Macodirect Non-communicative?

[gdi]

I have tried multiple times to have a query answered by Macodirect - both through email and via their webform. I get no response at all.

Has anyone here ever had success via email or web, or do I have to use the phone to get a response? Maybe there is better email than their service@ macodirect.de address?

Thanks

 

[tocalosh]

I have always found them easy to contact.
They will most likely have been closed since 23/12/16 for the Christmas and New Years holiday. It's a holiday in the UK today, not sure about Germany, most small businesses will reopen tomorrow.

 

[FujiLove]

They have always got back to me within a few hours. Probably the Christmas/New Year holiday.

 

[gdi]

Maybe that's the problem, I'll try back tommorrow.

 

[joeswe]

My experience is they are very responsive and in the case they promise they will get back into contact with you later (for questions that require some research on their part) they actually keep that promise.

 

[J enea]

I have tried many times to get an answer regarding defective film i bought from them. over 10 emails and they never once got back to me. I sent an email from a dummy email account and they did reply to a sales question within a few days. I think if its a negative question they will avoid you but for a sale they will answer. that always bugs me about online retailers. no way to go in and deal with it face to face. such is life as far as online buying

 

[joeswe]

I have tried many times to get an answer regarding defective film i bought from them. over 10 emails and they never once got back to me. I sent an email from a dummy email account and they did reply to a sales question within a few days. I think if its a negative question they will avoid you but for a sale they will answer.

I think your conclusions are wrong. Why? I have given them negative feedback over the past ten years or so exactly three times (when I was not satisfied with the product they sent) and in each case a manager got into contact with me within reasonable time (2~3 business days) and they really did their best to solve the problem.

Generally from my observation in past discussions here and elsewhere, it seems there are relatively high expectations among people from the US regarding the responsiveness of Internet stores. Maybe in the US it is standard to have Email support within 24 hours on 365 days a year. It is not like this in this part of the world. Small companies like maco with a handful of employees cannot afford to have a 24/365 service team. Apart from that, such companies usually close down for the holiday season, do their annual inventory check between Christmas and New Year. Email will take a couple of business days to be answered. This is just the way it is here and people accept it knowing they would have to pay a much higher price for the product if companies like maco hired more service staff in order to respond to every Email within a couple of hours.

That being said and to get back to the OP's complaint, it seems that something indeed went wrong in his case and I am not sure what. If he is not an existing customer it is possible that for some reason his Email got lost in a Spam filter, especially if he sent several Emails in a row. Maybe it is just that there is a huge buildup of unanswered Email due to the holiday season and the communication from existing customers/regarding actual orders is prioritized, so general product questions have to be a bit more patient. IDK. The mentioned "service"... address should work. But I can provide a personal Email address from one of the managers at macodirect through private conversation here if the OP is interested.

 

[sevo]

Email will take a couple of business days to be answered. This is just the way it is here and people accept it knowing they would have to pay a much higher price for the product if companies like maco hired more service staff in order to respond to every Email within a couple of hours.

The point is that companies like Maco generally do their own communication rather than have some polite but ignorant call centre respond by cutting and pasting bits from a FAQ. There is no such thing as a good but affordable German language call centre, as German language competence drops faster with distance from Germany than help desk staff wages, and the small international business they do does not warrant running a second infrastructure.

Also, they (like all film-centric photographic businesses these days) are a engineer rather than a salesforce driven enterprise - the people you deal with generally will have used the product you complain about, or may even be involved in its invention or production. They will often be more into defending the product and its virtues than into averting a PR disaster for the company. Expect detailed questions rather than a polite "no questions asked" refund, and expect them to spot and name where you screwed up, if the fault was with your use rather than the product...

 

[valdas]

I have tried multiple times to have a query answered by Macodirect - both through email and via their webform. I get no response at all.

Has anyone here ever had success via email or web, or do I have to use the phone to get a response? Maybe there is better email than their service@ macodirect.de address?

Thanks

Same here, I have sent a few emails this week, no response so far. I also had experience with them when I bought "vintage" photografphic paper which was faulty (developing completely black even if not exposed at all)- I wrote them about this and got nothing back. So yes, I agree with another memeber stating that they are a bit selective in their communication.

 

[FujiLove]

Have you tried calling the helpline? +49 (0)40 23 700 888

 

[valdas]

By the way, when you send an email to service@ macodirect.de you can see that it goes to a person named Sebastian Junghans, so it could well be that it's still Christmas holiday for Sebastian 🙂 But, honestly, in this case I would expect "out of office reply"...

 

[gdi]

Yeah, it's not promising- I have received no response at all this week. I wasn't complaining, I was just asking for a discount that think I should have received a while back. I'm fine if they say no (it's only about $35), but I would like to at least get a response. And I haven't had time to call, due to work ad the time difference.

Oh well....

 

[valdas]

Well, I should take my comments back... They reacted immediately when I communicated to them via Facebook! It appears it is the best way (or call)! They have also issued a voucher to compensate for my issue they failed to react initially. So, I am really impressed.

 

[gdi]

Thanks Valdas, I'll try that...

 

[FujiLove]

Good to know they are easy to contact on Facebook.

 

[gdi]

I did contact them on facebook and got a quick reply and resolution to my query. Thanks again for the tip.