacting the company at all). There are posts with topics like: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, Horrible Service YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY – WTF? Not Happy With ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ It’s constantly “I didn’t get my order exactly as I wanted to get it”. The complaints aren’t “They had a problem and then told me to “fuck off” when I questioned it. That would be a company that “stinks”.
Part of the problem here is that when you state things like “only once I had posted the issue here did I get concrete action”, you are describing a situation that is 180 degrees different from what we have personally experienced.
This statement is like you telling me that the sun never rises where you live. It may be true, but it is not a situation that I can possibly imagine with this company. Recently, I also had a Kickback problem with Five Star. I sent them an e-mail at 7:04 eastern time. I had a reply from them 23 minutes later. If a week from now, the problem is not properly resolved, I will send them another e-mail. I won’t come running to a forum complaining that they made a mistake when they tried to fix a problem.
If they had not been attempting to rectify your problem, I would have no problem with your complaint. Never in anything that you wrote, did you ever indicate that you ever followed up on this problem with them.
Maybe you’re right when you state “Perhaps my communication skills are lacking”. If you go back and re-read your original post you will see that astroknight’s first three items listed are exactly what you said happened, followed up by #4: You, waiting a week, seeing that the credit had not been posted #5: You, then making the public statement “FIVE STAR stinks”
As far as the box arriving opened, bitch to the US Postal Service, not Five Star. The Postal Service provides these boxes to Five Star. Someone in the Postal Service crushed or tore your box (or whatever happened that caused the box to open). Discreet does not mean that the package is hermetically sealed. It means that the outer packaging doesn’t indicate the presence of adult material inside of it.
As far as you being “a little unsettled that it had to come at my expense in the form of misinformed ADT members”, YOU were the one who was informing us. If WE are misinformed, then it is because you did a poor job of informing us.
I (and I'm sure Steph & Drew) would like who these people are. From what I've seen here, people who have attempted to disguise themselves this way have been tossed out of ADT pretty quickly,
Now, on to individual points as jasfl have stated both in response to my post and others:
Nowhere in what you posted does it say anything about the order not being fulfilled. As you state here, 5 Star has every intention of fulfilling the order.That's true, but as most people who have a credit card know, it is possible to have charges reversed by talking to the company who holds the credit card itself. It's one of the avenues that can be used to correct incorrect charges. It normally takes more than a week to do.Well, what would you call this (from your respose to Ethan, who is one of the best customer service reps I've had the pleasure to deal with):Free might not be the right word here (assuming that the order was cancelled which was never mentioned anywhere). Instead they're offering you anything over the $30 Kickback you spent with them free. Perhaps it would be better put as a free upgrade with no top end.Then please correct me! That's why I tried to give a detailed summary. You claim we are all confused, so I tried to simplify things. Most of us thing that details like what happens when and what a store offers to do to try and solve problems are important in that little thing called "customer service".My comment was based on sensitivity to those who are still in the closet. I don't know much about this, but from what I understand many of those people go to some length to cover up their lifestyle. Having DVDs pour out of the box would be something that could challenge that lifestyle, especially if they live in a very small community where gossiping is frequent. I've ordered from 5 Star many times in the past and, as Bill stated, their packages have always been extremely discrete. The DVDs pouring out of the box is the only thing I could see as not being discrete, which once again as Bill pointed out, is not 5 Star's fault.I can be a little slow sometimes, and really hate to be misinformed. Please direct me to where anybody other than yourself gave any information about what happened here.We are here to support one another. As I think I've said several times now, that is why I tried to simplify things by detailing what happened when. When things aren't stated completely clearly, there's normally some confusion and we're led to make assumptions. When we point out assumptions we can then clarify things as to whether they were correct or incorrect assumptions. I've been wrong before and admitted it. I'm sure it will happen again, which is why I try to state when I'm making an assumption or guess. That way we don't have to look like fools. I know I'm kind of biased here, but only one of us is appearing to be a fool.Yep. It has happened in the past. It rarely lasts too long before those people are banned. On the other hand, there are many other people who openly admit to owning adult shops. They're a valuable part of Adult DVD Talk, and are often worth listening to. I hope you weren't just assuming certain long time people were retailers, so nobody looks like a fool.
If that comment is directed at either Bill or Astroknight, I can assure you that neither is the case. I know that on the Internet, no one knows you're a dog, but if anything, they're defensive of Five Star because both have bought a lot of discs (emphasis on bought) from them and have not encountered anything remotely close to your situation.
Personally, I've had occasional problems with Five Star, but I would consider their customer service to be excellent. I've had them misship and they either tell me to keep the wrong discs plus they reshipped the correct ones, or they've sent a pre-paid mailer for returns. They always ship partial orders and fulfill backorders via priority mail. And I've never had a case when the packages are not sealed properly.
I appreciate your report, and I'd like to think that this is an isolated incident. However, if you do a search on this forum for Five Star, you'll see an overwhelming number of positive reports compared to negative ones.
I don't think you understand the way the Kickback program works. ADT rebates a portion of your purchase price into your Kickback account on eligible purchases. This rebate is funded as a contribution of part of ADT's sales commission.
When you redeem your Kickbacks into store gift certificates, ADT pays the store you want the certificate from for a gift certificate.
Per the Operating Agreement: "Gift certificates issued through the Kickback program are non-refundable." So even if you wanted Five Star to "give back" your Kickback gift certificate, ADT will not let you exchange it for another vendor. So the bottom line is, once you redeem your Kickback rebates for a specific store, you either have to spend the certificate at that store, or you can just choose not to redeem it at all. Either way, you have no option to choose another store. That has nothing to do with the vendor, it's the terms of the Kickback program itself.
So your statement that it isn't worth the hassle to continue to deal with Five Star, it's pretty clear that it is worth the hassle, otherwise you won't get anything from your $30 Kickback.
Finally, unless your order was going to be for more than a single DVD (sounds like it wasn't), the offer to send a DVD of over $30 value at least matches what you were getting from the $30 gift certificate. Now, as for your inconvenience, maybe Five Star will offer something further since you don't feel their offer is unacceptable, but unless my math is wrong, you're not out anything more than some hassle at the end of the day.
As someone who works in the CS field, I can tell you that no matter how hard we try, mistakes will be made from time to time. We're human, stuff happens. The mark of a good CS rep is how they rectify the problem.
I honestly cannot see what else Ethan from 5 Star could have done to make things right. To me, he's going above & beyond the call of duty in order in to satisfy this customer-more power to him.
This will be my last post on this subject. I want to thank everyone who participated in this heated debate for their thoughts and opinions. People disagree about all kinds of things and we disagree here.
I want to clarify one point before I sign off. The box that opened in front of the Postman was not damaged in any way. It was a Priority Mail box that was shipped from Five Star's warehouse without being sealed with tape. The two tabs at each end of the box were simply inserted. (The box itself had clear instructions from the Post Office to seal each end.) Five Star's President, in his letter to me at the time, was horrified and took full responsibility. He also sent me a copy of the letter he addressed to all employees on the matter. His words were strong, effective and resolute,I thought, and that is why I dropped the subject at the time. I felt that voicing my angst had made a difference and that is what I had hoped would happen here.
When I said that perhaps my communication skills were lacking I was trying to be gracious to members who it seemed were having difficulty "getting it" and jumping to inappropriate conclusions. Repeating things over and over again is of no use to anyone.
I will repeat, I do not expect Five Star and Ethan to do anymore than they have promised. As long as matters are followed through to their completion I have no qualms about letting this go. I want to thank Ethan for now doing his best, no ifs ands or buts.
Thanks for listening. I am sorry there is such a divergence of opinion. I wish you all well.
I wish I was around when this all started. (Steph and I have been on vacation in Nova Scotia since Monday.)
jasfl - You should have received a $30 credit to your Kickback account. Check your email.
There's a number of other things I would like to comment on in response to points made in this thread but since I've been putting out fires since I got home an hour ago. More to some when I get settled in.
