I am sure some of you know that i have been dealing with a lost coin purchased last April. The case has been in the hands of Roma numismatics for 7 months and in that timespan i have received only 1 email, which was a response to my question regarding time taken some four & a half months ago. Today i decided enough was enough and sent them a very direct message regarding my treatment as a customer. The reply i received was mindblowing to say the least Not only have Roma failed to act on my behalf, they are now claiming Fed Ex " technically " NEVER marked the package as lost. WTF They are also claiming that too much time has passed meaning Fed Ex wont acknowledge the claim, Really. Roma can not act on my behalf unless i have received an email from Fed EX saying the package has been lost ( which i have ), therefore requesting the seller contact them to resolve the matter. At that point it is out of my hands & solely the responsibility of Roma. What kind of an R Tard would come up with that excuse and run with it ? I have clearly been failed as far as customer service is concerned, now i have to go through further drama just to get back what is rightfully mine. Maybe @Rich Beale would like to clear things up & explain why i am being treated so poorly
I had the very same experience from Roma about a year ago. They shipped by Royal Mail even though I requested FedEx. They marked the tracking address wrong so the Post said it was delivered but it most certainly wasn’t. I went back and forth with them for about a month, they offered little assistance other than saying they will refund once their insurance claim clears through Royal Mail. After waiting another few weeks without any positive response I decided to make my own claim through PayPal. I was then refunded by PayPal within a week. Due to this incident I stopped all purchases from them for about a year, but since they have great stock I’ve recently been pulled back in. Now I make sure I pay using PayPal so if this happens again I can get a refund. The coin lost was a denarius of Pecenius Niger which made it even more difficult to accept. In my opinion this is poor performance from a major auction house. Any advice regarding other equivalent auction houses? I’m willing to investigate others.
Is Roma not the one that arranges for the insurance and shipment of the coin ? Does Roma not get a receipt from the shipper for insurance purposes? If so they should be the one responsible for following up on the shipment of the coin and filing the claim not the purchaser. This is the way all of the places I have done business have done it. The seller is the one responsible for whatever is sent until it is in the hands of the purchaser.
It appears that some sellers know that most of their customers will patronize them no matter how badly they are treated. You proved them to be right. Rather few coins are lost and it costs money to provide proper customer service. When it seems that there is no reason to do the right thing, some people do not. You have given them no reason to treat you better.
As much as I hate advising others to be my competition I have to give a strong recommendation to Nomos AG on the customer service front. I had a problem with a coin that came to me with bronze disease and they went out of their way to make it right. Their customer service approach certainly cost them some money in the short term but I have continued to buy and bid with them since to the point I am confident they have come out the better financially for it. They also have nice coins and some very high end sales occasionally as well if that is your thing. I will say I have never had a bad experience in dealing with Roma and I hope I never do. If I did encounter a situation such as yours or the OP it would certainly put me off of buying from them just as Doug suggests above. Honest business practices are important. I hope Roma responds. I am interested.
I agree @dougsmit, I guess I’m willing to pay the extra 2.5% fees incurred from PayPal to ensure I don’t have to deal with the people at Roma if the package is lost. Like I said before, I purchase 90% of my coins from a local dealer that has great service, quality and prices but they don’t typically have the rare usurpers, etc. which is why I venture out into the auction world. If anyone has better experience with other similar auction houses please let me know and I will switch, I have no allegiance to Roma that’s for sure.
I have had great service with Roma. I ask them to send my coins via Royal Mail=no customs charges/ theft. So far, out of last 500 mail shipments since 1998/ no MIAS. Last and only MIA a CNG one with 2 Aurei. Nothing more invites theft them declaring value/ contents. Lots of crooks....
@bcuda, you are correct regarding insurance & shipping. My apologies if i wasn't clear, i had contact with Fed Ex when the package didn't arrive. I received an email from them saying the package was Lost & instructing me to contact the seller, which i did. I also received one from Roma saying that they had been in contact with Fed ex & the process had been started. This was 7 months ago.
@panzerman I’ve probably had about 20 shipments from Roma with one going missing. Probably not that bad overall, and I’m sure that percentage will decrease as the sample size gets larger. I’m absolutely positive that they are not purposely trying to make their shipments go missing, and the customer service lady is really nice (even though she didn’t give me a refund). Since then I’m will to pay the extra fees with FedEx on the basis that I hope it has a higher probability of making it into my collection.
I am not close to your league. I have had 9 shipments from them/ all came safe. Funny thing though, I always send them a bank draft in UK pounds via Canada Post. Two went MIA/ so I sent them replacements. Later on they informed me, they got the original 4 months late. The fees here are horrific/ 13 percent HST/ can add up to $800 or more on a coin.
Wow, I am sorry that you have experienced so much aggravation with this shipment. Did you use Paypal? Did you file a claim with them? If the Fedex tracking indicates that the shipment was not delivered and is indeed lost, that should be enough documentation to get a refund through Paypal. I use Royal Mail/USPS with Roma. It is slow, and I did have one problem with one shipment. That shipment had the wrong zip code (a couple of numbers out of place), the rest of the address was correct. But, since the package is tracked through a bar code, and that code included the wrong zip code, the package was taking a scenic tour or Missouri. I was able to contact the Postmaster in one of the towns that the package was cycling through, and altered her to the problem. Fortunately, she was able to put the correct zip code on the package and route it to my address in California. One other package, sent from Israel last year, was lost during the upheaval at the USPS when many of the sorting machines were removed last summer. So, try Paypal or your credit card company and see if you can get your money back that way.
Sounds like a frustrating experience. Perhaps I'm misreading your post, but I get the impression that perhaps you haven't exactly pushed them, either. Ideally, a single e-mail should do, but in the real world people often need some polite prodding to get them going. I have made a few purchases with Roma over the last year and always found their customer service to be friendly, knowledgeable and helpful.
7 months is a long time to wait. It's understandable you're frustrated or even angry. But is posting this on a public forum the best way to get it resolved...? Unless there is no hope of a satisfactory resolution of course.
Why not? Some of the most educational threads I’ve read on CT have simply been fellow collectors sharing their experiences with various venues and dealers. Sometimes the feedback is legitimate, sometimes not, but I will usually learn something from it either way.
@RichardT, after 7 months of waiting the last thing i expected to happen was for the person supposedly dealing with my claim to throw an email at me full of lies & fabrications. I sent a reply pointing out such lies & countered with facts, this has remained unanswered ( no surprise there ) At this point i am left with no other option than sharing my experience with the community, how else can i alleviate my frustration/ anger ? For those wondering how it has got to 7 months. The coin spent nearly 2 months in lockdown due to postal issues ( funny that ) The problems started when it was released & stolen in June. 7 months later here we are. My experience when using Roma has always been a pleasant one, never had an issue & Rich was easy to deal with regarding use of images. Why this particular employee has chosen such a path is beyond my comprehension. I will update ( or not ) when ( if ) i get a reply.
I have received a reply, unfortunately it was even worse than the previous one Rather than focus on my questions, the Roma rep decided to pick out a line in my last message as his his main point of focus. He miss-read my email & then followed up by miss-quoting me. Having consulted a colleague for help before replying At this point i think it is best to give all the details available. June 12th, i receive 2 emails saying the parcel has been collected & the 2nd one giving me a delivery date of the 15th june. No delivery so i give it a week until contacting Fed ex. June 23rd, i receive an email from a Fed ex rep which says the package can't be found so is considered LOST & advising me to contact the seller/ shipper as it is them that they need to deal with. July 5th, I receive an email from Roma saying they have been in touch with Fed ex & have heard back from them. Telling me an update should be coming soon regarding compensation. August 11th, I get a reply from Roma saying that the person dealing with the claim has been on annual leave with no idea when she is going to be back. Roma then claim to have requested someone else take on the case. September 9th, Roma says that they submitted a CLAIMS form on the 17th of August but have yet to receive a reply from Fed ex. Roma also say that they have written confirmation from Fed ex that their search for the package came back NEGATIVE. January 27th, An email from Fed ex that has not been passed on by the shipping team magically turns up. The outcome of which is... While Fed ex TECHNICALLY could not declare the package as LOST ( see above email ) due to the amount of time that has passed since the date of dispatch. We ( roma ) would be able to ACTION a Refund immediately. All of the above leaves me with many questions that require answers. No mention of the word SORRY either. The last 2 emails really stand out to me. Even though Roma are saying that they have not been paid out by Fed ex ( only a failure to act could cause this ) they are willing to do me a FAVOUR by offering an immediate refund ( not an insurance payout ) What happened to the claim submitted on the 17th of August ? There would be no point submitting a claims form without having confirmation already that the package has been confirmed lost, Which Roma says they have. How is it possible to get to the last email from the previous one ? i know To be F**k*d about is one thing, for those same people to then turn around and lie through their back teeth is something entirely different. Remember, i have not been an Ahole by bothering them every week. Sometimes being patient pays off, unfortunately on other occasions giving idiots too much rope can lead to situations like this. At this point i am quite happy to ignore the refund offer ( i have NOT turned it down ) & to keep going at it. Sorry for the long post everyone, it felt like therapy typing it out
After reading all this I am glad I made a decision quite some time ago to deal only with dealers here in the USA (with the exception of a few from Canada, next door). I have ordered at least a hundred coins over the past few years and I have never had one problem with delivery and think that if I did I could rectify the problem far easier that it appears to go with dealers being abroad.