Hello and Brunell

[steammadman]

looks like another one to be avoided, our hobby seems to be full of em!

reading this thread , i have never heard so many lame brained excuses in my lfe

[Laurie_B]

The webmaster of the Burton Upon Trent Model Engineering Society (to which I belong) has recently received two messages via our website about problems yet more model engineers have been having with Brunell Models.The messages are appended below (names have been withheld).

My personal view (not necessarily that of the Burton MES) is that while I have ever sympathy with those people who have had problems (I have experienced problems with Brunell myself) I'm not sure quite what exactly Burton MES can,or could be expected to do.There is a Burton MES club meeting next week where the subject may well be raised.

It might be better (again my personal view) for the people affected to contact the editors of both Model Engineer and Engineering In Miniature to 'name and shame' those suppliers who consistantly fail their customers.I would also agree with the view posted previously that this could be a matter for Trading Standards.Let's hope the problem can be resolved soon.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Message 1)

Sent: Thursday, October 29, 2009 10:35 AM
Subject: Brunell steam models.

Hi,
Please can you help me?

I am a member of the Hull & District SMEE. A few weeks ago, I ordered a set of Triple Expansion Engine castings from the above supplier.

It has become increasingly obvious to me, over the last few weeks, that these castings are never going to arrive. I have been in contact with Graham (Howard?) and he is always "just in the middle of something" and promises to ring me back, but then doesn't. The last contact I had with him, he stated that the parcels had been despatched on Saturday 24th October. When I asked for the tracking numbers, he said that he would email them to me that same day.

I have no castings, no tracking numbers and am £717.00 worse off. Needless to say, now that he has run out of excuses, Graham is not answering his phone and is not returning the numerous messages that have been left.

The reason I have contacted you, because I believe your society to be the closest to this supplier, is to ask if any of your membership has had any dealings with this man and if he has a track record for poor service (fraud?)

I fear now that I shall have to start legal proceedings and any information that I can gather will help build my case.



Regards....

Message 2)

Sent: Friday, October 23, 2009 6:19 PM
Subject: Brunell models


Dear MES Do you have knowledge of brunell models in your town please? I have placed an order for castings & drawings costing over £260 , paid by cheque. Have sent loads of e mails & phone calls but no joy , just an answer mc' The address is 47 belvordere rd Burton on trent . I would be gratefull for any info,I belong to Weymouth Me Soc .....

[klank]

I was interested and grateful to see the comments posted subsequent to my re-starting this thread.

It is possibly of some comfort (to me) to know that I am not alone in my anger, frustration and disappointment but my situation appears less (financially) serious than that poor member of the Hull and District SMEE.

As Laurie (thankyou for replying) has said, it seems that these mounting number of common comments as to the dealings of Brunel Model Engineering may be usefully put before the wider model engineering community in order that others may be better aware of the situation that currently appears to obtain before considering parting with any money.

[davidmew]

Hi There
I am unable to coment about Brunel.

Unfortunatly I cannot put anything in either magazine as I do not have first hand experience of this trader and could not if I had a problem. Also, I doubt I would be able to do this as the magazines and or me would be open to legal action.

This is why I mention often in editorials to pay by credit card.
Also, make sure you confirm a price for the item especially postage before making the purchase.

regards David

[miner]

For those of you that have not recieved your orders from Brunell, For what it's worth you have my sympathy. I have ordered a fairly large ammount from the U.K. over the years and Brunell has been my ONLY bad experience. I fully intend to make further orders from your great country. It takes only one bad apple to give people the perception that there are a lot of dealers like this. In my opinion, I have a great deal of respect for companies such as Hemingway, Warco, Chester, and RDG. If anyone else would like to list U.K. businesses that they have had good luck with and trust then please list them for the benefit of all.

I also find it odd that Graham has not decided to post anything here in his defence as he was quite vocal when vpitool and myself posted our experiences with Brunell, At that time he thought we were being unfair. I also wonder how many other people are out there with experiences that are the same as ours but don't know about this forum.

Pete

[klank]

It may be of interest to those who are having problems with Brunel Model Engineering to know that someone else is taking "official" action.

I came across this thread, and the post in it by "bowbridge" from the UK.

www.homemodelenginemachinist.com/index.php?topic=6430.0

"bowbridge" and I have exchanged information and he told me that he took advice fom the Citizens' Advice Bureau.

This is what he has done (extract from e-mail to me) :-

"I finally lost patience with Graham having made repeated phone calls and an e-mail with no success. He would only answer the phone if I used a different phone, i.e. a number he didn't recognise. Even then he never got back to me. Sinister?
My local Citizens Advice Bureau suggested Consumer Direct (08454 040506 or consumerdirect.gov.uk)
They will advise you on how to proceed and give you a ref. no. for future use. They automatically pas on all details to the Office of Fair Trading. If you wish to link your problem with mine, my ref. no. is SW638041." (end of extract)

I too shall be contacting Consumer Direct, and refer to this reference.
If as many people as possible who are also out of pocket/awaiting fulfilment of order do the same, then maybe some real "official" action may be forthcoming.

Interestingly, "bowbridge" did say he had written an official letter of complaint to Graham at Brunel - using the correct format provided by Consumer Direct - sent recorded delivery. According to Bowbridge, Brunel refused to accept the letter when the Post Office attempted to deliver it!!

[welshy]

It is unbelievable that anyone could run a business in such a way, I luckily have never dealt with Brunell's and certainly won't entertain using them at all in the future, I have used most of the other well known suppliers and have had excellent service from most of them. I did have some trouble with a well known boiler firm but even that wasn't as bad an experience as Brunell customers seem to have had.
Hope you all get your full refunds, this guy clearly should not be trading!

[klank]

Subsequent to my last post, I have been in touch with Consumer Direct - which is acting for Trading Standards.
I have since learned that Trading Standards have directly been in touch with Bowbridge regarding Brunell's activities, both home and abroad and may be looking at this matter more closely.

Whatever action they (Trading Standards) may take would be helped if any other people reading this, who have outstanding issues with Brunell, would please contact Consumer Direct and give their story.
As mentioned in a posting above, their telephone number is 08454 040506, e-mail consumerdirect.gov.uk

[k11gmh]

I thought I would brake cover after reading the latest saga on the problem page sorry to hear Burton Model Engineering being contacted so being that no one has mentioned both orders have been forfilled.Thanyou "VPITOOL"for your comments after receiving the outstanding parts, "MINER"or "PETE I think you are the same person I have emailed you today " LAURIE-B" from Burton Model Engineering Society I remember you bought from us you say you had problems,we had only bought the business some months before we were in the deep end !! but you were you happy with the castings I hope.Mr "KLANK" I have again emailed you your replacement cylinder is waiting please send the faulty one back simply that and the silver steel for the crank shaft and the piston rod as my email states I am happy to send it you say you have contcted Trading Standards so why then have we had no contact so I can explain your replacment and the terms and conditions we offer and now to "BOWBRIDGE"I have sent you an email from our web site so you can read it all and for all you on this web site Mr Goddard "BOWBRIDGE" has contacted Trading Standards with his order to which we have said we will refund all twenty odd pounds,even though the order arrived back with us over xmas with a Stroud postmark dated november but to finish Mr Goddard please do not repeat your comments again I quote "This man is an idiot"no I am not.We have worked day and night to re build this business after the fire and I will say its finished after eighteen months and great expence doing two jobs is hard work could have given up many times.I Appologise to the valued customers who have delt with us and in many cases delivery times have gone very wrong I will say there are two sides to every story but the buck stops with us thanks to Dave for your advise today

[casillas]

Hi everybody,

It's Joan from Spain. Also having problems with Brunell Models. I buyed on 17th January 2010 a Georgina Overcrank Egine in Brunell web page. I paied by PayPal without any problem. One month passed with any information, so I decided to contact with Brunell. Since they didn't answer me I complained using PayPal complaining tool and then, suddenly my buy status changed, and I receveid an email from Brunell saying that they right made a sending with some pieces, but that the flywheel and some other pieces where not in the package and they will be send next week.

With this trick they showed to paypal that they made the sending since they send to PayPal the tracking number.... very clever from their part. That package arrived me without problems. For the missing parts I have contacted last week, and they contacted to me on 11th April 2010 saying that they will send pieces on Monday 12th and email to me when having the tracking number.... Until now.... I have send more emails and nothing happen. I think that almost 5 months to send a packet is too may time... I can do the Georgina from plain steel in that time .

At least I see that I'm not the only person having problems with that company. I'm not complaining about the time (altought is almost 5 months is very very big time), I complain about mails with lies (saying that they will send the packet when they didn't) and above all about not contacting with the customer to explain the problems. Everybody is "human being" but at least contact them and explain the situation, because patient is free, but also limited.

Sorry for my english and thank you for reading

[piecrusty]

To all members on the forum.

Graham and I would be the first to admit that their have been problems with customer service and supply at Brunel Models. However let me re assure all customers that Graham is an honest and genuinely hard working business man for whom Brunel is not his main operation and unfortunately the meagre turnover does not allow him the luxury of reception staff, so he struggles on by himself often with major communication difficulties due to the nature of his work and problems re routing his calls.

I as his friend and entirely voluntarily have stepped into the breach to give him chance to sort the business out and have agreed to be an additional point of contact for Brunel. I have built the Brunel 3 in scale Marshall TE and had many dealings with the firm as a customer. Anyone still experiencing problems can contact me via email or private message and I can give you my phone number for further information in response and I will do my best to remedy your query or complaint. Please judge us by our efforts from now on rather than this defamatory reputation that is undeserved. Brunel has been checked by Trading Standards and no problems were found.

Bear with us as we try and improve.

Mark Pybus, Secretary Handforth MES
[e-mail]

Attachments:

[jasonb]

Mark does seem to be able to get things moving, I gave his details to someone else the other day and their castings turned up within a few days.

Keep up the good work

Jason

[miner]

Well I guess it's time for a further update about Graham and Brunell. I have still yet to recieve a single penny back from Graham for approximitely an $800 order placed over 2 years ago. I contacted Graham a couple of weeks ago and I was not suprised to learn that supposedly his company records were somehow destroyed. Or at least that's what he claims. Fortunately for me, I kept a copy of my order with Brunell and forwarded that to Graham to refresh his memory. Well I thought giving Graham 2 weeks to get back to me was more than fair. I've yet to hear a word.

I also happened to join a German steam form "Dampfforum" a few weeks ago. Sadly you have to join to view it But I did find an interesting item posted by a Gerhard S***tz. He's warning all the forum members on that site about Graham and Brunell. I guess about all he's gotten since March 1st 2010 Is one flywheel and a whole lot of excuses. Right now he says he's out over 600 british pounds.

Oh yes, I'd like to add that Graham threatened to sue me some months ago over my comments about him and his company on various forums. Well that might be possible in todays world. But as long as I tell the exact truth, Then You don't have a hope of winning Graham. So any day you'd like to try, I'm very easy to find.

I'll also be forwarding a link for this post to Graham.

Maybe this post will prevent a few others from losing their money.

Cheers,
Pete

[goldstar31]

Pete,
I'm of the opinion that there will be a time when a debtor will finally run foul of the law and his commitments and will reach a point when he becomes a bankrupt. At that point, any ordinary creditor will get what is left of the assets- after the liquidators and the various government debts have been settled. After that, there will be a share out of something about pence in the pound of remaining debts.

Which, my friend, is the long way of saying that you recieve 'the square root of damn all'

In this case, you might be sneaky and find out if County Court summonses have already been taken out by individuals-- before things like those mentioned might emerge.

( Long time ago, Pete, but that was more or less what happened when I was about)

[miner]

Goldstar,
That's a very good idea. There's a lot of information that can be found today without moving away from a mouse or keyboard. I also happen to know a couple of people who should be able to advise me about further and more indepth searches. At this point in time I've pretty well given up hope of ever recieving my money back, So about all I can do now is to try and help others from losing theirs.

I've ordered more than a few items from the U.K. and this is the only time I've had a problem like this.

Again thank you for the great idea Norman. ;D

Cheers,
Pete

[alanstepney]

No matter what the "reason" I hate to see someone not getting what they have paid for.

The reason can be anything from an outright scam, to the supplier havingg business or personal problems.
It matters not. The end result is that the actual customer, who is the most important person in any transaction, loses out. And often loses substantial sums of hard-earned money.

Thankfully, it is rare, but still a shame when it happens.

In the past I have taken legal action against suppliers (not, I must add, in the model engineering field), and have managed to recover my money, with costs.

In any case (and I dont know the full details of this one), it is worth seeing is anyone else has gone the legal route, (check for Country Court Judgements / CCJ's), and also look up the County Court that covers the area of the business person concerned.
Most have websites that advise you on how to take legal action, and the costs and procedures involved.
(You can do it yourself, without a lawyer/solicitor.)

[brozier]

Another option would be contacting the local trading standards officer.

www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/advice/consumer-advice.cfm

Plug in the post code nearest to the supplier and drop them a line.

I'd suggest always buying stuff like this on a VISA card as you can usually ask VISA to refund the money.

Best Regards
Bryan

[Smifffy]

I'd suggest always buying stuff like this on a VISA card as you can usually ask VISA to refund the money.

This applies to any Credit Card here in the UK, not just Visa. I would also be a bit stronger in terms of how this is phrased (without meaning to get legal!), in that the Credit Card company are obliged to refund you - it's down to them to take the issue with the supplier.

Note, that this applies to Credit and not Debit cards.

How this applies to Pete as a non UK resident I don't know!

Smifffy

[drumkilbo]

There is a time limit though for getting a refund via credit card, I think it's 6 months...I paid a deposit about 2 years ago for a suite at Land of Leather, about 3 days later they closed the doors but kept us hanging on by promising that we would actually get our suite, when eventually I realised that we wouldn't [ I read that fact on some statement on their website that was only there briefly] I contacted credit card company, got through to a very nice wifie in India only to be told that there was a time limit for submitting a claim, however I persisted and as we hadn't actually been told directly that we wouldn't get the suite by the company, I did get my money back quite quickly albeit 9 months after handing over the deposit.

Ian

[Smifffy]

....hmmmm, you did the right thing in pursuing. I'm not sure that there is a time limit. If you didn't get the goods you paid for the C/Card company are liable. I am of course, no expert here!

I have always encountered resistance from any of my credit card companies when I've pursued claims with them over the years . Bearing the amount they make in interest, it's a bit rich!

Smifffy