Just a caution from buying second hand gear from ------------ I bought a second hand sail at $350 b/c the guy told me it was 'like new' well it most deffinitly was not. It had fraid stitching scratches all over the windows, that was bareable but a big gapping hole in the mast sleeve really peaved me off.

Take it back to him.. Maybe it wasn't the one he thought, and if it was it certainly sounds like mis-representation, and there are laws against that.

Did you seriously not check before you bought it? I'd have thought that it was pretty standard to unroll a sail and have a look at it before handing over your cash.. especially at that price. I'd even go as far as test rigging it on MY mast to make sure it was all good if I had the opportunity.

Sorry Mangoman, part of the policy of the forums is no slagging off businesses in the forums - you really do need to work it out with the store.

Initially, this seems unfair, as if you have actually been ripped off, it seems unjust.

However, there are also unscrupulous people out there (not saying you are one) who use the forums to hurl mud at businesses where no mud exists.

As a result, we have the "no bagging out businesses in the forums" policy...

Here's from the Forum Rules, which can be found here
www.seabreeze.com.au/Members/Help/ForumRules.aspx#h40 .

Complaints about a business

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.

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. Go to the appropriate legal/government authority and do it there.

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.

Thanks for the feedback guys, I know to check the sail unfortunately it was located in NSW and I could only go off the photo (that I think may have been taken a long... time ago) Anyway I did try to reach them and let them know, they said they would look into it but I never heard back. The sail belonged to one of the guys that worked in the shop so I guess they're being pretty cagey about it. Figure I just cut my losses but just wanted to warn unsuspecting buyers of my story..