Get yourself a pint and pull up a stool...

Just wondering if anyone else on here has had a similar experience ordering stuff from a certain “doctor” on the other place. If not, then take this as a possible heads up.

Previously, I had a valve block rebuild kit from him, which although slow, did finally arrive. To be fair, the timespan wasn’t his fault, the delay occurred with the post at this end.

So back April 2015, I agreed to buy some interior parts that he had sourced for me, namely :

Right and left rear carpet finishers (biscuit)
Parcel shelf surrounds, L&R (biscuit)
Centre box lid (black)
Instrument binnacle surround (black)

Along with those, I also ordered a compressor rebuild kit for my stock and a rover raiser as well. The latter not because I couldn’t knock up something similar, but the idea of trailing from place to place here just knowing each one would only have one bit I need in stock and no idea when they would get any more, made it not worth the candle. Anyway, sorted, price agreed and paid for. I also paid for the stuff to be couriered so that the Philippine postal service were kept well out of the loop!

I then had a string of mails telling me of a litany of problems he was having with couriers and how everything he sent outside the USA was being returned by three different ones. Not just me, but a radiator bound for Dubai as well and a steering rack to Ireland. We got a whole host of other stuff about travelling, losing family members, daughters getting married in Thailand as reasons for not responding to mails and messages.

Eventually, we agreed that we’d try the US Parcel Service as a last resort and risk the inevitable involvement of PHLPost. That was 13 December 2015 and his last mail said he’d get them away on the following Monday and send me proof of postage that I’d need for here. “George DEAL Brother! They’ll go on Monday and I’ll follow up with the tracking.”

Since then nothing. No proof of postage, no kit, no updates, no response to my mails (last one yesterday), a big fat zero.

I’ve also spoken to a fellow ’38 owner here who had similar experience over a radiator and I ended up sorting him one out from the guys who made mine. He’s very happy with it, as am I, but he’s not so chuffed about his dealings with the good doctor.

I considered raising this on the other place but have the feeling the post would last for around 30 seconds before disappearing, due to being an insult to a “forum god”.

I know most of you, being in the UK and Europe, can source this type of stuff fairly easily, but for me it’s not so simple, hence, when the doctor said he could supply the interior bits I needed, I went with him. I can't help but feel that I'm going to write this off as a bad job.

So to anyone else thinking of going down this route, beware.

Still need the bits though!

No name and shame?

This is the internet Shep. Naming names is a bad thing when Google can so easily drag up every little instance where the name is mentioned, especially as most of us use the same names across forums. As George says, if you were to name and shame on the other place you'd instantly be flamed and banned and the other place does have its uses! If you've hung around the other forum for long enough you'll know who the doctor is. If not I'll pm his nick to you. <br>
Just for fun, have you ever tried Googling yourself? Stick in your name in inverted commas. You'll be amazed what facts come back about you... <br>
EDIT- apparently his latest disaster is a computer crash that has resulted in him losing all of his information and hence contact with his customers. If you depend on a computer for business (or even not), you back the bloody thing up and back up the back up! Maybe it's a good time to sell him a backup solution, by post of course!

There's also been a couple of threads on the other forum where people have had problems (one a BeCM and another with a valve block) that a certain item couldn't be the cause as it had been rebuilt by the 'doctor'. After lengthy long distance diagnosis it turned out that it was the parts that had been operated on that were actually faulty. I get the impression he's like most of the other mechanics I've had dealings with in the US. Full of bull but f*cking useless.

Seems the 'specialists' are even worse. We ordered a complete front and rear competition suspension set up for a Volvo P1800 that we were restoring and upgrading (2.5 litre turbo 5 pot, 5 speed manual gearbox, fully independent front and rear end with discs all round and rack and pinion steering, digital dash, etc). £5k sent by bank transfer and never received anything other than lots of excuses. Ended up having to downgrade the spec and buy another scrap P1800 to use as a donor as the old stuff had been thrown away as we weren't going to need it.

I'm the victim whose aluminium radiator was lost on the way to Dubai ..... actually, it was Portugal last July.

I'm USD 500 down and no response to e mails now.

Actually, I'm more disappointed than angry.

What to do now?

SpiggyTopes wrote:

I'm the victim whose aluminium radiator was lost on the way to Dubai ..... actually, it was Portugal last July.

I'm USD 500 down and no response to e mails now.

Actually, I'm more disappointed than angry.

What to do now?

Got to admit when I got the mail of excuses including the Dubai radiator, I did wonder. The guy I met here had a similar experience.

To be honest, I tend to agree with Gilbertd here. When I first got the '38 I tried the US part suppliers, thinking that shipping would be better than from the UK. The fact that 99% of their websites insisted that the Philippines was part of the US and demanded a ZIP code and that not one, and I mean not a single one, ever answered e-mails put them very firmly into the bullshit department. Of course, we know that there isn't a world outside the US, don't we?

The UK gets all my business now, and there's been a lot of it!

I'm in for just under half of what you are, but as I say, after 12 months I'm going to write the whole thing off and put it down to experience. Unless work ever takes me to SoCal of course...

However, if anyone in the UK cares to throw the bits I need into a box, let me know!

I got bitten aswell - but not by parts, but information...

I'd done a fair bit or work mapping out all the main components on the BECM power boards and had a PM over there with a few questions and along the lines of having a mate who works at LRNA and had information to some more things on BECM's and all that. I ended up sending my research over, with the promise of being sent the information found out from this 'mate' - sharing is caring and all that.

Funnily enough, never had a response - and when I emailed (this was quite awhile ago now) to see if there was any of this magical info I got told something along the lines of not having heard from him, but will be in touch when he has etc. To this day, nothing more.

I am sure I read somewhere that he doesn't do RR stuff full time anymore and has a job working at Apple or something like that?

George B - I would send you bits, but I'm away and don't think I'm likely to have all the parts you actually need anymore as it's been awhile since I've had a vehicle about for parts!

Strangely enough, I actually got a reply to my last mail on Tuesday. Two in fact. One basically saying, wow, you haven't got anything? and when I replied in the negative, responding that I would have confirmed delivery otherwise, I then received another tale of destruction and woe. He also promised me the proof of postage he promised me in December, within 24 hours. That was Tuesday.

But never mind, he's $3,000 dollars out this year in refunds on stuff sent overseas apparently, although obviously not to either Spiggy or myself!

I know you're away Marty, working with a potential belligerent enemy of the glorious Republic of the Philippines, but if you or anyone else on here come across the stuff I'm after, I'd be happy to hear from you. I can do credit card, PayPal or, depending where someone is, even cash, using a mate over there.

What sort of stuff are you after, George?

Ha!

I just got a response too!

Let's see.

OldShep56 wrote:

What sort of stuff are you after, George?

The following interior trim parts:

Right and left rear carpet finishers (biscuit)

Parcel shelf surrounds, L&R (biscuit)

Centre box lid (black)

Instrument binnacle surround

I'd take black carpet finishers but then I'd need to two front ones as well.

What bugs me with him, is he goes so far off track, so what that's he's bought a Porsche for his son, it's a land rover forum, not bloody Porsche !

Wrong bloke, Scotty is the one being talked about, the self styled BeCM Doctor, but I know what you mean. If anyone else posted some of the stuff mates of RRTH post, they'd be deleted immediately. He may be an ex-Pat Brit but he's rapidly turning into a Yank, 3 pages on a thread where he's trying to find an electrical fault. Stop playing around on the bloody internet and get your meter out FFS! There was a thread in the Classic forum about garages a few weeks ago. It had nothing to do with Classics other than the fact that some of them had Classics in their huge, industrial warehouse sized, fully equipped, centrally heated, air conditioned, carpeted garages but it didn't get deleted because it allowed the moderators to show off how many cars they'd got.

That's why this forum exists though.......

and isn't it great :)

It is. Be even better if it were a private forum though. Being public any opinions expressed on here are accessible via Google or even just surfing to the site. Kind of stifles the fun of free speech! <br>
Just for fun I put "What sort of stuff are you after, George?" (quote from above in this thread) into Google and it brought me straight here!

Orangebean wrote:

It is. Be even better if it were a private forum though. Being public any opinions expressed on here are accessible via Google or even just surfing to the site. Kind of stifles the fun of free speech! <br>
Just for fun I put "What sort of stuff are you after, George?" (quote from above in this thread) into Google and it brought me straight here!

Good job it was a nice clean answer then!!!

Still no response from the good Doctor regarding his 24 hour turnaround of proof of posting. Hmm, wonder why?

Yeah, I've got to the swearing stage with this mail. I really hate bullshit!

"I’m kind of thinking that your promise of 24 hours (again – remember December?) for the tracking details may just have passed?

Funny but the more I ask around, the more I realise I’m not alone. I’d go public on RR.Net, but I also know that your mates would delete my post within seconds.

Scotty, I operate my own business as well and I’d be fucked if I did it the same way as you do. And no, they aren’t all in Manila, I treat them the same, no matter where they are in the world. I operate railways for a living and dead relatives, travelling, daughter’s weddings and sundry other excuses don’t wait for that.

Fucking disappointed."

Now Gilbertd has named and shamed, then let 'em Google!

Oh, and italics aren't working.

Now we'll see if the mods "over there" read PM's as well.

Some bloke who's just bought a '38 in the Philippines was asking about having a spare BECM, and apart from being lambasted for having such a stupid idea, was pointed towards the good doctor.

I've PM'd him pointing him in the opposite direction!

Will I burn in hell?

GeorgeB wrote:

Now we'll see if the mods "over there" read PM's as well.

Some bloke who's just bought a '38 in the Philippines was asking about having a spare BECM, and apart from being lambasted for having such a stupid idea, was pointed towards the good doctor.

I've PM'd him pointing him in the opposite direction!

Will I burn in hell?

I doubt it, your most probably get a free pass the other way, I saw the post and can't understand why he wants a spare becm, if/when something happens, deal with it

From the information I managed to glean when I got my lifetime ban (for sending 'daily' spam advertising this forum when I'd actually only sent two invites in 6 weeks) it seems that PMs are scanned automatically for urls rather than someone reading them. Send a PM with a link in it and that flags up apparently. I registered another username using minimal personal details and a different email address and posted in a thread. That post appeared, after a couple of hours delay while it was checked as all newly registered users posts are, and then disappeared a few hours later. Anything I've posted since has never appeared but I can, and have, sent PMs.