Angelo Pelle Wrist Straps

[Nero]

Has anyone here ever had a problem with Angelo Pelle? I've never heard anything bad and I'm not accusing them of anything, but I ordered a wrist strap in the last week of March and have not received it. I'm in the US and did go with the cheapest shipping option, basic airmail. Still, 5+ weeks seems a bit long. I emailed him through the contact form on his site about 7-10 days ago and have not received any response. Has anyone else had extremely long delivery times when ordering from him with the cheapest international shipping option?

[milandro]

Have they provided you with no tracking? Was it paid by paypal or credit card?

 

I ship a lot internationally and shipping a parcel, even small,might easily take 5 weeks or more with provincial location in the US.

 

It generally takes a week to arrive in the US, but then it might be held up in customs for a very long time  and then it goes to several local depots. Besides it is very rare but it occasionally happens that some custom officer in the US decide to check it manually and to levy a tax ( especially if the value is relatively high for some particular imports and if you have given a commercial address this hardly ever happens to provate citizens) it might take really a long time.

 

Remember that sometimes parcels have been all opened because of particular moments in which safety played a major role.

 

If you paid by paypal or credit card you have cause to recourse and can claim the money back and pay only when the item shows up at your door.

 

Good luck.

[Nero]

Thanks, I have had some things (Helios lenses) take even longer than this, but they were coming Ukraine when the crisis with Russia seemed to have peaked, so I assumed up front that those would take a long time. I did pay with PayPal and the charge went through, but did not receive a shipping notification. I'm going to try contacting him again through something other than the form on his site (perhaps it is not working) before I file anything through PayPal. I don't want to cause any problems for him and I have never heard anything but good reviews about his business.

[milandro]

as per paypal rules, all transactions have to be shipped with a system which guarantees the delivery by means od a signed confirmation.

 

You can most certainly notice Angelo Pelle that you didn’t receive anything and at the same time alert paypal which will lead you through the procedure.

 

They will pull the money out and give it back to you.

 

If and when you receive the goods, you will then sign a paper upon receiving it, so they will know you have got the strap and you can at that point, pay them back again. ( if they didn’t send it like that it is their fault because this is clearly in breach of the contractual obligation with paypal ). You won’t put them in trouble and you will be acting completely within your rights.

[Nero]

Well, I have to report that I am very disappointed in Angelo Pelle. I submitted a dispute in PayPal and let him know that I had not received the item. Note that this was after I had made 2 attempts to contact him through his website.

 

He responded by criticizing my choice of shipping.

 

I responded by saying that I apologize for selecting his least expensive option, but that was the only way I could afford to buy one of his wrist straps, but I had heard good things about the quality of his products and wanted to give him my business.

 

I then received an email from him saying only "TYPICAL AMERICAN."

 

I just escalated the dispute to a claim.

 

I cannot recommend dealing with him going forward given that he has consistently chosen to criticize and insult me instead of handling this professionally.

[milandro]

good reputations are difficult to gain and easy to lose. He would have been just better advised to send another item.

 

Very unwise choice to antagonize a dissatisfied customer especially in an injurious way.

 

Paypal specifically requires a registered and trackable shipment and he should not offer any other form if he doesn’t agree to that or not use paypal.

Edited May 31, 2016 by milandro

[MacPhail]

I sent Angelo a message on the weekend about a special request for a wrist strap and haven't heard back from him.  I did so after having given up on another Italian maker of wrist straps.

 

Maybe Italians are generally more laid back and take longer to respond (and expect things to take longer arriving when they ship things out).  

 

Either way, I think I'll be going with a UK based company at the end of the day.

[milandro]

No, it is not in the genes it is in the personal ethos of each individual.

 

I am Italian born and I always make a point (unless I am on holiday and my company is closed) to answer within 24 hours any email, both personal or business. One of the reasons I was always on line it was because my business demanded to be on line all the time and I was on call from 8:00 to 24:00 

 

I am always on time ( I was taught to be , my all family is) because I consider utter disrespect to not be and I am more often than not early to appointments.

 

I have dealt with companies, all over the world, which weren’t able to meet MY standards.

 

Having said this, just to clarify that being late or irresponsive to emails or making excuses for failing to provide the proper service, is NOT an Italian thing, the Angelo Pelle behavior described here doesn’t meet MY standards although I might share one of the passports that I hold with this gentleman.

[MacPhail]

 

I am Italian born and I always make a point (unless I am on holiday and my company is closed) to answer within 24 hours any email, both personal or business. One of the reasons I was always on line it was because my business demanded to be on line all the time and I was on call from 8:00 to 24:00 

 

I am always on time ( I was taught to be , my all family is) because I consider utter disrespect to not be and I am more often than not early to appointments.

 

I have dealt with companies, all over the world, which weren’t able to meet MY standards.

 

Having said this, just to clarify that being late or irresponsive to emails or making excuses for failing to provide the proper service, is NOT an Italian thing, the Angelo Pelle behavior described here doesn’t meet MY standards although I might share one of the passports that I hold with this gentleman.

 

Well said.  I'm with you:  I believe in punctuality and proper customer service.  

 

Looks like I'll be purchasing a leather strap from here in the UK from a company who was prompt in responding to a question I had.

[dolcemarta]

Well, I have to report that I am very disappointed in Angelo Pelle. I submitted a dispute in PayPal and let him know that I had not received the item. Note that this was after I had made 2 attempts to contact him through his website.

 

He responded by criticizing my choice of shipping.

 

I responded by saying that I apologize for selecting his least expensive option, but that was the only way I could afford to buy one of his wrist straps, but I had heard good things about the quality of his products and wanted to give him my business.

 

I then received an email from him saying only "TYPICAL AMERICAN."

 

I just escalated the dispute to a claim.

 

I cannot recommend dealing with him going forward given that he has consistently chosen to criticize and insult me instead of handling this professionally.

I understand your disappointment and as Italian I'm very sorry for that. Rudeness is not permissible ever: everyone has to be respected as a person firstly and as a customer secondarily. No matters which nationality you belong.

About his lack of answers I can assure that it's normal with Angelo Pelle: in the past I tried to contact him for a camera case and I got an answer just after lots of attempts and eventually I ended up buying another case from another manufacturer because he couldn't understand why I didn't want the back flap with the push buttons on the case itself. But they were nice with me.

The idea I have of this manufacturer is that it is a very small "old" manner craft shop (thankfully we still have a bunch of them here in Italy!), so that maybe they don't use computer and email on a daily basis. One day I'll go to Florence and I want to pop up in his store, so I'll tell you if I was right or not!

Edited June 4, 2016 by dolcemarta

[milandro]

If one doesn’t use a computer on a daily base one should never pretend to have any form of e-commerce.

 

If you have a site which you use for selling your products with an email address, you need to respond at least within 24 hours and if you are on holiday you need to have an automatic response system which alerts the sender that you are on holiday.

 

There is no excuse for behaving otherwise.

[MacPhail]

I ended up buying a wrist strap from Hard Graft.  

[milandro]

Today I went to see the new Kia dealer where I live. The previous dealership has ceased to do business and we were informed that the service could be conducted at another dealer.

 

The place looked grotty ,small, was difficult to park (at a car dealership?) there were only a few cars and the only seller was not so kind to me. I was also enquiring about updating my car and he showed me two not so interesting and too expensive “ occasion” and wasn’t pro active thinking at all in trying to think with and for me.

 

I left with little satisfaction and the determination to never set foor again in such place ( not even for service, I would have looked for another dealer)

 

Across the road, there was a large dealership of Hyundai ( same company as Kia) there wer at least 30 new cars from outside and inside, plenty of parking space too and a large area for auto service.

 

A nice guy came to meet me as I drove in, smiling and immediately trying to make me feel comfortable. He showed me a number of option and gave me the key of a car to try. This was practically the newer and more luxurious version of my own car.

 

I went for a test drive, was very happy.

 

Within the same day he had offered me a very good deal on the very test car with incredibly small mileage. I bought the car today.

 

I had to think of this famous scene .

 

[Nero]

I ended up getting my money back through the PayPal dispute. If the strap does miraculously show up at some point, I'll gladly transfer the money back to him even though I felt mistreated as a customer and will probably get another nasty email from him as a result.

 

I have found that most countries, regardless of whether they supposedly have good or bad reputations, have roughly the same proportions of good versus bad business people. The majority I encounter are fine and at worst may not be overly polite, but are not at all rude either. Whether they are American, Italian, Middle Eastern, or other nationalities, most small businesses I deal with are a pleasure to work with.

 

I still wish him well in his business, but I personally won't be spending my money in his shop again. 

 

I ended up going with a Tap and Dye wrist strap, which is more than I wanted to spend, but I have one for my X-T1 and have been very happy with everything about it, from craftsmanship to look to the fit. I guess sometimes it just pays to stay with what you know!

[Danielle]

I had the same experience with Angelo.  After two months I wrote to Angelo who was very rude and said it had been shipped the day I had ordered.  He also referred to me having purchased the cheapest and slowest mode.  I then opened a complaint with PayPal.  He then wrote to me again - rudely saying he had fulfilled the order. A couple of days ago the package arrived and I canceled the complaint.  It must have been put on a slow boat...? The strap is fine but I would not order from him again.

[Tom H.]

I've sent postcards from Italy that took six months to make it to Belgium, so it is possible that the problem is not him but the shipping...

 

Still, no need for him to be rude to his customers if that were the case.

[milandro]

I’ve very often sent post to and from Italy ( since a large chunk of family and friends live there) which took 3 days. Postcards might not have the highest priority both to and fro.

 

Last year, I’ve received an envelope with glasses for me from Italy, it took 3 days from Siena to where I live. I couldn’t believe it.

 

By the way, last week I’ve sent something to France and it has yet to arrive.