• You must be a Supporting Member to participate in the Candle Power Forums Marketplace.

    You can become a Supporting Member.

Jeers to Surefire

Mr. LED

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
721
Location
Canada
What a crappy customer service! I have been trying to get replacement tailcaps for two defective ones I have and nothing happens. Today, after calling for the third time, they wanted to charge me for the tailcaps, when they're clearly defective and not misused. And I was bombarded with questions like when and where I bought them.

I know a thousand of you guys will come here to vouch for their perfect no questions asked customer service, but that's not what I'm experiencing. Even Chinese manufacturers are much better at this.

I may sell my collection and buy another brand. They won't see my money ever again.
 

griff

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Mar 22, 2007
Messages
1,917
Location
Kansas
Patience is a virtue..... next time you call ask for a supervisor. They ask Questions to track their products . Never had a problem est.2004 !
 

archimedes

Flashaholic
Joined
Nov 12, 2010
Messages
15,780
Location
CONUS, top left
Responding as to my personal experience, not as a mod here ...

I have had multiple interactions with SF over perhaps 8-10 years.

In general, best results are found with courteous requests by phone

Response to eMail, in my experience (and many others here) has been more variable

Did you call, eMail, or both?

The first few times I needed CS assistance, parts replacement was very generous, although not particularly speedy (no complaints from me, but just an observation, as I have plenty of backup flashlights ;) ... )

I did, of course, pay for shipping fees (as expected, and as would be reasonable)

The most recent time, maybe a year or two ago, was a little bit more involved in terms of questions and details, but fully satisfactory to me.

One issue that may have some bearing on this was their (now discontinued, I believe) "rapid replacement parts program"

SureFire had a streamlined process for "no questions asked" replacement of certain parts, notably tailcaps.

After this got widely publicized, many "new-in-package" parts (mostly tailcaps and bezels) started showing up rather regularly on auction sales sites :(

I am guessing that may be why that no longer exists, and perhaps why these particular parts requests are now scrutinized more carefully ? :thinking: :shrug:

Finally, I know that SF has certain limitations as regards international issues, and I am wondering if any of those may have played a role in your situation.

Given your upset with being questioned by SF, I am hesitant to ask, but if you wouldn't mind sharing relevant details here, it would be useful to know the following ...

• Are you the original purchaser of these new ? Direct from SF, or via distributor ? US, or international ?

• Did you eMail, call, or both ?

• What failed, and how ? Particularly if this happened in multiple similar parts, at the same time, I would imagine that QA / QC would be very interested in those details.

Sorry to hear that you had difficulties with this, as my experiences with them have been reasonably smooth overall.
 
Last edited:

Mr. LED

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
721
Location
Canada
Hi, yes I have called and emailed multiple times. In the emails I included serial numbers, pictures and videos of the defective tailcaps. One of them is flickering when used in momentary (when clicked it works OK) and the other's spring is extremely noisy and squeaky. Both purchased in USA, although I live in Germany.

I've always heard that customer service for international customers wasn't good, now I can see it myself. They just don't care.

I'm not upset by the questions, they're in their right to ask me these details. But how it was done, it was very strange, and they didn't say the tailcaps were defective, they said they were "damaged" insinuating I broke them and wanted to charge me.


:hahaha:

altermann's going shopping! :laughing:

LOL
 
Last edited:

archimedes

Flashaholic
Joined
Nov 12, 2010
Messages
15,780
Location
CONUS, top left
My point was that eMails, for whatever reason, tend not to be that effective with SF. This is well known on CPF.

Personal phone calls tend to be much better received and well handled there.

I am surprised that it took _multiple_ calls to get things sorted out for you (leaving aside any eMail contact) as that seems atypical in my experience.

They are also very firm on correcting only "functional" problems, and I wonder if they might consider a "squeaky" spring to not impair its function. I'm not debating that point with you, by the way, but simply trying to understand their possible perspective.
 
Last edited:

Mr. LED

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
721
Location
Canada
Yesterday they said it would be resolved, and I asked to have a confirmation by email, and didn't get it until now. Let's see what happens next.
 

Mr. LED

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
721
Location
Canada
They are also very firm on correcting only "functional" problems, and I wonder if they might consider a "squeaky" spring to not impair its function. I'm not debating that point with you, by the way, but simply trying to understand their possible perspective.

I understand this. But on the other hand, shouldn't a "tactical" light be silent? :D
 

bykfixer

Flashaholic
Joined
Aug 9, 2015
Messages
20,352
Location
Dust in the Wind
I always thought silent tactical lights were better too……until somebody posed the question "yeah but don't you give away your position when you turn on your light?" Hmmmm.
Can't argue with that.

Anyway hopefully you get straight with SureFire soon. Maybe I'm lucky because I've never had an issue with any SureFire product minus a Z59 tailcap that was DOA NIP, but a spring stretch got it working.
 

thermal guy

Flashaholic
Joined
Jan 28, 2007
Messages
9,981
Location
ny
Lol that might of been me. I remember going off on a thread here stating a silent switch was better for tactical situations. Pretty sure 1000 lumens would be more noticeable then a "click". Lol but that's not the topic here soooo
 

DayofReckoning

Enlightened
Joined
May 1, 2018
Messages
573
Location
USA
It's unfortunate the OP had their negative experience with Surefire. I had a few interactions with them the last few years, and everything went smoothly.

As a fan of the company and a 13 year user of their products, I will say this. The company, the products, the customer service, and their vision of future products? Yeah, the Surefire of today IS NOT the Surefire I knew when I was introduced them in 2007.
 
Joined
Jul 9, 2019
Messages
404
Location
SoCal
I bought open package G2X pro a month ago really good deal, later found led wasn't sit on center. I email to Surefire CS what is remedy to fix other than to return to seller. Surprisingly I got the reply in few days, and there were more surprise in the email. One statement, it said "That is perfectly normal and will not impact the performance of the light." from Tech Support Manager. No further explanations why. I sent second email, no return at all. I was really disappointed since it was simply against my knowledge which importance on position of LED in modern flashlight. Maybe G2X pro is cheaply mass produced, so it may not that critical as he said. But he should add some technical aspect in reply to his customer regarding on any products either cheap or expensive from his company logo and name on it which I been trust many many years. Here is the picture.
28VFSj4.jpg
 
Last edited:

Mr. LED

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
721
Location
Canada
And you're from California. Imagine how much they (don't) care for the foreign customers.
 

Latest posts

Top