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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Group Buy: Budget CRI 95 LED Strip Lights

Well, hopefully this can be settled in private. I personally have found Brandon very responsive. Even during and after treatment. Yes, the timeline has been frustrating, and yes, you do need to advocate for yourself to get the products you want and need. This for me has meant being overcommunicative and even pestering. I would venture to say that the person with the highest level of frustration is Brandon, the amount of moving parts and timeline dependencies is mind boggling.

Fabricating products is not nearly as linear as we all would hope. Especially given all of the bumps and unexpected circumstances along the way. I’ve never had a query to Brandon go without response. I think most of us walked into the group buy hopeful that it would conclude quickly, but with eyes wide open that Brandon is not a conglomerate, he is one guy who has bitten off a lot. When it became clear that “quickly” was out of the question due to extenuating circumstances, I began to do constant check-ins to see the status of production.

Brandon has been transparent and communicative about where things were. I understand not everyone went about this the same way as I did. At this point, I have received all of my controllers and strip lights, and even bought much more than my initial order because the price for quality is unbeatable. I’m still waiting for mats and power supplies, and I hope none of this online drama damages that timeline because we’re very close.

I truly hope you can settle things amicably, and in private, there are still a lot of us who would like this to succeed.
 
Couldn't agree more...

James Jetel said:
Well, hopefully this can be settled in private. I personally have found Brandon very responsive. Even during and after treatment. Yes, the timeline has been frustrating, and yes, you do need to advocate for yourself to get the products you want and need. This for me has meant being overcommunicative and even pestering. I would venture to say that the person with the highest level of frustration is Brandon, the amount of moving parts and timeline dependencies is mind boggling.

Fabricating products is not nearly as linear as we all would hope. Especially given all of the bumps and unexpected circumstances along the way. I’ve never had a query to Brandon go without response. I think most of us walked into the group buy hopeful that it would conclude quickly, but with eyes wide open that Brandon is not a conglomerate, he is one guy who has bitten off a lot. When it became clear that “quickly” was out of the question due to extenuating circumstances, I began to do constant check-ins to see the status of production.

Brandon has been transparent and communicative about where things were. I understand not everyone went about this the same way as I did. At this point, I have received all of my controllers and strip lights, and even bought much more than my initial order because the price for quality is unbeatable. I’m still waiting for mats and power supplies, and I hope none of this online drama damages that timeline because we’re very close.

I truly hope you can settle things amicably, and in private, there are still a lot of us who would like this to succeed.
Click to expand...
 
James Jetel said:
I truly hope you can settle things amicably, and in private, there are still a lot of us who would like this to succeed.
Click to expand...

This was the hope as well. We shall see how Brandon wishes to proceed.
 
I have three of these Solaris controllers to sell, if anyone needs it for their productions. I just never got into the diy led rigs like I thought I would. $150ea. Just pm me for info/questions. Thanks.
 
I think I may have fallen through the cracks. I ordered some lights and controllers several years ago and have not received anything yet. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
 
Peter, I will email you in a few minutes. I mass emailed everyone several times but some people later found the message in their spam folders. Probably the case here, too. I'll be at my computer in 10 minutes.
 
As with others, I have personally found Brandon REMARKABLY understanding and helpful. In fact, he has offered our company vastly better service than any other vendor we've ever dealt with. Not only are his products first-rate, but he has always been there for us when we needed him.

I do not understand the issues people are having with him at all. As in so many cases in this world, I think it often comes down to a failure to communicate, and, to this chap at least, Brandon has most definitely earned the benefit of the doubt.

Stephen
 
I'm heartened to hear testimony as to Brendon's commitment to operating a transparent, open, and honest group buy.

In that regard, I was wondering if Brandon would provide the physical address of KoraLED, as well as the state/country that the company is incorporated in.

Thank you. All the best.
 
Brooks Moore said:
Still waiting on my stuff. Any updates.
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Brooks, according to my records you were sent most of your group buy order on February 15th, 2015. What's left (controllers, etc) I had marked down to go out with your new order for mats and power units when those are ready to ship. I'll get what I have processed to ship now and will email you.
 
I started the day encouraged, but ended it deeply disturbed by more of Brandon's unethical behavior.

I was initially encouraged, because the first of the partial refunds of my order came through, and were deposited into my bank account. Despite Brandon still owing me over $1,200 in refunds for the bulk of my orders, I felt these initial small refunds were at least some small step on his part to restoring normal business operations.

Then came the troubling behavior.

As it turns out... Brandon completely deleted my account from KoraLED.com, and everything that went along with it - evidence of past payments, orders, etc. All gone. I am completely locked out of my account, with all evidence of my account destroyed by Brandon
 
Nate, every order you made through the website was refunded to you. Even an order that was fulfilled was refunded.

Your group buy order was delayed because you never paid for shipping. You say you never saw the payment notification email and I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but the fact remains that you never paid for your shipping. To get this over with I paid for your shipping myself personally, told you it was coming, and gave you the tracking number.

You then posted here that you would refuse the shipment, but at that point, it was already gone. I had told the warehouse to process and ship your order prior to any of your recent posts on the forum. After seeing your post about refusing delivery, I told you that doing so may cause the shipping company to throw out your package since it was an international shipment and I had that happen a few times with another shipping company when delivery was attempted when people were out of town. When DHL called you about your package you told them you have no idea what it is and who it is from, which is obviously not true. Once I was contacted by the freight forwarder I emailed you to confirm, again, that it's your order. We exchanged about 30 emails that day. You could have resolved the situation with one phone call to DHL, which I told you, or when the courier was standing at your door with the package. You knew exactly what the package was. You refused.

drYQWZH.jpg


So, at this point I'm waiting to see what the fees are from DHL to return the package. The freight forwarder estimates I will have to pay $200-$300 because you refused delivery, but most likely everything will be returned. I have no idea how long it will take, but once it's back then I will be in touch with you.

As for your deleted account, absolutely I did that. I want nothing to do with you. Every order you made through the site was refunded and then your account was deleted. It doesn't really seem that scandalous. As you apparently don't recall, there was no such thing as Kora LED when this group buy started. It's a 6 week old company. The group buy was me hooking up the community with a great deal on some strip lights. Everything went through PayPal. You have all your records there.
 
Let's address your points one-by-one:

1) You never invoiced me for shipping on the original group buy items. Never. I have asked you to provide me with evidence of this, as I have no record of it, and you refused. But the issue with shipping from 4 months ago is irrelevant at this point. You did not ship me product, so I canceled my order and asked for a refund. You then became verbally abusive, and cut off all communication, forcing me to take this issue public here on REDuser.

2) Yes, I told you I would refuse shipment. In a panic, you quickly - without first notifying me - told me that you would ship me items. The issue is, that these items were completely unsolicited. I had cancelled my order a month-and-a-half prior when I requested the refund. The items you sent me, were not ordered by me, and you refused to answer what was in the package. You threatened that if I refused the package "It won't be replaced and certainly won't be refunded." Unfortunately, this is not the way that online commerce works, and I'm quite taken aback by your lack of either knowledge or regard for the laws dictating sales.

3) Except you merged all of my orders on KoraLED, and had Kora take over the process of fulfilling these orders. We all got the emails, Brandon, when you formed the site 2 years ago. In essence, you have wiped out any proof of over $1200 in remaining orders that you have refused refund on. This is a HIGHLY unethical way for a business owner to conduct themselves, and should be a giant red-flag for anyone considering doing business with you or your company. I know this is harsh language that's unbecoming of the REDuser community, but the only time I've ever seen behavior like yours, is when a business owner is actively trying to commit fraud.
 
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1) An automated payment request for the shipping charges was sent from the server, and it was never paid.

2) I had already told the warehouse to send your package before you posted here. An automated email with a list of what was in the shipment along with the tracking number is emailed out when orders are sent to the warehouse. The package contents and tracking number were also available when you log in to your account.

3) The group buy was all done manually through PayPal. All the records you are looking for are available there. They would have also been emailed to you when you paid.

As I have said several times, there are no refunds for this group buy. Not with prices this low, and not when 100% of all money received went toward product. This has been a money-losing venture for me.

I am sorry this became personal, and I am partly to blame here. I did reply in anger after your first couple posts, which was a mistake and I deleted what I wrote. I totally get that you are angry, I think that's clear to everyone, but saying I'm committing fraud is completely false and way out of line. I've been through hell to get this group buy across the finish line. I never promised refunds, but I did promise everyone they will get what they ordered. I am just one person and I am doing the best that I can. It has taken longer than expected, but we are 95% done.

You were fully refunded for all orders you made on the site.

When DHL returns your package to the warehouse, I will be in touch by email, Nate.
 
Brandon J.F. said:
As I have said several times, there are no refunds for this group buy. Not with prices this low, and not when 100% of all money received went toward product. This has been a money-losing venture for me.
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Again, could you please articulate where this policy exists? It seems that this policy is being enforced at your discretion, and not universally across the group buy. It states nothing about this on the main page for this group buy. I highly suspect, that had people known there was no chance of receiving a refund, you would not have had nearly as many people signing up (myself included). Indeed, I checked back through this entire thread, up until 2/8/2015 - the date I was invoiced for my initial order - and as of that time, no no-refund policy had ever been noted. Not in the invoice, not on this forum. NONE. You simply cannot unilaterally alter/amend the terms and conditions of a sale after it has been made. There is absolutely no legal basis for you to do this.

I understand that money may be tight for you. And I have offered to work with you to resolve this refund. I have offered to help find buyers for my strips and accessories. I am extending an offer to you today that I'm willing to formulate a payment plan with you, so that you can refund the money bit-by-bit.

What I want at the end of all of this, is simply a refund. I want to delete all my posts on this thread to reduce the drama here on REDuser, and so that you can continue operating KoraLED as you see fit. I want your company to be a success. I want all the REDusers on here to have their orders fulfilled and to be thrilled with the product. I want you to be able to troll me with a balance sheet for Kora that shows a hundred grand in the bank. That's what I want for me, you, and all the other members of this group buy. I think we can all agree on that, correct?

But the only thing preventing that from happening is this messy issue of a refund. The sooner we can get this taken care of, the sooner all of this gets behind us.
 
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