GOT CAUGHT BY THE WIFE...

[tuned4life]

what happened to you and your corns is a heartbreaker. its happened to me more than once. if by chance you know someone who has an account and does a large volume with fedex. they could possably get there rep to push the claim through as a courtesy. if that fails, you should petition the seller to your local small claims court. the jurisdiction would be point of delivery. the grounds for your claim would be damage due to sellers negligence. he either didnt read, or chose to ignore insurance packing requirements. take lots of pics of the inadequate packing. get print out of shippers packing requirements for insurance. if the out of town seller doesnt appear in court you win by default. if youre lucky the seller will pay long before the trail date. if he doesnt pay then you make arrangements with his sherriffs dept. to enforce the judgement. he will have the option to pay in full or make weekly payments to the sherriffs. if he fails to pay, they issue a warrant for his arrest. if he does pay, the sherriffs will send you the money. if you do your part, the court and law enforcement will do thers. they may try to derail you with the we are under staffed line but if you persist they are obligated. whether seller was an ebay pirate, or just an ignorant idiot makes no differance. NO QUARTER.

[Cal Blacksmith]

[:@]Oh MAN! I am hurtin along with you Bro! I have had shipping damage

myself. Worse, when I shipped a pair of speakers home from the army,

they were too big to go by either FedEx or ups so I sent them by

Greyhound freight, I bet they never even left the depot I dropped them

off at![:@][:@]

I shipped them on two separate tickets so that the value of them would

be covered by the insurance. I submitted the claims and the twits only

paid ONE of them! I had to RE-submit the second claim and it took a

good 4 months to get paid.

Good luck, Are you coming out in person to pick up the Khorns? If you

are, I am only about 60 miles from them, I would like to invite you

over for a listen to my setup and to get to meet you.

[Gilbert]

Wayne, that sounds like a plan. I have made no plans yet as to when I'll pick them up, but I'm thinking end of November or first week in Dec. I'll let you know when the date is set. Hopefully, this time we can hook up, and you won't have to work late.

For most of this year I've done nothing but office work, and I'm starting to get cabin fever, again. On the way back from CA, I'll be stopping in AZ to pick up a puppy (Labrador) for my girls. This is going to be a great adventure for me. If I can make the time, I'd even like to visit the Grand Canyon. I've never seen it from the ground level.

[Gilbert]

Almost forgot.....I filed a claim with FedEx. They come by on Monday to take the CW to the, get this, Damage Accessment Facsilities. There FedEx's claims adjuster will verify the damage, and determine a settlement.

I informed the Seller, and she said her company "I SOLDIT.COM" has some serious clout with FedEx, because they do quite a lot of business with them. She told me that she will petition for the full insured amount, should FedEx try and weasle out of anything, but she that that they're usually pretty good, but just slow to respond.

That said, I should get the full bid price back, and still keep the speakers. With some careful prep-work and puddy, I think I can fix'er up so that the screwed up area won't stand out. Lord knows I've done enough small ding repairs, and finished enough of these puppies to know them inside out.

I'll keep my fingers crossed, but I wont hold my breath on this deal. We'll just ride this one out, and see how the wind blows.

[kev313]

Bubble wrap and a cardboard box? Shipping these is crazy enough, but that is just stupid! If they have to be shipped, buyers should CAREFULLY review the seller's shipping method.

[jt1stcav]

So sorry to hear about your damaged Cornwalls...I pray that everything works out to your advantage. So many good buyers either get ripped off or the sellers don't know how to properly package their items and claim they're professional packers!

One of my brothers just recently won an eBay auction on a pair of mint Acoustic Research S40 tower loudspeakers and paid the seller through PayPal. The seller had described the S40s as in excellent condition, and that they will be perfectly packaged and shipped FedEx Ground (the seller did not have the original cartons and packing material, but claimed to do excellent packing...with decent feedback you tend to take the seller at their word).

My bro received the two 45" tall cartons the other day, and he immediately had his doubts even before he opened them just by looking at the flimsy cartons and what looked like medical tape used to seal them. These towers are about 45 lbs. each and much heavier triple-ply cardstock should've been used instead of the much thinner cardboard used, which looked no thicker than that used in shoe boxes IMO! There were no gouges or tears in either carton, but you could tell from the indentations that both cartons had been dropped, probably on more than one occassion! Sure enough, the first carton opened revealed the feeling of being kicked in the stomach...NO thick styrofoam edges or top piece were used on top of the loudspeaker, and only a few slabs of thin styrofoam strips were used on all four sides (the rest of the dead-space inbetween the loudspeaker and the inside of the carton was filled only with styrofoam peanuts (Craig's favorite), and not even enough to cover the top of the cabinet or the remaining inch of clearance between the cabinet top and the box lid, absolutely no packing material of any kind to protect the loudspeaker top...nothing, zip, nada! Oh, and the covering used around the entire cabinet was the ultra-thin sheets of bubblewrap; not the industrial-size bubblewrap with bubbles the size of ping-pong balls, but the nearly microscopic bubbles the size of ball bearings! Great packaging indeed!

Caution: The following image is of a disturbing nature and should not be viewed by the faint of heart!

[EVGuy]

I manage a furniture repair shop for a major department stores furniture division in the Chicago and Milwaukee areas, and believe me when I tell you, a good repair guy can repair any damage done to speaker cabinets so you will never see the repairs. Don't try and do it yourself. That last picture of the crushed corner is about an hours work by a guy who knows what he's doing. Don't give up hope!

[jt1stcav]

This is the second carton just after cutting open its lid...you can plainly see how the peanuts had settled and not nearly enough was used to protect the cabinet top, along with a few strips of styrofoam added for $hits and giggles (they sure weren't there to protect anything). It's amazing the second S40 tower wasn't damaged anymore than it was...you can see the crumbled MDF on the bottom right corner if this image. Surely the bubblewrap used wasn't meant to protect something as large and heavy as a loudspeaker, especially a tower!

Amazingly both floorstanding towers still work! My brother already contacted the seller and filed a claim with both FedEx and eBay/PayPal. As far as I know, nothing's been said yet due to it being the weekend; maybe he'll find out something this coming Monday. He barely paid over $200 for the pair of discontinued towers including shipping and insurance. With that said, he's not counting on getting his money back, not even partial payment; if he does he feels it'll be a miracle!

We'll see...

[jt1stcav]

EVGuy, thanks for the tip. But can a furniture repair tech repair the severe damage done to Gilbert's Cornwalls?

[EVGuy]

Reading his description of the damage, I'd say yes. Any damage done to wood or MDF or even this compressed cardboard crap most new furniture from China is made of, can be repaired. A large smashed corner may need to be cut off, (I know it sounds bad) and rebuilt using what all repair guys use, bondo. The bondo is then shaped and trimmed then sprayed with several layers of different shades of color to blend until the color and finish is right. Bondo works better then patching with a piece of wood because the wood used would have it's own grain where as the bondo does not. Wood grain can be painted on believe it or not, then finished over so you could never tell. I suggest finding a repair shop with some old timers, or younger guys who take pride in their work. Maybe even find out who does repairs for department stores in their area. Department stores have a reputation to uphold so their repairs have to be done well.

[Gilbert]

The damage sustained to the worst cornwall is no where near as bad as what they did to your brothers speaker. But it kicked me in the gut, just the same. These were near perfect decorator CW's. Cosmetically, there WERE better than 95%. Now, it's bondo time, but I still have to wait till FedEx does their thing, and I get reimburst by the Seller.

Anyone know how long of a grace period PayPal offers to Buyer's? I'd better go a research it, ..because I may just need it.

I'll try and post some pic's tomorrow. I'd better go before I get bummed out again.

Later,

[colterphoto1]

I believe 30 days, but please research it. Sorry for your predicament.

M

[johnyholiday]

Case-ID XX-X, damage is so bad,an the packaging so $hity,that it slips

out of the box an UPS sends it back to the Shipper\seller,then the

Shipper\seller him-haw's around buying time to put in a claim,then

ships it back out too Buyer,from a different UPS store,removes a woofer

so the weight is 4# different, ships it separately 2 days later,from a

different UPS store to cover their tracks,the Buyer thinks its lost,an

gives the Seller\ shipper\ scamer the benefit of the doubt, while the

Seller\ shipper\ scamer ,tries to work his magic timeline an get Buyer's

money, an UPS claim money,when Buyer puts in a Paypal dispute for

never receiving anything, then the fun begins messing up the

Seller\shipper\scamers timeline,then the Seller\shipper\scamer emails

the Buyer threating to call the Buyers state authority,then the Buyer

calls Paypal then Paypal tells Buyer to break off communication with

Seller\shipper\scamer,then Paypal makes available Buyer's phone number

because of dispute, turning transaction into a quadangled oxymoron,to

communicate, or not to communicate, via Paypals advise, to communicate,

an

not to communicate,then the fun begins again,with phone calls begging,

using children's mouths to feed excuse,from

Seller\shipper\scamer\beggar for the the Buyer to cancel

dispute,meanwhile back at the UPS ranch,UPS cross references' catch

on,an call Buyer,ask Buyer "has the item been shipped back out to

them", Buyer says "yes an damaged twice,minus 4# woofer to show up in 2

days",buyer tells UPS

Pathological\seller\scamer\shipper\beggar\childnonprovider\lier is

committing fraud upon Buyer an UPS, leaving a trail of clues,such as

first damaged package returned to sender by UPS,first damaged speaker

returned to sender by UPS,second damaged package which was first

damaged package,including first shipping label not torn off because of

packing tape,on the package's third top flap,folded under top

flap,second UPS damage, to first UPS damaged speaker,which is not a

replacement ,as stated by,

Pathological\seller\scamer\shipper\beggar\childnonprovider\lier\insurance

frauder,the mystery\dark comedy ,to be wrapped up with the first

time UPS punctured 4# woofer,showing up nicely packaged ,with no

secondary UPS damage ,that won't fasten,into original wood screw holes

because of first UPS impact ,due to

pathological\seller\scamer\shipper\beggar\childnonprovider\lier\insurancefrauder\nutjuggler

[jt1stcav]

Damn those nutjugglers!

[codhead]

Gilbert,

Man, I really know what you're feeling right now! After UPS knocked the

bottoms out of my Decorator Cornwalls, I was fit to be tied. I have a

slightly compressed corner too, but thankfully it's a back corner.

After damaging 2 of my amps by dropping them, I would not hold my

breath when it comes to getting a claim out of FedEx. Taking them to

court appears to be the only viable solution. I think they're blowing

smoke up your a$$ regarding how they inspect packages for damage. Their

standard procedure is to take the package back to the FedEx hub, and

have the manager look at it. I found this out, as there was no way I

was gonna trust those apes not to do further damage to one of my amps.

I borrowed a friend's SUV, and personally hauled a 100+ pound amp back

to the FedEx facility in a rain storm for the damage inspection.

From the sound of things, your cabinets may be too far gone - unless

you want to bondo them, and paint them black. If you do manage to get

blood from a turnip (FedEx pays your claim) there may be another

solution. The forum member Popbumper might be willing to CNC cut you a

new set of cabinets, and ship them flat (unassembled). Assuming that

you're allowed to keep the damaged speakers, you could have them glued

up locally and reuse the innards. That would probably result in the

nicest set of Decorators in existence.

Good luck!

- Jeff

[michael hurd]

Could have been much much worse, still sucks no matter what. When I read the title, I had an impression that some-how an extra-marital relationship was uncovered....... in the form of other Klipsch.

[Gilbert]

I had an impression that some-how an extra-marital relationship was uncovered....... in the form of other Klipsch.

It started out that way, until I got home to open the boxes.....that's when everything changed. For the worst.

Getting chewed on by Queenzilla was the easy part, looking at my FedEx customized CW Decorators is the hard part.

[jt1stcav]

It's definately enough to make a grown man cry...[:'(]

[IB Slammin]

I had an impression that some-how an extra-marital relationship was uncovered....... in the form of other Klipsch.

It started out that way, until I got home to open the boxes.....that's when everything changed. For the worst.

Getting chewed on by Queenzilla was the easy part, looking at my FedEx customized CW Decorators is the hard part.

So the guy gets busted buying CW's. What does he do to get out of it? Buys a pair of Khorns.[*-)]

If I pulled somthing like that,,,,,,,I would be out in the yard looking for my boys!

Hell, i'm still trying to hide Merlin![]

Terry

[Gilbert]

Shhh. She hasn't found out about the Khorns, ...yet.[H]