WARNING Thunderball Marketing

[Chad Kimrey]

Hi - I am posting in ecommerce forums so that other business owners can avoid the nightmare I have gone through with Thunderball Marketing.

I became a dealer for them Feb. 2009 and right from the beginning things just weren't right. I was expecting to receive the typical new dealer info with terms and conditions, and procedures for ordering. Not a chance. Basically it was "thanks for the $1000, and good luck figuring this out."

Every question I had was met with a very strange evasiveness or flat out rudeness. Eventually I figured out how to use their antiquated Telnet (yes I did say telnet) ordering and inventory system. They tell you when you sign up that they are implementing a new online system, but it has not happened after a year of waiting.

Today I decided to close my account with them. I requested they mail the $452 left in my account back to me. They refused to do so saying that their website states this on the front page. I looked and it certainly does not say that. You be the judge - www.tball.com

Since May, when my websiite finally went live, I have sold over $17,000 worth of their merchandise. Today when I asked them to close my account and return my $452 they became unbelievably rude saying they wouldn't deal with me, that I had returned more merchandise than I had sold. I was shocked. I have never returned even one item! In fact I have had to bend over backwards to convince customers to use the warranties to repair defective products they received from this company.

I wrote this Joe Levy guy back (I assume he owns the company, but can't be sure since I never received any real info from them) and told him I thought it was illegal for hom to refuse to give me my money back and that I would be forced to take action. Here's his response:

Go ahead

We have been in business for 35 years

We don’t need dead beat customers

Can you believe that? Avoid this company like the plague!

[JEccles]

According to the Better Business Bureau, they have a good rating. You may want to take your complaint to them. I would also file a complaint with the New Jersey Attorney Generals office.

I have never heard of this company before and would not deal with anyone who required a deposit when I was drop shipping. One thing I can say is that they have a poorly designed website - but that is not a crime.

[Chad Kimrey]

Thanks for the quick reply, JE. Yeah I learned my lesson in this about fronting money. Their lying right to my face about how I handled my business is what still has me angry and confused. Just hope this helps others avoid Thunderball Marketing hell.

[Bilgosh]

Thunderball Marketing serves the Electronics - Consumer Electronics industry. You can access the Demandbase service to find business contact information for people employed at this company and other businesses in the Electronics industry.

[cleonann]

Thanks.. Nice post.n a period of rising prices, there is need of a perfect accounting and material management data sheets software and that is what actually MSDS is about.

[cleonann]

Enterprise and customer resource planning both are really important for every business. I have done great thing to add my information on msds sheets. MSDS sheets is great way to distribute info and products information on internet.

[alantball]

We at Thunderball Marketing take pride in our Etailing business and take it as quite an insult that you have allowed this fictional account to remain on your forums. We do business with most of the larger etailers in the USA and we take our customers quite seriously. We want your business to grow with profit and its most unfortunate that Chad Kimrey couldnt achieve such. Thunderball prides themselves on our Dealer growth and as seen on the BBB website with our "A" rating we have not had a dispute for the past 36 months. We find it most unfortunate that you even give a Chad Kimrey space to spew his nonsense.

[JEccles]

We at Thunderball Marketing take pride in our Etailing business and take it as quite an insult that you have allowed this fictional account to remain on your forums. We do business with most of the larger etailers in the USA and we take our customers quite seriously. We want your business to grow with profit and its most unfortunate that Chad Kimrey couldnt achieve such. Thunderball prides themselves on our Dealer growth and as seen on the BBB website with our "A" rating we have not had a dispute for the past 36 months. We find it most unfortunate that you even give a Chad Kimrey space to spew his nonsense.

It is called Free Speech. We are certainly NOT going to take it off just because you or anyone else disagrees with his opinion. You will notice that I did advise him to take his complaints to the Better Business Bureau and the State Attorney General.

[JPnyc]

Quite correct. The author has the right to complain, you have the right to make a rebuttal, and we have the right to publish both.

[alantball]

Quite acceptable to us. I just dont like this becoming a forum for lies and false accusations. Especially when his category begins "Beware of Thunderball Marketing" as if there was some truth to his story. I would consider that slander at any level of thought.

[JPnyc]

Then by all means, rebut the initial author's information.

[Chad Kimrey]

I figured my problems with Thunderball Marketing were over back last November when I canceled my account with them for the (true) reasons I noted above.

Well today I get my credit card statement and there is a charge for $1040.00 from Thunderball Marketing. I owed them nothing and I ordered nothing. Upon contacting them, once again was faced with the unbelievable rudeness that seems to be the company's business philosophy. They admitted that my wholesale account with them was closed which means that I couldn't have ordered anything, but then also refused to remit the charge. Alan Henslovitz who is my former account manager (and the poster above who claims my story is fiction) passed the buck saying we'd have to email a request to his boss to deal with this. Not his problem.

So having been stonewalled I contacted my credit card company and had to initiate a formal dispute which ended up forcing me to freeze the card.

This is no fiction as they claim. It is just how they handle their business. I have had NO contact with this company for 10 months and now I am forced to fight a fraudulent $1040.00 charge.

I had no motivation posting here other than to help other small business owners avoid what I went through. I think the tone of their "rebuttals" to my original post make my point. I never even saw their responses until today when I came back to update this. True Story.

[SS ProAudio]

I strongly agree with you Chad!! I've been through similar awful experience with this company.

We sell Pro Audio equipment and after opening an account with Thunderball Marketing, which happens to be located less than 20 minutes away from our store, we placed our first order. When we placed the order, we wanted to send our own van to their warehouse for pickup, which they refused and made some rude comments on how cheap we were at paying shipping. So I decided, fine we'll pay the shipping charges and I placed the order, it was a $8,500 order for 4 pro dj mixers. After a week we get the order along with a pink shipping receipt and an additional shipping charge for $425. I went nuts and called them, I got a very rude sales person with a foreign accent and all he said was, and I quote: "pay the shipping charges or go to hell"

That was our first and last order with this company, we also later found out that Rane Corp. a very respectful Pro audio manufacturer, took away their product line from thunderball for removing serial numbers and illegally exporting their products, so go figure what kind of distributor thunderball is!

They are the most rude, selfish, extremely disrespectful and useless distributors I've ever dealt with in my lifetime!!

[roban]

There are 2 sides to every story and it's helpful to hear both sides.

Any time you commit your resources anywhere, a tireless research into others' experiences is paramount. In the area of Internet Marketing there is no other way to make an informed decision. If you don't do this, you open yourself to huge losses. You might score on the plus side but it's a crap shoot.

[xXl Corps lXx]

i just find it quite ironic that both sides of the story come from brand new accounts (well 2v1). Now yes i am also on a new account but i came here to post a legitimate question and search for advice on a totally different subject, and i have never dealt with nor heard of the company in question. so im on neither side. ok NOW, the only way to really settle the dispute (here anyways) or to show who is lying or not is to show proof. a CC statement showing the charges, showing proof that the account was cancelled, etc. I am sure you have to have some proof that they just charged you money after your account was cancelled. And if you get reimbursed then obviously there was a fault on their part, show that here. and same thing for the company, if you dont want you name being thrown around, prove him wrong (yes, i know it may be a hassle, but it shows you truly care about your company, and product... shit if i had a company and some one was making accusations i would do everything i could too call out the bs. So your actions or lack of, can definitely show existing, or possibly new customers the lengths you will go to fix something.