I didn't see any after running a search, so I'm hoping someone can provide or point me to some feedback for this vendor. I placed on 2 January, and it still hasn't shipped out. When I asked for a tracking number on Friday, merely concerned that it had been misplaced by UPS or snatched from my front porch, the response I got was "YOU WILL RECIEVE IT AS SOON AS THE ITEM SHIPS."

Seems to me that a week is a bit long for a dry good item to go from ordered to shipped. Thankfully, my bank hasn't shown my card being charged yet, or I'd be rather upset.

Is this par for the course with these guys?

I think so, at least for this time of year. I think they were closed for most of the Holidays. I ordered on December 19th (Satruday before Christmas). My order wasn't shipped until January 6th. It's supposed to be delivered today.

edit: As far as the charges, it was odd. It was pending in my account for awhile, then it wasn't there, then it was there again, then it was there pending twice. It finally cleared over this past weekend (just once), but that part was getting pretty frustrating. Especially when I could've sworn it had cleared the very first time. Kinda screwed me up in the money department last week. Thankfully I caught it before I made that extra purchase. The double-pending thing did screw me up and almost cost me an overdraft, I had to transfer some money. $165 is a lot to have doubled up for someone these days.

This is not an ordinary dry good that sits on a shelf waiting to go out. When you place an order they actually build it and then test it. Its called great quality control. They do take a bit longer than some companies but they make a great product.

Your unit will have a date built on it and the person who built its name on it.

The all caps is a bit irritating imo. I was considering purchasing a new RO/DI from these guys. Perhaps I should look elsewhere.

You shouldn't, just realize you need to be a bit patient and wait for a quality handmade product

I would be pissed enough to cancel my order if I got a response in all caps to a legitimate question.

when i got my spectrapure they built the unit the day i ordered it. so maybe they were out of some pieces and are waiting for them to come in

You should consider yourself lucky that you received a reply. I didn't get anything back and had to call them this morning to get a status update. My RO/DI unit was ordered on 1/4 and I did not receive anything back from them other than the initial order confirmation email. They said mine should ship this week and arrive next week.

Ok, glad to know it's not just me! That really sucks about the double charge.




Well, if that had been in his email, my response would have been "Oh, OK then!" I definitely appreciate quality made products. Unfortunately, they didn't communicate that this was their SOP.






Yeah, that's the part that rubbed me the wrong way the most. If I'd have gotten an email along the lines of what dsn112 wrote, that probably would have satisfied me and I'd have just impatiently, but quietly, waited.

It's definitely not a good way to respond to a customer, especially for company that apparently puts so much effort into quality. All caps and a one-liner message is not the way to "win the hearts and minds" of waiting customers.

My unit came yesterday. Seems like a solid piece.


Well, a stretched gasket and a pretty nasty leak made it by them. I guess it's my turn to see how their customer service is.

I'll let you guys know how it works out.


Timeline:
order placed 12-19-09
order shipped 01-06-10
order recieved 01-11-10
Unit installed, leak discovered, email sent (w/ pictures), 9:55 pm 01-12-10
voicemail, 3:15 pm 01-13-10.
PMed spectrapure2 at 4:22 pm 01-13-10.
PM response at 4:32 pm 01-13-10, feeling better now. Said to expect a call soon, was not in all caps.
Returned phone call at 4:35 pm 01-13-10

I am curious to see the outcome of your orders...

Just wanted to bump this thread to say that a new O-ring will be sent out tomorrow and I was given a few suggestions for temporary fixes to get me by in the meantime. I'm satisfied with their service. I hope everyone else gets taken care of too.

They make good stuff and there prices with the customer appreciation deals are really tough to beat.

I was a filter guys buyer before, but i am on a tighter budget these days and the $50 difference was enough for me to switch, and AZDesertrat who knows water better than anyone pushes them hard.

I agree that they are terrible at updates and confirmations like most suppliers in this industry. Heck i didn't get anything for 2 weeks until i got a tracking number, but I have a little more patience than most on here i guess.

When I got it i needed to get support on the flow restrictor because my other units didn't have that. I called and talked to a nice guy and he walked me through everything. I think if you buy a quality unit from one of these water specialists, you be good

Glad to see that things are getting taken care of. Isn't it nice to have more than one all caps sentence as a response?



Yeah, I don't think there's any question that they have good stuff at great prices with that sale.



I guess it depends on the industry to which you are referring. It's been my experience that most business that target reefers are very big on customer service from the first instance, because the hobby is do heavily driven by word of mouth referrals. It would also be one thing if we were talking about an order of filter socks, pumps, bulbs, etc. However, given the significant importance of suitable water, it would be nice for them to communicate up front the fact that it takes them nearly a month (based on fewskillz timeline and my own experience thus far). Thankfully, I've got an alternative means of dealing with my water issues now, but if my current unit had completely failed (instead of just running high TDS), I would have appreciated knowing the time line up front, so that I could get a unit elsewhere. It's not always a question of "patience."




It sounds like the moral of the story is that once you've got the unit, SpectraPure is great about Q&A and troubleshooting. I guess it's the opposite of banking and cable companies, who woo you up front and then leave you holding the bag.

I was going to buy from them last month - when I phoned and asked what made their filters better - I got a response like - " we don't research our competition ". I was also told their sale price was good til the end of the month. I check the link - and it's still good for the same price today - as when I called in December.

I haven't gotten one yet - working on getting my PVC siphon design working reliably til I worry about it but I'm leaning toward Bulk Reef Supply when I want one. Their videos are great - and their product quality seems to be good. I like the concept of 2 pre-filter stages not getting clogged as easy as 1 prefilter - so I'll probably go that route.

Spectrapure may have a great product but I found their customer service response lacking a bit in terms of answering questions.

Well, I guess this is a bit of an interesting spin on things. I was at my LFS today (a sponsor of NR) and mentioned the delay with my RODI unit. He found it very odd, because he said that at one point, the store was a retail seller of SpectraPure units, and they always got the units very quickly after ordering them. He said he doubted that the units were made to order.

However, he agreed with my current thought, which is to find alternative means of maintaining water quality until it arrives, on account of the great price for the unit.

At 12 days after placing the order, hopefully it won't be too much longer before it ships.

My manufacture date was 7 days after my order was placed. Which model did your order? I ordered the pro plus and if you look anywhere else you won't find that model. The maxcap might be more readily available since many other stores sell it so I can see that shipping faster.

I ordered the ProPLUS (90GPD) as well. Maybe a post-holiday rush on ProPLUS models? Were you give the manufacture date in advance?

I ordered the maxcap 90 last year. It took about a week and half from order until I received my product. Built I believe 3 days after ordering. Did not charge me until item shipped. I also saw that it was free shipping on marineandreef.com and when I ordered I told them about it and they reduced their outrageous shipping to 6 dollars. Provided me with good customer service. I also ordered a booster pump and that took about a week. Love my unit. I would not stress the caps lock, probably a mistake, its a business email not a chat room.

It's not the all caps part that bothers me (I catch myself accidentally hitting Caps Lock now and then) but the shortness of the email. That one sentence was the entirety of the email. It didn't even have a name attached, as to who was sending it. The person on the other end simply hit "Reply," typed one sentence, and then walked away. That's the part that bothers me, especially as a business email.

I just got the tracking number, with a scheduled delivery date of next Thursday. We'll see the quality then!

took them almost a month to get me mine, but i like it

I agree with you in being pissed about the shortness of the response. They are probably like so many other companies out there right now, short staffed and over worked. But that's a whole other topic I'm not gonna venture into. You should be happy with your unit, I love mine.

yeah mj! yeah! give it to em!

Just thought I'd provide an update on my Maxcap 90 RO/DI order. Order placed: 1/4, order arrived 1/18, exactly 2 weeks after order placement date. The build date, as specified on the unit was exactly 1 week after order date. USPS shipping took the rest of the 7 days.

After receiving the unit, I must say that it's the most complete RO/DI unit I have owned to date. It comes with a pressure gauge built into the RO housing and 4 inline TDS meters to let you quickly check the health the system and to easily tune & troubleshoot issues. The filters & canisters all look like they are of top notch quality. If I had to gripe, it's that there were no RO tube clips to ensure leak free connections (although nothing leaked) and the lack of an auto shutoff valve - although that is supplied as part of another kit. The unit also only comes with a 2 stage pre-filter, both .5 microns in size so I wonder if these will clog quickly and require more frequent replacement than my old unit with a 3 stage pre-filter, the largest one starting at 5 microns.

Having said all that, I believe that this is a worthy replacement to my current 6yr old RO/DI unit that is on its last legs. I have no doubt it will last another 6 years with multiple filter changes of course.

Hello-
I just saw this thread and thought I would comment-
we have been slammed since before christmas and have posted on our website that standard orders were running about 5 days behind. Our systems are built to order, and are not DRY goods. Why do we think that build to order is best?
One example- DI filters that are stored dry for an extended length of time lose their efficacy. All of our cartrdiges are made daily with fresh, in house lab tested resin. This is how we gaurantee our quality as in our experience bad resin can (and has been) received from even the most respected resin manufacturer due to variables not always in the manufactures control. Additionally, resin that is stored improperly can also lose its efficacy. Again, daily quality control checks on resin performance can catch this. We have a lab dedicated to resin (and system performance) analysis taht also performs in house q/c of all critical incoming products/components. Additionally Spectrapure custom blends all of it's DI resins for optimum performance. Our chief scientist (he deveolped the proprietary MAXCAP DI cartridge, unique in the industry) oversee's this process and is actively engaged in insuring the higest product quality.
Another example of DRY is bad- Our membranes are treated with a proprietary treatement to enhance rejection and increase production. Dry membranes do not perform as well. Even our standard membranes routinely have rejection in the 98%+ levels. If you choose a MEM-S select,membrane - we gaurantee >98% rejection for example.
Another comment is the misperception that filters with smaller particle retention characteristics somehow plug up faster or have shorter life than large pore filters. Sediment filters should be changed on pressure drop, and carbon filters should be changed on chloramine breakthru using a chemical test kit. That said, most people change based on pressure drop for both elements. Keep in mind that a Sediment filter should prevent particles from clogging the carbon filter. A sediment filter that passes fines is not doing its job, as the carbon filter is to remove chemical contaminants, not sediments. Thos echemical contaminants if passed thru the carbon limit the life of your RO membrane. An impaired RO membrane (various species rejection) will consume DI much faster. FOr exapmle, a 2% loss of rejection cuts your DI stage life in HALF (caps intentional :-)

All that said, I would like to know who sent or even better obtain a copy of the message that ticked you off (my direct email is bruce@spectrapure.com) so I can follow up with this poor response. We have been under alot of pressure as with people out (death in family), people sick, the holidays, mandatory overtime, and ALOT of customers wanting their orders yesterday... it has been a pressure cooker here. We have hired two more people (in this economy we must be doing something right?) to try to keep up, but our training process takes about two months for basic skills to be built. We are trying to respond to the overwhelming wave that started in December.

To top things off, our new phone system (COX) has been up and down lilke a yo-yo for the last two weeks. We are losing phone messages and contacts. This has been espeically frustrating as communication is critical to service AFTER the sale, something we not only take pride over, but resource as well. See our forum here for how to's and FAQ's, and if you have a problem, PM us or email me directly and I will get after it with our folks.
I work for you.

Bruce
VP
Spectrapure

Thanks for posting, Bruce. I thought I had mentioned that Bruce is who helped me with my o-ring problem, I guess not. I'm very pleased with my ProPlus so far, thanks SpectraPure!

LOL

Don't worry, you can msg AZdesertrat, he is the unofficial spokeperson for Spectrapure...but really he is an expert in the whole water thing