BFL - kind of fishy

[Lurk]

 A friend of mine who preordered 3 jalapenos requested a refund.   He wishes to stay anonymous so I am going to post on his behalf.

This seemed extremely fishy to me so i thought i would share with everyone so they could make there own conclusions.

I am not saying bfl is a scam... i am not taking any position at all....just think others should be aware.

So my friend requests a refund.  he had 2 seperate orders. 1 order for 2 jalps and 1 order for 1 jalp.

he paid with bitcoin.

He got a response within 2 hours of his initial request. Bfl said "we could not find one of your orders in our system and we have no record of you paying with paypal.

They should have been able to tell right away that it was purchased with bitcoins.(possible way for them to delay)

So a day passed and my friend sent 3 different e-mails. He included the transaction i.d. and the e-mail confirmation that payment was made.

Still no response from Bfl.

The part that concerned me the most is this next part.....

Before going to bed my friend sent one last e-mail..... He told bfl that if they do not respond to his e-mail by the next day he was going to post the conversation on the forums and warn others about what had happened to him.

Not 10 minutes later his refund showed up in his wallet.  No response from bfl through e-mail...nothing. his coins were returned though.

So his first e-mail was answered in a couple hours.....his next 3 e-mails providing all the info were not responded to.

after threatening to post the e-mails to the forums  a refund was issued instantly.  still no response from bfl.

This tells me  that the poor customer service and delays of getting back to e-mails is not real.  When confronted with being outed on the forum they went from playing stupid and ignoring him...to giving an instant full refund.

could be coincidence. Maybe its nothing to be concerned about.

I am simply posting this so people can see that there is no reason for the e-mail delays or poor customer service.

The smell of fish is overwhelming.

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[yochdog]

I think accusations like these need to be backed up by the actual e-mails, including the original order confirm, and other evidence.

Otherwise the credibility of hearsay is very weak. 

Don't get me wrong, I am not saying you are making this up, it would simply have MUCH more credibility with evidence.  Anyone can make up allegations like this in 60 seconds to raise FUD. 

Just my .02 bitcents. 

[molecular]

maybe there really was some screwup with the one order and they couldn't find it.

when he threatened they decided it would be cheaper to just give him the required amount of BTC without necessarily having found the order.They could've just said "screw it" and shelled the money out from the marketing budget, which is not unethical, imo.

[Lurk]

i understand... maybe he will be willing to share the e-mails.

Just thought people should be aware.

[Inaba]

Yeah, I'd love to see these emails.

[Lurk]

well since the spokesperson has asked I will provide all relevant information.

once I gather the info I will post it here.

[Lurk]

xxxxxxxxxx
   
Nov 26 (2 days ago)
      
to office
Hello,
Id like to rquest a refund on my 2 seperate orders #13176 and #13220 .  I'm sorry for any trouble this causes but I could really use the funds to use towards christmas.  I'd also like to wait and eventually buy a single instead of the jalepenos.
  Thank you very much.
1LsBYmhFA8ucnbrsXgynHy2EWguRPfUeBW
xxxxxxxx
   
3:56 PM (22 hours ago)
      
to Butterfly
here is the transaction I.D. for my purchase with bitcoins for order 13176

ed7930abc22a1f1abc50afd03900572602647266a13473547886f8004ec8c04d

I would greatly appreciate a refund for my both of my orders. If you could please send the bitcoins back as soon as possible i would be very grateful.
my bitcoin address is  :    1LsBYmhFA8ucnbrsXgynHy2EWguRPfUeBW


On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 7:38 PM, xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

    here is the e-mail.
    I paid with bitcoins.  I should have a refund for a total of 3 jalapeno.
    please send the refund to address   1LsBYmhFA8ucnbrsXgynHy2EWguRPfUeBW
    Thank You
    Re: New submission from Pre-Order Form - BitForce 'Jalapeno'-13176
    Inbox
       x
    Butterfly Labs Inc
       
    Nov 19 (7 days ago)
       
       
    to me
    Hi xxxx,

    This is to confirm that your order no. 13176, pay-dated 11/17/2012, for 1 BitForce Jalapeno has been successfully entered into our system.

    We will notify you with tracking information when your order ships.

    For real-time updates on what is shipping now and news on projected SC products shipping schedule, please visit Jody's customer service blog at <https://forums.butterflylabs.com/blog.php/46-BFL_Jody>.

    Thank you for your interest in Butterfly Labs, Inc. and for your order.

    Kind regards,

    Debbie
    BF Labs, Inc. Customer Service



    On Sat, Nov 17, 2012 at 1:19 PM, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
    Preferred payment method
         BTC
    Shipping information
    Name
         xxxxxxxxxxxx
    Email
         xxxxxxxxxxx
    Phone
         xxxxxxxxxx
    Shipping Address Information
      xxxxxxxxx
    United States
    Map It
    Order
         
    Product    Qty    Unit Price    Price
    BitForce Jalapeno ($149)    1    $149.00    $149.00
         Shipping (US / Canada Priority ($14))    $14.00
    Total:    $163.00


    On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 7:13 PM, Butterfly Labs Inc <office@butterflylabs.com> wrote:

        xxxxxx,

        After looking through our orders, I need some help.

        First, I see an order 13220 but don't see an order 13176. Is it possible that it was cancelled before it was entered?

        Also, can you confirm the email used to place the order via PayPal? I can't find record of the payment in PayPal with the xxxxxxxxx address.

        Please advise.

        Dave M.
        Account Manager Butterfly Labs

        On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 1:22 PM, xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

            Hello,
            Id like to rquest a refund on my 2 seperate orders #13176 and #13220 .  I'm sorry for any trouble this causes but I could really use the funds to use towards christmas.  I'd also like to wait and eventually buy a single instead of the jalepenos.
              Thank you very much.
            1LsBYmhFA8ucnbrsXgynHy2EWguRPfUeBW




        --
        For Jody's Customer Service Blog, and more, please visit our new BFL Forums at <https://forums.butterflylabs.com/blog.php>



xxxxxxxxxxxx
   
9:04 PM (17 hours ago)
      
to Butterfly
Hi. I responded a couple of times with information about my orders.  I would like a refund. You sent this MSG yesterday and you have yet to update me about wether this issue is sorted out.  I preorderd 3 jalapeños purchased with bitcoin.
Please respond.  I do not want to start posting these Msgs on forums and warning others but if I do not get a response I will be forced to.
Thank you.

Sent from my Atari


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx  end of e-mails   xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


lets look at the time between the last post and the refund.
last e-mail sent  at 9:04 p.m.
refund transaction:
 
Status: 133 confirmations
Date: 11/27/2012 21:22
From: unknown
To: 1LsBYmhFA8ucnbrsXgynHy2EWguRPfUeBW (own address, label: anon ads)
Credit: 39.0042 BTC
Net amount: +39.0042 BTC
Transaction ID: 2d90cb1612e9611f3fe39fe756d5d150819bc59cb3ad9b1ff20f208dae16ba77

the refund was issued at 9:22 p.m.
18 minutes after the last e-mail.

There are the e-mails you wanted to see so bad.....Now explain it.

[Inaba]

I'm not sure what there is to explain.  You requested a refund on the 26th at 9pm at night and then received a refund on the 27th around 9pm... so 24 hours for a refund.  There was a question as to what your order number was and a request for more information was sent, then you responded with the information needed to process the refund and it was refunded.  All in ~24 hours.

Yeah... I'm not seeing a problem here.

[Lurk]

no.... no problems at all....  just fishy

[Inaba]

Yeah, 24 hour turn around time on refunds is really fishy. 

[Lurk]

the fact that he got no response at all until he threatened to post the e-mails  and then got an instant refund is fishy.

Its great that he got a refund so fast but would it really have happened so fast if he did not say he was going to post the e-mails?

Like I said I'm not accusing anyone of anything..........this is just info  that people should be aware of.

coincidence?  maybe.

A refund was issued quickly, after being ignored by the previous emails and not getting a response it just seems odd that a refund would be issued 18 minutes after the last e-mail.

could be nothing......it could be huge.

make your own desicions.

[jwzguy]

What I take away from this is that BFL processed your refund in under 24hrs. This makes me more confident in them as a prospective customer. Thanks for sharing.

[Lurk]

no problem. glad you could come to your own conclusion.

[Inaba]

If by "ignored" you mean "I didn't get a response instantly." Then yes, I would agree.  Otherwise, no.

[Fjordbit]

BFL isn't fishy they make perfect sense. But for them to make perfect sense, you have to step out of the bitcoin world.

People wonder why BFL would make these great miners and sell them instead of use them to mine. They wonder what the long term viability is. Why would they act this way.

It's very simple: catering to Bitcoin miners is just a way to get the capital to build up a custom processing unit business that in no way related to bitcoin. Their url doesn't have "bit" or "btc" in it. If you look at the FPGA firmware download page, they talk about custom loads for medical research. Their hope is that their future only has bitcoin as one of many accomplishments. And delivering a custom ASIC solution to a wide marketplace that will have people 2 or 3 months from now dancing for joy on public forums around the world in multiple languages is a good starting point.

So no, they don't really care that much about your friend's purchase order for their cheapest product line.

[owowo]

Well, he got his refund! In less then 30 hours!

STFU! MOVE ON! NOTHING TO SEE HERE!

and no I'm not payed by BFL, just one of the quite minory reading this BULLSHITFORUM from time to time.

[creativex]

Thanks for posting Lurk. This company has a lot of other people's money, skepticism is a good thing.

[molecular]

What I take away from this is that BFL processed your refund in under 24hrs. This makes me more confident in them as a prospective customer. Thanks for sharing.

+1

[psilan]

Your friend should stop playing dice if he needs the coins so bad.

[Lurk]

I wish it was me getting a refund.   I find your post amusing anyway.