My credit card dispute with a vendor (resolved).

[LanghamP]

Early in November I bought a refurbished eBike from Ariel Rider. However, when I got the bike there were a number of minor and moderate problems with it. They included minor things like a broken brake disk, rusted steering head, bent front forks. These are all rather easily fixed but the major thing was a low speed gear that made pedaling beyond 16 mph too fast.

Therefore, due to these problems I decided to return this bike and get a new similar one from the same company.

Under the adage of "you can't cheat an honest man" I offered to pay for shipping both ways, and whatever depreciation hit they decided, in addition to buying a new bike from them. Having done this perhaps half a dozen times over the past decade, I've always had merchants/vendors be extremely appreciative of this.

This time, however, Ariel Riders was unmoved; though polite they were adamant about not taking back their refurbished bicycle.

I filed a credit card dispute and two months later the dispute was resolved in my favor.

How I went about it:

1. Make a good faith effort with the vendor to try to return the item, and take the matter as far as it will go. Document everything. In my case, I had something like 27 emails, several phone calls (all unanswered), and an itemized list of what was wrong with the bicycle.

2. My first submit went against me!  This was actually just a technicality; my initial complaint(s) goes to the vendor through the credit card company and the vendor then responds. In this case, the vendor simply said I didn't get a (RAN) return authorization number.

Now this is a very interesting situation because the credit card company called me up, said the judgement went against me, and then offered no more details. I suspect most people give up at that point! Don't do this. In my case, I asked why and they gave the RAN as the reason; if I had not kept my emails proving the vendor did not issue RAN then this would have been the end and I would have lost.

3. I had to spend quite a bit of time putting all my documents into a PDF document. In my case, I copied and pasted all the relevant emails between vendor and me, then put in photos of each problem with the bicycle along with a description. I went full-court press; I even took pictures of my calipers measuring the wheel distance showing the forks were bent. In all, I probably had 12 or more color photos in an eight page document.

4. You will hear the word "comparable". For some reason I had two long conversations with the insurance adjuster. The word she kept using was "comparable", that is, how would we expect a <comparable> item to perform. In my case this was an "aha" moment; I simply went to Ariel's competitor, took a few screenshots of their "comparable" bicycle's specs, and pasted that information into my PDF document. To be specific, the gearing was radically and appropriately different.

5. Be somewhat wary of dealing with foreign-owned companies. This falls more into preventive maintenance, but before buying the eBike I noticed the two owners were Turkish brothers. It has been my experience that when dealing with foreign-anything that most non-US people take a "buyer beware" attitude and will knowingly sell you subpar goods if they can, especially if it isn't reeaallly broken. It's not that they are wrong, it's that the US is the odd one with strong consumer laws (hmm, but weak environmental laws). You may simply choose just shop at Amazon instead of all these little companies. I personally found this entire situation to be aggravating, and that isn't a little bit of money were are talking about either.

Anyway, I hope this helps with anyone making a credit card chargeback. The process is somewhat painful and tedious, plus it's hard to keep an even keel when you're unsure which way the judgement goes.

 

[Siggy]

glad it all worked out in the end! Sounded like a pain though

 

This is essential advice - take note people 😊👍🏾

[LanghamP]

5 hours ago, Siggy said:

glad it all worked out in the end! Sounded like a pain though

 

This is essential advice - take note people 😊👍🏾

It's somewhat of a "winner takes all", that is, you or the vendor either win big or lose big. In my case, as far as I can tell, I get a free although somewhat broken bicycle, and the vendor entirely loses. It could have easily gone the other way where the vendor gets money while passing off damaged goods and indeed that's what initially happened when the credit card company ruled against me.

Rather than take that risk I would have preferred to just lose $200-$400 in the return and exchange. Unless the vendor paid very little for the eBike and therefore can take a risk, I would think the vendor would also want to come to terms.

I would like to emphasize this is the first chargeback for damaged goods that I've ever done. I'm somewhat depressed that I had to resort to the chargeback. To me, it seems unseemly for adults not to at least negotiate some outcome.

[Siggy]

8 hours ago, LanghamP said:

To me, it seems unseemly for adults not to at least negotiate some outcome.

Indeed!

 

The all or nothing approach is not exactly conducive to building long term trust. 

 

We we seem to have lost the win- win approach. The situation where we can come to what’s good for all parties involved. 

 

I’m beginning to think this has mostly come about due to an erosion of direct and face to face communication over the years. 

 

Now one we just need to figure out a way how to solve it.