A sales rep (NOT Superdave) told me this three days ago:
A container entering the U.S. with, among other things, bicycle components was searched and found to contain “drugs”. He did not indicate which type, but I infer they are some type of controlled “drug”, be it illegal or prescription or some such thing.
As the “drugs” were not on the manifest for the container the entire container was seized and quarantined, including the bike parts therein.
The bicycle manufacturer, not frequently discussed on this forum and whom shall remain nameless, will now incur an indefinate delay in completeing certain models due to the quarantine/seizure. They may also re-order the vital components (basically entire grouppos) which puts them back at the beginning of the allocation line.
Where is your bike? The D.E.A. has it now, at least the cranks, derailleurs and brakes. By the way, I am totally serious about this- a rep actually *did *tell me this.
Your story is quite ironic since that same issue regarding a container being quarantied at the port happened to my company. However to use that as an excuse is not an acceptable level of customer service.
Basically, this is the freight companies fault for loading goods on the container not on the manifest. In response we air freighted replacement parts from Asia to replace the existing parts in quarantine and then charged the freight company the $15K invoice. Also the bike company should be aggressively talking with their freight fowarder whose job it is to expedite the shipment through the ports and to clear customs.
If the bicycle supplier is not doing something similar its another indication that they do not adequately manage their supply chain.
Not trying to get into a debate on customer service just trying to share what some other industries do when this situations occur.
I think the bike manufacurer is guilty of importing the drugs, even though I am sure they will claim to have no idea how the drugs got in the container and they should be banned from sales for the next two years. They have started a website: www.believe_my_components_are_clean.com to help rescue the parts.
too funny - the only thing that could make that better is if you had actually created the website…they should also be banned from importing Pro components for 4 years.
My wife brought ber mountain bike on a trip to Costa Rica this March and swore that her rear hub was disassembled by customs on the trip out. It wouldn’t function and when she took it to a bike shop they said it had the wrong sized bearings on the different sides of the hub. I tuned up her bike and packed it for her and I know it was right when I sent her off. Maybe customs was looking for drugs in the freehub body. -Marc
I can tell you for certain that this is not just a BS excuse for delivery delays since those were my drugs in that shipment of bike parts. Bikes and drugs go together, so I thought this approach would work great.