Better Business Bureau Response

You are wrong. If you use a debit card AS a credit card you get the full benifits of the credit card pertection. That is why Visa or whoever gets to put their name on the card. They have to guarantee that the transaction will work.

Now if you go to the store and use it as a debit, put in your PIN then you just get the guarantee of what a check carries.

 

I haven't filed a formal complaint. I don't think he has done anything legally wrong. I haven't gotten my video input either.

What I don't like is that they continue to advertise these products and accept orders for things that don't exist. Come-on. It's been about a year now with no product. Just take it off the website so other business are not hurt by people waiting to buy his.

That being said, I bought a video input to my MFD via G-NET Canada. Real products and support. If you want one, I have a dual video input for $349 plus $30 shipping and I have a factory backup camera too that I don't need.

Try G-NET or VAISTechnologies for products that exist or at least tell you so.

 

Is the poor service for all products, or just the electronic ones? I was interested in the 2" hitch.

/Jim

 

I think all products. It largely depends on if an item is in stock or not. If it is, you get it quick, if it's not, well, then you have problems. The problem mainly is lack of communications. Phone seems to work better than emails.

 

I got my EV mod and hitch rather quickly. The Nav/BT is still pending.

 

Generally, people have been happy with their mechanical mods. It's really just the NAV mod, video input, and iPod stuff that has never appeared. If you call them they just keep telling you its coming even though it has been about a year now.

Everything else seems to still get out.

I am happy with what I have bought from G-Net thus far and people seem happy with the VAIS technology stuff.

 

[/quote]

The NAV mod has been shipping, although I don't know how many. I received mine on the 23rd and installed it that night. It does what was promised, and it's interesting to watch it work.

 

I ordered the XM radio from Coastal Electronics and received it in 7 days. The hardest part of the install was getting the cable plugged into the back of the OEM radio. Easy to follow directions, installed in about 90 minutes. The included gift card for a $55 credit was also nice. XM works great. No complaints here about Coastal Electronics.

 

well its obvious that ordering something they have is an excellent experience...but i think it has to do with what they advertise as having and what they are able to deliver. i have only ordered an EV switch and it arrived a week after i ordered it. just lucky i guess since it was one of the parts in short supply at the time so i have no complaints. but hearing about others on this site has pretty much convinced me that i no longer even look at what they have to offer.

 

My understanding is that they are beginning to ship the Nav mod, but not the combined Nav/BT mod, which I am pre-ordered for.

 

Despite all the negative feedback about Coastaltech, i decided to purchase the hitch from them (fair price, good fit).

I emailed them to check if it was in stock and Paula replied the same day (confirmed it was in stock). Next day it shipped! I guess i'm on the lucky PC users side this time.

 

Nav w/BT arrived, installed easily, works fine.

 

I ordered the NAV kit and the door lock kit off their website last spring. I never received any kind of order confirmation, and over the next several months I made several telephone inquiries, none of which were ever returned. In December they shipped the door lock kit and in January the NAV kit. I waited for the complete shipment so I could install both at the same time. I installed the NAV kit first, and it flat out did not work. I removed it, ran the car, shut down, re-installed it. It just didn't work. The kit was defective.

I called and emailed and got no response. After several weeks (and after searching on "Coastal" on this forum and reading what other people had to say) I sent them email advising that I was going to file a dispute with my credit card issuer. No response. So I opened the dispute and mailed their merchandise back to them. I received some forms from my bank, which I filled out along with printouts of the unanswered emails I'd sent.

I find it rather telling that in the 9 months my order with Coastal was open, they never made any attempt to respond to my inquiries or contact me. Dead silence. It wasn't until MY BANK contacted them informing them the charges had been reversed that they called me. Pretty shabby.

To Coastal's credit, once they did contact me, they offered to refund my money plus return shipping (five bucks, big deal but I appreciated the gesture). Still, it doesn't make up for the previous nine months. At this point I'm just happy to have had this chapter closed finally.

I certainly won't be buying anything from them in the future.

 

I am of the opinion that Dave is one of a very large number of entrepreneurs who have a good business idea (in this case, Prius gadgets) but lack the skills needed to run a business. Communication seems to be his big shortcoming.

My own experience was good, and only slightly flawed:

I ordered the EV kit. As I found out later, the kit was still in the testing phase of development. His web page did not say it was still being developed. It merely offered the kit for sale. My order was accepted and acknowledged, with no indication of the actual state of affairs. I think I was told it was backordered. This implies a manufacturing delay, not a development delay.

I forget how long I waited. They did answer my emails, and I think I might have phoned once.

They did not charge my card until the kit shipped, and they gave me free shipping to compensate for the delay. The kit worked perfectly.

It was only after reading some reports, written earlier, about undesirable quirks in the EV (quirks which my unit did NOT display!) that I pieced it all together and realized that the mod had still been in beta testing when I placed my order. They took those reports, fixed the quirks, built the final version, and I was actually the first person on Prius Chat to install their kit. (Not the first one with EV, since there were DIY mods available before that.)

I am 100% satisfied with the EV kit.

For a long time I wanted to be able to plug my iPod into the car, and for a couple of years, Dave was supposedly working on an audio and video input kit. It was listed on his site as "coming soon." It was very disappointing to be always waiting. By the time it finally came out (I think it's available now???) I had changed my mind.

It's not true that "anyone can become an entrepreneur" and make it big. Running a business requires skills apart from the specific needs of the particular industry. Dave seems to fall short in those skills. But if you can get a confirmation that an item is presently in stock, the quality of his works seems to be excellent.

 

My experience supports this description. I wonder what goes through the mind of Dave and Kelley at Coastal to have such a wide ranging set of reactions from customers. Certainly they must know how unhappy some are. And yet they seem not to change their ways. I guess dealing with them is like riding a trottiing horse. Until you learn to rise with the trot it is a very rough and bouncy thing to do. Many of us give up first.

I am one of those who have had a good experience with Coastal and will try again.

 

I tried to reach out to Dave et al back in December, and got
completely blown off. What I really think should happen at this
point is that the people who have bought and received his widgets
begin contributing what they can to a massive reverse-engineering
effort, document everything about how said widgets work, and turn
that into instructions on how to build one's own equivalents. For
example, since Dave's braking-force monitor wasn't anywhere near
seeing the light of day, I constructed my own, and documented the
whole process for anyone who wants to duplicate it. Granted, what
I've done requires a little electronics savvy and isn't exactly
packaged up for high-volume sales, which is why I wouldn't even
consider trying to run a business producing such things, but anything
I can do to support Prius tinkerers is something I'll be glad to
contribute to the community and help people take an end run around
Dave in the process.
.
_H*

 

That's what you get for thinking. The Viewtech STILL isn't out yet even though Dave "updated" his website to reflect that it would be - FINALLY - as soon as he and Kelley were settled down after having been blessed with a new daughter. Of course that was in early February and it's now days away from April - par for the course. The only thing new IS his daughter.

Thankfully I've found other ways to compensate for his lack of product. No more money from me to Dave that's for sure unless he signs a contract stating he'll use it for acquiring a degrees in business AND communication.

You mentioned "reaching out to Dave", you do know his nickname is PIRANHUA.

 

I guess I've been lucky. I've orederd the XM sat. radio and a set of mud flaps (two different orders). They even shipped on Saturday for me.

I've had good luck and OK email response.

 

While I have never done business with Coastal Electronics personally, I have had success with Sigma Automotive. They carry a variety of aftermarket and imported OEM parts from Toyota of Canada and Japan. As I understand it they import the parts and resell them. They have preset "order dates" on their site. I placed mine a day before their "group" order and received all of my shipment within 4 weeks (Mud flaps from Canada, Organizer Coin Tray & Head rest hooks from Japan). They communicated with me promptly (within hours of my emails) and sent everything well before their quoted deadline. I was quite happy with their service and would do business with them in the future.

Sigma Automotive: http://www.sigmaautomotive.com/jdm/prius/prius0405.php

 

I have ordered several items from Dave by phone and have not had problems. I ask about availability and they have been honest with me. My most recent purchase was the backup camera and I was very pleased with that. I was ready to modify it (after reading just the OEM instructions) then discovered Dave had already done that. Aimed the camera and modified the wiring harness so all you had to do is put it on. Next time I read everything first. Bottom line they make things I want not that I need.