[shadowrulz3164]

ive ordered two items from beach and have yet ot receive bad service from them 0.o they always shipped as promised.

[SpecialK]

In early December, I ordered the 50mm lens from Beach . . . charged my card the day I ordered but,

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Funny, Beach manged to charge my card within minutes of my placing the order but the credit took three days.

Will i ever do business with Beach again . . . NO WAY.

In case you have not noticed, Pentax has put out new rebates and, I believe, they are continuing the 100 rebate on the 10-17 . . . I suggest going elsewhere.

I am a customer service manager for a corporation (not Beach) of 22 brick-and-mortar stores and website, so I have some knowledge of every way something can go wrong :-) And believe me, it is a daily thing to see what is "not" going correctly with any of our email/billing/inventory/website software systems, or inventory discrepancies. I am not defending Beach at all, but I got my K100D body and 10-17 in November without incident or tears, and they in fact suggested I send it to my work so as to not have it sitting on the doorstep.

We do not charge a card until the order ships, so that aspect of it was a little bothersome. But 17th St Photo and I think B&H was the same way.

Oh, and it takes a few days for the bank process a CC refund, though the charge sure goes through fast.

[gorfmai]

I work in a brick and mortar shop, and our favorite (heh) quote is "I can get it for x dollars less on the internet / mail order". Yes, you usually can. But, as some people have said, caveat emptor! If the price is wayyy too low, ask why?

I've many times seen mail order / internet places (and I am NOT claiming Beach has done this) take items out of boxes you should get and sell them to you separately, give you a foreign or no warranty instead of the proper one, send you an empty box, etc. People come in to me and tell me about the great deal they got, and when you add up everything, they actually paid more!

Allow me to be biased for a second, but if you are not sure what you want, want to talk to someone in person about how to use it, etc - go to your local camera store (not big box!). If you like to order mail order, go with B&H. I can't think of a single problem I've heard of that someone has had with them. Beach is one I have heard a LOT of complaints about over the years.....

Thanks for letting me get that off my chest, all... now I will brace for the river of flame of people telling me how all these other mail-orders are great and wonderful...