Prius Battery Replacement (GenII) Like you've never seen - NEW Cylindrical Cells

Did the border protection people destroy the cells, or was it the long wait that resulted in them failing?
At least the Australian wharf system isn't that bad, just very expensive between the ship getting close to the dock and finally having it some where we could pick up the LTO cells. Roughly the cost of the product ex factory to actually get it to the point of loading it in the car ..... if we had arranged to deliver it to the door it would have actually cost more than the product plus transport to the wharf in China and the actual shipping costs, including the exchange rate from USD to AUD .... and that is with a free trade agreement in place believe it or not ......
Glad I wasn't planning to resell them, the price would have had to include 10% GST and been way outside the scope of every selling any .....

T1 Terry

 

Thank you for the detailed explanation. People forget that everything around the world was shut down for a year. To put this into perspective, nothing was made and nothing was shipped..........nothing! Then, everyone is given the greenlight to open back up, but now companies and businesses needed to rehire and retrain people, which takes more time. Production can't keep up with demand. Shipping gets backlogged. It's a global hot mess. I think we are more than 3 years out to being anywhere near pre-covid conditions.

 

I guess it's everything else, other than video cards, that were the poster child of pandemic stock, and anything computer related. I'm amazed I could actually buy an RTX 3060, at less than $100 over MSRP right now. I could order any brand and get it next day. A far cry from what it was not even a year ago. SSDs seem to be very plentiful, as with a bounty of 12th gen motherboards, CPUs and power supplies. Meh, but what do I know, I'm just a consumer.

 

Thanks for the update. I am one of the customers eagerly waiting!

 

Ordered replacement Prius battery pack from this seller on August 4, 2022 and was given an expected ship date of August 12, 2022. They charged the full amount to my card as a sale and not a preauthorization (despite having no actual timeframe to ship). I reached out to them on August 19 requesting a status update. Nick Vergunst replied on August 21 and stated I was 2-3 shipments out and offered a full refund. I accepted the offer of a full refund on August 22 and reached out again on August 26 to inquire about the status of the refund. The seller did not reply, so I had no choice other than to file a chargeback through my credit card. This seller has ghosted me and I have yet to receive any confirmation that the transaction has been permanently reversed and credited to my card.

They should not be accepting full payments from buyers when they don't have a product to ship. Either do a preauthorization to confirm the card is good or charge a nominal, refundable deposit. This vendor is trash.

 

how did you get in contact? I've tried their e-mail, phone, ect.

I ordered on August 1st and have not been able to get in contact with anyone regarding my order. No timeline, nothing. I don't want to chargeback this vendor as a lot of people seem to have had decent experiences but after over 2 months of hearing nothing I feel like I have to?

 

Email worked for me until they refused to confirm a refund had been issued.

 

Excerpts from this vendor's response to a consumer protection complaint calling them out for taking orders and collecting funds without delivering goods:
"I recommend you stop wasting your state tax payer's money..."
"...the world was on fire for 2 years if you've been living under a rock..."
"Once your resident's two brain cells connected and they figured out it would take longer than a couple weeks..."
"Your resident redneck also filed a chargeback...in addition they complained to you people and are now wasting everyone's time. Go away we have actual work to do."

I apologize for my mistake, as it appears this vendor is doing actual work, such as taking payments for new orders for products which won't ship for a year, ignoring messages from customers, and not shipping new batteries. The personal attacks are unwarranted and reflect poorly upon this vendor's character. Finally, the mailing address listed on the vendor's website appears to be no longer valid, as an envelope mailed there was returned to sender/unable to forward with the notation "no longer at."

 

maybe a call the the ag's office?

 

Paying by credit card is the safest way. Just contact them and they will refund the money.
Why stress yourself over it?

 

yeah - I was able to place an order with projectlithium who are incredibly responsive.

I know Nick mentioned chargebacks cost him money - I'll give it a few more days but it's been months of me trying to contact him.

 

Well if it's been months, you're probably screwed. Not sure if the card will refund your money now.

 

Argh. If anyone has the text info for Nick could you please PM it to me?

 

I'm just hoping that I don't end up out a large amount of money. I confirmed I have the right number - I called and it rang so I'm assuming the phone is working/powered on. i'd advise people to be cautious before ordering from this vendor.

 

I'd advise people to skip NPB and find a different vendor to order from. Most are more responsive and don't make disparaging remarks about customers like NPB does.

 

i would contact your charge card. if you haven't recieved the product, idk why there would be a time limit.
it's not like a defect after six months or something

 

I think I'm probably one of the first suckers who got scammed by this guy. I'm still waiting for my order from March 7th, seven and half months ago I "pre-ordered" one. They graciously took the full payment. One month led to two, to three, delay after delay. You can see in this thread he gave me a fake excuse on August 21st about border protection damaging 90% of the shipment. Just an excuse to stall for time.

So where's my refund? F**k, I'm scammed out of $1,600. If anyone's looking for their BBB profile.

 

Sorry to hear you are a fellow victim. NPB seems to be following an unfortunate but predictable pattern at this point:
1. Accept orders for product he doesn't have and collect the full price ($$$$) of the orders. Fail to respond to inquiries by customer.
2. Gets called out by disgruntled customer.
3. Ridiculous story + abusive comments made towards said customer.
4. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

I’m another one that appears to have been taken! Ordered March 21, 2022. He accepted full payment. One follow up emai in June ‘22. Credit card company says too late for refund. Only have 90 days. I have filed complaints with NC and CO. Small claims court next.