Hi Guys,

I'm an advocate of talking about customer service when it is above and beyond and also when it is poor.

This post is about a poor Customer Service experience unfortunately.

I have a Nobile T5 twin tip which has served me well for the past 3 years but unfortunately one of the integrated bindings broke in November.

I went back to the retailer who sold me the board and ordered a new set of bindings and was told that the distributor was onto it but that there are sometimes some issues with getting access to Nobile products.

3 weeks later I spoke to the retailer and we decided it was best if I deal direct with the distributor as I am in New Zealand for the next 6 months and the product had not arrived.

The distributor is in SA. He said he had sent the product and that it must have been lost in the post. So he said he would send another set of bindings.

3 weeks later still no bindings .... you get the picture.

We are now 2 months later, 4 emails and 2 calls to the distributor with promises from that he would arrange for a NZ local shop to send me the product .... still no product.

I wrote an email to Nobile in Poland 7 days ago to complain about the poor service ... no response.

Unfortunately I am missing out on some great kiting here and have resorted to purchasing a new set of non Nobile bindings and am really dissapointed with the inability for Nobile to support their brand post sales.

I am sure that there are many happy Customers of Nobile out there (I was one, I love the board) but when the service is this bad I think it is worth making it known.

Safe Kiting

a board under warranty after 3 years? Lol

Not under warranty ...I paid for the new bindings but could not get them delivered

Select to expand quote

a board under warranty after 3 years? Lol

Read again .i don't see any mention of warranty claim .The dude just wants to get a replacement binding but is finding the experience sub par

I had my 18 month old 666 crack , nobile replaced it with a brand new current model board ,no questions asked . Never heard anyone complain about nobile service , they are one of the better kite board companies to deal with IMO.

My 1 year old run-out model NHP broke a strap. My retailer swaped out the straps and pads for the vastly improved next season's model in under 10 minutes and I was back in action.

The retailer knew that Nobile's warranty wouldn't be an issue, and took on all the paperwork and correspondance while I moved on.

I am sure that had your retailer kept enough stock, you would have had a similarly good experience. Maybe we've all just got to support our bricks-and-mortar retailers a bit more so that they can afford to carry the inventory we would like when things break...

The Polish based factory shouldn't be part of the solution, they build and ship the stuff. The retailer should be working with you to get a result from the Australian based distributor. My shop reckons the distributor's great, so maybe the retailer isn't getting the job done.

I hope things get resolved to your satisfaction, but I think it's too late...

Sorry guys - from the Forum Policy:

Complaints about a business/associations


When this occurs, the poster is usually quite fired up and emotional. Often the customer is now out to cause as much damage as possible to the business with the mission that they are "fully justified" (their words) and "simply stating facts" (their words) about the business/association.

This may be the case .. or not. There are many sides to any story. The point is that the Seabreeze forums are not the appropriate place to resolve the issue.

Choose not to, and end up in hot water. As soon as you flame a business, you'll usually get supporters of the business come out in defence and question your behaviour and motives. People interested in the discussion will seek more information from you. It soon descends into an argument containing many and varied versions of the truth and everybody goes home unhappy.

It has never ended well for anybody.

The business is damaged, the poster now has a stigma in the forum community (and now can't deal with many shops because the shops know what will happen if they cross this customer - there business will get dragged through the mud.)

And of course, there's also the situation when the poster does not really have a complaint, but is simply a competitor or naive associate of a business who thinks the way to get more business is to degrade the competition.

A special note: This applies (and has been applied) to any business, not just businesses that sponsor the site.


Sorry ... nothing personal .. topic locked.


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