I have tried to be as factual as possible in my timelines and paraphrasing. I have paraphrased conversations for the sake of simplicity, but anything inside quotation marks is directly taken from the email trail (with names changed to screen names). Of course, the complete emails are available if required.
I sent payment on May 8th for a grey Chrishimself cable to replace the stock Grado cable on my Magnum build. It was to be shipped directly to Symphones as Rhydon was installing the new drivers. Communication wasn’t great, but I don’t need my hand held, so it wasn’t really an issue.
I waited to send the headphones to Rhydon, as I knew that I’m an 8 hour drive from him and the cable had to come in from the USA. I sent them on May 25th after confirming with Chris that the cable had indeed been mailed on the 22nd.
On June 11th I contacted Rhydon to ask if the cable had arrived. He told me that it had just arrived that day and that installation would be complete soon.
On June 18th Rhydon emailed me to tell me that the cable did not have the polarity marked and that I would be on the hook for a $50 flat fee cable install price in order for him to purchase the correct equipment to test polarity and complete the install. I contacted Chris to tell him the problem with his cable. He asked me to contact Rhydon and attempt to get him to just go ahead with the install as a new multimeter costs less than $5 and that he was being unreasonable.
“Squeek the equipment they are referring to is a $4 multimeter, that is a ridiculous request honestly, we marked them using marker but it must have rubbed off. We're going to use colored tape from now on.
Please let them know that you know this information, if not I can talk to them to try to work something out with them Squeek.”
*Please note the underlined portion of this conversation as I will return to it later.
I agreed with Chris in that the $50 request seemed excessive and contacted Rhydon, indicating that I was aware of the cost of the required equipment and requested that he just go ahead with the install. He stuck to his guns and refused.
“The equipment is minor however the time needed to complete this job would be over what is considered a complementary service. If we are to recable your headphones with this cable i would have to charge you $50.”
I didn’t know if this had been an ongoing problem with these two (unmarked cables being sent to Rhydon), or if they didn’t care for each other, or what the problem was and I didn’t want to be in the middle of it.
Chris said that he refused to pay the $50 to Rhydon and that a replacement cable was to be sent via priority mail and that I should keep the original cable for my trouble. He said I’d have my completed headphones within the week. The below is the final correspondence that I received from Chris regarding this matter, and it was on June 18th.
“I refuse to pay the $50, we're building you a brand new cable and sending it to him via Priority Mail. It's costing me a whole lot more than $50 at the end of the day but there is no way I am putting more money in that guy's pocket if he thinks a quick trip to the hardware store is worth $50 for his "time". You'll have your assembled headphone in a week and I'm sure you were in a line anyway, sorry for the inconvenience.
Contact Rhydon, have him include the "first" cable, it's all yours. Sell it for some money back, they command rather high prices on the secondhand market almost close to new, so you're in good hands.
If you have any objection to this plan of action, please let me know. My customers come first and I'm willing to do anything to accommodate you but this is what I feel is fair for all parties."
On July 3rd I hadn’t heard anything so I emailed Chris and requested a tracking number for the cable. If it was sent via priority mail, it should have been there weeks ago. I wanted to make sure that the cable wasn’t just sitting in Rhydon’s PO box. No response.
On July 4 I emailed Rhydon to ask him if he had received the replacement. He told me no, but he would be checking the PO box the following day.
On July 5th Rhydon emailed me to say that the multimeter had arrived from Chris and that he would get the cable installed and sent. I replied stating that there must be a mistake, as he was supposed to send a replacement cable via priority. He replied and said that no, they had decided that a multimeter would be more useful. This is the point at which I became upset and replied with the following.
“It would have been nice for someone to have included me on the decision. I had promised the spare cable that I was expecting to a friend in need of a recable.
One would think that providing you the money required for the multi meter would have made more sense than leaving me to wait another three weeks.”
Rhydon indicated that he was unaware of the agreement reached by Chris and I and that I should take it up with him, which is of course only fair.
I emailed Chris last night for an explanation. I received the below response.
”He is in possession of two of our cables intended for your headphones, you will still get one but it is sleeved in red. I'm going to forward this to Ted I was under the impression that he was doing cables too.”
Enter Ted. I’ve never heard of Ted. I have no idea who Ted is or why any of this is Ted’s business. Also, enter the red cable. I’ve never heard of a red cable. I have no idea what he is talking about. I received the below three messages (in order) last night from Ted.
“i sent a red cable by mistake and then sent the right grey one,but forgot to label the wires figuring rhydon would have a continuity tester seeing as they only cost $3.he didn't have one so it was easier to just send one as i've already sent 2 cables.rhydon wanted to get me to pay him $50 to buy a $3 tester.so what else do i need to do as i'm losing double the cost now.”
*Remember when I told you that I would come back to the underlined bit? Chris had me tell Rhydon that they were marked with marker knowing full well that Ted had forgotten to label them at all.
Obviously Ted is the cable maker. I was never told about the initial mistake in sending a red cable instead of grey back in May. He is also the guy that made the mistake in not labeling the second (correct) cable. And finally, he is the also the guy that snail mailed a continuity checker instead of priority mailing a replacement cable. Basically, all of the mistakes are Ted’s, but Ted doesn’t see it that way.
“i was under the impression the red cable was being sent back to me as i was never told i'm out a cable also.so i lose either way in this?when i sent the cables rhydon told me he hasn't even received your grados yet for service. it seems that there is more than one reason for your delays.
i honestly cant believe rhydon doesn't have any way to do simple continuity testing.its a $3 tester.plus to try to extort $50 out of me on top of it.
you might be annoyed but i'm pissed since i get nothing from this exchange.”
Yup. Ted is pissed.
“the reason i sent the tester is because rhydon wanted $50 to buy one from his nearest store. i was stunned he wanted $50 for a $3 tester.besides if i sent a third cable i would then be out for two extra cables and double shipping.since i never got the red cable back as rhydon sold it to your friend and i only just now find out about it.
at this point i lost money on this exchange.
i cant believe you would expect to get your cable basically for free.
if canadian customs weren't such jerks then there would have been no delays.i cant understand how it can take such a long time to get to canada from oregon.”
Ted seems to think that it is everyone’s fault but his own. It is Rhydon’s fault for not having a continuity tester. It is Canada’s fault for it taking so long (he did not ship it via any method even close to priority mail…)
Ted also seems to think that I am a greedy bastard for expecting what was promised as penance for this mess of a transaction. Or more correctly, now it is a red cable that I don’t even want.
Initially I was annoyed by Rhydon and his reluctance to budge on the multimeter. I figured that he was just using me to teach Chris a lesson. As time has progressed and more has come to light, it is apparent that Chris has no idea what is going on. He has omitted truths, told flat out lies, and now dumped the problem on some stranger named Ted.
Why wasn’t I told about the initial mistake in shipping the red cable?
Why lie about marking the grey cable with marker?
Why tell me that a replacement would be shipped via priority if it wouldn’t?
Why not inform me that a multimeter is being sent instead of a new cable?
Why send it snail mail when priority was promised?
Why after all the mistakes and conversations would Chris just say “here is some guy called Ted, take it up with him”?
Why doesn’t Ted have any clue of the planned solution?
Why should any of this have been Rhydon’s problem?
Rhydon has fielded about 30 emails from me regarding this because of Chris/Ted and their mistakes and consequential failures.
Needless to say, I won’t be doing business with Chris Tran or Chris_Himself or headphonelounge again.
