bestcrickets, Elvis Mendoza, Patricia Castillo aka 5dollarmealworms.com

I recently purchased 2k mealworms from th5dollarmealworms.com. At the time of purchase, as requested on the 5dollarmealworms.com website, I stated in the paypal message that my temps would be below 40 degrees. Three days later on February 6th, I received a USPS electronic notification that seller had printed a shipping label. I immediately emailed seller that my temps would be extremely low, 5-10degrees, and I would have no problem waiting till the following week (This coming week - tomorrow) when my temps were forecasted to warm up into the mid to upper 30's.

No response.

I checked the tracking number each day to see if there were any updates. Acording to the tracking number, the mealworms shipped out two days later, on the 8th. They arrived on Friday the 11th, at around 5pm central time. They were packaged in a small USPS Priority box. (aprox. dimensions: (7"X4"X1 1/2") The seller had punctured several 3/8" air holes in the box. Inside the box was a canvas bag filled with, about 1500 mealworms, 90% have perished, the rest are barely moving, and there were also a handful of dead, black escapees, loose in the box. I immediately emailed seller, with pictures. I then went to fauna and saw that they were online, so I pm'ed him/her. I have sent several messages since, and I see that they are either online, or have logged in almost every time I frequent this sight. They refuse to even acknowledge my emails. I will not, and in my opinion neither should anyone else, do business with these people again.

bestcrickets is their fauna user name. Elvis Mendoza is their listed name on Fauna. Patricia Castillo is the person my paypal payment was sent to.
5dollarmealworms.com is their website.
Although it is just a shade over $15.00, it is still very bad business. Hopefully paypal will refund my money. bestcrickets does not even have the guts to return my emails. Over $15.00? Go figure.

I just got back in town to find out about your DOAs. I am in noway shape or form trying to scam you or not ship out a new order of worms. I issued you a full refund for the worms and shipping. I stand behind what I sell and will go out of my way to keep my costumers happy. Just ask everyone else that has bought animals or mealworms from me. Now I know that your order was shipped out before you asked for it to be shipped and arrived dead. But I ship out thousands of mealworms every week and every once and awhile thing dont go right.
Sorry for the inconveniece Elvis

While I have bought mealworms from the 5dollarmealworms.com site, I have to say that I got my mealworms within two days after shipping and they were all perfect. I live in Maryland and bestcrickets lives in California (it was even pretty cold outside; under 40 degrees the whole week). I don't think this was the seller's fault that this happened, and given that he replaces mealworms if there are any DOAs with no questions asked I don't see anything bad about this guy at all.

The mealworms were a great deal, shipping too, I would definitely buy from him again. Even if there were a hundred dead mealworms in my box I would be fine with that because it was such a great deal rather than buying them from my local pet store. lol

It is unfortunate that you had problems with your shipment, but unfortunately problems do happen sometimes. =\ I would give Elvis a break about this. Sometimes people gotta go out of town for different reasons while they still have a little business going on at home.

hey thanks for the good feed back kodie.

I forgot to add that I am in the California National Guard and was drilling in Camp Roberts this weekend. Thats why I wasnt able to reply sooner. All the log ins that you seen me make was my wife and kid looking at all the reptiles on fauna. I automaticly log in every time I visit fauna.

Originally Posted by bestcrickets

All the log ins that you seen me make was my wife and kid looking at all the reptiles on fauna. I automaticly log in every time I visit fauna.

I also forgot to mention that he answered all of my PMs in a timely fashion when I sent them, there were no escapees from my bag of mealworms, and it is not unusual for families to share log-ins for forums like this.

And you are welcome for the feedback. I hate to see someone get a bad reputation when they don't deserve it.

WOW! Didn't take long for you to find this thread, before even checking your pm's or email messages from me? Amazing! The ol' just got back in town routine? Ok, whatever, as long as I get my refund; and then there is no need for you to respond to any of my messages. Had I known all it would take was a kick in the...BOI, for all to see, I would have posted sooner. Amazing.

Thank you BOI for doing your job.

I don't mean to intrude...but I believe you mentioned you were posting a BOI on the thread where he first introduced his mealworm sales.

I would think that initially seeing that threat made there would lead him first to check the BOI rather than his private messages. This is how I found out about it. If he is like me, I get emails when someone posts to a thread that I have already responded on. Even though you were the customer that had the problem, since you brought the problem to the public, it would make more sense to respond publicly to your claims (at least beforehand) rather than copy and paste the same message that he would have sent you in a PM, to this thread here. By making a thread about him on the BOI, you are demeaning his business...people could have read this thread before he responded, what business owner would want people to see this negative claim without a response from the seller themselves? Who is to say that he even was able to see that he had "new" PMs on FaunaClassifieds when his child gets on the computer? I could see a child clicking the messages and forgetting to tell their parent that they had some new ones.

Just saying...

I do not mean to be making shots at you David, but I think you need to calm down a little bit.

You should check your paypal account. Theres was a refund in your account before I even notice this. No one here has to lie, Some of us have a life outside of Fauna. Oh and Thanks for the for the extra advertising. I just received a few extra orders since you posted this BOI. Anyone else that wants a ton of mealworms for cheap can go to 5dollarmealworms.com. or can contact me at fivedollarmealworms@hotmail.com.

Originally Posted by bestcrickets

Anyone else that wants a ton of mealworms for cheap can go to 5dollarmealworms.com. or can contact me at fivedollarmealworms@hotmail.com.

You should not advertise on the BOI. There is a classified here you can use.

Big, juicy, plump mealworms. At least...that is what my leo told me.

This was my shipment I got last week.