pissed

Would you be pissed if someone sold you a dome port with shark bites on it and told you they would not show up and they do and refused to take the item back? This guy Ike dealer/photo pro contacted me and offered me REAL WORLD ADVISE and told me he was a dealer. Even though his prices on new gear were higher than B+H etc. I thought he was a nice guy and I welcomed the help. Am I out of line here?

Thanks

JD

I would be pissed if they did not disclose that up front.

Cor

I would be pissed if they did not disclose that up front.

 

Cor

He said it had these marks but they did not show up in the images. They do and he claims its dust or grease on the port. Its not dust or grease and its in the same spot as the shark bites. Also it was pointed out to me by the guy that I contacted him. That may be true!

here is the email

" have a first generation Ikelite mount / Aquatica 8" dome port (see photo) that I've used for most of the shots I sent you. It has two small shark bites in it, but water fills these in and you will never see them in your photos."

Keeping out of this one now.

Does not sound like much of a Pro if he told you that the water fills these in and you will never see them in your photos

More like he just wanted a sale....have they a web site?

At the advice of one experienced forum member, here's my response:

* May 8th joeyfishes contacts me looking for free shooting advice with his used system. Between then and now 39 emails containing pricing, add items / substract items, wants to use old non-digital strobes, old strobe arms, etc. goes his way from me via email. Numerous phone conversations, too. All friendly and appreciative of my help.

* He buys a NEW Ikelite flat port for Nikon 60mm, a ball joint adapter and NEW manual synch cord from Ike housing to Nikonos SB105 strobe.

* I find him a MINT Sigma 15mm lens for $275.00. Quote NEW Ikelite 6" dome port. He wants to do over / under shots. Doesn't want to spend $$$ on NEW Ikelite 8" dome port assembly.

* I send multiple shots taken with exact first generation used 8" dome he claims is "defective". I include shots of the mark, and describe how most of will fill in with water on more shots than not. He says "I'll take it for that discount price".

* He goes on two trips with port, post photos on DDN and Wetpixel, asks more quesitons, etc.

* Today he contacts me and wants a full refund. Threatens me, calls me a crook, blah, blah, blah......I remind him of 39 emails with lots of real world advice on how to shoot UW photos, now evidently not valuable to him.

Which brings us to today......

When I'm threatened, I sure don't feel any need to continue to help people. Maybe some of you out there do. My reputation at DDN, Wetpixel, Ebay and with hundreds of happy travel and UW photo equipment customers should be fine. So no worries from me....

Those who have met me will hopefully understand my response I spend quite a bit of time, much of it uncompensated for, sincerely trying to help people enjoy taking underwater pictures.

Happy to email every single one of my emails sent to Joe to anyone, plus images taken with this dome port as recently as 2 months ago. None even needing clone stamped.....Including images sent to magazines who evidently don't think it is any visible problem.

Here's just one of hundreds below........

David Haas

Haas Photography Inc.

davidhaas@sbcglobal.net

www.haasimages.com

Oh yeah,

Before everyone rushes to crucify someone, you might want to get some facts.......Because someday you may be on the receiving end of a bad rap.

Food for thought.

dhaas

P.P.S. - Pros know the difference between BS and what works in the real world.

Sorry if that offends anyone

wow I never mentioned your name but here we go

Your FREE advise and all the GREAT deals you gave me(Not!!!) do not entitle you to misrepresent merchandise you sell. You said you CANNOT see the shark marks on the port. Not you cant see them most of the time or you see them and you can clone stamp them out or all the magazines I send them to don't mind them When I showed you the images with the shark marks what you should have said IMO is if you are unhappy with the port send it back. Not all the ranting and raving and unprofessional behavior on your part that has gone on. Having said that I am glad you outed yourself so other buyers can know what they are dealing with IN ADVANCE.

I contacted you after my trip and made a reasonable offer. Lets send it in to IKE and have it fixed (at the time I thought they would replace the port Dome for $150 turns out it is not fixable) and split the cost $75 each or take the port back.No go on your part. So I went out and got another port.

As far as your sample images goes who knows what you shot them with or if you clone stamped them out.

as far as your lie about you saying it will fill up and you wont see it MOST OF THE TIME. Here is the email you sent

"Joe,

Over / Under shots with a 6" port are difficult, not impossible, but usually don't come out as well as with an 8" dome port.

I have a first generation Ikelite mount / Aquatica 8" dome port (see photo) that I've used for most of the shots I sent you. It has two small shark bites in it, but water fills these in and you will never see them in your photos.

Let me know.....

David Haas

Haas Photography Inc.

4596 Greenlawn Drive

Stow OH 44224

330-678-0591 phone / fax

330-329-5981 cell

I am glad this is out and I am done with this thread

JD

At the risk of stirring the pot instead of turning down the heat - may I suggest in a pissing contest, NO ONE wins? You've both got your winkies in the wind.

That said, I've also had emails from dhaas lately in response to questions and found him most helpful and willing to teach an obvious noob. I still plan on checking him first when I'm ready to gear up. I'm glad to see confirmation (even grudging) that he offers great deals.

At the risk of stirring the pot instead of turning down the heat - may I suggest in a pissing contest, NO ONE wins? You've both got your winkies in the wind.

 

That said, I've also had emails from dhaas lately in response to questions and found him most helpful and willing to teach an obvious noob. I still plan on checking him first when I'm ready to gear up. I'm glad to see confirmation (even grudging) that he offers great deals.

I guess I am not done. If the gear is broken its NOT A GREAT DEAL!!!!!!!

Buyer beware

JD

I guess I am not done. If the gear is broken its NOT A GREAT DEAL!!!!!!!

 

Buyer beware

JD

I don't know you. I don't know dhaas, aside from a couple of emails. I clearly don't know all the facts, or the progression of events here, nor frankly am I interested in finding out. A blow-by-blow is only fun for voyeurs, and I don't get my jollies that way.

But you've both indicated there's been a fair amount of communication back and forth. You also indicate you were happy about other items priced, and haven't made comments about any other complaints aside from this one on a used part. So there's at least some 'good' that's come out of the relationship, and a basis for at least trying to be reasonable and talk things over further, IMO.

Now with that, I'm out. Not going to get in the middle of it, just thought I'd suggest a cooler response. <shrug>

Well there you go, there are always two sides to a story....sorry if I spoke too soon

I hope you guys can sort things out between you two and not continue on the forum about it.

My gut feeling when it comes to a customer being not happy about a product or service whether they are right or wrong is to give them their money back or come to some compromise. A unhappy customer can cause you much more lost sales etc due to negative talk later on.

If someone is unhappy with one of our DVD's for what ever reason, we just send them a cheque and we never hear from them again.

Glad to hear that Wagsy,

BTW, you did say that those Betamax DVD's you sell at your place should play on most stand alone players, right? No luck here yet. I'll try at a friends place tonight. If no go I'll have to get that $75 back.

Cheers mate,

Mark.

P.S It does happen sometimes that DVD's get warped or scratched so I have a 2 week policy. If after that time there's no problems then there's no refund. Believe me I've had people ask for refunds after a year of playing the DVD! I always also insist that they send back the disc for verification. Not really that much of an issue though.

Mark they are zone free but PAL...you are in the land of NTSC

The sound is not AC3 or wav but mpeg and NTSC players cannot play that audio compression.

They will play in any computer though...money back...I thought I sold it to you for FREE .

Selling any second hand / used / ex demo item can be full of danger.

When we sell our used / demo SLR housings we recomend that customers purchase new ports - saves a lot of hassles.

When their budget does not stretch to new ports I always give them a port polishing kit ( Novus 123 ).

In reality those tiny shark bite marks appear to be very tiny on the scale of things and would polish out in no time at all.

Dave is a straight up guy and I'm sure he will sort you out.

On the daily DVD's - strictly a no refund policy. ( That said each disc is checked ,verified and checked again before it leaves )

We have a disclaimer on the back of the DVD order forms that reads :

Not all DVD players will play all DVDs. This DVD has been created in DVD -R format and will play back on the vast majority of DVD players, particularly recent models. No refunds or returns will be accepted if this DVD does not happen to play in your DVD player.

I understand and agree to the above conditions.

Name: Date:

Signed:

My Updated policy will read:

"Bwahahahaha, you paid hooooow much"!! Thanks for the cash, fingers crossed it plays! If not gimme a call within two weeks of getting home otherwise no refunds or replacements will be given" cheers, Mark.

Gotta have a laff,

Mark.

Gee you guys run a tight ship...I think we have only ever had to do it a few time over the years anyhow, thats because we make our DVD's on a PC so they are much better

Looks like we have hijacked this thread as well...O well the boys did not need it anymore I figure.

Not so tight as formal.

We found in the early days of DVD we needed to draw attention to the possibilty that it may not work in a given player.

We also needed to stop the " I've changed my mind / or it doesn't work" , which when translated from backpackese means " We've just made a copy and now don't need the original any more " !!

They are deep. Not scratches. Do you think they could be polished out ? Ikelite told me if you can feel them you cant polish them out

Thanks

JD

They are deep. Not scratches. Do you think they could be polished out ? Ikelite told me if you can feel them you cant polish them out

Thanks

 

JD

If they are shark marks then polishing probably isn't an option. I do have one question, however: How much of a crop is the shot you posted? Or, is it taken with a zom lens? If that is full frame with a Sigma 15mm (assuming you're using the lens Dave said he located for you) then the marks must be pretty big. I have a couple scuffs in my S&S 9" dome but they don't normally show up. If they do, I can usually use the clone tool to clean things up. Since I don't tend to spend much time editing the pictures that aren't keepers, it doesn't take all that long to touch things up in Photoshop. YMMV.

Mike

You need to attack the dome witha few levels of emery paper and the novus plastic polish be new befor you know it. If in doubt polish .polish ,,,,polish polish, polish, ,polish ,,,,