Has anybody else paid for a pre-order via Bank Transfer and had no confirmation that the funds were received?
I placed an order for the CSL Elite bundle for PS4 on 19th May (EU, I'm based in the UK) and transferred 609EUR the same day as per their payment instruction email.
I had one email back from customer support that day saying that I would receive a confirmation when payment was recieved. No confirmation has been supplied.
Despite 3 subsequent emails to their team I have had no response. I'm not overly worried about the delivery date, I knew there was a backlog when placing an order. What annoys (and worries) me is that they have not confirmed that 609EUR has been recieved - this is incredibly unprofessional when dealing with such large sums of money (someone should be checking incoming payments and linking them to orders every day, it's now been 5 days!)
My order status is showing as 'In Process'. When I ordered the availability date was showing on the EU site as the 29th March - the bundle was updated on Friday to show as 'available' immediately. My order remains showing as 'In Process' but with an availability date of the 29th.
I can only assume that they haven't got anybody checking their account to allocate incoming bank transfers to orders!
If anybody from the Fantatec team is reading these messages please communicate with your customers, especially on critical issues such as confirming large payments have been received! I would appreciate an update ASAP!
If it's any help Christopher, I also ordered about the same time as you and my order also reads in "In Process" - I paid by paypal so hopefully yours is good.
I paid by PayPal on the 15th and got a confirmation of payment on the 16th. My order has been “in process” ever since. Hope your payment went through as well, Christopher. Getting a response from them will take some tome I’m sure
I hope so! With hindsight I would have used Paypal for the sake of protection. I went for a Bank Transfer as the currency FX rate was much better and I figured Fanatec were a reputable brand - hopefully they are and all will be well. I'll keep this thread updated with my progress. Good luck with your orders & getting some answers from customer services.
Reading some of these posts, I'm glad I used PayPal just in case. I would still like to hope that there is an explanation why this is happening over at Fanatec though.
I dont think anyone has had any issue getting a refund through any payment method. I haven't seen any posts even hinting at that. When I requested a refund, it came in 1 day to credit card.
I've not had a single issue. I've purchased V3 pedals and a CSW V2.5 within the past month and received both within a week. Not realizing the paddles on the Formula V2 that came with the base didn't have magnetic shifters, ordered the APM that same week and received it a few days later. Sorry you're having issues, but I can honestly say that I've not had a single bad experience. And my first Fanatec purchase was in late April. Thats because Thrustmaster issued me an RMA for a wheel base that was a month old and lost power, but wouldn't let me ship it yet because Canada is locked down. They wouldn't even give me an estimate or time frame. So, I'm done with Thrustmaster. And as long as Fanatec keeps supplying the service I've received so far I'll continue to be a customer.
I think there are a couple people who have requested a refund and are getting a message saying "Clarification Needed" and it hasn't processed the refund yet. I think I'm still going to wait it out and hope the date doesn't change from June 12th.
I'm extremely happy that you are a satisfied customer; and I honestly do not mean that to sound snarky or nasty at all. However, I'm sure you've read the plethora of comments on this thread and many others. I wish there were more satisfied customers right now. Clearly most people who are upset didn't receive their order on May 15th and first stated on the site, or even May 22nd, as stated thereafter. But when the date changed almost a month out to June 12th, I think that frustrated a lot of people. And I can't speak for everyone who hasn't received their order but common professional courtesy would dictate that someone should at least respond to the outcries on their own forum from disgruntled paying customers. Finally, if nothing else even an automated email, which wouldn't take more than 8 to 12 lines of code, would be appreciated.
Again, I am very glad that you have your order and are happily able to use the items that you've purchased. If most of us were able to do the same this thread wouldn't exist.
That's really good to know. I'm thinking of canceling my order for now as well. I'll wait until June 12th but if it doesn't ship by then I think I will cancel and re-order some other time.
we can all understand current situation and challenges it creates and that is something nobody is enjoying but we can live with it, real problem and source of the frustration is the poor communication, that is simply hard to stomach or excuse also it is completely unnecessary and damaging to the brand.
give people some sort of indication on expected dates, highlight that it is expectation and not firm date then people can make their own decisions what to do with their purchases. like myself I want dd2 but there is no stock in australia, if it is going to take months to get it I would purchase CS base v2.5 for now and then buy DD2 later on in the year but right now I got no idea what to do, possibly miss out on CS wheel base if I wait too long for DD2 and endup with no base at all for months.
It would cost you nothing to treat customers better in those high anxiety times by just communicating better and would be great for everyone including your reputation, don't forget you are nothing without customers.
Wanted to chime in and give you guys my experience as well since it seems I am unfortunately not alone.
Purchased a CSW v2.5, V3 Pedals and Formula V2 Rim on April 17th 2020. Everything was in stock minus the pedals which had an availability date of May 15th. Week passes and my order status changes to May 22nd. Friday rolls around and it again changes to June 12th. Not one form of communication presented.
We all just gave these people a huge interest free loan.
Have asked on a different topic but never got an asnwer. Why dont you guys order through a reseller if you find fanatec non responsive etc. Same prices as the fanatec website.
I don't see a problem with him cross posting this. It's not like people haven't been patient here. I do see a problem with Fanatec continuing to MARKET products that they can't supply. Those esport posts are marketing, the twitch donations... marketing. Twitter regularily updated.. Marketing. Marketing to increase sales and customers, yet they can't maintain the customers they currently have interest free loans from without so much as taking any measure to address these concerns. I'm sure none of this would be a big deal to people and they would understand production delays and supply chain issues during what we are experiencing worldwide right now, but the complete disrespect from a company as large as this is inexcusable.
It seems the marketing department is still functioning at normal capacity somehow while every other aspect of this company seems to be unreachable. Making this known in that channel now seems to be the only logical method of getting a response at this point.
I will start posting this on twitter on all related hashtags if we don't hear something soon. I will reach out to WRC as well.
Hijacking, in its purest definition, is an unlawful seizure. So let me explain who actually has been hijacked here. It's all the people, who have placed pre-orders under false pretenses advertised by Fanatec, whose funds are now, as multiple people have said, a huge interest-free loan to Fanatec. I'm sorry that you consider that spamming. I consider that attempting to get everyone who is having issues together into one massive post in the hopes that we can hear something back from someone at Fanatec.
In case you're actually curious, it didn't go so well. My refund says clarification needed and I haven't received it yet. Now I'm a reasonable man; I understand it's a long holiday weekend and I'm hoping to get my refund by the end of the week.
Thank you very much. I appreciate the backup. WRC is one channel that I didn't think of. If I had Twitter I would probably use that platform as well.
Fanatec, again I plead to someone there to just give us some sort of reliable communication. I can't speak for all of us, but most of us completely understand shipping delays in these times. What we are all having a problem with is the complete shutdown of communication with your customers. Your marketing department seems alive with event notifications and deliveries of influencers who are reviewing items just announced but your customer service department is silent with barely a heartbeat to respond to the flood of complains.
I'm glad Jon has been active across the forum bringing members who are having similar issues together. It's certainly been good to see that those of us with issues are not alone.
A small minority of disatisfied customers will find their way to this forum - I imagine many more are sitting at home thinking they're being ignored (note the forum sign up page for new members has been disabled...)
As per some of the posts above, the issue is not the delays, it's the complete lack of communication from Fanatec.
My payment has still not been confirmed (6 days after the transfer) and the order remains showing as potentially available 29th May (even though the same bundle is "ready to ship now'' on the website) - how many others are placing orders each day and joining the backlog?
I placed an order on May 13th. The wheelbase and pedals were in stock. The V2 rim was available june 5th. It now says June 12th on the website, but on my orders page it still says June 5th. Hopefully it will ship on June 5th, but all these comments here are making me worried. I hope we all get what we paid for.
I will try to keep you guys updated on what happens
I'm sorry you feel that way Paul, but it is difficult to answer questions about individual orders. This is not really something that should be discussed on the forum at all. There could be several reasons why certain orders have been delayed, rather than one general explanation. As a result, it is only the sales team that can provide that information to the customer.
There is a general explanation for the slow response of enquiries to the Fanatec website:
We are receiving an unprecedented number of orders at this time, and as a result, vastly more enquiries than usual. This is a result of sim racing taking centre stage in motorsport globally at the moment, meaning that our products are in extremely high demand. A niche-but-growing market suddenly became a much larger one, and it has had an impact on the sales team's ability to respond quickly. We are trying to adjust in all areas of the company, but it takes time to bring new staff up to speed on what is a complicated set of hardware products.
But this does not explain why one particular order had its availability adjusted more than once.
I think it's also important to understand that if an estimated date changes on the product page, it doesn't necessarily mean that the estimated date for an order in the queue is also affected by that date.
This matter will be discussed with the team and if I can provide a statement, I will.
In the meantime I ask everyone to be patient, the sales team will get to your questions.
First let me say, that I appreciate your response here on this thread especially after hours. I also appreciate your message to me and I will respond back to that separately.
You're absolutely correct Dom. This is not something that should be discussed in forums. However, when people have followed the appropriate channels and sent their questions only to be greeted with an automated email that says responses are taking up to 7 days and some waiting 8, 9, 10 up to 12 days and still not hearing anything back, you tell us where we are supposed to turn. Is it right that the grievances are being aired on a forum? Not at all. Is it right that Fanatec hasn't responded until now? Not at all. Except Fanatec has our funds and we have no answers. Most people here can agree; the shipping delays are not the issue. It's the total lack of communication. in times like these even an automated email would comfort most and keep the burden off of your customer service agents.
Unless I'm mistaken, reading threads on this forum it seems that the item with the most delays and date-changes has been the CSL Elite Bundle. For this item, it seems that a date change on the website does, in fact, mean a date change for orders already placed. Otherwise it would have at least shipped on May 22nd but it didn't with customers having to do the legwork and visit the website to find out the date was changed again.
With all due respect, even your closing sounds so flippant. "If I can provide a statement, I will". If? Really? If? How about trying something like this: "We already took your money so I WILL get an answer and make sure there is ongoing communication."
The order I messaged you about has already been canceled. So, like I stated in my response to your email, working in the IT / customer service industry, this is a matter of principle now. I hope that the lack of communication that is clearly visible between Fanatec and its customers is not the same lack of communication within your team.
Since my order has already been canceled and reading some other threads I have no reason to believe that refund will not be processed, I feel like I have no right from this point forward to comment here. Unless if something is addressed to me directly, this will be my last post.
I wish everyone who has pre-ordered, good luck. if you wish to message me for any reason, please send me a private message.
The worst part about this is they replied fairly quickly when I was having payment issue. After receiving my payment, they just didn't bother answering anymore.
I have no doubt you understand the frustration being vented on this post and others, it's not your fault but hopefully you can use your position to escalate the issue. It may be that the senior leaders at Fanatec/Endor are not aware of the discontent brewing!
I disagree that this topic should not be discussed on the forum. The point of this forum is for Fanatec customers to share their experiences - these can be positive & negative. The fact that this thread has more responses than any other thread in recent times speaks volumes - many of us aren't having a good experience at the moment.
None of us want to post on the forum for this reason, but as per Jon's last post, we feel we have no other option as our queries are unanswered via the website.
I am in a similar position to Sirawich - the only response I received from Fanatec was in relation to MAKING my payment (I had it within 30 minutes of asking the question). Since my money was sent I have had absolutely no response to my follow up emails. I am not asking for expedited shipping or even a delivery date, I just want to know that the money has been received and allocated to my order number. It's very stressful to think it could have easily been lost/missed in the Fanatec processes (especially when it's over 600EUR)
I would not be here if I had received a 1 liner email saying 'thanks, we have your money and will process your order once the product is available' - that's not an unreasonable ask at all.
Can this be arranged?
Chris
--
p.s. Jon, best of luck - appreciate your efforts in pulling these threads together.
Comments
I may use this as a case study for my lecture on risk and crisis management at a Canadian university this week
Please do... The more negative press that they have to deal with might actually result in a response, a resolution, or restitution.
Has anybody else paid for a pre-order via Bank Transfer and had no confirmation that the funds were received?
I placed an order for the CSL Elite bundle for PS4 on 19th May (EU, I'm based in the UK) and transferred 609EUR the same day as per their payment instruction email.
I had one email back from customer support that day saying that I would receive a confirmation when payment was recieved. No confirmation has been supplied.
Despite 3 subsequent emails to their team I have had no response. I'm not overly worried about the delivery date, I knew there was a backlog when placing an order. What annoys (and worries) me is that they have not confirmed that 609EUR has been recieved - this is incredibly unprofessional when dealing with such large sums of money (someone should be checking incoming payments and linking them to orders every day, it's now been 5 days!)
My order status is showing as 'In Process'. When I ordered the availability date was showing on the EU site as the 29th March - the bundle was updated on Friday to show as 'available' immediately. My order remains showing as 'In Process' but with an availability date of the 29th.
I can only assume that they haven't got anybody checking their account to allocate incoming bank transfers to orders!
If anybody from the Fantatec team is reading these messages please communicate with your customers, especially on critical issues such as confirming large payments have been received! I would appreciate an update ASAP!
If it's any help Christopher, I also ordered about the same time as you and my order also reads in "In Process" - I paid by paypal so hopefully yours is good.
I paid by PayPal on the 15th and got a confirmation of payment on the 16th. My order has been “in process” ever since. Hope your payment went through as well, Christopher. Getting a response from them will take some tome I’m sure
Thanks Tyler & Jeremy.
I hope so! With hindsight I would have used Paypal for the sake of protection. I went for a Bank Transfer as the currency FX rate was much better and I figured Fanatec were a reputable brand - hopefully they are and all will be well. I'll keep this thread updated with my progress. Good luck with your orders & getting some answers from customer services.
Reading some of these posts, I'm glad I used PayPal just in case. I would still like to hope that there is an explanation why this is happening over at Fanatec though.
I dont think anyone has had any issue getting a refund through any payment method. I haven't seen any posts even hinting at that. When I requested a refund, it came in 1 day to credit card.
I've not had a single issue. I've purchased V3 pedals and a CSW V2.5 within the past month and received both within a week. Not realizing the paddles on the Formula V2 that came with the base didn't have magnetic shifters, ordered the APM that same week and received it a few days later. Sorry you're having issues, but I can honestly say that I've not had a single bad experience. And my first Fanatec purchase was in late April. Thats because Thrustmaster issued me an RMA for a wheel base that was a month old and lost power, but wouldn't let me ship it yet because Canada is locked down. They wouldn't even give me an estimate or time frame. So, I'm done with Thrustmaster. And as long as Fanatec keeps supplying the service I've received so far I'll continue to be a customer.
I think there are a couple people who have requested a refund and are getting a message saying "Clarification Needed" and it hasn't processed the refund yet. I think I'm still going to wait it out and hope the date doesn't change from June 12th.
I'm extremely happy that you are a satisfied customer; and I honestly do not mean that to sound snarky or nasty at all. However, I'm sure you've read the plethora of comments on this thread and many others. I wish there were more satisfied customers right now. Clearly most people who are upset didn't receive their order on May 15th and first stated on the site, or even May 22nd, as stated thereafter. But when the date changed almost a month out to June 12th, I think that frustrated a lot of people. And I can't speak for everyone who hasn't received their order but common professional courtesy would dictate that someone should at least respond to the outcries on their own forum from disgruntled paying customers. Finally, if nothing else even an automated email, which wouldn't take more than 8 to 12 lines of code, would be appreciated.
Again, I am very glad that you have your order and are happily able to use the items that you've purchased. If most of us were able to do the same this thread wouldn't exist.
My refund said clarification needed, and I still got it in 1 business day.
That's really good to know. I'm thinking of canceling my order for now as well. I'll wait until June 12th but if it doesn't ship by then I think I will cancel and re-order some other time.
we can all understand current situation and challenges it creates and that is something nobody is enjoying but we can live with it, real problem and source of the frustration is the poor communication, that is simply hard to stomach or excuse also it is completely unnecessary and damaging to the brand.
give people some sort of indication on expected dates, highlight that it is expectation and not firm date then people can make their own decisions what to do with their purchases. like myself I want dd2 but there is no stock in australia, if it is going to take months to get it I would purchase CS base v2.5 for now and then buy DD2 later on in the year but right now I got no idea what to do, possibly miss out on CS wheel base if I wait too long for DD2 and endup with no base at all for months.
It would cost you nothing to treat customers better in those high anxiety times by just communicating better and would be great for everyone including your reputation, don't forget you are nothing without customers.
Wanted to chime in and give you guys my experience as well since it seems I am unfortunately not alone.
Purchased a CSW v2.5, V3 Pedals and Formula V2 Rim on April 17th 2020. Everything was in stock minus the pedals which had an availability date of May 15th. Week passes and my order status changes to May 22nd. Friday rolls around and it again changes to June 12th. Not one form of communication presented.
We all just gave these people a huge interest free loan.
Hi mate,
Have asked on a different topic but never got an asnwer. Why dont you guys order through a reseller if you find fanatec non responsive etc. Same prices as the fanatec website.
Anyway. For example and in stock.
https://digital-motorsports.com/products/fanatec-podium-f1-direct-drive-racing-wheel
The lads there are very helpful.
Yeah. We have noticed, together with all the other gazillion threads that you highjacked and spammed with the same post.
Thought you were gonna ask for a refund by 22nd midnight. How did that go?
I don't see a problem with him cross posting this. It's not like people haven't been patient here. I do see a problem with Fanatec continuing to MARKET products that they can't supply. Those esport posts are marketing, the twitch donations... marketing. Twitter regularily updated.. Marketing. Marketing to increase sales and customers, yet they can't maintain the customers they currently have interest free loans from without so much as taking any measure to address these concerns. I'm sure none of this would be a big deal to people and they would understand production delays and supply chain issues during what we are experiencing worldwide right now, but the complete disrespect from a company as large as this is inexcusable.
It seems the marketing department is still functioning at normal capacity somehow while every other aspect of this company seems to be unreachable. Making this known in that channel now seems to be the only logical method of getting a response at this point.
I will start posting this on twitter on all related hashtags if we don't hear something soon. I will reach out to WRC as well.
Hijacking, in its purest definition, is an unlawful seizure. So let me explain who actually has been hijacked here. It's all the people, who have placed pre-orders under false pretenses advertised by Fanatec, whose funds are now, as multiple people have said, a huge interest-free loan to Fanatec. I'm sorry that you consider that spamming. I consider that attempting to get everyone who is having issues together into one massive post in the hopes that we can hear something back from someone at Fanatec.
In case you're actually curious, it didn't go so well. My refund says clarification needed and I haven't received it yet. Now I'm a reasonable man; I understand it's a long holiday weekend and I'm hoping to get my refund by the end of the week.
Thank you very much. I appreciate the backup. WRC is one channel that I didn't think of. If I had Twitter I would probably use that platform as well.
Fanatec, again I plead to someone there to just give us some sort of reliable communication. I can't speak for all of us, but most of us completely understand shipping delays in these times. What we are all having a problem with is the complete shutdown of communication with your customers. Your marketing department seems alive with event notifications and deliveries of influencers who are reviewing items just announced but your customer service department is silent with barely a heartbeat to respond to the flood of complains.
I'm glad Jon has been active across the forum bringing members who are having similar issues together. It's certainly been good to see that those of us with issues are not alone.
A small minority of disatisfied customers will find their way to this forum - I imagine many more are sitting at home thinking they're being ignored (note the forum sign up page for new members has been disabled...)
As per some of the posts above, the issue is not the delays, it's the complete lack of communication from Fanatec.
My payment has still not been confirmed (6 days after the transfer) and the order remains showing as potentially available 29th May (even though the same bundle is "ready to ship now'' on the website) - how many others are placing orders each day and joining the backlog?
Thank you Chris for the positive feedback. I appreciate it.
UPDATE: I did receive a message from Dom today and I will keep everyone informed.
I placed an order on May 13th. The wheelbase and pedals were in stock. The V2 rim was available june 5th. It now says June 12th on the website, but on my orders page it still says June 5th. Hopefully it will ship on June 5th, but all these comments here are making me worried. I hope we all get what we paid for.
I will try to keep you guys updated on what happens
I hope he has good news for you and everyone else
I hope so too! I'm hoping that June 12th is a final date.
I hope so too. It hasnt changed for a while. If it changes when June 5th rolls around ill be very sad lol.
I'm sorry you feel that way Paul, but it is difficult to answer questions about individual orders. This is not really something that should be discussed on the forum at all. There could be several reasons why certain orders have been delayed, rather than one general explanation. As a result, it is only the sales team that can provide that information to the customer.
There is a general explanation for the slow response of enquiries to the Fanatec website:
We are receiving an unprecedented number of orders at this time, and as a result, vastly more enquiries than usual. This is a result of sim racing taking centre stage in motorsport globally at the moment, meaning that our products are in extremely high demand. A niche-but-growing market suddenly became a much larger one, and it has had an impact on the sales team's ability to respond quickly. We are trying to adjust in all areas of the company, but it takes time to bring new staff up to speed on what is a complicated set of hardware products.
But this does not explain why one particular order had its availability adjusted more than once.
I think it's also important to understand that if an estimated date changes on the product page, it doesn't necessarily mean that the estimated date for an order in the queue is also affected by that date.
This matter will be discussed with the team and if I can provide a statement, I will.
In the meantime I ask everyone to be patient, the sales team will get to your questions.
[Fanatec Community Manager]
First let me say, that I appreciate your response here on this thread especially after hours. I also appreciate your message to me and I will respond back to that separately.
You're absolutely correct Dom. This is not something that should be discussed in forums. However, when people have followed the appropriate channels and sent their questions only to be greeted with an automated email that says responses are taking up to 7 days and some waiting 8, 9, 10 up to 12 days and still not hearing anything back, you tell us where we are supposed to turn. Is it right that the grievances are being aired on a forum? Not at all. Is it right that Fanatec hasn't responded until now? Not at all. Except Fanatec has our funds and we have no answers. Most people here can agree; the shipping delays are not the issue. It's the total lack of communication. in times like these even an automated email would comfort most and keep the burden off of your customer service agents.
Unless I'm mistaken, reading threads on this forum it seems that the item with the most delays and date-changes has been the CSL Elite Bundle. For this item, it seems that a date change on the website does, in fact, mean a date change for orders already placed. Otherwise it would have at least shipped on May 22nd but it didn't with customers having to do the legwork and visit the website to find out the date was changed again.
With all due respect, even your closing sounds so flippant. "If I can provide a statement, I will". If? Really? If? How about trying something like this: "We already took your money so I WILL get an answer and make sure there is ongoing communication."
The order I messaged you about has already been canceled. So, like I stated in my response to your email, working in the IT / customer service industry, this is a matter of principle now. I hope that the lack of communication that is clearly visible between Fanatec and its customers is not the same lack of communication within your team.
Since my order has already been canceled and reading some other threads I have no reason to believe that refund will not be processed, I feel like I have no right from this point forward to comment here. Unless if something is addressed to me directly, this will be my last post.
I wish everyone who has pre-ordered, good luck. if you wish to message me for any reason, please send me a private message.
Thank you.
-Jon Satule
The worst part about this is they replied fairly quickly when I was having payment issue. After receiving my payment, they just didn't bother answering anymore.
Dom,
Thank you for your response.
I have no doubt you understand the frustration being vented on this post and others, it's not your fault but hopefully you can use your position to escalate the issue. It may be that the senior leaders at Fanatec/Endor are not aware of the discontent brewing!
I disagree that this topic should not be discussed on the forum. The point of this forum is for Fanatec customers to share their experiences - these can be positive & negative. The fact that this thread has more responses than any other thread in recent times speaks volumes - many of us aren't having a good experience at the moment.
None of us want to post on the forum for this reason, but as per Jon's last post, we feel we have no other option as our queries are unanswered via the website.
I am in a similar position to Sirawich - the only response I received from Fanatec was in relation to MAKING my payment (I had it within 30 minutes of asking the question). Since my money was sent I have had absolutely no response to my follow up emails. I am not asking for expedited shipping or even a delivery date, I just want to know that the money has been received and allocated to my order number. It's very stressful to think it could have easily been lost/missed in the Fanatec processes (especially when it's over 600EUR)
I would not be here if I had received a 1 liner email saying 'thanks, we have your money and will process your order once the product is available' - that's not an unreasonable ask at all.
Can this be arranged?
Chris
--
p.s. Jon, best of luck - appreciate your efforts in pulling these threads together.