Odd Interaction with Acustrike Customer Service

[sadclevelandsports]

Hey all, first post here. I've been a lurker for a little while, but felt inclined to post since people may be thinking of making a purchase with acustrike. I thought I'd leave my thoughts about the product, and the somewhat odd interaction I've had with one of the staff (possibly the owner of the company?).

Firstly, my thoughts about the product. I really think it's a fantastic idea on paper, and it's simplicity pushed me into a purchase. I purchased the outdoor mat, took it out to the backyard, and as instructed, anchored it in place with the long tees that were included in the packaging. The first thing I noticed is that I could not get a single ball to stay in place on the target zone when I placed by club down behind the ball. Given the incessant rolling, I decided to float my club before my strikes, which worked reasonably. The second thing I noticed was that the turf was pretty sensitive, and even though I felt that I was hitting the mat in front of the ball, the turf mark was showing about an inch behind the ball. I used a slow motion camera to confirm that I was touching down in front of the ball, but the mark started 3-4 inches behind where the club touched down oddly enough. Last and most frustrating, after the first 3 hits, the tees broke. I added a new set of tees, broke after 2 more swings.

I took a total of 10 swings, broke 4 sets of tees, and decided that it was time to email the company. I knew I had taken several swings at the mat but given that I spent more time trying to make the mat work than actually getting practice in, I wanted to see if they would be amenable to a return. This was my first email:

"Dear AcuStrike,

I purchased and received your product 2 days ago. Unfortunately, it does not seem to work for me as advertised as after I strike the ball, the mat will not stay in place. I've probably taken 10 total swings, and I have broken 4 sets of tees. Additionally, the balls will not stay in place when placing the club behind the ball on the mat. While I could probably make it work if I bought stakes to put into the ground and cut out more from the center to make the ball stay, this is more trouble than I would like, and I would prefer to return your product. Thank you very much, and I would appreciate your help in facilitating this return."

Mark Seiver's first response:

"We've never heard of the issue of Tees breaking.. we have 25,000 that's out there. However if you're having problems with the tease please go to Home Depot and get there 6 in galvanized nails. They're $0.17 a piece.

The mat will not budge. 

However warning with this because it's then that will not budge and you hid behind the Met you can jam your wrist potentially.  

Do not cut a hole in the mat. 

This was designed to use with or without a golf ball. 

Did the idea of an that is to teach you to hit the Impact Zone and you do not need a golf ball to have the night help you with this skill.  

I am getting so many rave reviews from all over the world are people thanking me and telling me how quickly it's helping them so I want to encourage you to really give this ago because it's really going to help you in the long run.  So if you cannot get the mat to B-flat yes the ball may move. 

Don't use the ball then if you're getting frustrated with that you don't need it. 

Mark C Seiver 

Acu-Strike Golf"

My Response: 

"While I appreciate the troubleshooting recommendations, I simply am finding this to be more trouble than it's worth for me. In terms of how I practice, it's actually made it slightly more difficult for me. I totally understand that there are people who are enamored with your product, and I agree that it is well thought out in design, but it is unfortunately not working for me. I would like to continue processing the return, and I'm happy to still post positive feedback on online forums that I had a good experience with customer service. Thank you!"

Mark Seiver's second response:

"Jonathan ,

We do not do double work here.

I cannot have you return the product.

It has been opened and used.

We are a small company and this is just all to much.

You have used the product and opened the package

and now want to return it where I won't repackage it or give it to someone else.

Can't do that.

So , I recommend you give this to a friend whom won't think this is so much trouble.

And you are cheating yourself if you do not get those Nails and work with this.

I know , I get the letters from all over the world."

 

 

So...just wanted to share this very odd interaction. I don't disagree with him the mat is technically used, though he could have just told me up front in his first email instead of going back and forth. Secondly, he goes from having "25,000 out there" with "so many rave reviews" to "we are a small company and this is just all to much" and then coming back to "I know, I get letters from all over the world." Just wanted to share this very odd interaction. I have heard of others having issues with this company with not wanting to provide any assistance with products that ended up tearing. It's also very possible he was just having a bad day, but just wanted to leave this here in case people were thinking of making a purchase, and what dealing with their customer service looks like. I'm certainly bummed because I was really excited about the product. Looks great on paper, but just didn't work out for me. Per his recommendation, I will be giving it to a friend.

 

JP

[TooMuchAwesome]

Thanks for posting! Note to self: do not buy an Acustrike.

[LPSISCO]

You are much more understanding toward his “odd” response than I would be. How did you pay for it? Can you reach out to your credit card company?

[jarederco]

sorry you experienced this but it was great comedy to read.

[MaineMariner]

So they're a large enough company to advertise all over YouTube and send their product to a bunch of YouTube golf review channels (surely free of charge)... but not process a simple return for a possibly defective product? Yikes.

By the way, your experience with the mat showing marks behind the ball matches a few of the reviews I've seen, particularly this one:

 

[sadclevelandsports]

Haha sometimes I tend to be overly accepting of my circumstances. Do you think reaching out to my credit card company might be worth it? I've certainly never had to do so for anything before, so I'm not sure if this is within the scope of things they can help me out with.

[thevaporz]

All of this over $50. Stay sad, Cleveland.

[sadclevelandsports]

With the exception of 2016, they feed me sadness on a yearly basis.

[Krt22]

He sounds like a certain person with a bad spray tan.. Someone posted in another forum and had an even more lively conversation with this character.

[SubaruWRX]

Call your credit card company. The guy sold you a product that didn’t work how it was supposed to. Who cares about his claims of rave reviews? That doesn’t pertain to you. Get your money back.

[Instron4204]

Wow, customer service at it's finest...yikes. Thanks for posting.

[JackpotJohnny]

just playing devils advocate here..

While you can eat 3/4 of your burger and say it’s pink and get a refund, that doesn’t mean they are giving you award-winning service. It just means it cost less to go out of the way to Buy back your complaining. It should never be the measure or expectation of good service.

Clearly whoever you spoke with was trained in customer service about as good as they were trained in spelling, but that said, he doesn’t have to take the used product back, and I can see the standpoint of how on earth could someone buy something, use it, not like it, and think they were entitled to return it? That automatically puts you in defense mode.

To his credit, he tried to be helpful and give you some solutions. Even without saying it, he basically told you that you’re hitting too steep into the mat and of course you’re going to break tees.

I read his response like this-

get something sturdier to hold it down

get rid of the ball so you’re not trying to compress it so much

and be careful not to break your wrist, because seem like the kind of Kyle that would come back and try to sue me for that.

The insinuation that “if” he processed a return, you would sing praises on the Internet, was a clearly passive threat that you would do the exact opposite if he didn’t. And that is exactly what you did, in the same passive aggressive way.

I can see both sides, but in the same situation, I probably would have told you where you could take it, with no Vaseline, and I work in customer service.

sorry you didn’t get the resolution you wanted, but that doesn’t make it the wrong one.

 

 

 

[dcfball88]

You’re kidding, right?

People return stuff every day.

OP not asking for special service. He’s asking to return a product that at least from his standpoint, doesn’t serve its intended purpose...

[straightshot7]

Companies refuse to accept used product returns every day...

[LPSISCO]

I think “used” is a relative term. If he took 10 swings on a golf trainer and it doesn’t work as advertised, is that used? Or did he have to take a few swings to learn that it didn’t work?

 

If I buy a shirt and the threads start coming out the first time I wear it...is it used, or defective?

[LPSISCO]

I would generally be hard pressed to get too worked up about a relatively small amount of money too. But...the replies from the guy would definitely antagonize me such that I’d go to my credit card company just to annoy him.

[nikeblades00]

Wow what a jerk. Condscening reply. Zero customer service skills.

[sadclevelandsports]

After reading some of the comments above, just to avoid any misunderstanding, my intention in posting this is not because I feel like I absolutely need a refund. As I posted above, I agree to some extent with the person I exchanged emails with that, given that I have taken some swings, it is technically "used." The cost of the product is not enough for me to get my knickers in a wad. I just wanted to let everyone know what my discourse with this company has been like, and if anyone was on the fence about making a purchase, to see if I can provide some additional info to guide their decision. Obviously for me, it's not been a terribly positive experience. I expect some level of professionalism when I deal with any company, but this feels straight out of grade school.

[thevaporz]

Very odd first post. Not willing to try nails or anything else to find a simple solution, you had to register on the site to post your disdain after lurking for awhile. Really. This was the straw? Petty.

[TooMuchAwesome]

I think the lack of a professional and coherent response was worth mentioning, especially given the context and range of topics seen on this particular sub forum.

[sleuth]

Unfortunate situation but I think you learned something form this. You should always check return policies of it's something you're unsure about but buying on a whim. I was considering Ben Hogan irons myself but saw that all sales are final - easy pass.

[dcfball88]

Did someone nominate you the boss around here? My lord. Free country Bambi

[SubaruWRX]

Bambi... LOL!

[Colej]

Ok he’s never heard of a issue but he knew exactly what you should do to remedy the situation? Lol

my opinion? He wouldn’t have gotten so specific if he’s never had to remedy this situation

[straightshot7]

The only thing I disagree with is you saying you're just trying to inform other people, etc.

Let's be honest: you are pissed and you wanted to put the guy "on blast".

[MaineMariner]

I'm perfectly fine with putting the guy on blast. His product is all over social media and one would expect a customer service experience commensurate with that. I would not expect a poorly-written, defensive response to a poor product experience. I wouldn't expect that from a dude selling stuff on the BST, let alone a company that is blanketing the virtual airwaves with advertising. I do sort of sympathize with the seller, especially if he just stumbled upon a good idea and doesn't have much experience in sales. Hopefully he hires a customer service team.

As far as the returns issue goes... I also understand a company not accepting returns. Unfortunately, Amazon, eBay, and other large retailers (hello Costco) have totally changed the customer perception on returns. However, instead of getting defensive about the issues OP was having with the product ("never heard of this happening before, we have a ton of good reviews"), the seller should have taken the opportunity to investigate the problems that OP was reporting. Again, hopefully this is a learning experience for the seller. He lost a potential sale from me and probably others reading this thread by not accepting one return of a potentially defective product. Oops. That's the same reason why I've accepted returns on eBay even when I don't have to - I save myself the potential negative feedback that will prevent me from future sales.

[SubaruWRX]

Accustrike got the OP’s $50, but lost much more in potential sales from this thread alone. And word of mouth even more.

 

Was that worth not accepting one return? With all the rave reviews, one return couldn’t hurt the company much at all, right?

[My2Dogs]

Thanks for your post. Even if the person who started the thread was upset, he posted very detailed info of the product, what the issue was and then the customer service experience with the actual dialogue.

we are a golf forum, we state our opinions everyday on products. This is no different. I respect the company for not taking returns but they also should expect feedback (positive and negative) on golf forums and other forms of media. Comes with the territory. Also sounds from others that this person has a history of how he treats customers who are not happy with their purchases. No one will make everyone happy so either take the product back, or have it built into your financial model of negative feedback.

[tobythedog]

I also had a poor experience with the owner/customer service. I used the indoor mat outside off wooden decking (driving range) as is suggested. Second swing ripped the outer material and crushed the inner. If you read ALL the fine print on the back side of the packaging, you might eventually discover that the mat cannot be used if it's cold. I play golf when it's in the upper 30s or lower 40s - never occurred to me that I couldn't hit off a mat. Owner didn't care.

[SubaruWRX]

You must not understand. He has many great reviews. You must be wrong. He should have offered you another solution. It’s called a needle and thread. Just see it together and you should be good to go. Have you heard? He has many many rave reviews...