Buyer Beware Suncoast Reptiles, owner Kevin Olbrych, and their crappy shipping practices. Maybe i have gotten spoiled with the all the different leopard gecko shipments I have received because each of them looked like the same person packed them despite them coming from different breeders. Insulated boxes, appropriate sized cups with tissue in the bottom, lots of newspaper to keep things from moving and to cushion the containers from the sides of the package but I am 2 for 2 having tortoises shipped in in completely inappropriate materials. Do tortoise folks think they are shipping rocks? It would certainly appear that there is little concern for their safety or comfort in shipping.
On 5/10/15 I saw and ad for a pair of hatchling Dwarf Cherry Head Tortoises on Fauna's website for $300 including shipping. I made arrangements to purchase. Given our last disaster shipping in the baby Elongated Tortoises I sent him this email
- "Thursday shipment? Or would you rather wait till next week also had a bad experience recently you use insulated boxes heat appropriate containers etc when shipping? live delivery guaranteed? Sorry have to ask had a very disappointing experience on Fauna recently. We are super excited. Kathy" -
We exchanged a couple more emails and somehow I missed that he never answered my question regarding the above question/request. He also started signing his emails as "Suncoast" and I think that might have also lulled me into thinking "ok he's a legit business, he's got this."
Tortoises were shipped out 5/26/15 and arrived on 5/27/15. They were 45 minutes late and I had sent him an email letting him know when there weren't delivered on time. When they arrived my spouse, Amy, was the one home to receive them. She met the FedEx driver at the door. She's been our FedEx driver for years and we do a lot of business on Ebay so we see her often. She apologized but seemed very surprised to learn the small box contained live animals.
As you can see from the video they were shipped in a free "if it fits it ships" box from the post office that he cut one of seams on (destroying it's integrity) turned inside out then retaped with brown tape to cover the USPS Priority Mail logos. It measures 5 3/8" x 8 5/8" x 1 5/8". Written in fat black marker above the label and barely legible it says "Live Harmless Reptiles". Nowhere are their arrows indicating which side is up or that you even need to worry about having it right side up or otherwise. Inside that box was another box just a fraction smaller. It's not corrugated cardboard. It is thin like a cereal box. Inside that was a semi wadded up half sheet of a standard kitchen paper towel and loose in the box was our 2 tiny tortoises. Here is the video of Amy unpacking them. It ended up being done in 2 videos because when she opened the 1st box she couldn't believe how they were packed and was pissed and almost scared to open the inner box afraid that we were once again going to have something dead. Note no insulation of any sort. No cushioning. Nothing to keep them from sliding from one side to the other. Nothing to indicate unless you look really hard that their was anything alive in the box or which side went up. I'm pissed and I'm done shipping in tortoises. This is cruel.
I contacted him, chewed him out over the crappy boxing and told him since he could get his shipping refunded that I wanted him to refund it to me because I never wanted to be a party to this crappy risky shipping practice (Ok I was mad). He sent me an email calling up that I put a downpayment on them and was was unable to make the final payment on the original date I had set up (I had emailed him letting him know it was going to be late and he'd said it was ok) like that justifies somehow the risky way he shipped?? I will figure out how to get the screen shots of the emails up where my concerns are brushed off and I"m told to enjoy my tortoises. Today I wrote him just to let him know I was posting to this BOI and to Fauna's BOI because I'm not going to have it said I did anything behind his back and he told him to call him and that I'm harassing him. I have nothing more to say to him or about him. I wish someone had reviewed his shipping practice as I am now so I could have avoided him all together. I was contacted by another party on Fauna's website in response to my questions about shipping tortoises and they had gotten a shipment from Suncoast and were also shocked and unhappy about the way it was packed. It's not ok and I'm not afraid to give an honest review. Buyer beware. Yes I got my torts. Yes the are gorgeous and seem to be ok but they were put in an extremely dangerous situation and this very easily could have had a much different ending. I got lucky.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFQIm8g0Kng
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naF5qQWBcKo
Crappy Shipping Practices-Kevin Olbrych owner Suncoast Reptiles
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