Thanks for your considered reply, I am not luckily, of a sensitive nature, and my philosophy is robust enough to handle your suggestion, thanks for bringing my unintentional punctuation errors to my attention. I hope it did not detract too much from the opinion I was trying to convey. :)
 
tacr2man said:
Thanks for your considered reply, I am not luckily, of a sensitive nature, and my philosophy is robust enough to handle your suggestion, thanks for bringing my unintentional punctuation errors to my attention. I hope it did not detract too much from the opinion I was trying to convey. :)
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What a shame, you are missing out on so many good things in life as sensitivity helps you to apreciate so many of the "arts." :) Just my humble opinion, but one which is voiced by many great people and thinkers alike.

Nope it didn't, and as my philosophy dictates, everyone is entitled to their opinion, I thank you in turn for sharing your's with us.

Now as I said in my previous post, rant over, topic done to death and oil on it's way from elsewhere (with the added bonus of free carriage as I bought a couple of bulbs as well.) :)
 
From Luton to Perth: TNT may not have an available route. They will probably get it to Heathrow and ship north, or probably by looking at the price ship to Liege in Belguim where their Euro hub is, then ship out with a large batch up north. Luton to N.Ireland is via the Euro hub too. £30 is about right for what we pay at work. Also if your destination is none commercial estate then they may charge more. Liquids and batteries etc they won't like.
 
Hippo said:
From Luton to Perth: TNT may not have an available route. They will probably get it to Heathrow and ship north, or probably by looking at the price ship to Liege in Belguim where their Euro hub is, then ship out with a large batch up north. Luton to N.Ireland is via the Euro hub too. £30 is about right for what we pay at work. Also if your destination is none commercial estate then they may charge more. Liquids and batteries etc they won't like.
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Yeah but if an Ebayer can send double the weight/volume for £5.95 from further south than Ashcrofts and LRDirect can do same extra weight/volume for £4.50 I still consider £35 to be a bit steep. But it's all water under the bridge, or oil on troubled waters, as my 5ltrs (slightly cheaper per litre as well) and some headlight bulbs are now on their way from LRDirect with free carriage as an added bonus. So I'm a happy chappie with LRDirect and my only other contact with them was a pleasant experience over the phone. I know who's customer service I prefer.

Also, TNT have a depot about 50 miles south of me in Edinburgh or one 65 miles north of me in Aberdeen. I see their vans regularly in my workplace which is less than 5 miles from my home, so I'm on their route.
 
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Clanforbes said:
I disagree James, shipping charges to the far north can be horrendous, even worse to the island etc., but I'm only just in the highlands, Perth is the gateway, I'm 50 miles north of Edinburgh, and every major carrier company has a depot within 15 or 16 miles from me ... I know, I used to drive for Tuffnells.
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i can only go on what im charged ,it used to be just far north etc but its more expensive over greater parts now
 
In Scotland and Ireland most large couriers will subcontract locally to reduce costs. Local agent finishing off the job from several main couriers. Cheaper this way.
 
i use anc /fedex i did queery but local depot didnt really know ,whether there rounds are bigger more miles per parcel compared to further south or whether they can get away with it
 
Valid point about delivery charges, a couple of years back bought a book for my wife for her studies from a large internet book store, book cost £95 delivery charge £55, had to pay it as we couldn't get the book elsewhere being a specialist book, it was delivered 8 days later by the postie, NOT parcel force, the postie with £7.50 stamps on it, a few weeks later we ordered a complete shower unit from screwfix for £215 with free delivery, this was delivered by courier who had drove up from Mansfield to deliver it and it took two of them to carry it, he had 6 other deliveries to do in the north of Scotland, do the math, only one of them ripped us off the other one has never been used again for anything. we have regular mail flights into the airport and we have courier depots here in Inverness we are a city like all the others in the UK just a bit further north, the extra fuel cost an artic would incur getting up here as opposed to Glasgow or Edinburgh would be about £0.10 an item.

Lewi
 
Hippo said:
In Scotland and Ireland most large couriers will subcontract locally to reduce costs. Local agent finishing off the job from several main couriers. Cheaper this way.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is fairly standard practice for some companies, including the one I used to work for, they will farm out the more remote areas (basically anything much further north than Pitlochry on the A9 and up past Inverness to Thurso. Much more so on the west coast where most will farm out the deliveries for the islands and just about anything further north than Kyle of Lochalsh. The east coast however, is pretty much all kept to themselves as this takes in Perth, Dundee, Aberdeen, Peterhead and Fraserburgh, as well as the Kingdom of Fife, where the cut-off point between the east coast (Aberdeen) and Inverness is I cannot say, I know Tuffnells did quite a bit of it themselves, but not as far as Inverness when I worked for them (I believe they do it all themselves now.)

Me, I'm in the northern half of the central belt and well within the catchment areas of all the main carriers. It's just one of those facts of life, if you are lucky enough to live in such a beautiful area you have to expect to get ripped off by some, but I am happy as there are many, many people, dealers, online merchants who give us a fair deal as they value their customers.

The whole debate about this is totally out of the scope of my original critisim of Dave Ashcroft ... I felt that Mr. Ashcroft was out of order telling me there was "No Need To Be Rude", I hadn't been, ok, maybe he doesn't like constructive critisism, maybe he doesn't want to waste his time on a small initial order, maybe 1001 other reasons behind it, but I know I wasn't being rude. If he mis-construed my email as being rude for whatever reason, it's his loss, not mine. I don't need his services that much, but he DOES need his customers, old and new, but if he can't be bothered to try and give his customers a better deal then, again, his loss as I feel sure people won't use his services if they have friendlier and more cost effective alternatives.
 
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Lewilander said:
Valid point about delivery charges, a couple of years back bought a book for my wife for her studies from a large internet book store, book cost £95 delivery charge £55, had to pay it as we couldn't get the book elsewhere being a specialist book, it was delivered 8 days later by the postie, NOT parcel force, the postie with £7.50 stamps on it, a few weeks later we ordered a complete shower unit from screwfix for £215 with free delivery, this was delivered by courier who had drove up from Mansfield to deliver it and it took two of them to carry it, he had 6 other deliveries to do in the north of Scotland, do the math, only one of them ripped us off the other one has never been used again for anything. we have regular mail flights into the airport and we have courier depots here in Inverness we are a city like all the others in the UK just a bit further north, the extra fuel cost an artic would incur getting up here as opposed to Glasgow or Edinburgh would be about £0.10 an item.

Lewi
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Lewi, I drive the A9 in an artic regularly and the MPG for fuel is better than most Scottish roads because we have an open road with very, very few changes to speed etc., which wastes fuel, and a lower speed limit (though few of us drive to that as it's more of a hazard than keeping up with the traffic.)

As I said, I live in a bonnie part of the world and am happy to pay my way, but I don't like to be ripped off and I like it even less when I am told I am rude when I was trying to be helpful ... I truly had intended replacing the diffs on my fender this summer and I even had a few posts on the subject a month or so ago. That would have been about £1,000 of my hard earned cash going to someone with an attitude towards his customers that, quite frankly, I didn't like the sound of, and I am glad I found this out before committing myself to a much bigger deal than a few pints of oil.
 
Clanforbes said:
As I said, I live in a bonnie part of the world and am happy to pay my way, but I don't like to be ripped off and I like it even less when I am told I am rude when I was trying to be helpful ... I truly had intended replacing the diffs on my fender this summer and I even had a few posts on the subject a month or so ago. That would have been about £1,000 of my hard earned cash going to someone with an attitude towards his customers that, quite frankly, I didn't like the sound of, and I am glad I found this out before committing myself to a much bigger deal than a few pints of oil.
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Again I agree, your message to them come across to me as fairly relaxed? your comment " I dont think I'll be ordering much from Ashcroft's" I dont think is rude, or as has been suggested, aggresive, but a comment I myself would make, indeed I dont think that I would have kept it as polite! his explanation is valid but if it were me replying to you I dont think I would be saying that you are rude that is a customer service cock up if ever there was one not on the Gerald Ratner scale but a cock up nonetheless but at the end of the day it's his loss your money in his turnover would not be much but others will maybe be put off now and it all adds up. good customer service costs next to nothing but can make you a lot of profit!

Lewi
 
To be honest, I was trying to be theatrically humourous ... you know in the vein of "I don't beeeeeleeeeeve it" hence the "You GOT to be kidding me (or whatever it was)"

I did reply to him asking where he thought I'd been rude (intending to apologise) but he showed true to his standards and ignored my reply.

All I can say is I am glad I didn't do business with him, can you imagine what it would be like if there had been a problem?

Nah, Ashcrofts isn't for me, I know a lot of people did recommend them on here, and they maybe had happier dealings with him, I cannot say, yeah, maybe I am a bit old fashioned in believing that the customer should come first, yeah maybe it is a completely different world up here as compared to down there, but what the hell, I'll get by.
 
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With everyone tightening their belts, first impressions mean everything. I'd bet that if it was one of his employees who'd said that, he'd be horrified.

It's not like he's the only parts supplier in the world...
 
Costlyy said:
With everyone tightening their belts, first impressions mean everything. I'd bet that if it was one of his employees who'd said that, he'd be horrified.

It's not like he's the only parts supplier in the world...
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Thank you, what I was trying to say in a nutshell :)
 
I agree on the Aschcrofts shipping charges. They are outrageous. I live in Denmark and once I've got a new diff shipped in at £90! And a locker at £70! As a comparison .. Paddock shipped four new tires/rims around £50or60 .. I will hesitate using Aschcroft again ..

Lars
 
If you don't like their shipping costs, arrange your own courier. I'm sure they wouldn't have a problem with that as they say they're not making any money on shipping anyway. :)
 
'91 Defender said:
If you don't like their shipping costs, arrange your own courier. I'm sure they wouldn't have a problem with that as they say they're not making any money on shipping anyway. :)
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For me the initial surprise at the shipping costs was what triggered my response, but it was my criticism of Dave Ashcroft's reply to my initial response that made me start this thread. The discussion that has arisen re. the charges is incidental to my original intent, but none-the-less quite informative.

However, I would suggest that, since a few others have agreed that they felt they had been overcharged then it might make it worthwhile looking into other carriers for your smaller items.... Also, Dave, since a few others have agreed I was harsh, then if you, or anyone from Ashcroft's who might be in a position to comment, happen to come across this thread I would be happy to apologise to you publicly on this forum if you can point out why, or where, I offended you personally to the extent that warranted your initial response?

Yes, the comments I raised during my original re-action and email may have been taken as a bit blunt, or abrupt (and I assure you that I did mean them to be theatrically humourous in a similar vein to Victor Meldrew,) but I still stand by what I tried to imply ... I think £35 to ship 2ltrs of oil to the central belt of mainland Scotland is extremely expensive (cost of oil from Ashcrofts is about £18) when compared to the shipping charges levied by some of your competitors (£5.95 Ebay seller or £4.50 Paddocks and both of them for 5ltrs of oil which would be of a higher weight and/or volume.)
 
why are so many people so negative about poor old victor.meldrew..... most of what he said and did made perfect sense to me......



reckon the missus is a fan cos she occasionally refers to me as victor....
 
****er really cos a forum member is down viviting in their car and I'm 5 mins from Ashcroft they are heading back up to the the Caithness..
 
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