TheSamba.com :: View topic

Tue Nov 07, 2006 12:08 am

I've been restoring old buses for some years and I used to buy sheet metal panels and other things from a large company in southern California. The quality of some of the panels was bad and too many mistakes were made, so I began buying parts from Rocky Mtn. Motorworks, with good results, but they were bought out (now Mid America Motorworks).
Bus Depot seemed like a good company so I bought, about twenty months ago, three big stub axle RGB rebuid kits for $100 plus shipping, a good price. The expensive SKF roller bearings were made in Germany and were great but two of the ball bearings were no good: one was noisy when I rolled it and the other was rusty. It's not the fault of anyone at Bus Depot, though, and I'm sure that I could have exchanged them for good ones; I just never got around to it. With the cost for shipping it may have not been worth it.
The only thing that I didn't like about the RGB kits was that each one came with a useless type I axle nut. It would be much better if each kit came with a peening nut, like the Bus Boys kits do.
Does Bus Depot sell type II sheet metal panels such as corner and rocker panels, and are any of them any good?

Tue Nov 07, 2006 7:44 am

Busdepot wrote: I sent you an email at the end of last week. I am out of the scrapers and trying to reach the importer to see if they have more. They were out most of last week at an auto parts industry show, and supposedly returned today but were not answering their phones. I hope to have an answer tomorrow. My apologies for this delay.

Incidentally we have had a few email problems recently. Over the last several weeks some incoming emails were mistakenly being filtered as spam by our ISP (an issue now resolved, I believe). An issue not yet resolved is that Verizon is bouncing all emails that we send to Verizon customers. So far Verizon has been completely unhelpful in resolving this. :-(

Ok, I never got the email. but thanks for your efforts

Tue Nov 07, 2006 4:18 pm

I have very mixed feelings about Bus Depot.
Every order I have placed with them has had a problem.
The most recent being, after 2 weeks of waiting, I called to find my order had never been placed and was just sitting on someones desk/computer. This was after I had telephoned the order in initially and confirmed that everything that I wanted was in stock, no back orders, I didnt want to wait on something. Somebody dropped the ball.
I cancelled the order, tired of waiting. To be fair I did receive a follow up telephone call with a concern to do right. A couple of weeks later I replaced my order and did receive it in a timely manner.
I know from the boards here that Ron, the owner, tries to do right and I want to support him and his business. There are, however, obvious problems going on there. When placing an order customers need to know that in stock items will be shipped within a reasonable time (3 days?) and that there will be prompt communications when items are not in stock. The lack of communication is maddening.
That being said I would order from them again but only if I didnt need the parts immediately, I would plan on a 30 day window.

Wed Nov 29, 2006 4:50 pm

My replacement Part arrived, and my return postage was refunded promptly.

Thanks Don!!

(now I just gotta figure out how to change the damn thing...)

Wed Nov 29, 2006 5:10 pm

mook wrote: My replacement Part arrived, and my return postage was refunded promptly.

Thanks Don!!

(now I just gotta figure out how to change the damn thing...)

The owner's name is Ron...not Don.

Wed Nov 29, 2006 6:33 pm

You can call me Don, you can call me Ron, as long as you're saying something nice I'll answer to anything. :lol:

Wed Nov 29, 2006 6:40 pm

D'oh!

sorry Ron! :oops:

Wed Nov 29, 2006 6:44 pm

I have been a long time customer of The Bus Depot, maybe $2000.00 worth of parts over the years so not their biggest purchaser but not a one time customer either…..

However I must write and let everyone know what I encountered this past week.

I ordered a Rancho Transmission from them, reduction box to reduction box as was advertised on their website. As always the price was right and what I wanted. Since it was such a unique item I felt it would be best to call their customer service and order it directly over the phone so I could confirm what I was needing and getting. This was Friday November 24, the day after Thanksgiving.

The price I was quoted was the price as advertised on the site, the transmission cost, shipping and a core charge of $150.00. GREAT, give them my credit card and my transaction was complete…..or so I thought?

I get a call on Tuesday saying the price of the Transmission and Core charge has changed and they would no longer be able to sell me the transmission for price I bought it for….SAY WHAT?????

I have never had this happen before; they should have honored the contract as it was made. I was finally told they would sell me the transmission at the price I purchased it for, in fact I was told, “they would be giving me $50.00 to take the transmission” the new price difference. I also understand that Rancho has had a Core Charge Increase, from the $150.00 to $400.00 as I was told, but….did I not purchase the transmission along with the original core charge?

I’m not bashing their business as I have ALWAYS had good luck and been VERY happy with every thing I purchased, I just don’t understand HOW or WHY a business would do that, even if they lost money.

Wed Nov 29, 2006 8:07 pm

Let me explain why. We take losses all the time in the interest of good customer service, but there is only so much loss we can absorb over a factory cost increase that is beyond our control.

We sell parts at or below cost frequently, when the cost of a part goes up without notice. Most of our customers have probably gotten a part or two at our cost and don't even know it. A good example is backorders from Germany, which often come in at a much higher price than our last landed cost (a situation we can't predict, due to the ever-changing exchange rate and import costs). We just bite the bullet, send you the product at our cost or slightly below, and you never know we did it. As long as we're not losing our shirts on it, we just eat it. I see it as the cost of satisfying my customers.

In this case, the cost went up dramatically, and we make almost nothing on transmissions to begin with, so there was no room to absorb it all. In such cases (which are rare), my store manager usually calls the customer to see if they're willing to meet us part of the way. I have to say that most bus owners are extremely reasonable and fair when the situation is explained. Usually their response is something like, "look, I don't expect you to lose money on it, just give it to me for what it costs you."

So the manager explained the situation to you, and asked you to cover just $25 of the price increase, and we'd still sell it for $25 below cost; at least cut our losses. But you found this unreasonable, so he agreed to give it to you for the old price (at roughly a $50 loss to us). The only thing he couldn't change was that the core deposit had gone up. That's set by Rancho, not us, and of course if your core is rebuildable you get it back. We could not afford to both lose $50 and cover a couple hundred bucks of your core deposit. If you didn't send your core back, we'd be out about $300! We're no Amazon.com; were a small business with small pockets. That $300 comes right out of my pocket, and I just can't afford to lose $300 on a single sale due to a factory price increase that is beyond my control.

So you were offered the original price (at a loss to us) and only an increase in the core deposit (which is not determined by us, and will almost certainly be refunded anyway). I think most people would agree that this was very fair and reasonable. To be honest, I'd have thought you'd have praised this as an example of excellent customer service.

Thu Nov 30, 2006 7:52 am

Ron,

I do praise you and your excellent customer service, for me it has always been there and I have always been very pleased buying from you, and I will in the future, “if you will sell to me”

The only confusion on my part was the fact that I found the price on the website, then called to confirm it was still the same, placed my order.

Then I get a call saying the price went up, if the price was different when I called because of a price increase I would have had the chance to make a different decision as I know things change daily and a website might take longer to update than a response from customer service. Again I know prices change in business all the time, in fact I bought a pack of M&M’s after Halloween, three stickers on the package, the price I paid, lets say $2.85, one below from after Halloween, $2.00 and I’m guessing one before, $2.50. Sure I know I paid more than what I would have 2 weeks before, but I decided to purchase it at the listed price.

Respectfully, what if I picked them up thinking they where $2.00, checked out and the price rang up as $2.00, paid the bill and drove home. Then the next time I went shopping at the same store, after I walked in the manger ran up to me and said, “sorry the price changed on those M&M’s last week before we had a chance to change the price, what would you have done, paid it? That was my point; I bought it for a price, gave my credit card and checked out.

OK OK I know $2.50 and $400.00 is a BIG difference and a grocery store is a BIG BUINESS, but the concept is the same, in my humble little opinion.

Also, in honor and respect to your business I called Rancho myself to see if it might be less expensive for me to buy from them direct, BOTH the Transmission charge and the Core charge was…. WAY MORE than what you where selling it to me for, Now that’s good business, you could be making allot more if you wanted to.

So again, any one reading this should know, The Bus Depot is a GREAT vendor with good prices, I have always had GREAT service from them, period. I just wish the price I paid for the core charge would have been honored, nothing more.

Ron, Thank you for a great business, you have made lots of VW owners happy, me included, I respect you for staying in business all of these years as I remember how and why you started it; and how HARD it has to be to stay in business these days…..THANK YOU.

Thu Nov 30, 2006 11:18 am

Quote: Respectfully, what if I picked them up thinking they where $2.00, checked out and the price rang up as $2.00, paid the bill and drove home. Then the next time I went shopping at the same store, after I walked in the manger ran up to me and said, “sorry the price changed on those M&M’s last week before we had a chance to change the price, what would you have done, paid it? That was my point; I bought it for a price, gave my credit card and checked out.

The analog to your example would be if you bought a product, we charged you for it and sent it to you, and then called later asking for more money retroactively. In this case you placed a special-order for a custom built item, and we contacted you promptly (given the holiday weekend) to inform you of the price increase when we went to pass that special order on to the rebuilder, before anything was actually charged or processed. So in all fairness it is a little different. A closer analogy would be if an item were mispriced on the shelf of a store, and when you got to the register it scanned higher. If it were a small item the store would probably honor the incorrect price, but if it were a several hundred dollar difference they probably wouldn't. But we're spliting hairs.

I do agree that in a perfect world there would never be a lag between when a factory raised a price and when we learned of it and posted it, so everything was perfectly up-to-date minute to minute. Believe me, no one wishes that more than; I give away a lot of parts at cost because it isn't always so!

Thank you for clarifying your previous comments and relaying your positive experience with the Bus Depot, I do appreciate that. It does frustrate me sometimes that we may ship thousands of thousands upon thousands of orders to happy customers, but it's the few that go wrong (through our fault or not) that tend to get the press. If everybody who was happy with their purchases posted here, this thread would be hundreds of pages long! But the nature of things is that most people tend to be silent about a positve experience, and only post when they have a negative one (even if it was preceded by multiple positive ones). This tends to give a skewed impression to the uninitiated. I think one thing that does come through, though, is that while everyone makes a mistake here and there, even in those cases people have commented overwhelmingly that we went out of our way to make things right.

Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:08 pm

I don't care what anybody says about The Bus Depot. They seem like really nice people but, as a business, they're a disaster! Wrong or incomplete information about products listed on their website, wrong products shipped (in addition to sending me the WRONG item(s) they also sent me someone else's unopened return items!!!), shipping takes forever and you can't ever, ever, ever, ever get through to customer service on the phone...need I go on? I finally gave up on trying to negotiate a correct credit for the items I had returned to them (as I said, these were items that were sent to me by mistake instead of the items I had ordered and another item that was so badly misrepresented that I returned it) and just told them to keep both the items and my money. What a MESS!!

Sat Dec 23, 2006 9:45 pm

A few years ago I ordered 4 fuel injectors from them.
Thier Idea of packing was to tape the 4 boxes the fuel injectors came in together and put a shipping label on it.
I was not impressed, and considered the fuel injectors a $200 mistake.
I would NEVER buy from these idiots again.

Sun Dec 24, 2006 12:21 am

Two words - Wolfsburg West.

Sun Dec 24, 2006 8:39 am

thumbs up to the bus depot
i recently placed an order for type 2 parts
no screw ups, arrived in reasonable time, quaility parts, good prices
from experience i know that there can be issues, not this time
btw, at the same time i also ordered from ww and oeveedub
ww - excellent
oeveedub - messed up, still dealing with them

Fri Jan 26, 2007 8:02 pm

nbessie1 wrote: I don't care what anybody says about The Bus Depot. They seem like really nice people but, as a business, they're a disaster! and you can't ever, ever, ever, ever get through to customer service on the phone...need I go on?

I use them frequently...I've never ever ever ever had a problem getting customer service on the phone...are you dialing the correct number :shock:

Yes, sometimes their shipping is a bit slow...they also have a good stock of reasonably priced parts...and the phone service I've received is always friendly. And, in a pinch Ron will be on the phone or sending me a personal email. Kudos to them, they are in a tough biz.

Sat Jan 27, 2007 3:49 am

I just received parts from them. They called me after a week, explained that there was a paper work problem, corrected it and told me i would receive the parts the next day. They showed up as they said. I will buy from them again.

Fri Feb 16, 2007 2:01 pm

I've bought tires, CV joints and some other miscellaneous parts from the Busdepot. Due to a misunderstanding they once misquoted a lower price on the phone, and then offered a substantial discount to "make it right" when the price turned out to be more. Integrity. I will do business with them again. I love the fact that his location is so close to Philadelphia, I usually drive to pickup my order.

Tue Mar 06, 2007 1:36 pm

I just got my stuff from BusDepot. It was here in a timely manner and the stuff that was backordered showed up about a week later. I'm sure I'll use them again.

Wed Apr 11, 2007 1:31 pm

:evil: I WILL NEVER BUY FROM BUSDEPOT AGAIN!

order placed: 3/28/07
today's date: 4/11/07

My order consisted of a fan cover and a set of front seat belts.
I received the fan cover yesterday. It took customer dis-service two days to mail me a tracking number, and only ONE tracking number at that. Apparently, the belts weren't in stock. Did the website indicate that, NO. I tried calling costomer service, no answer-no voicemail-NOTHING.

I was referred to BD from a guy on here that I have a real respect for, so I really hate to bash them. But, I will never buy from another website that doesn't include shipping on the final checkout page. Ironicly, BD is the only website I've ever bought from that had costomer service call me to discuss shipping rates. :shock: That should have been the first red flag.

Suggestions for BusDepot.com
1. Fire your costomer service rep immediately!
2. Make your website more user friendly (better descriptions of products and with pictures)
3. Tell your customers when something is out of stock (when ordering!)

*Just tried calling customer service, again, and now I've been on hold for ten minutes. :x
*Talking with Rick (seems confused on where my order is)
*Back on hold
*Ok, he "found" my invoice - has no idea what's up with my belts - and that concludes my buisness with busdepot!