Just an update on PSA Customer Service

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Uncle Malice

New member
After hearing such great things about Palmetto State Armory on this and other forums, I went ahead and ordered some of their stuff during the Black Friday/Thanksgiving sale.

I must say that I am rather unimpressed with their customer service/communication.

I ordered one of their complete uppers and the MOE lower build kit. They say to expect 10-15 days for shipping of the uppers as they are built to order. That's fine.

On Day 16, I used their contact form on their website just to see if there was an ETA. I was hoping to have this all together by Christmas. I never got a response....

I tried contacting them through Facebook and my question was deleted.

It is now 20 days past the order date with no communication from them on when I should be expecting my order. I understand that they are probably busy due to the sale.. and I would be fine if they said "Yes, we're a little behind. We apologize for the delay. Your order should be delivered by 12/30" ....or January 10th... I don't care... but not responding to a customer that just gave you $800 is a bit ridiculous to me. I've worked with quite a few companies in the industry and most of them have excellent customer service. Unfortunately, PSA does not seem to be one of them. I'm pretty bummed about it actually. Everyone says they are great quality, but it seems to have left a bad taste in my mouth.


Anyone have any similar experiences? I would do a thread like this on their AR15.com forums, but I read reports of them deleting negative threads over there, too.
 
Im in the same boat as you. Ordered week after thanksgiving, emails came with ups shipment but no tracking info was supplied to ups. emails are vague and rushed, im not thrilled. They better hope everything comes in good working order.
 
Checking through some more of their updates on the AR15.com "WHERE IS MY ORDER THREAD"

I saw these:

Order #00092766: Is in transit, with three business days left.*

Order #00093257: should be shipping early this week.*
Click to expand...

My order is 000931XX so I guess it looks like it should be shipping early this week? The actual shipping date doesn't bother me nearly as much as their lack of response though.
 
It seems the retailers with the best prices are often the ones with the least overhead. That means they aren't employing scads of folks to research the status of hundreds of orders and respond to every email.

Even small retailers can get hundreds a day. Each takes time on the clock to investigate - and then compose an answer. It's only assumed by the consumer that someone could easily look up one order among thousands and estimate the shipping date. It's much more complicated when the assembly crew is backlogged. Experienced assemblers don't get hired off the street, they get scheduled overtime. That only works up to point - people balk working twelve hour days seven days a week.

When they get to your upper, among the week backlog on top of the week they already have, is something only they can judge. And getting interrupted five times an hour to guess about another one doesn't get the last one off the bench any quicker.

No doubt, had you ordered an upper and paid another $150, you'd already have a firm shipping date. This isn't that vendor, you get what you pay for. It has nothing to do with the quality of the parts or expertise in assembly. It has to do with YOU PAID LESS. Don't expect Nordstrum level service.

I can get a Timex Intelligent Quartz Flyback Chronograph with compass from Nordstrum, for $15 over list, or buy it off evilbay for $50 under. I expect the cheaper dealer to get around to it as they can, possibly having to work a regular job. He hasn't got the time to respond to hourly inquiries about an order, he needs to get the orders out to actually achieve the real goal.

Stories like this pop up every month, and it really only exposes the consumers viewpoint being unrealistically self centered. Working the front lines of retail for over 35 years, I can tell you that the correct expression is, The Customer Always THINKS He's Right. And all too often, it isn't necessarily so.

Retailers won't ever admit it, but the honest truth is people expect way too much.
 
think they just get behind especially when they have sales would agree the customer service is lacking its pretty bad that your best chance of getting a response about your order is going through ar15.com where is my order thread, as it usually gets responded to where the website inquirys may not.
they do have good prices and if your not in a big hurry to get it I would certainly use them again, but they could improve alot in customer sevice.
 
I think tirod makes a good point. Consumers have made the lowest price king.

Then they complain about WalMart running off Mom and Pop stores; crowding and lack of amenities on airliners; and, yes, unresponsive online retailers.

Everything comes at a price - including low prices.
 
I would have to disagree that a low price means lack of customer service. I work in a client services department with some pretty major customers (Sharp, Toshiba, Canon, Xerox, etc.) and one thing that we really hammer hard is customer response and service. Customers are much happier if I tell them that something will be resolved in a month and I do it in 2 weeks than if I tell them 2 weeks and it takes a month.

Like I said, I understand that they are probably swamped... That's fine. They specifically say 10-15 days to ship upper receivers... if they know that they are swamped and it's taking an avg of 2 extra days... or 10 extra days... or 15 extra days... it would be easy to write up a standard response that says "due to the heavy volume of orders during our sale, our current lead time is more like 25 days to ship"... or something... anything... no response is unacceptable, I don't care how cheap your products are.

Add to that the fact that one of my coworkers ordered a complete upper from JSE Surplus during the same time(they had a similar sale) and he received his upper about 6 days later(quality is excellent, by the way). His price was actually a bit less than mine... so cost factor is not an issue here.
 
Well, Uncle Malice, some low-cost providers are better than others. Now you can apply increased specific consumer knowledge to your next purchase, and perhaps PSA will learn something at the production end.
 
Personally I find more and more companies that simply do not respond to email, laziness,poor employees,too few employees,not sure but overall email provides a great way to treat customers fairly but many companies over look it. Takes very little time or effort to answer numbers of email in a few hours well that is if the worker will turn off his smart phone.:rolleyes:
 
Odd. I ordered something from them last week and was surprised when it showed up in less than 48 hours. Of course it was a part they just had to pull off the shelf and, I live in GA. about 5 hours drive from them.
 
I ordered a pistol kit from them on Black Friday. Didn't ship till a week ago, arrived here on Thursday.

They also met my special requests.

Special Order Instructions
Draw a hand turkey on the box please?
Click to expand...

IMAG0260.jpg
 
tirod said:
It seems the retailers with the best prices are often the ones with the least overhead. That means they aren't employing scads of folks to research the status of hundreds of orders and respond to every email.

Even small retailers can get hundreds a day. Each takes time on the clock to investigate - and then compose an answer. It's only assumed by the consumer that someone could easily look up one order among thousands and estimate the shipping date. It's much more complicated when the assembly crew is backlogged. Experienced assemblers don't get hired off the street, they get scheduled overtime. That only works up to point - people balk working twelve hour days seven days a week.
Click to expand...

Right on. If you want instant response to your e-mails may be they could sell a special "fast response" rifle...for $200 more.

PSA was flooded with orders, they can build rifles or answer e-mail, or raise prices and do both. Some people just don't get it.
 
Some people just don't get it.
Click to expand...

Boy, you can say that again... :rolleyes:


Perhaps they need to rethink their shipping methods. I received a UPS tracking number a couple of days after my order. It indicated Scheduled Delivery: 14-December-2011. I tried to contact them for the first time on December 16th, as according to UPS, they had not even received the item yet.

I finally did get am email response last night that the order was shipped yesterday afternoon. Tracking has been updated to Friday, 12/23.

I'll say this one more time for those of you that apparently aren't actually reading my complaint... it's not about the time frame.. it's about lack of response. Period.

They explained in their email to me that they create the tracking number and shipping label as soon as they begin processing the order. So, when they have to build the upper to the order - this tracking number is sitting there with a stale 'Delivery' date...

I don't have a problem waiting. I've waited over 8 months for guns that I had on order, but the wait time was communicated to me. How does this not bother anyone else?
 
I'm completely aware of what you're saying. I work retail for one of the top three auto parts retailers in America. Order a part we have to special ship, and you're told it will take about 7-10 days. I always add more, like you said, promise a guaranteed date, and then when it comes early, happy consumer.

The one thing we cannot do is track the shipment, period. The company simply hasn't spent the money on the programming and infrastructure. There's NO return on the investment, it will never pay it's way and get a return on it in three years. Therefore, no profit means it's an expense, and when you promise the Low Price Guaranteed, blowing money on dynamic communications with continued overhead means LOST PROFIT.

You might be used to communicating ship dates to your clientele, and no doubt the infrastructure exists - for you. The basic disconnect being made is that just because YOU have that ability doesn't mean others can. PSA is in the market position of having a low price - and that means you don't get a lot of handholding or feedback, you get it as soon as they can.

Their reputation is based on a good quality product at a really low price - and they do it. Responding to hundreds of emails daily isn't going to happen - simply because a two to three week surge doesn't justify hiring 50 new employees to research hundreds of emails. Especially when they'd just get laid off until the next time, 6 months later.

Work retail and factories for 35 years, add 22 years Reserves, you get a broader perspective. Lately, I'm back on night shift closing, the low man on the pole again, until March or so. Others left or changed jobs. I don't expect the two open positions to be filled until next spring. That means I mop the floors, until more are hired.

What comes around goes around, I understand peak seasons and the slow times. At least I still have a job, glad I don't work CS just to get laid off when things quiet down. It's no wonder companies outsource it, and the parking lot across the street at the phone bank isn't so full right now, either.

You want the Low Price Guaranteed, that's the focus. There's no valet parking at Walmart.
 
I think your STILL not getting what he is saying.

He wasn't disappointed with lack of estimate, but lack of response. It seem like he would have been happy with "Sorry for the delay, we have lot of rifles back ordered. There's no way for us to know exactly how long your will take but it seems like they are taking 2 weeks longer. Thanks"

This could have been copy and pasted to all the "where is my order" emails that they most likely get and would have kept alot of people happier.

That's all he was looking for. They sure do have time to delete posts....
 
I posted these EXACT complaints before on this website. Everyone told me I was crazy and wrong.

Thier subforum on another website is RELIGIOUSLY modded and questions/complaints are REGULARY deleted. Ive seen more crazy/crappy/misshipped things come out of PSA than I care to talk about, and this is only with people I know PERONALLY.

I will NEVER, EVER buy from PSA again. I will not elaborate my personal issue when I ordered from them, but I can safely say that its the worst CS experience I have ever heard/seen or read about anywhere.

Everyone wants cheap quality parts. Well in many cases PSA's stuff is cheap, but its far, far off from "quality". And whats worse, You make a complaint and the PSA drones attack you ferverously, making excuses for poor QC and poor CS.

Guess who doesnt make excuses? BCM.
 
timelinex and Therealkoop are exactly right.

I've read nothing but glowing praises about BCM. They will very likely be my next build format. After watching some of their interviews and videos.. I'm impressed.

My next rifle is my Daniel Defense DDM4 v4. It's just about paid off of layaway and will be done next weekend.
 
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