Well I know everyone on here speaks so highly of Long and the things he does for the members of this site. While I do not deny these things, I had a horrible experience with him and a product that came from him. At the risk of being flamed publicly... here is my LONG story (no pun intended).
In early September I purchased a CF trim set from an E90P user and upon receiving it and fitting it, I found out that 2 pieces didn't fit properly. The 1st was the ashtray cover which I had to grind down with a dremel, finally making it into the shape to get it to fit, however it still wasn't a proper fit as when it flipped up one side of it hit the back of center console trim piece and one didn't... so it didn't flip up as far as it should have. The other piece was the large dash trim piece. Not only was it not sitting properly on the dash, the opening where the ignition button goes wasn't aligned properly both laterally and in depth... so the button was not only nowhere close to flush but it stuck out and jiggled when you pushed it. I contacted the guy about it and he said it was from Long and if I sent it to Long directly, he would get me a replacement as he'd already spoke to him about it. So I did, on Sept 15th along with these pictures that I took 2 min before boxing it all up for shipping.
After he finally got it via FedEx like a week and a half later of it sitting at his neighbors house, this was the response I received:
He sent me this pic a few days later of the damage.
I replied several times, going back and forth about the issue - I felt I was entitled to a new piece or partial refund because of the fact that the piece was initially defective. He said that because it had somehow sustained cracking (cracking that I did not inflict because I know I was SUPER careful installing/removing as I've done it a few times and know how fragile the pieces are) and because of that the supplier he got the trim from wouldn't take it back.
I asked him to give me the info for the shop that makes the trim and he claimed he could not reveal the shop he is using because he "promised them he wouldn't". I obviously found this to be pretty bogus when I'm being told they won't take the piece back because it was cracked. My only thought at this point was that they wouldn't take it back cracked because that would mean they couldn't resell it to someone else and would end up losing a little money on giving me a replacement... hardly what I would call customer service.
Now I'm not nieve, I understand how business and customer service works, but how the hell are you gonna tell me you won't take the piece back because its cracked, over the fact that it didn't fit properly in the 1st place. That is like me selling you tires and after you leave you notice one has defective tread and is bald in a bunch of spots. On your way to drive back over for a return, you hit a nail and put a whole in the tire. Do I now
not owe you a refund/replacement since its punctured? Any decent human and anyone savvy in the ways of business would agree that a refund was due because it was the initial mistake by the seller/manufacturer that caused the 2nd problem "incident" to occur. If the piece had fit properly in the 1st place, it wouldn't have been sent to Long and thus wouldn't have been damaged, what/whoever the cause of the damage was, FedEx, Long or even me "allegedly" pulling the thing off my dash with the force of a Mack truck.
Anyway back to the story before I
He then said on 9/25 that the only thing he could do was test fit it on his car to confirm that it didn't fit well and try to do something having seen the poor fit first hand.
To spare a lot of time reading an already SUPER long post and some redundant arguments and me hounding him to test fit it over and over and over and over... I'll fast forward to Oct 7th. It had been 2 whole weeks since he said he would fit the trim and get back to me and he was getting married the next day. While I am not unrealistic, I understand a few weeks up to your wedding is a hectic time, however I don't see where he couldn't find a few minutes at work where he could fit the piece for me like he has said he would... it's not like he's a school teacher and is in a classroom all day, this guy has his own shop, doesn't he???
Anyway, he told me he'd be on his honeymoon for a week and when he got back things would be back to normal. Well 10 days later, 3 or 4 after he had gotten back and was into his so called "normal routine" and 3 unanswered PM's later, this is what I got:
This was sent to me on 10/20... a month and 5 days AFTER I had sent him the trim initially, I was obiviously getting pretty
about the whole thing. So after him telling me he had some car trouble of his own recently he said he had tested the part but didn't offer to do anything about it and was just going to send the broken piece back to me.
He overnighted the piece to a person I sold the trim to at the beginning of October, expecting the poorly fitted piece would have been replaced like it should have been. Finally on 10/24 he sent me the tracking info, however it never made it to the buyer, as after checking the tracking, it was sent right back to Long. Whether there was a mixup in the address or USPS just being weird, Long said nobody claimed it, however no notice was ever left at the buyers door stating that a package had arrived.
After asking him SEVERAL times to call USPS and find out what had happened, he finally did so on 11/2 and then resent the (still broken) piece out again on 11/10 (this past monday). It arrived via FedEx to the buyers house today (11/12) which means that this WHOLE thing took 2 months and nothing was accomplished. No new piece was sent to me for the piece being a poor fit and now the piece somehow isn't only cracked, but the buyer said it looks even more cracked than indicated in the pictures Long sent me originally (which is even MORE frustrating because I sent him a piece that wasn't cracked to begin with and now its twice as bad).
I guess after all the rambling, bottom line is that as great as Long might seem to be on these boards, watch out when you do business with/through him. The only thing I ended up getting out of all of this mess was a busted up, unusable trim piece, several broken promises and a shit ton of excuses on why he couldn't do something he said he would.
Now I have to go about finding somewhere to get a new Titanium CF trim piece (PM me if you know of anywhere) because I, unlike others mentioned in this thread, will not leave the buyer of something I sold high and dry. So I guess this means I'm going to be at a $100 or so loss because of all of this....
thanks again Long.
