Be Very Careful Buying Cobalt Aquatics Equipment

If you got a company to honor a warranty for an item sold off of eBay than good for you - that is the exception, not the rule. You claim everyone here is a chump for not expecting companies to stand behind goods whose history, condition and authenticity cannot be verified, but I think the manufacturers would be chumps if they did.

What I'm curious about is why premium aquatics is selling the same products through 2 different channels at different prices and with different shipping charges.


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sleepydoc said:
What I'm curious about is why premium aquatics is selling the same products through 2 different channels at different prices and with different shipping charges.
Click to expand...

This is the real question. If PA wants to sell product below MAP, they should not expect a warranty on that product or for the manufacturer to continue selling to them.
 
sleepydoc said:
If you got a company to honor a warranty for an item sold off of eBay than good for you - that is the exception, not the rule. You claim everyone here is a chump for not expecting companies to stand behind goods whose history, condition and authenticity cannot be verified, but I think the manufacturers would be chumps if they did.

What I'm curious about is why premium aquatics is selling the same products through 2 different channels at different prices and with different shipping charges.


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Click to expand...

It's called multiple storefronts. No different than petco, wallmart, best buy, etc selling stuff at different prices online than in store. Best buy has a web site, physical, and ebay storefront. No matter which one you buy from it is Best Buy.

Ebay is still the wild west only to the uninformed which I guess seems to be the majority of reefers. The site is now no different than amazon which is also a storefront for vendors to sell goods.

Here is an example for you, when I bought my Gyre I got it from Amazon. Now amazon is not an authorized retailer for maxspect but saltwater aquarium is which has a storefront at amazon. The receipt I got was an amazon receipt and it just stated that saltwater aquarium was the seller in small print. When I had an issue with the unit I sent Carlos the amazon receipt and he didn't contest it at all. Why? Because the people at coralvue are not idiots and know that their authorized dealers sell stuff through different storefronts and all he needed to see was that saltwater aquarium was the seller.

The ebay receipt the OP got clearly stated that the seller was premium aquatics just how it says it when I buy stuff from newegg on ebay. That's all Cobalt needed to know in order to honor the warranty. Instead OP got that BS message back from their support.

Ask the OP if when he received the package he got a Premium Aquatics receipt in the box, because I am sure he did. LXXero is right, it doesn't do any good trying to be forthcoming with information and it's better to just give as little of it as possible.
 
Potatohead said:
This is the real question. If PA wants to sell product below MAP, they should not expect a warranty on that product or for the manufacturer to continue selling to them.
Click to expand...

Most people don't seem to know what MAP really is. MAP or Minimum Advertised Price is an agreement between the vendor and retailer, nothing more. The agreement states that if a retailer wants to sell products at prices lower than MAP they may/will get their authorized retailer status revoked. The consumer has nothing to do with this. Under law if someone buys a product from an authorized retailer, it doesn't matter what they paid and warranty is valid. If the vendor wants to go after the retailer for selling below MAP after the fact that's on them and well within their right but doing so has ZERO effect on the consumer who already purchased the product. Only after the vendor has revoked authorized dealer status does the items sold become "gray market" thereby not requiring the vendor to honor warranties.
 
Did the pump break after a few months of use or it showed up from PA damaged? Either way PA should handle the situation or work with Cobalt to get you a new pump.
 
Don't buy products directly from the cobalt website either if you want a warranty...

I have NO idea why they would put this on their website..

AND ANY PRODUCTS SOLD THROUGH THIS WEB SITE ARE PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS WITHOUT ANY WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND
Click to expand...

and there is NOTHING in their warranty for the MJ600 that states product must be purchased through authorized retailer,etc... or anything to the sort for the warranty to remain valid..

Cobalt did send you a new one.. BUT they also have no legal ground to stand on for not sending out a replacement/honoring the warranty..

In the future Cobalt should beef up their terms/warranty if they intend to avoid potential bad press.
 
gus6464 said:
It's called multiple storefronts. No different than petco, wallmart, best buy, etc selling stuff at different prices online than in store. Best buy has a web site, physical, and ebay storefront. No matter which one you buy from it is Best Buy.

Ebay is still the wild west only to the uninformed which I guess seems to be the majority of reefers. The site is now no different than amazon which is also a storefront for vendors to sell goods.

Here is an example for you, when I bought my Gyre I got it from Amazon. Now amazon is not an authorized retailer for maxspect but saltwater aquarium is which has a storefront at amazon. The receipt I got was an amazon receipt and it just stated that saltwater aquarium was the seller in small print. When I had an issue with the unit I sent Carlos the amazon receipt and he didn't contest it at all. Why? Because the people at coralvue are not idiots and know that their authorized dealers sell stuff through different storefronts and all he needed to see was that saltwater aquarium was the seller.

The ebay receipt the OP got clearly stated that the seller was premium aquatics just how it says it when I buy stuff from newegg on ebay. That's all Cobalt needed to know in order to honor the warranty. Instead OP got that BS message back from their support.

Ask the OP if when he received the package he got a Premium Aquatics receipt in the box, because I am sure he did. LXXero is right, it doesn't do any good trying to be forthcoming with information and it's better to just give as little of it as possible.
Click to expand...

Preach it man. You've been spot-on with your opinions lately, lol. So much bullshit to sift through on these forums, it's good to hear straight talk.

This is totally correct. Amazon, ebay, and now, even FACEBOOK! for crying out loud, all let businesses run storefronts. Why would a company want 3 different store fronts? Exposure. Now your products are showing up on searches from 3 different major websites, that can't be bad. It's unacceptable to assume any of these store fronts are selling you used products and/or products under an agreed upon MAP without any evidence to prove it. And most MAP's, as far as I know, don't care what shopping cart checkout system you used to place the order. This would be as stupid as someone telling the store they had to use a specific brand of cash registers to make the sale or they won't honor the warranty. I don't think the people here are getting this point.

And yeah, MAP isn't the consumer's problem, it's the wholesalers & retailers. If someone is violating MAP, that's gonna get them blacklisted from being a retailer from most of these places. If you had access to see the wholesale prices, you'd know why, as there is a pretty big margin in there for some products/brands, and not for others, among other things, needless to say there's a lot the average consumer doesn't know is going on.
 
Last edited:
LXXero said:
And yeah, MAP isn't the consumer's problem, it's the wholesalers. If someone is violating MAP, that's gonna get them blacklisted from being a wholesaler from most of these places. If you had access to see the wholesale prices, you'd know why, as there is a pretty big margin in there for some products/brands, and not for others, among other things, needless to say there's a lot the average consumer doesn't know is going on.
Click to expand...

... What?

A wholesaler sells to a retailer. MAP is minimum advertised price, and applies to retailers selling over the counter.
 
Potatohead said:
... What?

A wholesaler sells to a retailer. MAP is minimum advertised price, and applies to retailers selling over the counter.
Click to expand...

Thank you for nitpicking a minor mistake. I edited the post.

Yes, I meant retailer. There are some retailers that are wholesalers as well. Like BRS.
 
I hear this all the time! IMO, it really sucks that the hobbyist is penalized when he did nothing wrong. Manufacturers need to hold the sellers accountable, not the consumer. in these instances, the consumer is the victim. In the end, the manufacturer received every penny of compensation they were due for the product when they sold it. in the compensation they figured that supporting the product was included in the wholesale price. IMO, they owe it to the end user as the support was paid for at the time it left the manufacturer. I would love to chat with a manufacturer or two to discuss why they are taking the stance they are taking.
 
A basic supply chain is manufacturer -> wholesaler -> retailer. Cobalt got their money for the product long before the product got to the retailer. Violating MAP without getting caught is so easy and in the end the manufacturer could care less.

Say I have a shop. I advertise Radions are $799. Guy comes into shop to buy the Radion. When it comes time to ring him up I tell customer "you know what I am going to give you 20% off the radions because you bought 4 units". Will I get in trouble with ecotech for MAP violation? Probably not. Why? Because I never advertised the radion at the lower price so I didn't do anything special to get the customer in the door. In the end who is going to know what I did? The customer, ecotech if he has to do a warranty claim, and myself. MAP contracts were created because retailers complain about unfair price competition but at the end of the day the manufacturer only cares about selling units. Do you honestly think ecotech is going to tell all the retailers around me that I am selling radions at a cheaper price than they are if I move a lot more units than they do?

Stuff like this is the norm with boutique audio equipment. Long ago in college I worked for an audio shop and that is exactly what they did. Not a single item we sold was purchased at sticker price even though everything had MAP. They never advertised cheaper prices anywhere. Key word in MAP is Advertised. I can advertise something at a certain price all day long, what I sell it to you for is a whole different story.
 
gcarroll said:
I hear this all the time! IMO, it really sucks that the hobbyist is penalized when he did nothing wrong. Manufacturers need to hold the sellers accountable, not the consumer. in these instances, the consumer is the victim. In the end, the manufacturer received every penny of compensation they were due for the product when they sold it. in the compensation they figured that supporting the product was included in the wholesale price. IMO, they owe it to the end user as the support was paid for at the time it left the manufacturer. I would love to chat with a manufacturer or two to discuss why they are taking the stance they are taking.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's kind of silly because they're still offering to replace the part regardless, just giving the guy a big guilt trip over it. It was bought new from an actual authorized dealer, just through ebay. So what, right?

They probably didn't have to say anything if they were still gonna replace the part anyway, they chose to make it a point, albeit a bad one, without really fully understanding the situation. I'm not sure what the point of this is, but i'd also not immediately take this to mean that this is some sort of official company stance, so much as it is a customer service rep with a chip on their shoulder. Like, denying this warranty is this guy's power trip for the day since it's about the only authority he even has, lol....i am good on all of that. i'll just not say anything about place of purchase to avoid the situation entirely.

Companies rarely fess up to mistakes anyway, it's just move forward. Heh, we are talking about cobalt here, you know, the people who made the heaters that explode with black ooze all over your tank? Yeah. Perspective. I'd presume this isn't their first customer support rodeo, let's just say that.

I think it's better not to volunteer any unnecessary information to begin with, but it's still obnoxious that they had to make him feel like he's only half a customer simply because he used ebay buy-it-now payment rather than their website's payment method, or something. I mean who cares? At some point even the warranty doesn't matter, what matters is they either fix it or they don't, and ultimately they did offer to fix it, after being scolded for doing nothing wrong, lol.

Oh well. I'm still not sure how upset I should really be over this, since they still offered to replace it. Really, the only thing to be upset about is that their customer service rep is a jerk, lol. Like as if running into a BOFH should ever be a surprise or something, haha.
 
gus6464 said:
A basic supply chain is manufacturer -> wholesaler -> retailer. Cobalt got their money for the product long before the product got to the retailer. Violating MAP without getting caught is so easy and in the end the manufacturer could care less.

Say I have a shop. I advertise Radions are $799. Guy comes into shop to buy the Radion. When it comes time to ring him up I tell customer "you know what I am going to give you 20% off the radions because you bought 4 units". Will I get in trouble with ecotech for MAP violation? Probably not. Why? Because I never advertised the radion at the lower price so I didn't do anything special to get the customer in the door. In the end who is going to know what I did? The customer, ecotech if he has to do a warranty claim, and myself. MAP contracts were created because retailers complain about unfair price competition but at the end of the day the manufacturer only cares about selling units. Do you honestly think ecotech is going to tell all the retailers around me that I am selling radions at a cheaper price than they are if I move a lot more units than they do?

Stuff like this is the norm with boutique audio equipment. Long ago in college I worked for an audio shop and that is exactly what they did. Not a single item we sold was purchased at sticker price even though everything had MAP. They never advertised cheaper prices anywhere. Key word in MAP is Advertised. I can advertise something at a certain price all day long, what I sell it to you for is a whole different story.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I was sort of thinking the whole "manufacturer -> wholesaler bit" in my mind because i'm so used to dealing with companies that are wholesalers and retailers, like BRS. There is often a middle man in the aquarium industry. I know for a fact that my local fish stores all get stuff from a local distributor who deals with numerous brands, and this upstream distributor is usually buying stuff 2 shipping containers at a time, that includes everything, glass tanks, heaters, pumps, whatever, you name it. Only some stuff is sourced directly from manufacturers, a lot of stores do use a wholesaler though, and that does add another layer of complexity in it, because sometimes the manufactuer has a MAP but the wholesaler won't mention it to their wholesale customers.....it's all possible, and from what i've seen on some of the wholesaler sites, they often dont mention the map at all.

lol haggling over stereo equipment is like an old cliche I think. but totally true. the markup on some of that stuff is crazy too, especially in the audiophile world. repairing vintage audio equipment is one of my old past-times though so i've definitely been down that road before as well.
 
if it came from premium aquatics or any of the authorized retailers even through ebay it is supposed to have a warranty as the manufacture has a "trust" with its authorized dealers.
 
Well, if they're not going to cover the impeller they might as well not have a warranty. Cobalt even said as much: "Virtually all pump problems can be solved by replacing the impeller..."

eBay may have improved since its 'wild west' days, but there are still a lot of goods from non-traditional sources and/or varied or questionable backgrounds. My sister has an eBay storefront from which she sells cosmetics that she gets as overstock from a local supplier. They're genuine as far as she knows, but she's definitely not an authorized retailer and I suspect the manufacturer would do the same a Cobalt did if someone were to have an issue. That said, if a customer had an issue, she would stand behind the product and either replace it or refund the price.

I'm surprised Premium Aquatics didn't offer to help you out; their customer service is generally quite good. If Cobalt has a policy of not supporting eBay purchases, they should be aware of that and either work something out with Cobalt, not sell their products on eBay or give a disclaimer with the sale since the lack of a warranty definitely affects the value of the product.

I wonder if they explicitly stated their policy in their agreement with Premium Aquatics? I think they are complete within their rights to limit the warranty coverage, but they should be clear about that with their distributors so people like the OP don't get caught in the middle. Not covering the impeller on a pump? That's just inexcusable.
 
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