Rabo de Arraia online
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| jstora |  Fri Jun 23 2006, 00:35 | |
| Joined: May 25 2006
Locale: Sydney
Posts: 8
| RABO DE ARRAIA ONLINE
IT'S A BIG SCAM. DO NOT BUY FROM THEM....
READ THE STORY BELOW.
I run a Dance Studio and a samba school in Sydney Australia.
I decide to purchase some Capoeira pants (Abadas) from Brazil to sell back to our students at a profit.
Back in August 2005, I wrote to several online stores to inquire about prices for those pants. I selected [link] because the prices were competitive and they offered to have our logos printed on the pants at a reasonable price.
19 August 2005 - I called Rabo de Arraia and talked to Monise Cassano Fernandes, then sent an email with my complete order for 50 pairs of abada pants.
24 August 2005 - We paid the full amount of USD $1,207.14 (AUD $1,636.64) though paypal as requested by Monise. I was told the pants will be ready and sent the following week. The amount paid included insurance and shipping by boat (economico).
11 September 2005 - I had no news and inquired about the shipment. I received a response 4 days later (15 September) and was told they had not yet sent the pants because the money had not cleared into their account yet. Monise wrote they would send the pants the following day Friday 16 September “economico” by boat. I waited.
10 October 2005 - We had not received anything and we had not been advised if the pants had been sent. I wrote an email to inquire but there was no response. I wrote every other day, there was no reply but I know someone had read my emails because I requested a read-Receipt but no answer.
01 November 2005 - I called Monise and she apologised and said she had not been working as much because she had been injured but that she will look into it with the Brazilian post (Correios). I waited… but no news…
24 November 2005 - After waiting for a week, I wrote more emails to inquire about the status of the order and finally received an email from Cristina Ipiadis from Rabo de Arraia stating that Monise had been away travelling and that it seemed that Correios had lost the parcel and that Monise will contact me.
25 November 2005 - Monise wrote that she will prepare and insurance claim and send me another package in 2 weeks.
10 January 2006 - I wrote to inquire about the new shipment because I had still received nothing.
15 January2006 – Received an Email from Monise stating that the new shipment was sent on 27 December 2005.
23 January 2006 to 03 March 2006 - I sent many emails and faxes, even called but there was no reply to any of my requests, and still no pants.
03 March 2006 – I called Monise and finally got through. I let her know I was still waiting for the pants. She sent me a copy of the Correios shipping info but it was very hard to read. She said she would check with Correios again and get back to me in a week.
10 March 2006 - No news from Monise. I emailed her and received a response saying she would call me to explain what happened.
13 March 2006 - I had still received no call. I called Monise and she told me that Correios said that the parcel had been delivered in Australia but went to the wrong city. She mentioned Melbourne.
14 March 2006 - I received an email from Monise stating that it looked like the parcel was lost by Correios. She forwarded an email she had received from them with an international reference number. I called Australia post with that reference number but was told that this number was not in their system, therefore, no parcel had entered Australia on this reference number. Also, it seems that the document had some information that did not make sense at all. For example under City, it showed Szczecin (which is in Poland), however the street address, postal code and country was correct. The name of our business and telephone number was missing.
Monise said she would check with Correios and get back to me in a couple of days.
11 April 2005 - After waiting for a week, I sent many email every other day, called many times unable to get through. I decided to send a letter clearly stating that I now wanted full refund because obviously nothing was happening and I started seriously doubting I would ever get anything and that I now believed everything had been a lie since the beginning.
12 April 2005 - I received and email from Monise stating that she was sorry but had problems with her employees and that she had some news from Correios and she will scan and send to me the following day. I received nothing for a week.
20 April 2005 - I sent a rather strong email asking for a full refund immediately. I also contacted Pay Pal to let them know what was happening with Rabo de Arraia and lodge an official complaint. Pay pal could not do anything for me. I received no answer from Monise.
23 April 2005 - I sent a fax asking for full refund immediately or that I would start taking a series of actions against Rabo De Arraia.
24 April 2005 - I received a fax back from Gilliard at Rabo De Arraia stating that Monise was not responding because her husband Wellington Fernandes had a Hart attack and that she will contact me the following week.
I waited but no news… had to send more faxes and emails.
01 May 2005 - Monise called to inform me that the Abadas had been to Australia but then shipped back to her but she was not aware of it because her employees did not tell her. Also she had personal problems with her husband being in hospital and also she had computer problems. She asked for my understanding and she begged me not to ask for a refund but to let her send the abadas I had ordered because they had our logo and she could not resell them. I agreed at the condition se would send the abadas the following day by air so that I can receive them within a week. She promised she would take care of it the following day.
11 May 2005 - Nothing happened. I talked to Monise and she said she needed more time because the abadas were actually at customs and she needed to pay a fee to pick up the parcel and that she had difficulties (the story changed). I reminded Monise I had paid the entire amount and that I did not want to hear any more excuses and that I will take legal actions if she did not either reimburse or send by air immediately.
28 May 2005 - After a few more emails exchanged within the last 2 week, Monise asked for more time because she was going thought difficulties in her personal life but she promised I would receive the abadas within 2 weeks. I agreed as long as I received the abadas by 09 June.
13 June 2005 - I have received nothing, I called and left a message for Monise to call me. I also sent an email but no reply.
I have been very patient and understanding but it is obvious Monise is either dishonest or has no idea how to run a business and has no idea about basic business ethics.
I have done some research and I have been in touch with other people from different parts of the world who had similar bad experiences with Rabo De Arraia. I am convinced collect money with the intention to never send the goods hoping the customer will give up.
I have saved most of the emails and faxes we exchanged (about 150 emails and 30 faxes).
I want to take Rabo De Arraia to court for the value of the pants, the loss of income, loss of time, the communication cost and legal fees (estimated total USD $15.000)
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If you've had a bad experience with them, let ne know...
Jean©dancecentral.com.au
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| Chave | | Fri Jun 23 2006, 07:27 | |
| Joined: Jun 22 2006
Locale: Orlando USA
Posts: 3
| Wow...Im at a loss for words.
Some people are dishonest and thats a shame but to make you wait for nearly a year...ouch.
I went to their site and sat this on the main page:
"ATENÇÃO "
"Nos da equipe Rabo de Arraia vem por meio desta pedir desculpas a todos nossos clientes pois tivemos um problema de força maior (doença um infarto do diretor da empresa M. Wellington), que ficou 20 dias internado por conta deste fato os pedidos foram atrasados um pouco, mas já estamos normalizando tudo, agradecemos todos os pensamentos positivos de todos nossos clientes amigos!
Equipe Rabo de Arraia on line "
Which to our non-portuguese speaking friends translatest to roughly:
Attention, the team Rabo de arraia thru these means appologise to all our clients but we had a grave problem (the heart attack of our Directoc M. Wellington) he was hospitalized for 20 days and due to this fact our orders were delayed a little, but we are currently normalizing everything, we thank all the positive thinking from all our client frineds!
TeamRabo de arraia online.
Wow....first of all a year worth of delayed can hardly be described as "delayed a little". Also their story seems shady. If the guy had the heart attack and was hospitalized for 20 days how do they justify a year of delay? Also even if you posted that you received the pants ...who wants to wait a year for their order?
Also I cant believe PayPall could not do anything about it.
I sent them an e-mail saying they lost a potential custumer becasue of word of mouth. This kind of scam wont stop but has to be known.
PS. Please dont tear my translation to pieces adn complain about how a word or two was miss translated or misspelled ( I know some people here thrive on that)
Axe, muita paz | | Back to top | |
| Chave | | Fri Jun 23 2006, 07:31 | |
| Joined: Jun 22 2006
Locale: Orlando USA
Posts: 3
| Holy cow...just saw the "English" button where it translates the page to english, felt silly when I saw it but once I clicked on it the translation was barely understandable. I recomend anyone here to click on it and see if you can manage to understand what the english paragraph is trying to convey. I would offer my translating services to them but I dont want to wait a year to get paid LOL!!!!
Axe e paz | | Back to top | |
| corujaforte | | Fri Jun 23 2006, 08:12 | |
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Joined: Jul 24 2003
Locale: Bronx NY USA
Posts: 4
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<span class='smallblacktext'>[ Edited Fri Jun 23 2006, 13:18 ]</span> | | Back to top | |
| Manhoso113 | | Fri Jun 23 2006, 10:32 | |
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Joined: Dec 10 2003
Locale: Chicago USA
Posts: 3442
| This makes me sad because I actually know their family.
I can confirm that Wellington was hospitalized, it really effected their family hard because he soley ran the business, and now its suffering.. Your right on with the observation that she has little to no idea how to run a business, efficently. Which, being a person who has a online capoeira store as well, I run into this quite often with brasilians, not to mention that the postal system in Sao Paulo really blows.. they are either on strike or about to go on strike. Sorry to hear about your situation, I hope it gets resolved soon.
Manhoso | | Back to top | |
| Cantor | | Thu Jun 29 2006, 14:11 | |
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Joined: Mar 25 2002
Locale: Montreal, Quebec CANADA
Posts: 1627
| Hi all,
Glad to add to this post. I was also one of the people that were affected by the service levels at Rabo de Arraia. I'm happy to say that my order arrived today, everything inside it.
Yes there were problems, yes I had to run after them to get info. But given the medical condition, I can definately give them some understanding.
If they scammed you, I'm sorry, I was having the same thoughts, but turns out I was wrong.
The order took a few months to work itself out, and the service wasn't great. But to be honest, my expectations were pretty low when ordering from Brasil in the first place, so I guess I got exactly what ordered so I'm happy. : )
ache,
cantor
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| cafezinho | | Thu Jun 29 2006, 20:18 | |
| Joined: Jul 06 2004
Locale: Austin, Tx
Posts: 772
| Good news to me. I ordered a CD on the 12th then I saw this thread. That got me to thinking... | | Back to top | |
| gaze13 | | Fri Jun 30 2006, 14:54 | |
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Joined: Feb 19 2003
Locale: Alexandria, Virginia USA
Posts: 109
| I ran into a similar situation myself. I ordered some abadas for students, and another time I ordered some other items for myself. Each time, the order took about three months to arrive. If you expect the delay, it isn't that bad because they have the best selection of any online store that I've seen.
Almost a year though, ouch. I hope it gets resolved...
Doninha | | Back to top | |
| sozinho | | Sat Jul 01 2006, 00:42 | |
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Joined: Mar 22 2006
Locale: chania creta GREECE
Posts: 12
| i had order from rabo de arraia and i received them also in late but everything was in (after 3 months!!) | | Back to top | |
| pricansnowbrdr | | Sat Jul 01 2006, 07:41 | |
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Joined: Mar 20 2005
Locale: Dover Delaware USA
Posts: 228
| I'm reading this thread, and I just had to post a reply to it.
I have placed orders (twice) with Rabo de Arraia. The very first one was relatively small, and with items that are, in my opinion, accessible (either you have them in stock, or you don't). However, when it comes to items that they cannot stock (custom abadas and clothing, instruments, etc.), it seems they have a problem.
In all fairness to them (and all other Capoeira businesses managed from Brasil), customs and the post office dept. there have had various partial strikes, which, in occasions can aggravate things more. In addition, there is nothing more devastating than having a personal matter interfere with your livelyhood.
Having said that, as a business, they should be prepared when tragedy strikes. And, even with all these culprits, there is absolutely no excuse that can justify delivering a package with a delay of over 40 days.
I did have a serious situation with them in my second order(no communication, shipping or confirmation of order), waiting for almost 3 months before I could place a chargeback from my CC company and place a mediation complain through PayPal.
There is another vendor (which name I will not mention for the sake of their reputation and for matters being out of their control), with which we had the same situation. However, this time the package was shipped when promised, but because of customs, DHL and incompetence of personnel handling the package, the goods are now lost somewhere between Miami and Belo Horizonte in customs limbo.
If it was my business, I would do what any other reputable corporation would have done: reproduce the materials that had been already paid, send them such that my customer's request is met to their satisfaction, and recover the package lost, probably try to sale the material back to the customer at cost so I wouldn't have any losses. But making them wait for purchases for an extended period of time is just unacceptable.
Having said this, here is my recommendation (as a customer and business partner):
- If you are making purchases overseas, try your damnest to make these with a credit card. If the material is not delivered (again - DELIVERED, not shipped), within 60 days, initiate communication with the vendor. If there is no resolution after 15 days, request a chargeback from your CC company. Why within 90 days? Because most CC banks havea grace period of 90 days to do claims for non-dlivered goods.
- If you use a debit card, you can still do the same. However, credit takes a little longer to process (usually 60 days after the request has been placed), becuase they are dealing with cash transactions instead of credit. Again, the 60-90 day rule still aplies.
- If you are using Western Union, STILL use a credit card...it will make your life easier. CASH transfers without a CC are almost impossible (if not impossible, PERIOD) to recover.
My business recommendations (people and businesses with which I've dealt with better than EXCELLENT service):
- Tienda Bahia: in all my experiences with vendors and customers I have in my line of work, I have not seen ANYONE who has more and better communication and customer focus than Jaqueline. Highly recommended.
- CapoeiraMart: Fastest delivery I've experienced yet.
- Capoeira-Shop: A little pricier, but you will get an honest communication, and you WILL get your good, hands down. Besides, I love their dynamic in their classes (I had the chance to visit their school in Manhattan a few weeks ago after I purchased some goods from them!).
- Capoeira-Arts: Although they had a few hiccups in the beginning, and takes a little longer than you would like, they do deliver.
That's it! If you have any questions at all, or need any further information (stuff that I can't write here), feel free to drop me a line...
Muita axé e lembrancas...
...Verdugo! | | Back to top | |
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