Real face of MK-V Customer support

[Alfeo Dixon SOC]

Tomas,

 

Sorry about your dealings, but you mentioned your purchase was with a bank loan... was this a business loan from your bank and was your equipment partial collateral? Check with your bank and see if they can get involved, after all, they partially own the faulty gear which the manufacture will not make good on. They have deeper pockets and fatter lawyers.

 

-Alfeo

[Tomas Riuka]

That was a business loan, but they're not really interested in that. As a collateral i had to give them real estate, they wouldn't take the equipment as they don't understand a think about it..

[Alfeo Dixon SOC]

That was a business loan, but they're not really interested in that. As a collateral i had to give them real estate, they wouldn't take the equipment as they don't understand a think about it..

Right, your real estate is to make sure you are making good on your loan. I'm not telling you to turn over your gear to the bank. I would explain to your banker the problem of the manufacture not making good on their product or warranty. The bank is not in the business to purchase faulty equipment and should have some legal recourse in the purchase as long as you are making good on your commitment to them.

[Ants Martin Vahur]

Ouch!

 

That is really bad story!

 

Thanks for posting it though, Tomas! One potential new rig for me for the future is now definitely out of the equation.

I knew about their poor customer service and not sometimes malfunctioning equipment before, but your story puts it below any acceptable line.

 

Funnily enough- the problem you scarcely mentioned about the gimbal that sled is going out of the balance at 180 degree angle- I heard exactly the same thing about MK-V-s gimbal from a fellow operator in 2003- yes, that was 8 years ago!

So if they still haven't fixed that problem, you shouldn't wait for the SDI signal problem fixed probably with the V4 either.

 

As Mike said- whatever is the problem, they should never go this low and start yelling at the customer!

And Mr. Howard (hm.. this H looks a bit like a C..) should face the problem and deal with customers, who have this problem, directly and personally, and not have a figurehead, to avoid the problems.

It is even sadder because Howard used to be or still is a operator himself.

 

That said, I'll probably upgrade my Master Series little bit, and maybe in few years- new(er) Steadicam or PRO. Happy so far, and thankful to the Decimators and other cool inventions that help keeping my old rig up to date.

 

Best of luck you, Tomas!

Hope you come out of it alive.

Ants Martin Vahur from Estonia

[Andrew Ansnick]

That said, I'll probably upgrade my Master Series little bit, and maybe in few years- new(er) Steadicam or PRO. Happy so far, and thankful to the Decimators and other cool inventions that help keeping my old rig up to date.

 

Here here! My Master Series Elite sled has treated me well for the last two years, my first big rig. I can't speak more highly of Tiffen's customer service, for that fact alone they have a customer for life! Well, at least as long as they keep Dan and Michael around here in L.A. anyways :D That being said, I'm truly sorry to hear of the problems you're having Tomas with your MK-V and I hope that you get the issues resolved quickly and to your satisfaction!

[Eric Fletcher S.O.C.]

Tomas, as requested I have reopened this topic. I'm sorry that you had to go thru this experience with Howard and MK-V and unfortunately what you have experienced is their standard operating procedure. I have literally hundreds of emails and private messages from other operators that have gone through the same experiences.

 

I'm just glad that you have decided to show the world what the true face of MK-V is.

 

If I'm near you or you are here in LA drinks are on me

[Tomas Riuka]

Okay... so the story kind of ended, feel like i should let all possible MK-V clients know what they are dealing with.

 

At the moment phone call link is dead, i will reupload the phone conversation once again. So that everyone know, the call has been recorder in Lithuanian territory, under our laws it is legal to do that except the situations if would use the phone call to insult or humiliate, which i don't, naturally.

 

Here is the link to a phone call: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ53jbkvVWU

 

 

 

[Tomas Riuka]

Cool Eric, if i'm anywhere near US, i will call you :D

 

As for what concerns MK-V support, it's non existant and i'm not the one to be fooled, like the did with others. So i'm gonna be the one to let everyone know. God knows, i didn't want that fight.

[Rob Vuona SOC]

To my knowledge the XCS sled is the only one with HD coax in the post.

 

My new Phantom-V Steadicam does . . .

 

Now you know of two . . .

[JobScholtze]

And my mk/v rig das, makes it 3. BUT make sure to visit betz first. I just finished a concert on hd with the wireless thompson. And for the first time i didnt have power issues, nor hd issues. It is the best investment i have made after my xcs gimbal. Christian is able to fix this, and boy he did. I will post pics soon with the rebuild and there you will see the difference. Board is out, small wires are gone and proper hd is installed. sorry for you tomas that it ended for you this way, perhaps i can help you with a decimator untill you have the funds to go and see betz.

 

I just want to tell existing v3 owners that there is a solution, at least for me. Got a killer rig now.

 

Best

[Tomas Riuka]

So well, people have noticed that this thread has been gone for a few days, i will get to that later.

 

Right now, as the story somehow ended (at least partially), i want to tell more background about all of this. It was only this february that i bought MK-V sled. I was new to big rigs (and still am), but somehow i really like MK-V from the very first time i saw it in pictures. Then the famous alien revolution. With AR in mind for the future and real life touching MK-V Nexus, i decided to go with it. I liked the rig, all seemed great.

 

I have to tell, that living in a small country, big rigs priced at 60-70k $ is extremely expensive to anyone living in my country. I would say for us it is the same as for the average american would be to pay 200 000$ for it, so naturally, every dollar i was going to spend, had gold price.

 

It was strange a little, that i could find alot of comments on this forum about PRO, Tiffen, XCS, products, service etc, but Mk-v was almost non existant. That didn't make sense, but hey.. i'm not the guy who would think bad from the very beginning. You could find one or another thread, question, but somewhat all the answers were tight lipped. That makes sense now for me, it will for you, but later...

 

communication with mk-v was awesome. Before buying the rig me and Rachael exchanged probably around 300 emails in half a year discussing which rig is more suitable for me, asking all the details, trying to deal a price etc. I would get answers almost live as on chat, though hardly any from Howard even if i send directly to him. It is interesting to note now, that publicly on mk-v.com you can always see "Email us" ... if you do - you rarely get an answer if you ask something that does not hint a sale. I'm sure A NUMBER of people can confirm that, i had been confirmed this by a few operators already. If you don't plan on spending huge money, don't talk to mk-v, they're not interested.

 

So as is said, communication was extremely fast, Rachael was friendly. I have met Rachael on CINEC show in Germany, all seemed fine, so somehow i was thinking that even if Howard is bad at communication, there's always Rachael to help me out. I was wrong. First suspision was raised even before getting my rig. It was somewhat december when i put my order and before paying money, i was promised to deliver the rig as soon as possible. It was maybe two weeks before christmas, they didn't deny i might get that before that, at least they would try. After paying, immediately i was quoted that delivery terms are 4 weeks from payment. Ouch... Ok, after 4 weeks i didn't get anything. It was snowing in US and i would never get a date as, so i called Rachael trying to find out when finally that happens... Guess what, i got shouted at why am i calling, why am i writing etc. Sorry, i just want to get my stuff and wanna know when it's gonna happen. Then i was quoted the date and my rig was shipped i think pretty much two months after the payment. '

 

We skip now to the current situation, when i started having problems...

 

Before posting anyting on forum, of course i tried to solve that directly with MK-V. I would get answers with total denial - the problem does not exist, seemed like i'm the only one complaining and i don't know what i'm talking about. After a bunch of useless emails i decided to go public, cause it's the only way to get attention. Guess what, it did work.

 

when i posted the thread, I got email from Howard immediately, he seemed angry of course. we exchanged a number of emails and he said he would ship me a replacement rig and solve all the problems, but i would have to remove the thread from forum. I asked a few times whether he is refusing to service me until the thread is removed (know that some poeple already went through that!), he didn't answer, because of course, he couldn't, i could sue him for that, despite what i do online, post or don't find feelings towards MK-V, all i did - shared my experiences and he is OBLIGED to service the rig. So i knew and understood that he simple pushed me into the corner - remove the thread or i will not help you, it's blackmailing, isn't it? I could go to court with that i think...

 

He kept silence not wanting to say directly 'yes'. I decided to pull the plug and ask Eric to hide the post (hide, not delete, i felt this is gonna fell through and i will not get anything as no one else did). So when i noticed him about thread removal, he said he would ship me new electronics and a gimbal a week later and asked whether it is true that phone call recording was posted online. Seems like he didn't read all that and didn't see the link. When he heard that it was posted online, i got quite an angry email , generally saying how can i do that. Next emai stated strongly that i should write written apology to MK-v and Rachael and only then they would think of servicing me or doing anything at all, if Racahel agrees to that. Of course, that was over the line. I didn't find myself doing something wrong, so i refused to do that.

 

I have to add, that even after this i kept it all quiet inside me and even asked mk-v to keep it in a correct manner and get on the phone one time , talk this over and solve the problems. I would not get any answer. Just to notice, all my emails and communication was ethical and in a very correct manner.

 

After my refusal, i didn't get any reply, so i sent an email trying to find out what's going on and if they are ignoring me, and i got a very surprising answer. Instead of trying to solve any problems, i was offered a refund, because i bacame unwanted client for the company.

 

That's interesting. Now i try to understand why this happened and come to these conclusions:

1. I bacame a hard pain to deal with. I'm sure mk-v knows that a number of operators are having issues with HD-SDi and huge power loss, but most likely there is no solution for that. In 3 years it wasn't fixed, so sending me new set of electronics - wouldn't have changed nothing and i would still be demanding to do that. So they would kind of be in situation without no way out.

2. I already knew too much - with the help of this forum members, i got to know a lot of things, so then again, knowing how these problems were 'dealt' before, is not very suitable for them.

 

I decided not to send the rig. Why?

1. i don't trust mk-v and i'm not sure if i would get money back and when that would happen.

2. I don't have money to buy second rig to replace shipped rig while waiting for money (and then again risk)

3. I have jobs already confirmed for the next two months, so i can't afford loosing money.

4. The rig itself is nice and Betz tools is a fantastic company which can fix all Mk-V electronic issues, after that it will be perfect for years to come.

 

After this all story, it all makes sense why there is no comments about mkv rigs on the forum - because you cannot complaing anything, otherwise you are being blackmailed of not getting service, and if you're afraid of that... you will ask moderators to remove the thread. Honestly, i didn't expect electronics problem to be fixed, all i wanted was at least to replace the gimbal, but well.. gimbal can be fixed too :D

 

Now it makes sense, that all mk-v owners are so tigh lipped about customer service. I talked with a few before purchase, asked how is customer service at mk-v they would say something like 'oh, it's ok', but well, in reality now you can understand that it's not what they think. It's what people been forced to say. Despite total denial, everyone knows that there a number of people who are having problems like me (hd-sdi, power) and mk-v is refusing to fix them. If you experience the same, don't be afraid - post here, because most likely there is going to be no service from Mk-v anyway..

 

What i can't understand is when you're a company owner, you should care about your clients but not scare them. Know for 2-3 years that there is a problem, why not just solve it for once and it's over and everybody is happy? Why someone can fix it, but Mk-v wont? Mk-v is holding a side of complete denial. why? Because if they aknowledged the issue , they would have to fix that for EVERYONE! and that would be costly! But you can't be serious trying to shut everybody down, one time it will get out. The time is now.

 

No doubts Mk-v will release v4 of their electronics which would 'solve' all the issues (maybe it will in reality, who knows), but i'm sure it will not be a free upgrade for anyone as there never were any problems with v3+! as there nevere were with v2, v3 (it's not my experience, but direct info from owners or people who fix that).

 

By telling all this I hope that future rig buyers will learn from my mistakes and make better decisions. I'm sure i would be getting very soon various threatening emails, but sorry, it is probably the only company i faced nowadays, who is total freakish about controlling what people say. We are free to express our opinion, share our experiences and you cannot forbid that by threatening or blackmailing. Focus should be switched to product quality and proper customer support first instead of censoring people by blackmailing them. When you get service like PRO GPI does, you would never say any word except praise... and calling client 'insane' ???

 

And btw, only when i got into this 'fight' i read the old thread about 'alien revolution'... i wish i read that before buying Mk-V. Howard may blame everyone not know how it is in real life, but things happen for a purpose - rumours aren't going to start out of nowhere, it's not like out of nowhere everyone somewhy keeps interpreting things in a bad way etc...

 

 

What i am happy about is that this 'saga' brought me contacts and steadicamforum.com community support, for which i'm very thankful. I can feel calm that there will always be would service my equipment or help when in trouble, appreciate that very much. Honestly. Thank you guys (and not only! :) )

p.s. Anyone want to present me a new sled? :)

[James Davis]

To my knowledge the XCS sled is the only one with HD coax in the post.

 

My new Phantom-V Steadicam does . . .

 

Now you know of two . . .

 

and my Steadicam Archer....Which now has the expensive connector removed and replaced with a HD-SDI connector so I can use BNC's with that connection too :=)

 

Happy days!

[James Davis]

In all seriousness though, I am very sorry to hear of your situation, and I really hope one way or another, you end up with a working fully functioning sled, i'm sure from what i've heard on here and from the guys at optical support you won't go wrong with Betz tools either, looks like they did great work on Job's sled, I was pretty shocked when I saw the original internals!

 

Technical issues aside....maybe they should send their staff on a customer service course, I hear these guys are good:

 

http://www.welcometoexcellence.co.uk/

[Tomas Riuka]

Hey James,

 

well the sled is working, it's not like you can't work with it :) it's just it's not working as supposed to! But it's only a matter of time before i send it to Betz.

 

What concerns MK-V, i doubt that something will change unless Howard will step down and somebody else will take over. The must understand that scaring and blackmailing people not to talk about their mk-v problems publicly - is not the way to do it. You have to solve problems, but not try to hide them. I could compare that to Bernard Madoff afair, when something goes wrong, it's all out in public, so that happened with me.

 

I wish they learned something, but doubt that's gonna happen seeing how they act.

[Jeff Muhlstock SOC]

When you hook the monitor up directly to the camera without going through the sled, then key the radio does it do the same thing? I was having problems at one time and it turned out to be the monitor oddly enough. My service from MK-V has always been spot on.

 

JA

 

Hey John, do you have the 2 stage post, 4 stage post, 1.5 or 2"? Im going to guess 2", 2 stage? The shorter length of the post cable probably makes the difference.

 

BTW, I suffer from the same RF issue and I still wait for a solution.