Rian at Underground Reptiles BAD GUY

Hi Peter,

Hope you had a great start for 2004! Did you visit Rian at his store? If so, what was the outcome of your conversation?

Regards.

Was Peter flying out to Florida?

Rian sent me an email asking me to call him to talk at the store in a professional, friendly manner. So far he has seemed quite courteous and I am obliged to treat him the same. Hopefully I can take the time to listen to his side of the story, he can take the time to listen to mine and we can figure something out.

Wendy,

Maybe I misinterpreted his words, but when he said he was going to "call him to talk at the store" I understood it was going to be in person. One way or the other I would like to hear what the outcome was.

Kindly.

I see. I interpreted that as he would be calling Rian a the store to talk. Doesn't make much sense for Peter to fly all the way out there from California just to talk about this...unless he is vacationing there for Christmas.

I agree, I would like to hear the outcome. I hope it is positive.

Ok.. I sat here and read this entire thread. It cought my eye in the first place, because my hubby and a good friend of his have asked me repeatedly if I knew anything about Undergound's rep, as they were both interested in purchasing a group of chondros from them. Now I am very glad I read all this, and thank you Pete for posting your experiance. I am very sorry this happened to you. I love Uros, and she was a gorgeous animal. Egyptians happen to be one of my favorites due to their personality and size.

IMO, everything that Underground has been doing is S#%$TTY! COMPLETELY and UTTERLY irresponcible, bad business practise, and very bad ethically and morally. I'm going to completely stay away from the religion thing, as I'm a member of a pagan family, and our two groups natoriously do not mix, even though I have no problem with them. I'd like to commend CheriS though, for her obvious true understanding of Christianity. Too many people use this as a mask for their hate, which the religion is not ment to do. Its actually a pretty loving religion for the most part. Ah well so much for staying out of it. lol.

Anyway, I definatly will never do business with these people, as they are obvious scam artists and typical money obcessed businessmen. I always had a bad vibe about them, and I like to trust my initial instincts. I'm glad I did, and prevented those close to me from getting ripped off.. Esp after hearing that someone on this thread had theirs die. They may have a nice shop, and good in store service, but that DOESN'T make a business. That just makes a front for it. A true, good business, is based on customer happiness, and good practises. Undergrand lacks both.

A few more points.

Pete was never rude, but only defended himself on one instance, when he was accused of killing the animal, which is flat out wrong.

IMO, the vet WAS wrong. I agree that any good herp vet would of figured out it was an infection in the first visit. The problem is, there are VERY FEW good herp vets out there. There is only 1 or 2 good herp vets in my state, and having done rescue for many years, I know how difficult it can be to get a herp to one of them. Peter did what he thought was right, and got his animal to a vet.

Interesting that you mention their chondros Brie.

I contacted them some time ago about some "Zoo Bred" chondros they had for sale on kingsnake. I told them I liked the way they looked and that I might be interested in purchasing one or two, but would like more information, namely the zoological facility they were produced at.

I received a very short e-mail response back stating that the paperwork would be in the box with my purchase when the snakes arrived to my home. Doesn't sound too above board to me. Especially considering TRULY zoo bred animals come with mountains of paperwork on all ends of the transactions in most cases(maybe they were special, but I HIGHLY doubt it).

I e-mailed them back very politely stating that I was hoping for more information BEFORE making a purchase and that based on their lack of information I would not purchase these animals.

Then another response comes back saying they don't have time to spend giving out information to people who aren't serious about buying. That's too bad considering I spent that money I was seriously thinking of spending with them and got some nice quality CBB chondros from a reputable source.

Guess Upstate, whoops, I mean Underground doesn't want your money unless you just hand it over blindly. God forbid you ask a question.

Hi everyone,

First of all, I apologize for not getting on here and explaining how all of this turned out. Once it was settled I was caught up in a flood of work and to be honest, I really just wanted to forget about all of it.

The good news is I received a refund from Rian. I called intending to try and get time for both of us to talk in a polite manner and hear our respective sides to the story. That didn't really work out however. I attempted to tell my story and it was not received very well. However, Rian did say that, because of his belief in Jesus, he was going to give me back a full refund, including for the vet bills! I did receive the money as promised.

I really don't know what happened from their side. This whole ordeal was very hard for me and, despite a few emails about possibe replacements for Pebbles, I have decided to wait and see if my younger Egyptian is a female before looking for a different mate for my adult male Egyptian Uromastyx Boulder (for those of you who don't know the story, he's a rescue, I bought him from a petstore in Florida after hearing he had 3rd degree heat lamp burns on his back and he was not going to get veterinary attention...woah, I'm off topic now). The motivation for giving me a refund could have been a lot of things.

In the end, I hope all of this doesn't overshadow the horrible tragedy of losing a beautiful animal. Thank you all again for your support and I hope you and all of your animals have a wonderful and healthy year.

Rest in peace Pebbles.

im sorry to hear you lost you reptile. as to rian ,i have purchased 13 snakes from him and alot of supplys. we have had no problem with underground reptiles in the years we been doing buisnes with them. we had two snakes that died all most 30 days after the purchas and he has replased both of them
with the snake of our choise and deducted the full price of each dead snake . i didnt have to ask him to do this,he said come on in and bring the snake with you we will make it good. every time we are in his store we see a lot of the same custumers. he has a great following , and i wont but from any one else. his snakes are top in health and prices are great. the two that died ,one went in to a bad shed and died from strees. the other was looking fine and eating great.we got up one morning and found it dead in the cage,this one we had 29 days. i have been in retail management for many years and i have learned one thing than wont change(you cant please every one no matter how hard you try) if you would have taken your reptile to a good vet he could hqave saved it. you need to find one that deals in exotic pets . snake eyes reptiles

I too have purchased many reptiles and supplies from Rian and Greg @ Underground Reptiles. I have also been to the store in Deerfield Beach, FL many times. There service is always friendly and very helpful. Their store is very clean. My wife and I have a great relationship with the guys (and girls - sorry lia) @ Underground. I trust them 100% and would recommend them to anyone.

SAL @ WNCHerps
www.imageevent.com/wncherps