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Euro Car Parts: AKA - 'The Good, the bad and the Ugly'.


sevenfourate

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The good: They are cheap.

 

The Bad: I got sucked in......

 

The Ugly: (How long do you have ?)

 

 

A "55% off all Brake parts" email fell into my inbox recently. Just at the time i was mulling over rear discs and pads. Sebro / Textar were duly purchased and delivered for around £150 from memory. Bargain i say. Job done in fact. You'd think......

 

 

I then thought; while in there i may as well replace the brake fluid with fresh too. So seeing as i was in Cambridge the next day with work - and an ECP was literally 50 yards away; i thought i'd order some tried and tested high boil point ATE Type 200 online - for it to be collected in store tomorrow in Cambridge. I turn up there the next day to be greeted with "Sorry our stock level was showing as available, but we actually have none; so we've ordered iit n from another Branch to be here tomorrow".

 

"I'm not here tomorrow" i reply - ".....and i've travelled 90 miles for work to be here today" . Which i why i ordered online to be collected here today. "Don't worry Sir" comes the reply - "we have some xxxxx on offer thats really cheap to begin with and cheaper still now"  ! "With all due respect i'm not looking for cheap" i retort. "But thanks anyway". I then immediately ring my garage and ask if he can somehow source 2 litres of the same i required at silly short notice so the job can still go ahead the following day as planned. Later i learned and little did i know he rang the local ECP. Who late in the day duly delivered 1 litre to his garage instead of the requested 2 litres asking "Will that be ok" ? 😡 (Luckily a couple more calls got me another litre elsewhere. But that's not where the fun ended).

 

So the very next day is fitting day. Mid Morning i get a message from the garage owner to give them a call when i have 5 minutes. Turns out ECP have indeed sent the 2 rear discs i ordered. One for my car - and unfortunately one for something completely different. So he gets on the phone to ECP, explains the issue - and turns out a branch 30 miles away have the correct one in stock which they'll deliver later.

 

ECP do duly deliver to him later on in the afternoon. And i'm not sure of the whats and wherefore's - but they actually deliver a pair to him. Still; at least we aren't short of discs any longer 🙄 So my garage sorts my brakes out and from that stand-point all is good. I settle up: paying for the extra one he ordered for me and he says he'll return the other. I then take the wrongly sent one / incorrect part disc that i'd ordered; back to my office and ring ECP for a collection, which they say will happen the next day. Which guess what; never happened. So i ring them again, going through the whole process again - and another collection day is set (Last Monday).  Which they managed to adhere to 👍

 

Friday Morning and i think - "I can't sit on the phone another 1/2 hour to ECP; so i'll email and ask about my refund". Of course no reply comes. So at 5pm tonight at work (Might as well get paid to do this right 🤣) i give them a call. Something is clearly up after a few exploratory efforts by the very helpful but completely useless customer service lady trying to find out what's going on. And i get put on hold.

 

She comes back quite a while later to tell me she's just sent an email to another department to ask if they know what's happening as it appears they can see my return has possibly been collected, but also seems it wasn't scanned in at the warehouse and they therefore can't process a refund at this stage.

 

At this point i'm not at all shocked; but still find myself scouring my desk for a blunt instrument as i really am losing the will to live.......

 

 

 

 

Motto of the story ? Pay peanuts - get monkey's in short.

 

We're all guilty of looking for a bargain. And i'm as guilty as the next man. But paying rock-bottom prices surely can't also go hand in hand with an over abundance of staff / an oh so helpful customer service mantra / skilled, trained and time-served people good at what they do - especially when things go wrong......

 

I will continue to use ECP for air fresheners, shampoo and Christmas stocking gifts. Anything more technical and securely needed than that and i'll happily pay 'reassuringly expensive' prices 😋

 

Rant over.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Really surprised to hear this. I always buy my parts from ECP and never have any problems.

 

You'll only need 1l of Type200 for a bleed by the way :)

Edited by Spykee
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1 hour ago, Spykee said:

Really surprised to hear this. I always buy my parts from ECP and never have any problems.

 

You'll only need 1l of Type200 for a bleed by the way :)

 

 

In this instance - completely inept and out of their depth. A failure on every level. In saying that - like you; i've had many pain-free success stories with them. But hey. They say you only really find out about a company when a problem occurs.....

 

Took nearly 3 weeks to sort it all out and get a refund in the end !

 

***My mechanic went through just over 1L of fluid bleeding the brakes....so just into the second tin.....in the end. Suspect it was difficult to see when the new stuff was coming through and he was perhaps overly cautious by bleeding through more than he absolutely needed to. Which i have no problem with whatsoever.. Thanks for the heads-up though. I'll pass it on to the wasteful wrench-monkey  😂 🤣

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3 hours ago, sevenfourate said:

 

 

Language ! You'll get banned for swearing on here..... 🤣

 

😂😂Are we not allowed to have more than 1 car here? I have a full bottle reserved for the Cayman but the 🤐 also needs a fluid change 🤪

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28 minutes ago, Spykee said:

 

😂😂Are we not allowed to have more than 1 car here? I have a full bottle reserved for the Cayman but the 🤐 also needs a fluid change 🤪

 

Yea of course you’re allowed multiple cars. And as long as they all wear the golden Stuttgart shield upfront; that’s absolutely fine 🤣 😁 😂 

 

I’m kidding [I have been on forums where if you attempt to write down competitors names / other brands etc - they get filtered out or changed however !!!]. Why I joked about brazenly mentioning ‘BMW’ on an open forum 😉. 😁

 

 

 

 

 

 

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14 hours ago, sevenfourate said:

 

Yea of course you’re allowed multiple cars. And as long as they all wear the golden Stuttgart shield upfront; that’s absolutely fine 🤣 😁 😂 

 

I’m kidding [I have been on forums where if you attempt to write down competitors names / other brands etc - they get filtered out or changed however !!!]. Why I joked about brazenly mentioning ‘BMW’ on an open forum 😉. 😁

 

 

 

 

 

 

I expect a COC Mod’ to be along any moment now to tell you off for ‘other marque’ blasphemy.... 😱🤨😉😁

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5 hours ago, Beanoir said:

🧐  

 

I can hardly say anything now can I... 

Didn’t realise you still had any ‘voting rights’ Nick since you ‘jumped ship’ and bought ya yellow-peril 🚕😉😛😁

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1 hour ago, Windymiller said:

Didn’t realise you still had any ‘voting rights’ Nick since you ‘jumped ship’ and bought ya yellow-peril 🚕😉😛😁

 
‘Voting’ would suggest this is a democracy Jason?? 😛

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