Terrible experience with Pacific Coast Star

[House O Pain]

For those not familiar with this web site, (link here: https://www.pacificcoaststar.com/pcs/star-parts-accessories.htm ) they offer a list of aftermarket parts for Star Motorcycles.


Here is how bad the customer service is there:


On July 31st 2020 I ordered/paid for a custom Shift linkage (see photo) and on Sept 6th, (over 30 days waiting) I asked where my order was.


Response was received Sept 9th (4 days later) saying,

"Just received them back from machining and having them off to coating now. Wont be much longer.

On Sept 26th, I asked for another update (cut-n-paste from email):

Subject: Re: New Contact Request: Item ordered over 50 days ago hasn't arrived


Your last order status (20 days ago) assured me, "Wont be much  longer". Based on the time I've still had to wait, it appears we have much, much different ideas about what much longer means.


Please look into my order to see if some oversight has delayed my order and update me.

Thank you,

Sept 29 (Three days later) Pacific Coast Star responded:

Linkages were just dropped off at plating.  Wont be more than 2 weeks.

Would you like to wait?

I responded saying:

Thank you for the status update.  I'm puzzled by your question,  "Would you like to wait?"  A yes answer would imply I like waiting, which  I don't, (especially when it's over 50 days) so I have no idea what a no answer would result in? Perhaps you're offering to send me parts unfinished? Maybe it was a joke in poor taste?  Regardless, I apparently have no choice but to wait another couple weeks.


When this order is finally ready to ship could you please ship it next day priority (your cost) seeing as how I'll have had to wait about two months + for it to ship? I have other items I'm interested in ordering if this order goes well, and I'm really trying to be patient so whatever you can do to ensure this isn't delayed over another 2 weeks would go far to make me feel like Customer Service is trying.


Thanks in advance,

Three days later Pacific Coast Star responded:

We will ship as soon as they arrive back from plating. Yes we will  expedite shipping.

On Nov. 2nd (now its 4 months after paying and over 30 days since saying it would be a "couple weeks") I asked for ANOTHER update:

PCS,

Please update me on the status of my order said to be at the plating phase OVER A MONTH ago!


my order #15378 PCS Billet Shift Linkage

-Special Info: Circle Cut

-Color: Black

This was ordered/paid for on 07/31/2020.


At this point honestly I'm feeling like my money was taken and I'm never going to get anything for it.  Please prove me wrong and soon.

On Nov 5th (Three days later) Pacific Coast responded:

Do you want solid black or the accent on the circles?

Note the ineptitude of this question as the photo on the web site clearly shows how these are offered.  I responded same day;

I want black with circle cut as is what I ordered.  Just like the in the attached photo from your web site.  I should be able to see the inner metal as a contrast to the black.


Ship soon.

By Dec 8th (almost a month later) No response was received so I sent the following message:

This message is to let you know I will begin processing a claim with PayPal regarding failure to receive my order within a reasonable time frame.  I will also make sure I file claims with The Better Business Burial and will post a warning in my two Yamaha motorcycle forums regarding my experience with Pacific Coast Star including how you respond to this final warning.


I'm sorry you have chosen to take a paying customers money and then let months pass without providing anything to show for money spent but failed promises.  If I don't receive my product by this Friday I will begin making sure others are made aware of my experience with your extremely poor customer service.


Sincerely,

Three days later I still had not received a reply from Pacific Coast so I filed a claim with Pay Pal and was notified by them in  a few days I had won my claim and money was refunded.


I will never buy anything from this company again.  Ordering/paying for an item and not getting it FIVE months later is some of the worst customer service I've ever experienced.  It only made matters worse to be promised twice the order would "arrive soon".


If I had a great experience with this order I would have posted that here, but I have no tolerance for this level of ineptitude and will go out of my way to warn other away from having to experience same.

[RoadStarRaider]

[ZEUS67]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I have not dealt with them but based on your experience i probably never will. Sorry this happened to you

[Zxdave]

Yeah man that’s terrible customer service.... thanks for the heads up

[dukedomain]

Waaay back I ordered some parts from them but I can’t remember what it was.  I don’t recall having any issues with them.  It’s a shame some businesses just can’t seem to get it right.

[Sgt Fury]

Definitely enough to boil one's blood!!  A little patience is nice for a cool trinket for our Raiders, but this seller's incompetence goes waaayyyy beyond being an understanding customer.  Sometimes ya just can't fix stupid.   Take Biden for example!!   Oops, I just went off the tracks here.           (Thanks for the info by the way!) 

[FireNative]

Thanks so much for the copy and paste responses on both ends as this response on their end has confirmed I will NEVER buy anything from them, and I had them as a possible aftermarket shop to buy stuff from. I have a long list of stuff to put on, shocks, pipes, chrome parts, LED under lights, tuner, integrated tail light, light bar, LED lights, new rims, so yeah ain't getting nothing from them now. Thanks for the heads up.

[House O Pain]

Well, sadly this is one of the very few vendors still selling Raider specific items.  All it takes for a small business to go under is hiring the wrong guy, no management overview and word of mouth about bad customer service.  The owner may never even know what happened.  I posted this same experience in another Yamaha forum, so word is getting out. 

[Sgt Fury]

May I suggest checking out Dennis Kirk MC parts, helmets and accessories.  My experience with them over the years has always been positive with purchases, pricing and returns.  They still show many pages of items for Raiders as of today, plus they have been around for a long time which says something.  Just my two cents!     

[Pir8]

Devil's advocate here. I agree this wasn't handled great, but supply chain issues have been rampant everywhere this year.  I'm planning on some purchases and they have been one vendor I've been looking at. I'll keep a close eye on them and appreciate the feedback, but I'm not writing anyone off this year. That said, I would have like to have seen a more timely response and an offer to discount on their part.

[FireNative]

Devil's advocate here. I agree this wasn't handled great, but supply chain issues have been rampant everywhere this year.  I'm planning on some purchases and they have been one vendor I've been looking at. I'll keep a close eye on them and appreciate the feedback, but I'm not writing anyone off this year. That said, I would have like to have seen a more timely response and an offer to discount on their part.

Agreed since about Feb of 2020 all companies have been hit hard with supply chains but in my opinion its not the long time waiting for a product or service, its the not communicating what is going on, the long delays on responses, and no signs of "trying to make it right" that is a deal breaker for me. And yes just like stated above that it is sad because all it takes is one employee you talk to, to have a bad experience that could possibly give them a bad track record, but I can only make an informed decision from what I see and hear so me personally I will take the original poster's experience into consideration......and never us them unless I have to. But that's just how I feel.

[House O Pain]

Devil's advocate here. I agree this wasn't handled great, but supply chain issues have been rampant everywhere this year.  I'm planning on some purchases and they have been one vendor I've been looking at. I'll keep a close eye on them and appreciate the feedback, but I'm not writing anyone off this year. That said, I would have like to have seen a more timely response and an offer to discount on their part.

I took all that into account, and it is why I allowed a full five months to pass before giving up.  Thing is, I received not one apology for being late, and three days after threatening to pull my funds from PayPal no reply.   

If anyone else has a good experience with them, they should post here for some balance.  I should have asked for the owner I suppose just to see if I was communicating with an underpaid clerk who could care less about the reputation of the company...

[A.T.]

Well - in the spirit of shared anguish, I'm still waiting on Florida tags, registration, and title for my 2015 purchased May last year from a Texas dealership (Mancuso Motorsports).  They've claimed mishandled paperwork, blamed the Florida DMV, yada yada yada - this list of bullshit excuses goes on.   I would've driven to Houston and got it myself but for the lock-down.   So rolling up on a year with TX temp tags.

[the urban legend]

Well - in the spirit of shared anguish, I'm still waiting on Florida tags, registration, and title for my 2015 purchased May last year from a Texas dealership (Mancuso Motorsports).  They've claimed mishandled paperwork, blamed the Florida DMV, yada yada yada - this list of bullshit excuses goes on.   I would've driven to Houston and got it myself but for the lock-down.   So rolling up on a year with TX temp tags.

Damn... Can't they just e-mail you a copy of each document? It's not like they have to send you the actual tag; A PDF file would do the trick. Then just print it and go to the DMV.

[A.T.]

Well - in the spirit of shared anguish, I'm still waiting on Florida tags, registration, and title for my 2015 purchased May last year from a Texas dealership (Mancuso Motorsports).  They've claimed mishandled paperwork, blamed the Florida DMV, yada yada yada - this list of bullshit excuses goes on.   I would've driven to Houston and got it myself but for the lock-down.   So rolling up on a year with TX temp tags.

Damn... Can't they just e-mail you a copy of each document? It's not like they have to send you the actual tag; A PDF file would do the trick. Then just print it and go to the DMV.

Why not?  That makes sense...but efficiency isn't a variable with these folks

[Pagemaster]

I figured I would post my recent experience with PCS as an additional data point.  I honestly can't comment about what you went through @House....that just seems crazy to me.  That said, that wasn't my experience.  I was shopping for a lowering kit for my 2012 Raider S, and I almost didn't order from PCS because of this thread.  Since they were basically the only place I could find that had any in stock I pulled the trigger.  They shipped the part out within a day.  USPS shipping times have just been horrible, so the shipping time was double whatever USPS said it would be.  Received the part about 10 days later. 

After receiving the part and starting the install, I realized that I had received the wrong part.  Note to anyone that orders, if you receive a part from PCS that isn't black powder coat, it's not for your Raider.  I picked up the phone to get it corrected and spoke to Greg.  He was very apologetic, immediately worked to get the correct part shipped with 2-day (not USPS) priority shipping, and couldn't have been nicer.

Clearly I wasn't happy that I received the wrong part, but as a business owner and well, as a human, I put that in the everyone makes mistakes category.  But, judge me on how I respond when I do make a mistake (I have made tons).  In this case the response was exactly as I would have hoped.

I am only offering this as counterpoint to the initial post for perspective.  I dont know if either of our experiences with PCS are typical, but nothing about anything in the last year has been typical.  @House, if you aren't already done with them, maybe call and ask for Greg.... I would guess he will be helpful.