MetalHeadMike
Well-known member
So a while back I received my Kiesel A6H build, and despite the fact that it was indeed a stunning guitar aesthetically, regrettably I returned it for a refund. I can honestly say that this was one of the most horrible customer experiences I've encountered, and I'll never even remotely consider another Kiesel product again.
There were several reasons I finally had enough and asked them to refund me:
1) Horrible experience with Mike Jones, my sales guy. This is explained in detail below for those interested in a lengthy read.
2) Action problems related to the bridge saddle heights. (Pics of this below)
3) Failure by the techs to address my concerns despite a very detailed letter I sent in with the guitar and a promise made by their sales manager.
Here is the conversation with Mike Jones, my sales guy:
Bear in mind I only contacted Mike about 4 times over the course of 3 months, so its not like I was hounding the guy.
The 4th time I contacted him because I had received an email from Kiesel stating that my guitar was complete and ready to ship. I had asked they ship it on a particular date and after getting their message that it was ready, I called Mike just to confirm they were shipping on the correct date.
Well here is how the conversation went (This is all 100% direct quoting
Me: Hi Mike how you doing, I just wanted to check the shipping status of my guitar.
Mike: Oh unfortunately we can't check on status of guitars in production.
Me: Oh no, I'm calling because I received an email that my guitar is complete and ready to ship.
Mike: Oh, Ok. Let me check on this. I'll have to check and call you back later because with NAMM coming up, were not allowed anywhere near the back where all the guitars are kept.
Me: Ok, but they emailed me and told me my guitar was ready to ship, so I guess I'm a bit confused here.
Mike: It may be done, but with NAMM coming up its not uncommon that they steal parts off customers completed guitars if need be to get our NAMM guitars ready to show.
Me: Oh! Well why don't you check on this, and please let me know today if you could.
So about 1.5 hours after hanging up with him I think shit on this, what's he talking about "stealing parts off customers finished guitars". So I call back for the 2nd time.
I get Mike on the line for the 2nd time this day and here is how it goes:
Me: Hey Mike, I called a little while ago checking on my completed guitar.
Here he cuts me off real aggressively:
Mike: You know your being really rude!
Me: Excuse me?
Mike: Yeah, I told you I would check on this and call you back. Now your calling back bothering me about your guitar, and its really starting to irritate me!
Me: Dude, Did you really just say that to me?
Mike: (In a completely aggressive tone) Yeah, I did. Because I told you we are not allowed near the guitars and also because there is a chance like I told you that even if your guitar is done and ready to ship, they may need to take parts off it to get ready for NAMM.
Me: So your telling me that even though my guitar is complete, ready to ship, and I have paid for it in full several days ago and thus essentially now own the guitar, they might need to take parts off of it.
Mike: Yep, That's exactly what I'm telling you.
At this point I'm fucking beyond pissed, and I tell Mike to have a good day and hang up.
I immediately email the billing person that emailed me several days prior informing me the guitar was complete and explain how Mike Jones just treated me. 15 minutes later Mike Jones calls back and no apology whatsoever tells me the guitars done and its shipping Monday. I thanked him and hung the fuck up.
So that should have been when I told them to keep the guitar and refund me, but unfortunately I didn't.
Now for the action problem I had that led to me sending the guitar in after speaking with the sales manager and their lead tech.
I sent the guitar in to have Albert their lead tech look at it after speaking with him on the phone. Talking to him gave me the impression he absolutely just did not care about anything I was saying. Spoke to him the first day and he couldn't think of anything that would cause the issues, so I asked if he could think on it and call me or email me by end of day. He said "yep, absolutely let you know before I leave today". Never heard back. Called him the next day and said "Hi Albert this is Mike, I spoke to yesterday about my Aries 6 issues. He says " Yeah?", and there's just this awkward dead silence. Just came off like he didn't care at all. Like why are you bothering me with this. He told me to just send it in because he still couldn't think what would cause the issues I described.
Now I sent it back with a VERY detailed letter explaining my issues and asked specifically that they call me after looking at it and before sending it back because if they couldn't get the saddle heights corrected by shimming, or by replacing the .125" bridge with the thicker .175" baseplate version, then I would just want them to keep the guitar and give me a refund.
The sales manager said they would absolutely call me after looking at it and before sending it back to me because he personally put a note in the tech's work order. It never happened. They ignored my detailed letter and the "supposed" tech notes the sales manager put in the work order because after about a week I called just to see if they had looked at it yet and the same sales manager that promised they'd contact me after it was looked at said "oh, its done and FedEx is picking it up here today and its on its way back to you".
I asked if he could stop the delivery and he said he couldn't. Which I didn't believe but....maybe that was true, I don't know. I asked what they did to correct the bridge saddle heights and he said they adjusted the truss rod. I told him that I already did this in addition to making all sorts of other adjustments and that's not where the problem was stemming from. He said well, just try it out and we can go from there.
I knew for a fact that the issue could not be fixed with a truss rod adjustment, so after all the bullshit I had been dealing with I decided to refuse delivery when the FedEx guy came and it went back for a refund.
Here is how the guitar came brand new from the factory set up:
The saddles were completely maxed out on the 6th and 5th strings and then almost maxed out on the remaining four. I couldn't get the saddles anywhere near adjusted to match the fretboard radius. It played REALLY bad. Action was horrible. This was set up by them as requested by me in drop C with .012-.054 strings. No way the saddles should have been had to be set at that height, but even a fraction of a mm lower and there was fret buzz all over the fretboard. I thought if they replaced the .125" Hipshot with the .175" taller version that this could have corrected things. Or hell, even if they had shimmed the neck, or both?
I'll just finish by saying the guitar was absolutely drop dead gorgeous, it came out exactly how I had hoped aesthetically, had no fit to finish flaws that I could find, had a great fundamental tone to it, and I truly wanted to keep it if they could have worked with me. Unfortunately however, the impression I got was they really could not have cared less.
There were several reasons I finally had enough and asked them to refund me:
1) Horrible experience with Mike Jones, my sales guy. This is explained in detail below for those interested in a lengthy read.
2) Action problems related to the bridge saddle heights. (Pics of this below)
3) Failure by the techs to address my concerns despite a very detailed letter I sent in with the guitar and a promise made by their sales manager.
Here is the conversation with Mike Jones, my sales guy:
Bear in mind I only contacted Mike about 4 times over the course of 3 months, so its not like I was hounding the guy.
The 4th time I contacted him because I had received an email from Kiesel stating that my guitar was complete and ready to ship. I had asked they ship it on a particular date and after getting their message that it was ready, I called Mike just to confirm they were shipping on the correct date.
Well here is how the conversation went (This is all 100% direct quoting
Me: Hi Mike how you doing, I just wanted to check the shipping status of my guitar.
Mike: Oh unfortunately we can't check on status of guitars in production.
Me: Oh no, I'm calling because I received an email that my guitar is complete and ready to ship.
Mike: Oh, Ok. Let me check on this. I'll have to check and call you back later because with NAMM coming up, were not allowed anywhere near the back where all the guitars are kept.
Me: Ok, but they emailed me and told me my guitar was ready to ship, so I guess I'm a bit confused here.
Mike: It may be done, but with NAMM coming up its not uncommon that they steal parts off customers completed guitars if need be to get our NAMM guitars ready to show.
Me: Oh! Well why don't you check on this, and please let me know today if you could.
So about 1.5 hours after hanging up with him I think shit on this, what's he talking about "stealing parts off customers finished guitars". So I call back for the 2nd time.
I get Mike on the line for the 2nd time this day and here is how it goes:
Me: Hey Mike, I called a little while ago checking on my completed guitar.
Here he cuts me off real aggressively:
Mike: You know your being really rude!
Me: Excuse me?
Mike: Yeah, I told you I would check on this and call you back. Now your calling back bothering me about your guitar, and its really starting to irritate me!
Me: Dude, Did you really just say that to me?
Mike: (In a completely aggressive tone) Yeah, I did. Because I told you we are not allowed near the guitars and also because there is a chance like I told you that even if your guitar is done and ready to ship, they may need to take parts off it to get ready for NAMM.
Me: So your telling me that even though my guitar is complete, ready to ship, and I have paid for it in full several days ago and thus essentially now own the guitar, they might need to take parts off of it.
Mike: Yep, That's exactly what I'm telling you.
At this point I'm fucking beyond pissed, and I tell Mike to have a good day and hang up.
I immediately email the billing person that emailed me several days prior informing me the guitar was complete and explain how Mike Jones just treated me. 15 minutes later Mike Jones calls back and no apology whatsoever tells me the guitars done and its shipping Monday. I thanked him and hung the fuck up.
So that should have been when I told them to keep the guitar and refund me, but unfortunately I didn't.
Now for the action problem I had that led to me sending the guitar in after speaking with the sales manager and their lead tech.
I sent the guitar in to have Albert their lead tech look at it after speaking with him on the phone. Talking to him gave me the impression he absolutely just did not care about anything I was saying. Spoke to him the first day and he couldn't think of anything that would cause the issues, so I asked if he could think on it and call me or email me by end of day. He said "yep, absolutely let you know before I leave today". Never heard back. Called him the next day and said "Hi Albert this is Mike, I spoke to yesterday about my Aries 6 issues. He says " Yeah?", and there's just this awkward dead silence. Just came off like he didn't care at all. Like why are you bothering me with this. He told me to just send it in because he still couldn't think what would cause the issues I described.
Now I sent it back with a VERY detailed letter explaining my issues and asked specifically that they call me after looking at it and before sending it back because if they couldn't get the saddle heights corrected by shimming, or by replacing the .125" bridge with the thicker .175" baseplate version, then I would just want them to keep the guitar and give me a refund.
The sales manager said they would absolutely call me after looking at it and before sending it back to me because he personally put a note in the tech's work order. It never happened. They ignored my detailed letter and the "supposed" tech notes the sales manager put in the work order because after about a week I called just to see if they had looked at it yet and the same sales manager that promised they'd contact me after it was looked at said "oh, its done and FedEx is picking it up here today and its on its way back to you".
I asked if he could stop the delivery and he said he couldn't. Which I didn't believe but....maybe that was true, I don't know. I asked what they did to correct the bridge saddle heights and he said they adjusted the truss rod. I told him that I already did this in addition to making all sorts of other adjustments and that's not where the problem was stemming from. He said well, just try it out and we can go from there.
I knew for a fact that the issue could not be fixed with a truss rod adjustment, so after all the bullshit I had been dealing with I decided to refuse delivery when the FedEx guy came and it went back for a refund.
Here is how the guitar came brand new from the factory set up:
The saddles were completely maxed out on the 6th and 5th strings and then almost maxed out on the remaining four. I couldn't get the saddles anywhere near adjusted to match the fretboard radius. It played REALLY bad. Action was horrible. This was set up by them as requested by me in drop C with .012-.054 strings. No way the saddles should have been had to be set at that height, but even a fraction of a mm lower and there was fret buzz all over the fretboard. I thought if they replaced the .125" Hipshot with the .175" taller version that this could have corrected things. Or hell, even if they had shimmed the neck, or both?
I'll just finish by saying the guitar was absolutely drop dead gorgeous, it came out exactly how I had hoped aesthetically, had no fit to finish flaws that I could find, had a great fundamental tone to it, and I truly wanted to keep it if they could have worked with me. Unfortunately however, the impression I got was they really could not have cared less.
