hey guys, I just wanted to share this experience with you as some one that has raced associated cars for 20 years. I recently bought a T4 team truck for my son and have been putting it together in the last week or so. The kit went together O.K. I had an issue with the left diff hub that has the pilot shaft that the diff gear rides on. the pilot shaft was oversized by .009" so the bearing wouldnt even go over it.also both of the front shocks had a rough bore issue.So I contacted associated by e-mail to let them know that there were some problematic peices in this kit, to see if I could exchange them for some different ones without haviing to send the whole kit back.The reply I got was a little dissapointing.Their customer service rep. told me that about 1% of the complaints he received were about the diff issue I was having. and aproximatly1% of the service claims he dealt with were due to shock issues. He continued to say that he didnt think this was a bad # since ' we're not building parts for the space shuttle'. That was the end of his correspondance.No offer to exchange the bad peices, nothing. I then wrote him back and told him that I thought that that was a crap answer and I thought it was a little unprofessional. in conclusion I told him that since no assistance was offered that this waould be the last associated product I would buy after racing their gear for 20 years. Just wanted to let you guys know that if you have a problem the new 'thunder tiger associated' is not going to be as cooperative as associated was in the past. I had a couple issues with things in the past and associated always made it right.Not now.

Woooow!!! I think after the "space shuttle" comment, I would of flipped out, and made a phone call and probably called him lots of "unmentionable" things. Granted, thats not the way to handle it, but, IMHO, we are paying these people salaries by buy the products, and thats the best he could come up with. What a load of crap. It sucks to hear stories like that. Quality control must have went out for a "smoke" break that day, if he even checked them at all

that tells you what kind of world we live in now, it's ALL ABOUT MAKING MONEY!!!!!! they don't care if your satisfied or not, they just want to make a buck. this may not be every business, but some are going that direction..

Do you know his name?

bill martinez, customer support specialist. Yeah I particularly liked the were not building parts for the space shuttle comment, and i hope his immmediate supervisor happens to read the forums occasionally because I am sure he would like it too.What because its not for the space shuttle it's not important??10 years ago I never would have got a reply like that, it would have been more along the lines of ' were sorry about that,send us the defective peices and we'll send you back some new ones and a butt load of free decals for your trouble' and thats the thing this guy didnt even say he was sorry the company that he was working for sent out some crap that never should have happened. Just thanks for your money , now go away and by the way come see us again when you want to spend a couple hundred more dollars. I have been pondering switching over to the new kyosho buggy now that my B4 is whipped out, so Mr. martinez just made my mind up for me, I will be ordering a ultima rb5 at the end of this week instead of another B4.

I,ve always enjoyed the challenge of building at item from "kit" form, Its amazing what can be done with a dremel tool some 2000 grit wet/dry sand paper followed by a little Mothers Mag & aluminum polish and a cloth,a correctly sized buffing wheel does wonders for shock bodys... oh yeah a little patience helps :) Enjoy your Hobby.

sorrry guy , but were not talking about a little polishing compound fix. the shock bodies for the front shocks were NASTY! I enjoy putting my kits together to , but this was ridiculous.Besides man you shouldnt have to do that crap to hard coated teflon shock bores. What did I pay for again??? If I wanted to fab a car I would have went and got some bar stock and chucked it up in a lathe and fabbed some shocks.

I guess theres always the RTR route, or maybe theres some one who will professionaly build a off-road truck, like Frank Ulbrik at Pro-Built is doing for oval cars? Heres his link probuilt_rc@yahoo.com

I've never had any bad parts in an Associated kit but have sent them a few emails asking Bill questions and for advice. He always got back to me in 1 day at most with an answer and always courteous with his answers. This is very disappointing to hear. Bad parts should be replaced no questions asked. I've raced Associated for over 20 years exclusively and never had a problem. I guess thunder tiger has changed all that.

Not hard to believe with TT/AE making such a push in the RTR market.

FlFlash -- I think you totally missed the point.

yeah he's missing thepoint altogether until it happens to him.Then he will be on here going wow this sucks bad!! It would be nice if people stood behind what they sell.

420---It sucks that customer service nowadays is non existent.

Hopefully your 2% of complaints will be seen by 20% of the hobbyists and they will relay their dissaproval and will get something accomplished if not for you but at least the next guy.

Later,

Mark

Not being a (racist) here. But, was the guy you emailed, even IN the USA?? I am tired of calling or emailing someone about a problem, just to be sent to an "out sourced" person that dont even speek English. Or is completely ablivous to what your even talking about, meaning, he or she is given a list of responses. And thats how they respond to questions like yours. And thats it???
Kevin

GLGRAPHICS, i dont think your question has to really do with race in the least bit, but companies outsourcing to people that speak the same level of english as my 2+1/2 year old son, so I wouldnt worry about that finger being pointed.But I do beleive he was in the states because his english, although typed, was in complete non broken sentences.I think that he did not want to address the issues I was having with the product that he was hired to support , so I got blown off.Tip of the day,by the way, if you have someone call you for a sales promotion call talk to them in another language and see how they like it.I have pretty good french skills, and answering their broken english questions in half broken french/ english usually encourages them to hang up on ME. Go figure they dont care for it much either.

MDB- that was the whole idea of posting here. It may not help me, but it may help the next guy that has the same problems, or even different ones. They need to realize that the percentage of people actually involved in this hobby is a very limited amount of the population, and if they handle things in this manner, ESPECIALLY with racers, The word will get out among the hobby involved people. And then they will be sitting and wondering why their stuff sits on shelves and people support other companies with their dollars. Its just pretty sad that a company that had a reputation for having THE best customer service in the industry has fallen to this level of greed.

Not missing any points just trying to help you fix the parts you have as I have done myself many times in the past and probaly in the future. Sorry I wasnt of any assitance to you.

Now on to Customer Support something I work with everyday in my business.
Virtually ALL Customer Support Centers are actually phone banks ran by a seperate company not even affiliated with the companys they "represent" The people you talk to at these "Support Centers" are sitting hundreds of miles away from the company in front of a phone and computer with prompts on what to say to differant questions and in all actuallity Can Do Nothing For You and have no knowledge of the product other than whats on the screen in front of them. Basicly they are there to give you a place to vent not to help resolve your problem. Save your self some time and breath write or e-mail the company involved. Sending clear pictures,diagrams,recepts or any other type of documentation you have always helps, as does a positive attitude. Under no circumstances mention you will never buy their product again ( Why should they help you on your current issue if they have already LOST YOU AS A CUSTOMER ? ) Actually its best to mention you are a long time customer and wish to continue to purchase their products. Almost always this approach will get your issue resolved although it will take longer. Hope that helps.

Personaly I would still rather spend the time massageing the parts to meet my standards, just because I enjoy working on my little toy cars :thumbsup:

I get what you are saying flash, But I DID represent myself as a LOYAL customer, and it got me nowhere.I wasnt venting on the guy, I was looking for help to my problem, and I was very cordial about it, until the 'space shuttle ' remark. As I said I have dealt with associated quite a few times in the past, and every other time i got a ' how can we help you' attitude, This time was QUITE different. I have a mill in my basement so the problems are fixed, but the point is I shouldnt have to fix them. I paid good money to get a good product, and received garbage. I just built a B4 18 months ago, and i tell you the difference in quality between the 2 kits was staggering. By the way They had not lost me as a customer UNTIL they had refused to help solve the problem.I run an on line hobby store, I also deal with customers all day. And i tell you this is a NEW associated compared to any time I have had to deal with them in the past.This is just a huge dissapointment.It isnt associated any more It's associated electrics, a division of Thunder tiger.YEAH for corperate conglomerates. Sad.

Flash- I don't know if I am reading you right. Are you saying that Customer Service is there to listen to our frustration and only help if we are overly polite? Also, we shouldn't expect to have our problem resolved and should suck it up and fix it our selfs?

GEEZER, yeah thats pretty much what he's saying,,,,,until he has aproblem that he cant fix with his dremmel and some emery cloth.

Flash- I don't know if I am reading you right. Are you saying that Customer Service is there to listen to our frustration and only help if we are overly polite? Also, we shouldn't expect to have our problem resolved and should suck it up and fix it our selfs?

No your not reading what I posted go back and read what a " Customer Service" phone line is in my post. What I am saying as someone who has worked in a business for over 25 years that now has one of these so called " Customer Service " employed by our corporation is that they are Worthless and will not do anything to Help your Concerns other than reading off prescripted responses to your concerns because they are NOT EMPOWERED to do ANYTHING. If a call escalates to an Extreme Level they may contact the Actual Company that they are handleing " Customer Service " calls for...maybe.
What I am saying is its Worthless Waste of Time to call the "Customer Service " number.

Instead it is much better although more time consuming to contact the actual business via e-mail or mail about your concerns. I also beleive you can be more effective by being a Polite, Long Term Customer who wishes to Continue being a Customer than by being rude/threatening or saying you will never buy their product again.

Also remember the current Associated Is Not the Associated of old it is now just a small portion of a much larger corporation with a very differant business sense.

As for 420 Tech R/C, I have attempted to help you but it appears its a lost cause.

Flash, obviously YOUR the one not reading previous posts, i have contacted the actual company via e-mail through their customer service, AT associated, and had dialogue with Bill martinez, not a operator at a phone bank. Flash you really need to bust out the bi-focals before you write brother, because that was stated in the first post that started this thread.NO_ONE WAS ON A PHONE WITH ANYBODY, SO YOUR WHOLE CUTOMER SERVICE SPEIL IS MUTE!

No your not reading what I posted go back and read what a " Customer Service" phone line is in my post. What I am saying as someone who has worked in a business for over 25 years that now has one of these so called " Customer Service " employed by our corporation is that they are Worthless and will not do anything to Help your Concerns other than reading off prescripted responses to your concerns because they are NOT EMPOWERED to do ANYTHING. If a call escalates to an Extreme Level they may contact the Actual Company that they are handleing " Customer Service " calls for...maybe.
What I am saying is its Worthless Waste of Time to call the "Customer Service " number.

Instead it is much better although more time consuming to contact the actual business via e-mail or mail about your concerns. I also beleive you can be more effective by being a Polite, Long Term Customer who wishes to Continue being a Customer than by being rude/threatening or saying you will never buy their product again.

Also remember the current Associated Is Not the Associated of old it is now just a small portion of a much larger corporation with a very differant business sense.



That's more clear. I would agree with you. Thanks for clearing that up.

I have also noticed that associated has gone down hill. One more company lost to our foreign counterparts...... Why didn't thunder tiger just buy Trinity? Their customer service already sucked!

I agree 100% with everything (hm, sarcasm). The last dealing I had with Associated was the same as 420's for the most part. However, it's not just Associated, these symptoms are typical of MANY companies.

I love XRAY products, but their support is no better than any other. In some aspects, it is worse.

There isn't a simple solution to the problem. Anymore a company can't make a decent product in the states because of devalued money and you can't get good products from Taiwan because they are just following specifications given to them by greedy company owners. "You mean we sent you a shipment of toys that has more lead than the previous shipment, and it was to replace the toys with lead because it was hurting children?" - "We're sorry, will put mercury in them to make up the difference, it's allowed by the FDA now days so we are covering our backs."

Anyways, I hear you and whole-heartedly agree, but the solution just isn't simple. The only recourse you have in the U.S. is to not buy their imported product.

I hear you SuperXray. This country is just now beginning to feel the effects of cheap imports......I hope we will learn someday.

I also beleive you can be more effective by being a Polite, Long Term Customer who wishes to Continue being a Customer than by being rude/threatening or saying you will never buy their product again.


You are right, we the people, those that PAY for the product, should be the ones kissing butt. Also, why would I want to be polite as a first-time buyer to a company that doesn't support their product? I'm confused, I'm so confused!

However, I do truly understand your point and you are correct about how to accomplish the most favorable result. On the other hand, the 'buyers' being forced to abide to the 'suppliers' demands is why there is a severe decline in our economy.

Supplier makes it clear that if you aren't polite as a customer, you won't get results. <---What you said but less words. That is an act of Submission, which is a technique used in battle. Doesn't sound very democratic to me. :) Good business is for the supplier to supply what the buyer wants, not the other way around.

There was also a comment about massaging the parts to fit and that's part of the hobby, which is true. How do you massage the teflon back onto the bore of the shock body after massaging it to be the correct size? I, myself, don't have the $10,000 machine to do so.

Just thought I'd have some fun. Like my previous post, I agree with alot of what's been said, but figured there had to be some fun in there too!

SUPER XRAY, I am glad you are seing both sides of this. What flash didnt understand is I went through the whole kiss teir butts process and was offered nothing to solve the problem. THEN and Only then did I e-mail them to inform them that since they were offering NO resolution to the problem I was going to terminate my 20 year relationship with associated. to which i received an e-mail thismorning stating that was my right to do so if I wished. I dont get upset over to much when it comes to my r/c cars,and I am used to "massaging" some peices to fit right. This repair involved a mill, lathe, and a hone to fix, that's not quite "massaging", that's more along the lines of re-working some bad peices.

UPDATE; received an e-mail from bill this evening. Seems others have complained about an oversized pilot shaft dimension. NOW he wants to know what he can do to help.My response was nothing, the problem has been fixed. He appologised for his initial response. To which my response was thats ok, kyosho appreciates your response since it sold another ultima rb5, and lazer zx5 for them over the weekend. Sorry guys but i had to be a d*ck about it after what he put me through last week when it was just me complaining about this particular problem.So I have jumped fence and will be running kyosho this year!!! Both 2wd and 4wd. so lets see that would have been about 500.00 worth of revenue that would have went for a new B4, and a B44, so yeah, I think I feel better about this now. So hey any body wanna buy a nice built ,but never ran T4 team kit so I can go buy my boy a losi???LOL!

420,

I don't see it as being a d**k about it at all. Apologizing (the AE guy) for a reaction certainly doesn't make it go away or have less of an impact. Kinda like pulling the trigger on a gun, you either do or you don't. You can be apologetic for pulling it, but the result is still the same...

Good luck with the Kyosho stuff.

949-544-7500 call them and work your way up the line to the top dawg

Supplier makes it clear that if you aren't polite as a customer, you won't get results. <---What you said but less words. That is an act of Submission, which is a technique used in battle. Doesn't sound very democratic to me. :) Good business is for the supplier to supply what the buyer wants, not the other way around.

I just cut out the meaty part :)

As a repair tech I get to deal with customers daily, customers that bought our product. As the repair tech I have leeway on what I can and can not cover under warranty.

In all cases where I give a customer an estimate to fix a product under warranty, the item was damaged because of customer misuse. If the customer is nice, explains what happened and it sounds reasonable, I may cover that damage under warranty. Don't worry, as someone with daily customer contact, I've heard ALL of the stories :)

Below is a short version of what we run up against on a daily basis:

Ummm sir, straight gas was run in the 2-cycle engine and it scored the piston and cyclinder.

No fringgin' way did I run it on straight gas. You are just trying to get out of paying to fix your cheap products. I'll never buy one of your products again. @##!%!#*!!

I'm sorry you feel that way. The cost to repair is $$$$$. Since you don't wish to have it repaired I wil return it unrepaired. Thank you.

OR

Ummm sir, straight gas was run in the 2-cycle engine and it scored the piston and cyclinder.

I know the gas I use has the proper mix, not sure how that would have happened.

Well, did you let anyone borrow it?

Oh, forgot..... I did let the neighbor use it.....

That may be what happened then. Tell you what I will do, I'll fix it this one time under warranty. Just make sure if you loan it out that the correct fuel mixture is used.

While not exactly the same thing as defective parts it is an example of how the CSR is more likely to help someone out that is "nice" to them rather then someone who is nasty. By his own admission, we have already lost the nasty guys business, no use throwing money at that customer. The nice guy made a mistake and even though the damage wasn't covered under warranty, we did fix it at no cost (or for the cost of the parts... free labor).

CSR people are human, expect to get the same treatment back that you give them.

I'm not saying the 420 was wrong, just a little statement on being "nice" to the CSR.

sorry about that hank, that first one might have been me. lol just kidding

Hank, hey long time no see guy!! You going to run some dirt in the mars series with us this year??Man I get what your saying and i cant stress enough that I was polite, and was more than happy to explain what peices were defective in this brand new kit. Even after it was apparrent that I was getting nothing done to resolve the problem other than the standard send it back to the retailer and exchange it if you can(couldnt at that point body was painted etc.) I have dealt with associated in the past and many other companies over the years, I know how to deal with a customer service rep. In no way was I not polite until I was told that nothing was going to be done about the issue. Then it was like wait a minute , i have been a loyal AE customer for 20 years and you not going to do any thing about this??? There was no send the peices in so we can see what is going on, or we can sell you the replace ment paices at discount cost to replace the bad peices or any thing. So I proceeded to tell him that that was unnacceptable and very unprofessional. Telling him that I was no longer going to be an AE customer, or use their equipment was a last resort, and I really didnt enjoy doing it after 20 years, but with support like that I really felt that there was no choice , so the decision was made, and I will stand by that decision for the reasons that were given.The offer that was made to do something about it a week after the first contact was too little , to late. Sorry ,but you shouldnt have to have others report the same issue to get something done.It should be handled , plain and simple.I run an on line hobby store where I custom fab parts for 1/28 scale r/c cars, And I would never, and have never told a customer something along the lines of ' were not making parts for the space shuttle' not even with the rudest customers I have had, and I have had acouple doozies, One guy told me he was going to come from N.J. just to whip my butt over a 3.00 part for his micro -t!! Trust me my conversation was not even in the same area code as that ,much less the same ball park. No foul language was used, no threats were made, in no way did I attack the product, he just didnt want to address the issue plain and simple. Look forward to seeing you around , hank!I know larry D would like to see you out running some dirt this year too!

Hankster,

I completely agree and I'm positive it's in my post. I think, perhaps, the quote from my post was taken out of the context I meant it to be in, but I wasn't about to write a book that explained that. :) Oh, the forums... It's all the same in the end, regardless of how 420 reacted to the situation:

Buyer has unusable part(s) and supplier made it clear they won't stand behind the product. (remember this is all hearsay anyways, none of us but 420 actually know what happened).

Regardless guys I am dropping this now. Problem has been resolved, and even though this thread has gotten a little off topic at times , I just wanted to give yoy fellow r/c guys a heads up so if you have an issue you wont get blind sided. That was the only intent I had, not to bash AE, or even Bill Martinez for that matter.This was my experience with them and I truly hope that if any of you have to deal with them you have a much more positive experience than I did, That being said Peace out and see you at the track!!

I didn't doubt that you did things right. It was just an example of that a customer doesn't have to kiss butt, but to at least be nice if you would like some considerations.

Not sure if I'm going to race at all next summer. A number of things prevent me from being gone overnight or all day. One is I have a dog to take care of and really no one to let him out while gone that long. I won't bring him to the races as sometimes he can be a bit "antisocial" around other dogs :)

I've never had any bad parts in an Associated kit but have sent them a few emails asking Bill questions and for advice. He always got back to me in 1 day at most with an answer and always courteous with his answers. This is very disappointing to hear. Bad parts should be replaced no questions asked. I've raced Associated for over 20 years exclusively and never had a problem. I guess thunder tiger has changed all that.

Your right! I feel the same way.

Well there are other R/C companies I'll will be buying from and not from
Associated anymore...

i know i said i was going to drop this, but i just had to let you know the kyosho Ultima Rb5 I ordered came yesterday. Put it together last night.GOOD STUFF!!all the peices were awesome, plastics are very clean, no moldlines or ugly gate bosses on them. Diff and tranny went together silky smooth. The 3 peice shocks are awesome!!Smother than any shocks I have ever felt.Not 1 thing about this kit i didnt like!!Now to build the Lazer Zx5......But after the ultima kit I am VERY confident that I made the right decision.

hey guys, I just wanted to share this experience with you as some one that has raced associated cars for 20 years. I recently bought a T4 team truck for my son and have been putting it together in the last week or so. The kit went together O.K. I had an issue with the left diff hub that has the pilot shaft that the diff gear rides on. the pilot shaft was oversized by .009" so the bearing wouldnt even go over it.also both of the front shocks had a rough bore issue.So I contacted associated by e-mail to let them know that there were some problematic peices in this kit, to see if I could exchange them for some different ones without haviing to send the whole kit back.The reply I got was a little dissapointing.Their customer service rep. told me that about 1% of the complaints he received were about the diff issue I was having. and aproximatly1% of the service claims he dealt with were due to shock issues. He continued to say that he didnt think this was a bad # since ' we're not building parts for the space shuttle'. That was the end of his correspondance.No offer to exchange the bad peices, nothing. I then wrote him back and told him that I thought that that was a crap answer and I thought it was a little unprofessional. in conclusion I told him that since no assistance was offered that this waould be the last associated product I would buy after racing their gear for 20 years. Just wanted to let you guys know that if you have a problem the new 'thunder tiger associated' is not going to be as cooperative as associated was in the past. I had a couple issues with things in the past and associated always made it right.Not now.

Hopefully for us as consumers , this individual was taking out his sucky day
on you and not being a true representative of the company which employes
him . I'd deffinitly speak or e-mail his manager. The bottom line " me as an employer " is its darn hard to find employee's that give a crap, especially compared to only 10 years ago.

I've always bought associated vehicles and hopefully they can get their
issues resolved. We own an L4 , T3 , TC-4 ,and many LRP products so they
better back up and address this issue .

I have also noticed that associated has gone down hill. One more company lost to our foreign counterparts...... Why didn't thunder tiger just buy Trinity? Their customer service already sucked!


Talk about a company out of control !!!

The left hand doesn't know what the right is doing.

They have been the industry std. for horribly bad service for years !!!!

Nfrc- i too have always ran associated stuff. My first dirt car was a gold chassis rc10 with the 6 gear tranny.I loved that car.talk about a battle tank on the track.My first pan car was an rc10L ,back before touring cars even existed.i have owned every 12L since the 12i. And at least 1 of every evolution of the 'B' series.Although I did prefer my black chassis worlds car with the RPM worlds suspension over the B2.My point is you see how far back I have been running AE stuff.So for me to jump fence took some thought.Mainly because I knew what to expect when I opened a new kit box.When I opened this T4 kit I didnt like what I saw from the get go.The plastics had a lot of flash, and were very ' grainy' in appearance.Not to mention they dont even include things like thread lock for the cvd set screw now. Or remember how you used to get a 'roll' of e-clips?Not any more, dont lose one because there are just enough in the shock bag to get the job done.So you couple those factors in with the diff and shock issue then pile the lack of support on top and you have a pretty convincing mountain of evidence that there have been some changes implemented since the buyout took place.I would liken this to the same as when AMF bought out Harley Davidson. Pretty much the same product, but not quite up to snuff when compared to the previouusly produced product. I think it will be quite interesting to see what happens with AE over the next couple years, but I think that I will watch from the side lines and not gamble my race dollars until they get their transitional period over with.