Velleman Customer service is in great need of improvements

Ok So I posted a while back about having an issue with my control board not working giving a communication error. I tried to trouble shoot the problem myself but there is very little info about this error online. Velleman on the forums is almost non existent and offers little help at least with my issue I got no response from them.

Now I searched the forum for people with the same issue and on all the threads velleman did not offer any form of trouble shooting simply instead just telling the customers to send their control boards directly to them.
So I contacted the people I purchased the printer from and sent them my controller board to then pass onto velleman.

So I get a phone call from the retailer saying velleman tested my controller board and that they found nothing wrong with. Ok fair enough if they can’t find a fault with it but when velleman won’t offer any type of trouble shooting and they just tell the customer to send the controller back to them. Why then am I responsible for the £15 plus return of my item or should I have to wait a month for them to return it back to the retailer.

Now to boot after getting the call saying they found no fault with the controller, I thought to myself what could be the problem then? So just out of curiosity I went and tested the PSU and found it is faulty. So that must be the problem, But here is the thing when you are trying to upload firmware the boards light all work from the USB giving the impression that it has power. So I had no idea that the power supply would have been faulty, and with out a power supply the board won’t function properly.

This is why they should not just tell people to send stuff back to them without offering some sort of trouble shooting first. This whole situation has put a sour taste in my mouth, so I will never buy another velleman product after this this is very poor customer service.

Thanks to those members of the forum who tried to offer.

Hi Veggienuts,

Actually I totally disagree with your statement. Have contacted Velleman several times for spare parts and had also a faulty controller (more specifically one of the drivers was damaged, I noticed afterwards). In all cases Velleman was really responsive and cooperative. Just follow the procedure as indicated, and for sure they will help you too.

I also think you can not complain about the support you get from other users on this forum. If interested I can offer you a free original power supply, because I no longer use mine.

It is not because something does not work right away, therefore “customer support is in great need of improvements”.

Hi all,
I have had a few issues with my printer, and all the time received spare parts within 1 to 2 weeks time.
So no complain about the support team

Best
Frank

We most likely assumed that you would have spotted something obvious such as a dead power supply.
Sorry about that.
Anyway, we’d be happy to replace the power supply.
Please open a support ticket: http://support.velleman.eu

[quote=“VEL417”]We most likely assumed that you would have spotted something obvious such as a dead power supply.
Sorry about that.
Anyway, we’d be happy to replace the power supply.
Please open a support ticket: http://support.velleman.eu[/quote]As I pointed out it was not “obvious” as the controller LED’s maintained illumination due to the USB so I didn’t think of it as a power issue, I was receiving a “communication timeout” error not a “your power supply is dead error!”. Is it standard practice for your customer service to be so patronizing? I am new to this 3d technology so it was not something that would have been obvious to me!

Maybe next time I shall reconsider my velleman purchases. Based on this exchange with your poor customer service

[quote=“fitchie”]Hi Veggienuts,

Actually I totally disagree with your statement. Have contacted Velleman several times for spare parts and had also a faulty controller (more specifically one of the drivers was damaged, I noticed afterwards). In all cases Velleman was really responsive and cooperative. Just follow the procedure as indicated, and for sure they will help you too.

I also think you can not complain about the support you get from other users on this forum. If interested I can offer you a free original power supply, because I no longer use mine.

It is not because something does not work right away, therefore “customer support is in great need of improvements”.[/quote]First thing all my attempts as I stated in the post received no replies from velleman so what procedure was I to follow? I do not live in Belgium, I had to go through the retailer which is a middle man who has never even used one of these machines.
Second I never complained about the users on this forum, I complained about vellemans customer service. The users on this forums have been great 2 or 3 of them mainly.
Third this is not about something not working right away it is about poor customer interaction on vellemans part.

Thanks for offering the power supply, but I think I now have the issue sorted no thanks to velleman!

Please be assured that it is not our intention to sound patronizing.
Sometimes it is difficult to troubleshoot something as complex as a 3D-printer from a distance and yes, sometimes we assume things that appear to be incorrect afterwards.
Once again, we do apologize and our offer for a replacement PSU still stands.

[quote=“VEL417”]Please be assured that it is not our intention to sound patronizing.
Sometimes it is difficult to troubleshoot something as complex as a 3D-printer from a distance and yes, sometimes we assume things that appear to be incorrect afterwards.
Once again, we do apologize and our offer for a replacement PSU still stands.[/quote]“We most likely assumed that you would have spotted something obvious such as a dead power supply.” That statement was pretty patronizing! As for the replacement of the PSU I am still waiting to hear back from the retailer that I purchased the printer from as they said they where going to request a new PSU for me. But as of now I am still without a controller board and power supply and I only just bought the dang thing, hand it running for maybe 10 hours in total.