[Closed] Forget CRC

by the way this isn't a dig at CRC, i've always found their service to be excellent if a little inconsistent recently

Crazy germans, either have too much time on their hands or run incredibly efficiently!

German mail order is trully excellent. I ordered some tyres last week and had them within two days there always fast, prompt and good at communication.

Anyone with stock is better that CRC. Their current inventory levels are rubbish, they have so much out of stock at the moment.

CC

lol etc at the 'Personal-hygiene' section

I've used Actionsports a couple of times and found them very good and Germanically efficient.
🙂

merlin did exactly that on monday for me - order made around 10 am, confirmed half an hour later, stuff waiting at the office for me the next day - order to receipt in under 24 hours.

Merlin are great.

Slight hijack, do you have to pay duty when buying something from actionsports?

no

So it's not a dig at CRC, and yet the title is "Forget CRC".

Classic.

Not promoting people to use CRC too much then are you. Looks just like a dig to me.

really?

good for you

even better service?

3.30pm - me, rings ukbikestore and asks for a part for my forks, they don't have it in but say they will go to the distributor and get it

11am next morning, part arrives

distribuor is in the next door unit?
😉

if you want a part NOW, go to your LBS
if you want it cheap, be prepared to wait 24 hrs.

ive never had problems with CRC

Slight change of subject but how about this for service?:

Badly damaged bike November 2nd.
Started insurance claim November 12th
Arranged to collect bike November 17th - no show
Collected bike December 2nd
Finally inspected it December 22nd
Decided (after I insisted) fork send to Fox January 7th
Fork returned OK January 14th
Ordered replacement bike January 15th
Arranged delivery for replacement bike on February 13th - stayed at home
Replacement arrived on February 16th - went to work
I checked it out - Fork not flush with underside of head tube (1mm gap) and brake hose snagging on fork's crown when turning....
Taking it to my local shop to be fixed on Saturday...

The bike shop is the insurance companies favourite: Wheelies Direct!

There! That's off my chest and I dfeel much better now....

Check this:

Any day of the week, speak to sales assistant, place order. Goods supplied instantly.

LBS everytime for me these days, fed up with being messed around by online retailers

lcj - Member
Check this:

Any day of the week, speak to sales assistant, place order. Goods supplied instantly.

I've tried to do that, but understandably, they're catering predominantly for the mass market, so their stock is tied up in Altura and lower end stuff, rather than the odds and sods I want half the time, just cos i like the colourscheme.

does your lbs keep 120+ mtb tyres in stock?

i'll go to my lbs for things i know they stock or things i need advice on

CRC has been shocking the last few months and iv'e not used them since my last bad experience with them (again!), tried ringing them to chase an order that hadn't turned up and their phones have remained unanswered for 3 weeks!!
Its now impossible to get an answer on the phone, yes you can email them but nothing beats talking to someone to put your mind at rest when spending £300 on custom wheels!

Merlin or evans for me next time i'm afraid 🙁

Phones are being answered daily from 9.00 am to 5.30 pm. Another member of staff starting on the phones next week to further increase the number of lines.

Fair enough but what about the constant out of stock items?

ive used actionsports, wiggle, crc, merlin recently and had great service from each.

but a bit like my lbs, if there is nothing in stock, i go elsewhere.

if my lbs offer to order something...........
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i would wait for ever and waste millions phoning them to check

An even better example of customer service comes from a few years ago, I was into the Japanese Car scene, ordered a pair of strut braces froma distributor in Japan on a Saturday, they arrived (bearing in mind that if you order almost anything in the UK on a Saturday they won't proces it 'till Monday am) and it arrived Wednesday morning at my front door.

THe best part is it was in Royal Mail in Birmingham on Monday Morning, it then took 2 days from there!!

I use CRC, Wiggle and Merlin quite regularly.

Best performance of late has been Merlin this week who I placed and order with at 2pm on Monday and it arrived Tuesday morning before 9am.

I've had a few minor delays with CRC lately but nothing more than a few days.

Things will go out of stock from time to time, if importers can't supply items there is little we can do. Other times we simply get caught out with demand, apologies for that.

We do try to maintain good stocks of the fastest moving lines, our stock team have just had some reorganisation to further improve this. The stock levels on some items should show a change middle to late next week.

I would say though that stock arrives with us constantly and the goods in team have been far from idle of late.....

CRC are either very good good or shocking in equal measure.
I recently bought a SRAM X9 shifter from their Flood Sale. It came, no problems but i notices that the internals were different from the 08 one that it was replacing. Now here's where it gets interesting... I phoned SRAM up and got it confirmed from one of their technical guys that the one from CRC was an 07 model and the internals weren't as good as the one i was replacing. When i questioned CRC about what year it was they said it was a current model. I challenged them on this and they were adamant that they were right. This went on and on and they just wouldn't admit thatr what they sold me was on old version. Now i realise that it was a cheap buy but surely they should say if the stock is not current or at least when challenged on it should hold there hands up and say so. I actually sent proof in an email that confirmed what SRAM has said... and they still wouldn't have it.

Dishonest and unprofesional. I'll never deal with them again.

Got anything to say about that Andy@CRC?

I am afraid I don't as I am unaware of the detail behind your claims, if you want to email them to me again directly i'll gladly look into it for you.

I ended up going round in circles to the point where i just sent it back. It was a simple case of your guys not admitting that they were wrong!

.....if you want a part NOW, go to your LBS.....

I see, i have already contacted Fishers and have requested details so i'll await that before commenting.

I am sure anythign you were told was based on the information to hand, though a mistake could have been made, i'll see once I get some information from Fishers.

If you want to email me them please do as i'd much rather resolve this if possible.

Never had a problem with CRC.
Might give the actionsports.de a look though.

Biggest problem with online purchasing ? Bloody useless Royal Mail.

Bought about a dozen things off here and other sites in last month or so (so what else is new?) 4 of them completely lost, never to be seen again. Much as I love it, getting to the point that I won't buy off forums, getting too risky. Sniff.

CRC are victims of their own success, or rather Uk distributors lack of foresight and huge currency fluctuations. Growth in any company is tricky to manage, i imagine CRC are expanding very rapidly

I called CRC this morning to check details of something I wanted and the phone was answered in 4 rings by a very knowledgable and helpful chap. I placed the order online at 11:34 and got the confirmation email straight away. Just after 3pm I got the email to say the order has been dispatched.

Now if Parcelforce hold up their end of the deal I'll be laughing but I've absolutely no complaints with CRC's service & staff from this transaction.

Yeah I think they have had to put another person on the phones due to all the complaints, your one of the few lucky ones 🙂

Never had an Issue with CRC to be honest and i've been using them for quite a long time now. Some of the best service avaiable i reckon.

I work for a lighting company in Southern Ireland and you cant always have everything in stock, people let you down, boats get delayed.
Once we have the items, our biggest enemy is the carrier getting it into the UK (Plane) Then the UK Carrier actually delivering it, in once piece, on time!

So hats off to CRC! Give them a chance on stock... you try keeping all those lines under one roof.
If they dont have it, go somewhere else... you would on the high street.
Im sure they'll make it up to you when they doooo have that odd spare item you needed that no one else has!

Yeah, many of us have used CRC, and I will again (when stock arrives...). They've been through a rough patch during recent times, but lets not turn this into a CRC bashing thread, please.

The lack of stock has been frustrating and of course I realized, like everyone else, that CRC must have a supply issue and nothing could be done in the short term, possibly related to recent high sales volumes.

You might want to consider that without the sellers such as CRC who have been extremely prompt in the past, we'd not even be expecting items to arrive so quickly. Perhaps they're kinda victims of their own, past, performance.

Either way, aren't we over looking one important player in all this, the couriers.

RM, for example, aint exactly the hot show around, service varies. Don't get me wrong, I know that the round pounders, the people who actually turn up at your door, most of them, work hard to get stuff to you, but sometimes the overall service hampers any speed of prep and dispatch carried out by the seller.

Its good that someone is reporting that ActionSPorts have impressed them with a speedy delivery, I'm sure if all the other peices fall into place (price, stock availability), then other retailers will feel the pressure as we all start buying from ActionSports, but lets not get bogged down with hammering outlets who have many satisfied, silent customers, but who occassionaly "drop the ball" or who's chosen courier sometimes leaves rather alot to be desired.

I've experienced slow delivery from Merlin, Wiggle, CRC, infact most of the more common retailers in the past, and I've also experienced the delight of recieving items so quickly you wonder if they've teleported to you.

CRC will live or die by its overall service and performance in the market place, and thats the way I think it should be. So lets not waist time slating them.

CC.

ACHTUNG ACHTUNG DAS ORDER IST CURRENTLY EIN POLAND SCHWEIN
ACHTUNG ACHTUNG DAS ORDER IST CURRENTLY EIN HOLLAND SCHWEIN
ACHTUNG ACHTUNG DAS ORDER IST CURRENTLY EIN FRANCE SCHWEIN
ACH, STUCHT AT CALAIS.

they have all had bad patches, not so long ago merlin was virtually a swear words around these parts

oh and 14:54 today:

Dear Costumer,

Thanks for your order (order-no. RE0VVC39).

Your order has shipped today (18.02.2009) via DPD GeoPost (Deutschland) to the following adress:

blah

The shipment consists of 1 package(s).
You can track your shipment online on the website using the tracking-number (NVE) 015BNFGBFGB806149Y.

aw bless their comedy (better than my german) accented english

Used CRC for 4 years - they have never failed to deliver the right goods - on time.

Recently bought a workstand from CRC which arrived quickly but with a part missing. Emailed CRC who ordered new part which is now in stock - took about a week.

The impressive bit was that before they dispatched it they bothered to email me again to check what I needed and pointed out another bit that I had missed.

Kept me informed throughout. Well impressed!

Mail order shops represent good value for money. Humans work there and somewhere down the line one of them may screw up. Last year merlin were getting stick for selling OEM goods and CRC could do no wrong.
It's parts for bikes...........................
Buy a mass produced jobbie from Halfords as a fall back - you'll always get parts.
Andy@CRC - obviously a sound fella trying to help out, but whinging is like flu - you'll never cure it

Just a quick question! Who actually works in a profession where they can actually say that they deliver 100% of the time, on time and never have to deal with complaints. I for sure dont work for one, though financially the company makes a mega fortune. I'm sure everyone can say they have been to a local newsagents, a clothes shop, a music shop etc and have a cause to complain or they have not had what they want in stock. I'm sure CRC have a great management team, good processes in place, a hard working team who dont just screw up on purpose. Simple, they'll deal with your order ASAP, if you complain they'll attempt to deal with that ASAP but at the end of the day you cant please everyone. For those who cant be pleased, and i meet many of them, get a life ( or a partner) and make ours less complicated

wot he said.
(Do they sell partners? and are they out of stock of 'popular' sizes?)