murdadock

I will not argue with your specific bad experience with Hobby King. I have had some issues with good online retailers before but hobby king is not among them.

I have had to wait a little while for a few of their packages but now I know how to get my stuff faster from them. My last tally since my first order in 2009 orders exceeds $3000 in a total of 16 orders and I'd like to say all of them were good. Once I received a bad battery that wouldn't balance, sent them a few pictures and they had me a replacement battery in about 7 days.


Sorry you had a bad experience, but if I never ordered from Towerhobbies or CKRC Crawlers because of some isolated bad shipping incidents, I would have missed out on some great deals.

topspin

Oh I absolutely agree with you but then how many bad experiences do you hear about on the interweb about Tower hobby each day? Every month? How about the past year? One, two maybe? That should be a clue right there.

ira d

Should not have to go to the trouble of sending pictures to get a replacement battery. I once received a battery from tower Hobbies that had been dropped and was kind of dented on
one end all it took was one phone call and a new battery was on the way and that let me keep the dented battery.

Francois Chiang Mai

Hello everyone ,
I am French and I live in Thailand , so wanting to buy a RC plane myself moving towards Hobby King because they have a warehouse in Hong Kong.
A week after my order , I realized that nothing had changed in my status when my bank account had been debited .
I sent 4 messages but I had no answer ...
I contacted the chat and the operator made ​​me wait to check my order and he answered me that hobby king had indeed received the money but needed proof that it was really my credit card ... my account had been debited and they had the money ... unbelievable ... I was obliged to send them a copy of my statement of account , I have never seen it in my life when I 'm 64 years ...
Today, after 3 weeks, I received my plane , the electric Cri Cri Hobby King
The package was not damaged, but when I opened the box and I started looking I realized that the fuselage was broken...
As the box was definitely not damaged, the only explanation is that this plane was damaged before it left the warehouse hobby king of Hong Kong
So, two solutions, or Hobby King is not capable, or is dishonest ...
My feeling is that this is a mixture of both, in any case I never would order anything from hobby king and I would talk about this story about me in France and Thailand

Rv7garage

My Feedback: (10)

There may be a reason Hobbyking is so cheap?? TANSTAAFL

I've only placed two orders thru them (small lipos for my MCPX BL), and have had a good experience. These orders were placed from the USA warehouse.

I wonder if some of the problem stems from HK being a truly "global" company? Lots of different laws, and yes, attitudes can come into play when you are trying to do business everywhere...

koastrc

Fly in a club that has about 100 members on average a year with a lot of turnovers because of the nature of the business in the area. I have been helping people to learn to fly for a long time. I have watched it go from a few kits to what it is today. More choices than I could have ever imagined just a few years ago.Hobby business was done at the local shop or Tower and perhaps one or two mail order companies. That is it just ten years ago. Now we have, it seems like hundreds of choices. Hobby King appears to get most of the action now days. The question is always the same. Are they a good company or a bad company? We can all say what we want, but price sells. Hobby King has some low prices and aggressive marketing. Will they reach that high place of golden customer service? That will be a questioned answered by you folks. Right now I think their business model is finding it's way.
The hobby or sport becomes very important at times to many of us. I think our feelings get misplaced at times. Poor customer service does little to help a bad day. The things Hobby King sell are, some good and some not so good. Just like other companies. In a attempt to not hurt a new persons feeling I make no comment. I have a trainer I use that is mind. Tower plane, Hobby people engine, and a 72 Futaba with trainer box. If the new person wants me to test out his plane, I look it over and still no comment. I must say that some of Hobby Kings stuff is outstanding for the price. Sad but true, some I will not attempt to fly it is so bad. The good thing about these forums is the learning process. I think we are learning what is Hobby King and will they make it in the happy world of R/C

topspin

Please be so kind as to let us know when they find that golden place. As it stands now there are well over a dozen large hobby companies, in the US at least, who got there the day after they opened their doors. I don't want to spend money with a company that is "Finding it's way", that just doesn't make sense to me.

Francois Chiang Mai

Yesterday I sent an email with photos of the fuselage broken but Hobby King did not even answer, these people have no respect for the customer

Francois Chiang Mai

Always no answer from Hobby King to my mail....
Send a broken plane is not honest.
Hobby King knows it is impossible to return a broken plane when you are in a different country.
The aircraft was fully packed with two boxes filled with bags filled with air and paper bubbles.
The boxes were in perfect condition, it is clear that this plane was already broken up in the box.
Hobby King is really not honest to do so.
This aircraft has cost me 244 us dollars with transport and I have to spend several hours to repair, this is unacceptable.
Reading several forums, I realize that I am not an isolated case and that it is a household communications practice for Hobby King.

tailskid

My Feedback: (34)

Any source or proof of that statement?

Francois Chiang Mai

Well sure I have proof, I took pictures that I sent to Hobby King but they never answered me, these people are not honest and without education.
You know, I'm not a kid, I'm 64.

topspin

I hope they have fixed your problem by now. It's a shame you have to go through so much agony just to get a problem resolved. I guess things must be getting pretty bad for them lately, I noticed the entire contingent of hired guns is on their RCG page trying to put out the fires of discontent. Doesn't look like they are having much success. IMO that company is in the same league as Banana Hobby. I had a couple of good transactions with them but then I had a couple of disasters and even they didn't take as long to fix the problem as HK.

Oh well, please let us know if they ever fixed your problem Francois.

Francois Chiang Mai

topsin...still no news of Hobby King

topspin

That's how the operate Francois, they just wait and hope that you will give up. It only took two really bad encounters with them to see what they were all about and I won't buy from them now. I doubt that they care but it seem that over the last year or so an awful lot of people have gotten fed up with them and have started taking their business elsewhere. It's pretty said when in order to buy a product you have to order it, wait a month, then contact a so called public relations firm to get what you ordered in the first place.

I don't know of any other hobby distributors that have had to hire a public relations company to fix their problems but then I don't know of any other hobby company that has so many dissatisfied customers either.

Francois Chiang Mai

Yes I know it's easy for them, they are in Hong Kong and I'mThailand they just wait until I give up
My main problem now is knowing where I'm going to make my next order because I do not want to have to do with them,
they have many good products, I desperately seeks an other better shop to order because in Thailand we have not a great choice...

on_your_six

My Feedback: (11)

I have a total of 24 orders with Hobby King completed. I am expecting a shipment today as a matter of fact. A tip: I never order a back ordered item. There is a feature on each item's web page that will notify you when the item is in stock. Only then will I order a product.

When something goes wrong, I think that it is important to provide as much information as possible in a positive light. Hobby King is a middle man. Every problem is not of their own making and customers do take advantage of them too. Hobby King has to deal with a wide array of vendors, so sometimes it takes a while to resolve problems. I know that does not help you when you are grounded due to an issue. That is a good reason to have a couple of aircraft. Keep in mind that you are dealing with a company 12-14 hours ahead of you... you may want to contact them late in the evening US time so it is during their business day.

By and large, I think that Hobby King is an honest company and I admit I see many people having problems. I keep that in mind as I order. I do not expect the highest quality for really low prices.

topspin

Yeah I think everyone is aware of the " don't order anything on back order" thing, I don't recall anyone mentioning that they purposely odered a backorder item. Often I see where someone places an order from Hobby King where all of the items are in stock but because they sit on the order for a week some items go out of stock leaving the poor customer with a backorder situation.

Like you I also have a boatload of orders but they are with with Horizon and Tower and have only had one problem in fifteen years with a tower order that was resolved with one phone call and the correct parts were expressed to me overnight at no cost to me. I also got a busted Spektrum transmitter and Horizon paid for the shipping back to their warranty center and sent me a brand new one absolutely free. No pictures or videos, just real service.

I also buy from HeadsUp RC who is a lot less expensive than Tower or Horizon and only a very little bit more expensive than Hobby King. Like you I don't expect world class service from a low price dealer but that is exactly what I get from HURC and cheap shipping too. I don't think that it is unreasonable to expect a decent level of customer service from any business regardless of price. And I for one really do believe that Hobby King is dishonest in the way they deal with customer issues.

ira d

Well said I agree.

Francois Chiang Mai

I ordered from Hobby King because I live in Thailand and they are in Hong Kong
therefore 2H30, and Horizon and Tower are very far from Thailand and transport costs are too high and many custom complexity..
I'm 64, I do not care about losing money, what bothers me is their contempt, they do not respond to emails and there are no excuses ...

Charley

My Feedback: (2)

I finally got a refund on a non-delivered item from HK through a Paypal complaint. HK's Cust. Svc. Dept. just kept stalling. I finally concluded they were trying to get past the deadline for a PP complaint. Can you apply any leverage throug your CC company?

CR

Francois Chiang Mai

Hello,
I finnaly received a response...

We do apologize for the late response. I understand how frustrating this is and we apologized for the inconvenience that this may have caused you. Our product specialist confirmed that the fuselage on Product ID:248000002 is proven faulty. We do not have a replacement part from our warehouse as we need to request a replacement from our supplier. The estimated time of arrival for replacement to arrive is within 2 to 4 weeks. Your utmost patience and understanding is highly appreciated.

Regards,
Jester S.
HobbyKing Support Team


WAIT and SEE

bogbeagle

I placed another order with Hobbyking ... I placed the order on 2nd May; it was shipped 8th May; it arrived on 20th May. Included two items on "backorder".

Still got nothing to complain about.

Charley

My Feedback: (2)

I have ordered from them post-problem. All has gone well since. But if something goes wrong they don't respond very well.

CR

Dick T.

My Feedback: (243)

Have placed and received many orders with HK, some well over $200.00 from both overseas and US warehouses. Only once received a defective LiPo from China and it was promptly replaced. Small ARF's have been well packed and damage free. One outer carton from China was a mess, held together with U.S. Customs tape and labels but inner carton and contents were fine.

I will continue to buy from HK and be patient if item is coming from half way around the world. Certainly issues can and do arise. HK provides real time tracking within their warehouse once an order is placed. Checking in periodically may head off a potential problem. Consider too the language issues a world wide shipper has to contend with so be patient with communications and explanations.

Some people want to rant about poor customer service when they may be contributing to the problem. The old adage "the customer is always right" is not always true but attitude can make or break an easy solution to a problem.

topspin

your post does nothing at all to help Francois. I have placed many hundreds of dollars worth of orders from tower, Horizon, and others with no problems. Again that does nothing to help Francois. he received an airplane that was clearly broken as you can see in the pictures I don't think he was ranting nor do I think he was being unreasonable he simply expected to get what he paid for not a broken airplane.

so I kinda have to wonder what's the purpose of your post to say I have X number of orders and I'm really happy and I never have a problem. forgive me but that seems antagonistic.