Cherrypal customer service: lies, ignored emails, and technical incompetence

[Velcro_SP]

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[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by Velcro_SP

I thought all that was needed was to verify an email address? You don't think a troll can do that in three minutes with some throwaway email account that he or she gets anonymously? Was even the email address needed for this forum?

I don't know for sure why someone would have a grudge against him. I have a suspicion, but unlike some here, I'm not going to go by mere suspicion. But there's an unlimited number of reasons people harbor grudges. Why are you so convinced none could possibly apply?

Lastly, Nate, it sounds to me like you'd rather sit and pout than take five minutes to actually tell Cherrypal your effort to stop payment fell through and would they please go ahead and send it so you could actually get the computer you once wanted.

Do you want to know how you lost this discussion? You accused me of being childish. It's not just that you pissed me off, but that you obviously can't think of a credible argument.

I'm not pouting. I've accepted that I'm not getting the laptop, and moved on. The only reason I posted an update was that I didn't want to leave this topic hanging.

[lene1949]

Velcro_SP - had also posted on this forum defending Cherrypal.

[Worldwalker]

I just wandered in here out of idle curiosity, but something really struck me about the whole CherryPal thing:

Supposedly their credit card processing capability went away -- it's unclear whether this termination was on their part, or on the part of their clearinghouse -- and never returned. I find this somewhat odd, because even when I was running a one-person, home-based software company, I was able to get CC processing services (they sent a guy to my physical location to take a picture of ... well ... my desk!) I find it rather surprising that a company which is somewhat more than one person and a desk has difficulty doing this.

Also, it has been mentioned that they are accepting checks and Western Union. Significantly, unlike credit cards, it's difficult to recover money that has been paid by check, and impossible to recover it from Western Union. No credit cards? No PayPal? Not even, given the controversy that has been going on for so long, an escrow service?

I've got no dog in this fight. I'm just a disinterested observer. And what I've observed does not cast the best light on the CherryPal people.

As far as the three random people showing up here sole to fiercely defend a corporation which may or may not be engaging in questionable business practices ... that's just odd. I own a netbook which I love mightily, and many other people are, um, considerably less enthusiastic about (including, unfortunately, its manufacturer). And as anyone who's been in a discussion with me here knows, I can get vociferous about my opinions. But I still don't go searching for random forums where someone might be criticizing the brand of netbook I own and joining them to defend it, and solely to defend it. That isn't the action of an enthusiast, and it is the action of a shill.

There have been a lot of other things that similarly provoke suspicion: Hints of legal threats, just vague enough for plausible deniability. Referring to any non-adulatory opinion as "flaming". Demanding personal identity information from other posters. Comments that come down to "you're all so meeeeeeean!" Accusations of sexism. Techniques straight out of "The Art of Controversy". And one really, really big one: a lack of enthusiasm for the product, only for the company. None of these, either, are characteristic of an enthusiast, and they're very characteristic of a shill.

By way of comparison, I have a PRS-505. I love it. I collect classic series books (Tom Swift, etc.) and I now have a large library of them on my 505, instead of adding more of them (and their attendant mildew) to my shelves, which has also freed up my used/rare book buying budget for hard-to-find works on military history instead. I can flip open my PRS and read whatever I want, whenever I want. I'm not about to give up my dead trees books, but I wouldn't give up my PRS either. I don't even like being more than ten feet away from it! Even after a year of ownership, I can't stop talking about how much I love it to anyone who will hold still long enough. I think the world would be a better place if everyone disregarded all those lesser ebook devices and and demanded the One True Reader, the PRS-505.

Oh, and Sony? They suck.

[Velcro_SP]

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[Velcro_SP]

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[Velcro_SP]

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[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Velcro_SP

Nate, I got frustrated with your whole approach and that's why I said that.

You started sending the company angry emails and a profane one.

It's reasonable for who's been charged for an item he hasn't received to be angry. Expressing that anger--no matter how profanely--doesn't remove the company's obligation to provide either the item or a refund.

Then you went to your bank to cancel payment, and who's to say your order wasn't put on hold then.

Months after he was told the item was shipping?

Then you're out calling the company and now the guy himself running it "liar," because, why, he didn't send you the tracking number like he probably thought he'd be able to?

No, because he didn't send a tracking number and the item hasn't arrived.

And now that your effort to stop payment fell through you won't even ask them to send the computer to straighten it out.

He's certainly not *stopping* them from sending the computer he was promised months ago. He's just decided it's not worth his time, on top of the money they've already stolen, to ask for something they've given him every indication they have no interest in providing.

If Cherrypal is unhappy with its online rep, all they have to do is honor their contracts: send computers to everyone who paid them for one. Or, if that's not possible (because they originally promised WinXP netbooks and apparently only have WinCE netbooks), send refunds.

How irate the customers get about *not getting their orders* shouldn't matter. Business law doesn't allow for "I'll take your money, and send you your stuff, unless you get upset while you're waiting for it and tell people I ripped you off." The company still has the obligation to fulfill those orders or give full refunds.

[Velcro_SP]

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[ardeegee]

Originally Posted by Velcro_SP

Heinlein warned against attributing conditions to villainy that merely result from stupidity.

I guess we should stop assuming that you are a villein, then...

[Velcro_SP]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

I guess we should stop assuming that you are a villein, then...

I am at least smart enough to recognize the year printed in approx. scale 36 font at the top of a blog post and not run off making false accusations based on my mistake. Unlike some.

[ardeegee]

Originally Posted by Velcro_SP

I am at least smart enough to recognize the year printed in approx. scale 36 font at the top of a blog post and not run off making false accusations based on my mistake. Unlike some.

Yes, that was my mistake. Your shill happened a year earlier than I thought.

[Worldwalker]

Originally Posted by Velcro_SP

There is no discussion forum at the Cherrypal website to talk about it. So if one is interested in Cherrypal and wants to talk about it, like it or not this is a natural place to do so.

Given that, at least as I understand it, the Cherrypal computer is a general-purpose computer, not an ebook reader or especially suited for reading ebooks in a way that any other ultra-portable computer is not, I can't see how forums devoted to ebooks and ebook reading devices are a "natural" place to discuss such a computer. If someone were to post about their dog on a fish forum, would that suddenly become a "natural" place to talk about dogs? I'm sure there are a lot of other forums more appropriate to discussing computers than a forum about ebooks.

Sorry, I just can't buy that.

[TGS]

Is this a comment to the OP or to Velcro_SP?

[Velcro_SP]

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