I've seen this on a few other boards and got to thinking lately that this would be a great idea for us to have in the bike section.


This could even become a sticky for all to come in and check out the good and bad experiences. Its hard enough to find good people to deal with these days and if we compile a data base of sorts, of the good experiences we have, this will reward the ones that treat us fairly.

I'm not make decisions for anybody, but hint, hint, to our good man Clint there. Are you listening.....HINT!



The guidelines are simple and as follows:

1. A vendor can be anyone whom you have delt with for the exchange of money for goods or services.(this must partain to the bike genre--so nothing about anything that doesn't have to do with bikes)

2. This is NOT to be used as an avenue to settle vendeta's(sp?).

3. You are to speak of truth and factual information, even if the vendor(s) rebuttle is not in truth.

4. This is to be used for all whom seek the past experiences of those who have dealt before them, so be honest and descriptive as to the actual transperation of events.

5. For a good experience give it the 'ol thumbs up in the begining of the post.

6. For a bad experience give it the 'ol thumbs down in the begining of the post. If the matter is resolved to your statisfaction then you need to go back and change it to a thumbsup or neutral(see below).

7. For neither a good or bad experience then you should post neutral in asterics in the begining of your post.

8. Remember to be descriptive of the events and give reasoning for WHY you give it a good/bad/neutral rating.

9. If you find yourself in the "vendor" postion on here, you have every right to defend your side of the story and tell your version of events. However, you are expected to abide by the same guidelines set forth for everyone posting here.

10. If you recieve a good, or thumbs up, from someone on this board you do not and will not respond. This is to avoid any self promotion.

11. Making up stories for the beratment(sp?) of someone, or to promote business for yourself is strictly prohibited.

 

uhm... I bought my bike from Longwood suzuki and they treated me pretty good. Not to mention military discount on helmets and parts. The people seem friendly and I've not had any problems with them. Longwood is quite a ways though.. I'm not sure what you mean by vendors.

 

I hope Stephen doesn't mind me for useing him as the guinea pig here, but here it goes.

If some of you don't already know Stephen goes by DogboneR1 on the boards here. He is very knowledgable in all types of motorcycle tuning and repair.


******IMPORTANT, If you want to get hold of him,DO NOT, try by posting in this thread. Politely send him a pm or email. This thread is only for posting "vendor" experiences.******


On wed. the 3rd of march 2004, i took a bike over to Stephen for some work. I dropped the bike off at his place a little before 12 noon. I had talked with him prior to going over there with the bike about what it needs done to it. He said bring it over and i'll treat you fair. To say the least i was worried that once i got it over there i couldn't say much because i would have then gone through the trouble of trailering the bike from St. Pete. to Tampa.

Well being the trusting person that i am i ended up getting the bike to him a little before noon as stated before. He walks outside to survey the bike and says hmmm. I thought to myself "oh no, here we go." He mentions that he had not pictured it this bad--huh i thought. Then he says well lets get her off so i can get to it.

To make a long story short...


By just after 4:30pm i was standing in front of his house with my bike in front of me and my jaw on the ground. I had brought him a very dusty(pollen) r1 that was to have the swing arm swapped, a new wire harness, and new rims swapped out; and standing before me was something completely different. I saw in front of me a bike that appeared to have been cleaned front to back with a tooth brush! He had taken the liberty to do maitenance on the chain, flushed the brake system, adjusted the suspention for my build, and the list goes on and on. He took the bike around the block one last time while i was there to make sure everything was perfect and to my satisfaction.

Here's the best part. I priced the labor for the things i took the bike for him to do. Which was swap the rims, install new harness, and swap swing arm. The total 'book' hours to complete these jobs came to 9-10.5! They, meaning Barney's and Savage, said they were giving me a deal and would have to have the bike for 2 days. Just incase you don't know their labor rates are 80 and 79 dollars and hour, so you figure that out. While i won't tell you exactly what Stephen charged me(because he says it all depends on the kinda of job) i will tell you that it come out around 50 dollars an hour and he said he spent only 4hrs on it. To me this was a deal of a lifetime and here's why.

No dealer's service deptartment would have cared half as much about my bike as Stephen did for mine. He did the unexpected by delivering well over 100% effort and going way beyond the extra mile. I didn't even ask him to and he cleaned the whole bike and did other maintanence on the bike and didn't ask for anything extra! Hell, i can't even get a dealer to wipe off my bike before they give it back to me.


So to sum it all up, Stephen did a fantastic job charging me less than half the booked man hours to accomplish the tasks, and charged only 2/3rds what the dealers hourly labor charges are. And he did something that money can't buy--he respected and treated my bike as if it was his and the last one on earth. I'd pay twice that much to get service like that. You guys can't go wrong with this guy.

Thanks a bunch Stephen

 

You got the right idea....and i doesn't matter where anyone is. They can be local, semi-local, the other side of the world, or even from the internet.

 

I used to deal with Barneys all the time until just recently. I had called up looking for a gasket to make sure they had one in stock before i drove down there. Well, i get down there and when i ask for the gasket i had called about, the guy disappeares to the back for more than 15 minutes. I'm like WTF? So i ask the assistant parts manager what was going on when he asked me if i had been helped yet. He said that the reason i'm waiting so long is because they are probably back there making one for you. Excuse me, did you say making one? He sure did, and then the parts manager chims in along with him.

They began asking me if there was a problem. Your mother f'ing right there is a problem. I told them in as nice a tone as possible, that i didn't just drive way the hell out of my way to stand around while some jabron making minimun wage is slaving away with an exacto(sp) over my supposed brand new genuine yamaha gasket in the back. These guys acted like i shouldn't be having a problem with this cause this was standard practice for them. Well about this time the guy i spoke to 15-20 minutes ago came out the back trying to stuff the supposed "new Yamaha" gasket in a bag, but he accidently made it around the corner before he fit it all the way into the bag. So there was that brief wierd moment when he knew he was busted, but i guess he thought he would still try to pull something off.

So now he pretended to be pulling the gasket out of the bag when he walks up to the counter. I point blank ask him if this is a new gasket from yamaha, he stumbles and says "yes"(with the manager and assistant manager right there). I pause and look at all three and say please, do explain. He asks, explain what? I said explain how a brand new gasket has finger prints all over it, is in an opened bag, took you 15+ minutes to find after you told me on the phone just 30 minutes earlier you were looking right at it; and last but not least, how your manager is under the impression that you guys haven't had any "new" gaskets for quite some time now? Before this became real ugly i said keep the gasket and walked away.

I then made my way over to _____ Lambert the GM of all of Barney's. I explained the situation to him. At first he called over to the parts manager and asked to know what was going on. The manager admitted over the phone to his boss(Lambert) that they had just tried to pass off their home made gasket as a geniune OEM gasket. Then Lambert seemed to take a wierd turn. He was no longer questioning why his employee's were being dishonest, rather he was now asking me why i had a problem with the gasket they presented to me. Because, as he explained, they spent a lot of money on this machine to be able to give their customers more efficient service. I asked: "how, by lying to them and tring to rail someone for a few dollars"?

Well he didn't see my point and i left before i exploded on him. as i was leaving he says you know you can go over there and pick up that gasket on me, cause "i wouldn't loose a customer over a few bucks". To late he already did and that i in fact wouldn't have had a problem buying the gasket they made if everyone hadn't lied about it.


Summary: If the right hand man of the owner is willing to try to steal a few dollars from you over a gasket, just think how much they will try to take you for on more expensive and probably uneccessary things. The fact of the matter is that i would have had no problem purchasing the home made gasket if they would have been honest about it from the get go. They even had the balls to try charge more for the gasket they make as opposed to the factory made one. Where the hell did they get that idea from? Four people had lied to me with not a single regret or feeling of conscience when they had be busted. I will drive to Alaska before i deal with them again. Everyone please be on your toes if and when you deal with these crooks. They certainly do not have your best interest in mind.

 

::Taking advice::

 

to the guys at Team Savage Motorsports



These guys are located of U.S. Hwy 19 N 1/2 north of Clearwater mall on the east side on the road. Some of you may have seen the episode with Barney's that made me promise myself to go to the moon before going back to Barney's stealership. Well Team Savage is damn near the moon for me, but well worth the drive. I have ordered several parts from them one at a time purposely. I was giving them every opportunity to screw up the orders in someway. After 5 seperate orders these guys have consitantely beat the Barney's prices by more than 20% and have yet to make a mistake. They are curtious, pretty knowledgable, and certainly not to proud to admit they may be wrong. They even listen to you and take your imput! Wow, what a concept. These are the reason's they get my thumbs up approval.

 

right to R&R performance out of river view. i went to have my Cr rebuilt crank up and richie was doing the job.instead of my freind that worked there and wanted to do it himself? so richie put a new piston in and that's it. used my old crank,rod,and other parts but charged me for new parts. the reason i know this is it blew up 1.5 hours of riding later and i took it apart to find no new parts at all minus the piston ,and i think he would've reused that if he could have. richie is nothing more than a common theif and the H.C.P.D. records also will reflect that. i had to get his wife involved just to get him to order me the parts i already paid for. $800 i gave R&R performance and he put all my old parts in my bike..... back in my bike! eventually i got SOME parts out of him and no labor. i was on my own for the rest of the parts and labor. and when my old crank blew(should have been new one in there) it took my left side engine casing with it. richine refused to admit any responsibility for that. if you have any questions or want further details please pm me. i also have two witnesses to this injust business deal one of witch worked there at the time and quit over richie's shady dealings bikes. H.C.S.D. records don't lie.

so in a nutshell i got a blown up motor a busted engine casing and a new piston for $800


-brian

 

+1 i have goood things to say about these guys. just a little far from me.

 

barney's in brandon???

and the riverview story...riverview as in brandon/riverview ?