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Von Schweikert Speaker Owners: Please Read.

I am sorrowfully writing this post to inform the good members of this board of a rather unpleasant recent dealing with the Von Schweikert Speaker company and their upgrade person, in particular.

I had contacted Albert VonSchwekert at VSA and Mr. Garner nearly 2 months ago regarding assistance for replacing a tweeter that is giving up the ghost on one of my speakers, requesting to either purchase a replacement from them or for assistance on finding a source for the unit. Near a month passed with multiple inquiries from me but not a single response from them. This prompted me to write about the events on a couple of websites for help finding the tweeter and wouldn’t you know it, I get a response with promise of a replacement tweeter to be sent out, free of charge, to make good on the whole mess. Sounds great, right? Well, wrong. A month passes and no tweeter, I inquire as to the status and get the run around and no further communication, finally I lose patience and send the following email a couple of weeks ago:

“Dear Mr. Garner:

It has been over a month since I had first contacted you regarding the blown tweeter, and though I understand you must be busy and this a small matter, communication has been very poor, slow to nonexistent. I am sorry to say that I am losing patience and have a need to restore my speakers to 100%, if I do not hear from you soon I will pursue a replacement tweeter through other sources, assuming you are unable to help, an you will not hear from me again.

Sincerely,
Michael Francis”

I do not wish to deter anyone from buying and enjoying these wonderful speakers, as they are quite amazing in their many virtues, but this is a warning to owners who may be thinking of upgrading their current VSA speakers, or even wondering what may happen if anything goes wrong with one of your speakers. The customer service for this company, in a word and put nicely as I can right now, sucks. I have corresponded with companies in the past with great customer service and do not expect all companies to live up to the highest standards, but by any reasonable account the service I have experienced on this matter has been quite poor, and as I’m sure most of you can appreciate, living with a sick tweeter for 2 months has not been pleasant! Personally, I had planned to move up the Von Schweikert line in the future and eventually setup a HT system using their speakers as well, now I will likely look elsewhere, sadly. Thank you for reading, I hope this account proves useful.

Signed,
A dissatisfied longtime owner.
socrates
rubherenow
7 posts
 
Paul Garner is the national sales manager for VSA and has his store, "In The Groove", located in Memphis Tn. I have spoken with him personally in the past. He has been very informative in my queries.
Albert and Co., in El Cahon Ca., are of impeccable character and obviously were not aware of your plight for a replacment tweeter. I agree in calling directly. If Albert is available in any way, he will speak to then and there on the spot. It would not surprise me if he did not Fed Ex you a replacment free of charge. Don't let this situation allow you to settle for less in your future HT project.
I have owned my custom modded VR-4 II's for years. They have outlasted all my "upgrades".
I say stick with Albert! Good Luck.
Mike Mills
socrates OP
247 posts
 
Thanks for the feedback, I will try calling at the 619- number. I had ordered a tweeter from madisound.com but was sent the wrong unit, not sure if they have their numbers crossed or just a shipping problem. If nothing else I will try a local dealer I just found nearby in the yellowpages. I recently moved across country so the original dealer is pretty much out of the question, if even still around. Thanks again.
socrates OP
247 posts
 
Update:

A replacement tweeter arrived today via fedex overnight from VSA! I'm a pretty happy dude now, all I ever wanted was my tweeter fixed. I do thoroughly enjoy the Von Schweikert sound and did not want to have to find a replacement speaker, I could not afford half as much sound with any other brand.

I am very sorry it had to come to this point to get it done, and though this may very well be an isolated case of customer service problems (as I hope true), or even a simple communication breakdown, nonetheless, the old saying "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" has not gone out of fashion....
vsacentral
1 posts
 
No one could be less sorry the original tweeter shipped didn't make it to it's final destination. A tweeter was in fact shipped. I regretfully did not follow up with an email to confirm receiving the tweeter. My fault. A second tweeter was shipped next day once I was made aware of the situation. Michael has received it. My first correspondence with Mr Francis was concerning a VR 3 upgrade. On Oct 28 I recieved an inquiry about a replacement tweeter. I replied on Nov 1. A tweeter was subsequently shipped shortly after that communication. On Nov 16 Michael requested a status for the tweeter. Our FedEx records showed it was shipped.
With a number of our clients emailing me of Michael's posting of his displeasure, a second unit was sent next day air. We at VSA strive to give personable service at every opportunity. This situation unfortunately arises when dealing with the services of parcel carriers. It is going to happen repeatedly. Once it does you can only hope to rectify the situation, and hope in time all will be forgiven. I would like to humbly apologize to Michael for the distress we caused.
Paul Garner
National Sales
Von Schweikert Audio
Post removed 
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