Info Mike @ Outback Reptiles

[hhmoore]

I'm not "blaming" her - not sure where you came up with that one. Though, if she had ever approached me with Lucille said... I sure wouldn't have offered her a pizza.

 

[DollysMom]

I'm not "blaming" her - not sure where you came up with that one. Though, if she had ever approached me with Lucille said... I sure wouldn't have offered her a pizza.

From your previous post these are the words that I took as laying blame for taking a day off to receive the mutually agreed upon and paid for shipment:

"The OP was not forced to accept that particular day for shipping, so the crying about taking the day off falls on (in my case) unsympathetic ears."

I apologize for misunderstanding your intent if those words were not meant to blame (or at the least hold solely accountable) the OP for her dismay in taking a day off to receive the shipment. It is not always easy to get intent from written text.

 

[Michael Brown]

This is a picture of my cell phone showing where I tried contacting Mike on the day I was supposedly waiting for delivery.

What day was this phone call log? Not to , but it would appear that you have this number "Cell: 703-895-0043" not saved as "Mike", but you text messaged a "Mike". Do you have his office number (which would appear to be a land line) saved as "Mike", for which you would be text messaging a land line (which wouldn't work).

Also why did you not call his cell Monday? 703-895-0043, prior to taking the day off.

Again, crappy situation for both. But I think Mike rectified the situation to the best of his ability. Unless he has a track record for this stuff, it would seem that this is mistake that only occurs in a small % of his transactions, to which he tried his best to rectify.

I could see how the pizza thing could rub some people the wrong way, but honestly, when I read that I was thinking to myself "who doesn't love pizza" lol. But to each his own.

 

[BeauBoi]

What day was this phone call log? Not to , but it would appear that you have this number "Cell: 703-895-0043" not saved as "Mike", but you text messaged a "Mike". Do you have his office number (which would appear to be a land line) saved as "Mike", for which you would be text messaging a land line (which wouldn't work).

Also why did you not call his cell Monday? 703-895-0043, prior to taking the day off.

Again, crappy situation for both. But I think Mike rectified the situation to the best of his ability. Unless he has a track record for this stuff, it would seem that this is mistake that only occurs in a small % of his transactions, to which he tried his best to rectify.

I could see how the pizza thing could rub some people the wrong way, but honestly, when I read that I was thinking to myself "who doesn't love pizza" lol. But to each his own.

The phone number I had for Mike (listed as "Mike") is the one I initially called. While on the phone with him, I apologized for calling on a Saturday, and Mike told me that was ok because it was his sell phone and hew was "open all the time". So when I saved it to my phone, I just typed Mike's name into the cell phone info.

At that time, I didn't know that Mike even had a brick and mortar business. It wasn't until after trying to call and message about the tracking number, that even began to look for another number (and the other number isn't much advertised). I will admit, that I didn't occure to me look for alternate numbers on Mike's email siggy.

Irregardless, I called both phones and left messages. No one answered the phones or returned the calls. I emailed. No response. I texted. No timely response. All this after him telling me that he was "Always Open" (which it also says on his FaceBook page, under operating hours). I had NO way of knowing it was his day off.

All of which, seems redundant at this point, since he has admitted it he dropped the ball.

I am answering, because you specifically asked me, but really (for me) this is done.

I accepted Mike's apology and my refund.

As far as pizza goes, my family doesn't like it. I cook every meal we eat unless we are going out with other families to eat. More to the point, I found it mildly insulting -- He refused to actually talk to me, but he wants to buy me a pizza..? I don't get it. The later pic, of him eating pizza, was more than mildly insulting.

The ironic thing, to me at least, was that after I got off the phone with Mike, I turned to my husband and said, "What a nice guy." There isn't a written record, of course, but I thought we had a rather long (for business) and pleasant conversation. it was really disappointing to go through this whole, stressing thing, only to basically be told, "I messed up your order but here is your money back. If you shop here again, we will give you a tiny discount. Be grateful we are offering that."

If anyone asks me a question, I will try to answer it. Otherwise, I'm out of the conversation. I post BOIs on all my transactions, ever since I found Fauna. I am going to keep posting BOIs.

~Beau

 

[Michael Brown]

The phone number I had for Mike (listed as "Mike") is the one I initially called. While on the phone with him, I apologized for calling on a Saturday, and Mike told me that was ok because it was his sell phone and hew was "open all the time". So when I saved it to my phone, I just typed Mike's name into the cell phone info.

At that time, I didn't know that Mike even had a brick and mortar business. It wasn't until after trying to call and message about the tracking number, that even began to look for another number (and the other number isn't much advertised). I will admit, that I didn't occure to me look for alternate numbers on Mike's email siggy.

Irregardless, I called both phones and left messages. No one answered the phones or returned the calls. I emailed. No response. I texted. No timely response. All this after him telling me that he was "Always Open" (which it also says on his FaceBook page, under operating hours). I had NO way of knowing it was his day off.

All of which, seems redundant at this point, since he has admitted it he dropped the ball.

I am answering, because you specifically asked me, but really (for me) this is done.

I accepted Mike's apology and my refund.

As far as pizza goes, my family doesn't like it. I cook every meal we eat unless we are going out with other families to eat. More to the point, I found it mildly insulting -- He refused to actually talk to me, but he wants to buy me a pizza..? I don't get it. The later pic, of him eating pizza, was more than mildly insulting.

The ironic thing, to me at least, was that after I got off the phone with Mike, I turned to my husband and said, "What a nice guy." There isn't a written record, of course, but I thought we had a rather long (for business) and pleasant conversation. it was really disappointing to go through this whole, stressing thing, only to basically be told, "I messed up your order but here is your money back. If you shop here again, we will give you a tiny discount. Be grateful we are offering that."

If anyone asks me a question, I will try to answer it. Otherwise, I'm out of the conversation. I post BOIs on all my transactions, ever since I found Fauna. I am going to keep posting BOIs.

~Beau

Thank you for the clarification. I apologize for the redundancy

 

[BeauBoi]

* For got to add:
I think both phone numbers are cell phones. Can't know for sure, but the automated (generic) message sounded alike on both of them. Something along the lines of, "The party you are trying to reach isn't available at this time..."

~Beau

 

[Black Adder]

Just my thoughts here
Mistakes happen as we are all human and thats what happened here, unfortunate yes but I think a genuine mistake
However it could certainly have been handled much better and Mikes replies so far have just come off as very condesending and unprofessional.
As far as having a tracking number to GUARANTEE that the snake was being delivered also is open to discussion, this year alone I have had 2 snakes delivered that I did not get tracking info for and relied on the sellers word for delivery which they both were.
So in absence of hearing ANYTHING different from the seller it was quite reasonable for the op to rely on the info given to her and expect delivery on Tuesday, I would have been waiting for the fedex van the same!
Also I have received and sent quite a few snakes in this heat and had no issues, yes shipping to a fedex hold facility could be better but as long as you are present to collect the animal as soon as fedex deliver should be fine.

Outback could and should have handled this a little better but the op did get her money back very promptly which is more than some can say.....

 

[reptileexperts]

Mike apologized, he made a mistake and admitted it.

OP made a mistake too, honest as it may have been, by missing work with the hope that even though there was no tracking information provided. Had the OP not missed work, would this be as large of a deal? Probably not. So while Mike dropped the ball (as we all do), he rectified it immediately. Missing work was not Mike's issue but the OP's.

For future reference. If you have a fedex account you can log in and check the tracking attached to your address. Anytime a label is generated to and from that address you have listed, you will get tracking information automatically. You can use this to validate shipping claims or just better monitor schedules based on shipping promises. It's a great tool to save these instances from happening as much.

 

[AllisonLeigh]

Like many in this thread, you are addressing this as if it is Mike's system and Mike's problem. Mike does not own Outback Reptiles - he's an employee.

Really? That would certainly make a big difference in my opinion for sure, but on MorphMarket.com he is listed as the owner. Is that not accurate?

 

[hhmoore]

Maybe he bought it, or the name, from Ian?

Mike, care to shed some light on this?

 

[hhmoore]

http://outbackreptiles.com/crew/

 

[gracie]

Wait a minute. Is this REALLY something that warranted a BOI report? This just seems a little....I dunno, petty. Customer orders snake online. Pays. Company realizes a mistake was made, issues a prompt refund and a discount off future purchases (which most companies wouldn't even consider), case closed. I'm not going through 8 pages of bickering so haven't the foggiest whats transpired here in this thread and am only speaking of the actual issue that had taken place.

There was no theft. No arguing or beating around the bush about refunds. The problem was handled promptly and responsibly. To ad a stain to someones reputation because you're irritated seems a bit childish and they made a simple mistake about a 50 dollar corn snake......

I've only had good dealings with Outback (99% of which were with Ian and in person at expos, which he does MANY MANY of and is quite busy consequently).

Large companies will occasionally have very small slip ups like this but many do not handle them as well as this one here. This should be an "Oh well, glad I got my money back, thankyou for taking responsibility for making a mistake" situation. Not a go cry about it on the BOI one....

 

[gracie]

Skimmed the first few pages and holy crap, lol, I give you credit Mike for being able to keep your cool through that....

Not to often you see a company handle a situation as well as this, completely and openly take full responsibility and STILL somehow end up with 8 pages of folks yelling at them for not being 100% perfect 100% of the time, that's incredible...

 

[Snake-Queen]

Wait a minute. Is this REALLY something that warranted a BOI report? This just seems a little....I dunno, petty. Customer orders snake online. Pays. Company realizes a mistake was made, issues a prompt refund and a discount off future purchases (which most companies wouldn't even consider), case closed. I'm not going through 8 pages of bickering so haven't the foggiest whats transpired here in this thread and am only speaking of the actual issue that had taken place.

There was no theft. No arguing or beating around the bush about refunds. The problem was handled promptly and responsibly. To ad a stain to someones reputation because you're irritated seems a bit childish and they made a simple mistake about a 50 dollar corn snake......

I've only had good dealings with Outback (99% of which were with Ian and in person at expos, which he does MANY MANY of and is quite busy consequently).

Large companies will occasionally have very small slip ups like this but many do not handle them as well as this one here. This should be an "Oh well, glad I got my money back, thankyou for taking responsibility for making a mistake" situation. Not a go cry about it on the BOI one....

Regardless of what you think, everyone is entitled to post their experiences with anyone or company they do business with. The OP did NOT label this as a BAD GUY thread, it is an INFO thread.

There were no expectations of a different outcome than the one that was received.

You may want to read the whole thread before commenting or risk looking petty yourself (for your unnecessary comment about how it isn't BOI worthy).




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[gracie]

Well sure its labled an "info thread", but in all reality, posts here are never just that. That will either positively paint a person or company or negatively, there really isn't actually any inbetween. If a person comes here and sees this it is doubtful they will say to themselves "Okay, I saw that thread but I will not take it nto account when forming my own opinion about said company because it was labled "info"".

It just seems pointless, unless the desired effect was to hurt the seller. I'm in no way saying Mike and/or outback are perfect, no one is, but this particular situation had as good an ending as could be expected. It was a mistake that was handled the way it should have been, no one was robbed or lied to. But this post, regardless of what label it was given, is obviously a negative one towards Mike and Outback, when there isn't really just cause to give a negative response.

 

[AllisonLeigh]

Not necessarily. I wouldn't be concerned ordering from Mike. If I were to order I now know it may be best to call the store to confirm availability first, if I am concerned about a shipping date being for sure. No one did anything wrong in this situation, but it's a review/experience the customer can benefit from knowing about.

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[DollysMom]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think this has morphed into shooting the messenger, albeit politely enough?

This thread would have ended long ago but the OP, who did nothing wrong except to buy a snake that was sold to someone else, and to honor a mutually agreed upon delivery date by awaiting shipment at the agreed to address, is being grilled up one side and down the other. She's now being told, again, she shouldn't even have posted because of assumptions others may make.

Also, maybe not everyone reads whole BOI threads, but I do. I've seen threads labeled bad guy where the evidence or lack thereof, quickly make it clear there is no bad guy in that case. I may not have many posts here but I have hours and hours of lurking and reading.

The OP even asked advice from a respected member before posting this info thread. Happily, I don't think you who are turning it on her will deter her from posting in the future, but what effect it may have on others is unknown.

When people are afraid to post BOI threads, good, bad, question, or info, the BOI loses its purpose.

For fear of going too much into policy and not this specific case I'll not comment on the purpose of the BOI and the validity of this info thread further, here.

 

[Snake-Queen]

Well sure its labled an "info thread", but in all reality, posts here are never just that. That will either positively paint a person or company or negatively, there really isn't actually any inbetween. If a person comes here and sees this it is doubtful they will say to themselves "Okay, I saw that thread but I will not take it nto account when forming my own opinion about said company because it was labled "info"".

It just seems pointless, unless the desired effect was to hurt the seller. I'm in no way saying Mike and/or outback are perfect, no one is, but this particular situation had as good an ending as could be expected. It was a mistake that was handled the way it should have been, no one was robbed or lied to. But this post, regardless of what label it was given, is obviously a negative one towards Mike and Outback, when there isn't really just cause to give a negative response.

Oh, you are one of those who read titles and move on.

Questioning the OP about her reason for posting is why more people don't post …

I've read the whole thread.

I've come away from this learning several things.

1) Mike is fallible, like everyone.
2) He admits his mistakes.
3) He refunds quickly.
4) He can be a little testy/snarky, etc.

If Outback had something I wanted, I would order from them.

I appreciate the OPs post.


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[nickolasanastasiou]

Well sure its labled an "info thread", but in all reality, posts here are never just that. That will either positively paint a person or company or negatively, there really isn't actually any inbetween. If a person comes here and sees this it is doubtful they will say to themselves "Okay, I saw that thread but I will not take it nto account when forming my own opinion about said company because it was labled "info"".

It just seems pointless, unless the desired effect was to hurt the seller. I'm in no way saying Mike and/or outback are perfect, no one is, but this particular situation had as good an ending as could be expected. It was a mistake that was handled the way it should have been, no one was robbed or lied to. But this post, regardless of what label it was given, is obviously a negative one towards Mike and Outback, when there isn't really just cause to give a negative response.

People are supposed to form opinions based on as much information as they can gather. If people want to skip or haphazardly skim, they are making themselves situationally illiterate. This medium for information exchange is written/typed, so choosing to be literate is kind of, you know, key to constructing an informed opinion. As for being either/or (strictly dichotomous) for info threads, that is untrue. Plenty of mid-spectrum mixed experiences with both good and bad aspects to experiences may be (and often are) included in an info-titled thread. It is up to us as readers to invest our time in gaining the knowledge to determine where we fall on such things.

The OP has made it clear for those not skimming that it is the normal procedure for the OP to aim to create a BOI thread or post (good/bad/info as applicable) for each transaction the OP has engaged in. Standard practice for the OP.

If you think this situation had a good ending and casts the selling party here in a positive light, then the thread is not negative to you regardless of your perception of the intention and speaks positively of the outcome.

The things I did like:

Admission of the mistake and rapid refunding. After the mistake, it really was all I would expect from a good businessman. I liked the future discount offer as well. That was a matter of good will. For clarity due to this having been disputed as being effectively meager, he said 10% off of any future order. Not only of a relatively inexpensive order. That can be very significant or very insignificant depending on what one's order total comes to and could easily range from a few dollars to hundreds of dollars.

The things I did not like:

The response (with photo of the pizza box) after the pizza offer was rejected and the matter was brought here in an info thread format (so part of post number five of this thread). There really was no need for that and could not have resulted in a positive impression for the person it was intended to affect. The offer itself was a little different (unusual), but I will give that offer itself the benefit of the doubt. I have done business with Mike before and I was perfectly happy with my experience. If the pizza photo nonsense was posted in response to my rejection of an offered pizza over an imperfect experience I could have had, I doubt I would perceive that as professional or decent. The deal for the OP turned a touch sour, so no need to add some sting to it as well.

---------------------------------

Side matter that has been brought up - I have had more than a few instances with various sellers where I had to ask for the tracking information in the late evening on the day of shipment and only received a response with that information on the morning slated for arrival. With the weather being what it was, it could have resulted in death for the animals if I had not elected to wait at that point. Updates in the system are not flawless and errors do get made. I have had things delivered to the incorrect house. I have had a hold-at-hub/facility selection ignored. This can and does happen (albeit rarely). I do generally select a hold-at-hub delivery these days for the safety that comes with it, as my "new" local delivery route is very rural and often delayed with many of those delays occurring in rather hot weather due to the climate in my region. If I did not receive adequate and timely communication after a shipment date had been scheduled, I absolutely would have waited if it was supposed to be delivered to my home. A person can drop off packages or have a pickup performed and then have an issue preventing communication. I was smashed into by another vehicle right after dropping off an outbound package in 2015 and, had the accident been worse, I might have been incapacitated without having yet forwarded the recipient the tracking link (which I tend to do right before or soon after I hand over the package). Since I know these things can happen, I will favor avoiding the potential risk to the animal's health and life and wait if I am expecting a delivery at home for which communication has been insufficient. Is that my choice? Yes. Would I have had to make that choice for a non-delivery if I had been properly informed? No. The wasted day or morning has a precipitating event here.

All of that said, Mike apologized multiple times after admitting the error, refunded promptly, and offered some compensatory bonuses that could be seen as above-and-beyond action by some people (and perhaps not by others).

 

[tlmoon]

I'm not going through 8 pages of bickering so haven't the foggiest whats transpired here in this thread and am only speaking of the actual issue that had taken place.

Maybe if you bothered to READ the thread you would understand it better. And if you think a Bad Guy title to a thread really and truly makes everyone think the subject is a bad guy, you haven't bothered to read very many threads at all. Check out some recent threads about garter snakes; you'll see what I mean.

Anyway, It's not a "Bad Guy" thread; it's an info thread. It's a feedback forum. The seller dropped the ball on letting the buyer know the snake was already sold, causing her to think the snake was coming when it wasn't. Had he not dropped the ball on communicating with her, she would not have missed a day of work waiting for the snake which never arrived. I highly doubt this would have gotten posted at all had the seller let her know of the error and not to expect the snake. And no, it's certainly not the worst thing that's ever happened to someone, and she doesn't say that it is. He did what he could to make it right. He apologized and refunded the money. She posted her experience just like anyone has a right to do.

My personal opinion, some people are jumping on the OP and trying to make out that she has no right to be frustrated by the transaction and that she shouldn't have posted the thread. I don't see her attacking him. She simply shared her experience. Other people (most, from the looks of it) have shared good experiences with that seller. That's good news, and informational for all as well. No seller will have a perfect track record. What puts me off the seller a bit is his attitude, otherwise I agree he's not a bad guy in that sense. And that's just my personal opinion.

Regardless, I support the OP in posting her experience. I hate to see an OP who has thought about the issue and posts a thread in good faith stating their experience get attacked for doing so. There are posters whose agenda is just to bash someone unfairly and this is not one of them.