"Horrible customer service experience. This company is a scam and a fraud. You can never reach anyone to speak to. I have returned an item and till this day I am still waiting for the money. Reported them to the BBB and, of course, no response. Don't buy from these people. They are scamming people everywhere."
"They took order, called to try and sell me an extended warranty, and were so obnoxious I cancelled my order. Which they _then_ shipped. After 20 minutes there is no answer at their customer service. Scary place.
--h"
"Same problem as other customers...no communication means with company, although obviously false glowing reviews. Charged my account two days after order but no tracking or shipping information, though site said bike was in current inventory. "
"Great service. Received my Schwinn 418 before the expected delivery date. Didn't face any problems at all.
Didn't have to contact customer service so I can't comment on it. "
"I have no idea if this will get published or not. Its the last attempt I will take to submit the review. All previous attempts did not post.
These people may not be crooks but I did not wait long enough to find out.
They take your order, confirm receipt, charge your credit card and, in my case, you will never hear from them again.
Calling them leads to an automated service where no options work other than to place an order. The web site contains contact info only to place an order. No email, all links other than "place an order" take you into a circle that leads to the same previous page (its not my browser, I tried 3 different browsers before writing this comment).
The only way I could cancel the order was to have my credit card company charge them back and they took care of canceling the order. I find this unusual so, perhaps, the credit companies know more than we do."
"On 3 August I ordered a coffee table from CoffeeTableSuperstore.com - one of Mercantila's "companies". They delivered the table base on 19 August, but the glass table top was broken and the FedEx guy said he didn't even put it on the truck because glass was falling out of the box.
So I called their customer service number and left a message advising them about the damage/non-delivery. I also emailed them for redundancy and to have a written record. The next day (20 August) I received an email from Katherine who told me that she'd order a new glass top and it would be shipped out by the end of that week.
By 27 August I hadn't heard from them or received my table top, so I emailed again. And again. And on the 29th I tried calling but they were no longer accepting phone calls for customer service, nor could I get a directory to speak to *anyone* at all.
When the table top still hadn't arrived on 30 August I filed a dispute with my credit card company. I also emailed Mercantila again...and again asking for tracking info and an order status.
On 5 September I got an email from Katherine who was surprised that I hadn't received my table top yet. She said she would email the manufacturer to find out when it would ship and get back to me.
On 8 September I got an automated email from Mercantila telling me that my table top had shipped. But when I plugged the UPS tracking number into UPS' system, it told me that the item had been (as best as I could determine) mis-addressed and had been delivered back to the manufacturer on **29 August**. Mercantila never even bothered to check this before sending me outdated tracking information.
I wrote to Mercantila and tried to call them numerous times since then -- with no response.
My dispute with my credit card is still ongoing.
Mercantila is nothing but frauds and scam artists. Do yourself a favor and don't do business with them or any of their hundred or more shill domains.
"
"ordered item on 7/16/08.checked order status after
one week. The only status was that my credit card
processing was completed on 7/16/08. Filled out email form on their site and requested shipping status. After waiting another week without any response, sent them email to either ship it or cancel it. Again no response, so called Visa to put a dispute on the order. order was delivered via ups later the same day. customer service for mercantile is useless and frustrating, but I did receive the order, go figure.
"
"Mercantila appears to be either a scam or a very poorly run company. I ordered a $1400 treadmill from the Treadmill Store. I received a phone call from a woman a few days later who tried to sell me a service agreement. I declined it. After that call I could never reach anyone again regarding my order either by email or telephone. I never received the treadmill. After 25 days, I filed a dispute with my credit card company. Stay away from any of Mercantila web sites. I suspect the any good reviews posted here are posted by Mercantila. Update 8/10/08: After a month and no response from Mercantila, the treadmill was delivered to me. The Lifespan TR-2000 treadmill is a very fine product. The delivery service was excellent. It is too bad that Mercantila Customer Support does not respond to its customers. Moreover, Mercantila (i.e., on the Treadmill Superstore website)provides a telephone number and email address for customer support, however, it does not respond to either. So after a few weeks, a customer will assume the company is pulling a scam. Although I love the treadmill, I would never knowingly buy another product from Mercantila given their lack of customer support."
"I purchased the espresso machine and it turned out to be a complete scam. I never received the product, they took the money within minutes--since then, no one receives phone calls, long holds, hang ups, no response to email inquiries; its a disaster! Stay away from them. And please be responsible and do something about it. They look very professional, so big and respected but in reality they are a real gimick. Only a front. Just one phone number, bogus address and a complete mess. I have already contacted FTC, consumer protection agency, District attorney's office and even then, it seems to be that it will take so long, too many victims and still they can rename or come with excuses and see they get off the hook. They are so professional--but only in stealing and gimick. "
"I placed an order on their with their website Shower Door SuperStore on April 16, 2008. I sent an email @ one week later asking for @ due date of delivery. It stated 3-4 wks. After 4 wks. I again requested an @ delivery date. I decided to call Customer Service when 3 days passed with no reply. I reached Customer Service who gave me the extension of the person on the original email. I called several times always reaching a voice mail until one morning he picked up and I stated my name, then the line went dead. Needless to say I was taken back. I called back and got the voice mail again. I started hitting extension combinations and reached a live body who I gave my story to who said they would get me to a supervisor, again the line went dead. To make a very long story, longer, I was contacted by the company who explained the company had had telephone problems and that no one had hung up on me. I expressed my thanks and would give them that point but related I had received no communication to my email. He assured me that the person in question would contact me the next day and tell me the delivery date. He also related I could call him if I had any questions or concerns. Needless to say, I sit here two days later, no telephone call or email from any company representative. One can make their own conclusions."
" I recently ordered a pair of inversion table gravity boots from a subsidiary of Mercantila (http://www.inversion-table-direct.com/). When i received the confirmation email that indicated that the billing would appear on my credit card as mercantila then i had a flashback of a problem that i had with this company in the past, so i came hear and checked their ratings.
At that point is was too late as i had already placed the order but given the reviews I was very worried. Much to my appreciation though, my order was fullfilled and delivered very quickly.
A few things that you might consider when reading these reviews.....#1 mercantila is a drop shipping conglamorate. They simply post a ton of web stores and sit back and let the manufacturers fullfill the orders. If there is a problem with the order then you can rest assured that you will have communication problems because most drop shipping companies are simply run by a husband and wife out of their home.
The second thing to consider is that when people get exactly what they paid for then they dont tend to go out of their way to give credit, rather its those who are disappointed who have the tendancy to come here and voice their problems. With that in mind i would say that 5 negative reviews is pretty dang low.
Websites like newegg.com tend to send links to customers directing them to resellerratings and thus have alot of positive reviews.
Maybe mercantila should do the same thing. I dont ever reccomend using a drop shipping company to fullfill your orders unless its a last resort option. In doing so you are adding a middle man between your money and the product.
I do feel that any company doing buisiness on the web should have their parent company clearly shown in the vacinity of the main sites name.
This type of disclosure should also be accompanied by full disclosure of being a drop shipping company either in the about us section or the shipping procedure section. I feel that it is extremely misleading for a company to claim that it leaves their wherehouses when in fact it leaves the manufacturers wherehouse.
"
"I ordered a Schwinn 430 Elliptical Trainer on 09/11/2007. I received it on 09/14/2007. I was very happy with the purchase and speed of delivery of the product. Now the bad part. When I opened the box the product was damaged. I contacted Schwinn about the problem. They were very helpfull. They sent a replacement part. When I received it it was the wrong part. This happened 2 times. I decided to call Mercantila. There customer service phone service is the worst I have ever tried. They start off with wait times less then 5 minutes. Then it got down to less then 1 minute. That is the longest 1 minute I have ever waited for. I stayed on the phone for 30 minutes and still no one answered. I kept getting the wait time less then 1 minute message. They never did answer the phone. I even tried later and still the same issue. They really need to work on this problem."
"Horrible, horrible, horrible. First of all, the order was placed through one of their subsidiaries (www.airconditioner-store.com).
The order went through without a hitch, and I received my confirmation email very soon afterwards. The order was placed on May 31, and after several days, the item had still not shipped, supposedly while they waited to verify some billing information. Eventually, the status changed to show that the order was expected to ship on 6/5/2007.
After waiting a few days, I emailed on 6/7/2007 to ask why the order hadn't shipped yet. They responded on 6/8/2007 stating that they would contact the manufacturer about the delay. That was the last time I EVER heard back from them despite numerous times emailing.
I eventually called them on 6/18/2007 to ask what the delay was and the rep told me that it was the manufacturer's fault and that he was sorry. I asked for an ETA. He wasn't able to give me one. I told him to cancel my order and refund the charge that they had already placed on my card despite not having shipped me anything. He said he would do that.
It is now 6/21/2007 and no credit has shown up on my realtime credit card billing statement. I emailed yesterday 6/20/2007 and did not receive a response, and I just emailed a few moments ago again.
This company is absolutely horrible. I may have to resort to contacting the BBB and also disputing the charge with my credit card company."
" i purchased a Fitnex elliptical from Mercantila and have been attempting to return it for months now. after over 10 calls, and 5 different attempts at return pickup dates, the item is still sitting in my home.
emailing customer service produces no responses. i've spoken to 2 different supervisor/managers who assured me that my return would be picked up by a freight company on a certain date but nobody ever came. i took 2 separate days off because i was told i needed to be home for the freight company to pick up the item but on all occasions, nobody showed up.
the supervisor/manager has consistently made promises to return my calls or to promise that a freight company would come but has not bothered to follow up if it ever happened or to even make contact with me.
i will never shop there again."
"I ordered some ping pong balls in which the product page clearly says "1-2 business day shipping". After one week of waiting (5 business days), I called to cancel. Mercantila customer service states that I will have to pay for return shipping charges if it has shipped AND that they do not know if it has shipped or not. I don't know whether to laugh or cry."