Seattle Coffee Gear
reviews and complaints

I ordered a coffee machine from this company. The machine never arrived, I called customer service and told them that the machine is not here. The customer service was non existent and rude, they started blaming me and telling me that it is not their problem. I’m sorry but I didn’t receive my $900 item and the only thing you can tell me is that it is not your problem and the most we can due for you is give you 20% off your next order. I DIDN'T RECEIVE MY PACKAGE and you can’t help me? How do you send out a $900 item and not require a signature or purchase a $3 insurance from FedEx. Do not buy from this company, save your self money and a headache. Company won’t last long with this type of customer service.

I shopped for a grinder and settled on Seattle Coffee gear due to a promotional $50 gift card offer. There was no indication that the card would have a 90 day expiration at the point of sale. I tried to use it too late. They refused to honor it. The email did note the expiration at the bottom below the code but I feel deceived and I’m out $50. One reason I delayed my order was because their website repeatedly would not let me add an item to my cart.

Their customer service is non-existent. I bought an expensive super automatic, which has broken down twice in eight months. They will honor the warranty I paid for, but would do nothing else. They sold me a lemon and will not stand behind it. Not willing to exchange the machine or offer any type of conciliatory gesture. Costs me over 40 dollars and a 2 month waiting period each time to ship it back to them for repairs. Bad business in my opinion.

After receiving this 'Certified' Refurbished Super Automatic espresso machine, we followed the instructions, and the unit still failed to get past priming the pump. Customer service was no help. Asking us to stick a turkey baster inside a 10 minute old machine is ridiculous! But in hopes of getting it to work, we followed their instructions, Force priming the supposedly 'Certified' refurbished machine. It still refused to work on its own. Clearly Seattle Coffee Gear has no business selling these machines. How can you send out $500+ machines and not even test them? HORRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE.

After an hour of failed priming, we decided to return the unit. Then came our next surprise. $69 to ship it back. Atleast it was FREE SHIPPING to us, right? WRONG. They decided to charge us for shipping after we returned the unit, only giving us a partial refund for this piece of crap that was their mistake to begin with. Now we are out over $110 and didn't even get a single coffee.

THE WORST SHOPPING EXPERIENCE EVER.

I purchased two items, both of which their Web site indicated were in stock. The next day I received an email stating that one item was not in stock but that they would be receiving it in a week or so. No shipment was made. A few days later I found my credit card had been charged even though no items had shipped. I wrote an email, informing them of the false 'in-stock' and charge. Their response was "I'm sorry we discovered the item was out of stock", and automatically charging your card though nothing is ready to ship "is standard practice". Then they informed me that the item won't be in for several more weeks. Three strikes, they're OUT!

For a Christmas 2010 present to myself, I ordered a Technivorm Moccamaster coffee maker and a Baratza Virtuoso coffee grinder. Seattle Coffee Gear (SCG) charged my credit card $179 for the Baratza but didnt ship it even tho the packing slip said it was included. SCG also shipped me an item in error I didnt even order. SCG sent the Baratza out in a second shipment after I notified them it was missing. While waiting for it, I opened the Technivorm and found it to be an apparently used/restocked machine, with scratches, stains, and missing the warranty sheet. I asked the owner (Gail W) in emails if my machine was used or restocked and my question was ignored and went unanswered. I asked if a full refund was possible, was told no because I had waited longer than 5 days to report problems. Was given two options, swap the Technivorm or pay to ship everything back unused & receive "full refund minus $21.50 for original S & H."

On 1/4, alarmed by the multiple errors & apparently being sold a restocked machine as new, I called and spoke with Jessica M. and told her I was upset at all the problems and might cancel delivery of the Baratza & may return everything. Said I'd call her back in 30 minutes & let her know. I decided to take a chance, called Jessica M. back as I said and instructed her to have the Baratza delivered. Well, it never arrived. I checked FedEx on 1/5 & was stunned to see my package was on its way back to Seattle. I emailed SCG to ask why & the owner (Gail W.) blamed SCG's failed delivery on me, claiming falsely that I'd refused the order. I phoned FedEx and their rep told me that Mitch H. of the shipper (SCG) had recalled the order. FedEx emailed me me a pdf letter apologizing for any inconvenience and stated that "the shipper" recalled the order. I provided FedEx's letter to owner (Gail W.) and she never even acknowledged it. I was later charged for that second Baratza shipment that never arrived because of SCG's error (see below).

Facing more 7-day shipping cycles to swap out the Technivorm and a 3rd Baratza shipment, I cut my losses because the Jan 15 returns deadline was near. I again asked for a refund. Was told no, that SCG is going above & beyond their policy to allow me to return everything & only charge me S & H. So, I returned everything unused, freebies untouched, & was stunned to get emails from SCG saying I'd also be charged for the 2nd Baratza shipment recalled in error by SCG, and, that I'd be charged for 1lb of free coffee that I'd returned unopened (returned because I'd been promised by Gail W. that if I returned everything unused I'd receive a full refund minus $21.50 S&H). I am out $64.69 and filed a dispute with my credit card co.

Seattle Coffee Gear (SCG) seems to have an unpublished policy not to pay out a single penny, no matter how badly they mangle a customer's order, and no matter how abysmal their customer service. Because of the many problems with my order, I did a post-order web search and found SCG has a ~ 20%+ negative review rate. I searched other online coffee gear stores (Boyd Coffee Company, Roastmasters, Clive Coffee, Sweet Marias, etc.) and didn’t find a single negative review about any of them. You can decide for yourself where to risk your money.

WOW! NEVER AGAIN.

This was a test run in selecting a supplier and I have never had such poor service. After I placed my order I received an email confirming my order... great I will have my gear in 5 to 9 days. (My credit card has been charged too.) 9 days go by and I have not received my order. I should have called then but chose to wait a few more days because it was over the holidays and I assumed that shipping could be running slow. When I didn’t have my order 15 days after I placed the order I called the store. I was put on hold for a really long time and had to hang up and call back. When I did finally talk to someone I was told that my order was on back order. Why was I never told it was on back order? When I asked, I was informed they sent me a email about the back ordered item. I re-checked my emails, inbox, trash and spam... NOTHING. Plus the item was never listed on the website as backordered. When I stated how disappointed I was in their customer service, I was not even given a "sorry" but rather was told again, that they DID in fact email me. The person I spoke with was not very friendly and in fact a bit rude. I was then told that I had the option of selecting a different item in place of the one on backorder, to which I accepted. At this time I should have canceled my order.

The following day I got an email stating my order was shipped so I waited 9 days…… when I didn’t have my order after waiting 9 days I called back and this person was more helpful/nicer than the last gal I spoke to. She couldn’t figure out what was going on with my order and needed to talk to the shipping rep who was not in the office and she said she would get back to me. The following Monday I got an email saying my order was shipped. At this point I am really upset because if I had known that it didn’t really ship when they said it shipped the first time I would have canceled the order. They did express ship the order because I received it the following day BUT it was A MONTH after I placed the order. Ordered=12/26/2010 Received=1/25/11.

This is not acceptable for a supplier (or retailer). This saddens me because I wanted to give my business to a local company but now I will be looking elsewhere for my personal and professional coffee needs.

I bought this machien from Ebay. The problem is that I sent this machine as a gift to my wife. The machine was received as promised no brochure, just five pages copy from the brochure. Plug the machine added the water and the coffee, made steam, but when tried to make coffee all we could get where two cups, after that did not heat up any more. Sent an email to seller (Victor) and all he said was to call the technical department and sent a their phone number. My wife did and their answer was to try to fix it ourselves. I was out of the country at this time and was not going to let her fix a gift I sent her.
They sent her a detalided email full of pictures and the sopts circled with the instructions on how to reset the boiler's thermostats. They even warned to use this special screw driver tip to open the machine. Meantime, during this back and forth between their technician and my wife, the seven day return policy expired. When I read the instructions, and how complicated it was to be for her to reset the thermostats, I asked them to take it back and send the full refund. They say, no because the seven days had passed. We could not beleive i, that was incredible!
ry to resason with them, but they will not take it back anymore.
Finally we opened a complaint with EBAY thinking that they will try to fix the problem, but they did not even try to do anything. After a couple of days EBAY closed the case in favor of the seller. The same seller that sold a broken machine.
that is sitting in my house, that they will not take back or pay the shipping cost.
I find both Seattle Coffee Gear and Ebay to be irresponsable. I want my money back, full refund plus shipping expenses.
Thank you.
J Sutera

Don't use this company for anything!. If you are upset then Gail and Victor will call your home to yell at you and tell you that you are not a nice person! Can you believe that owners of a company would call someone to yell at them for any reason, what terrible customer service?!?!?!

I had fraud on my bank account, someone used my credit card to purchase something on their website, so I called them and LISA told me there was NOTHING they could do to help me. Then Gail (co-owner) called my home to yell at me about how I spoke to LISA. I was unhappy that no one would help me, so of course I was mad. Then Gail hung up on me after we talked because she refused to listen to me. Then Victor the president and owner called to tell me how fraud work (like I didn't know) the told me that he was sitting next to Gail as she spoke to me and I am not a nice person. I told him that I wasn't a nice person right now (I said something a little more colorful) and that he should understand that I had money stolen from me. He then continued to make me seem like the person in the wrong, until I told him that they were harassing me calling me at home and I would call the police if they didn't stop harassing me!

My husband was so mad, he called them back and they tried to blame everything on me! How could any owner of business call someone at their home to yell at them, even more lie about the transaction not going through when even the bank confirmed that the transaction was completed.

DON'T USE SEATTLE COFFEE COMPANY! USE ANYONE ELSE!

I purchased an espresso machine from Seattle Coffee Gear in Seattle Washington. There was only one model of the particular machine I wanted. Prior to purchasing I asked the sales associate if they had any other boxes in back as the one I was sold appeared to have been opened. The sales person assured me that it was a brand new machine and had not been opened. I took the sales rep at their word and purchased the machine.

When I got home I started to get everything ready to set up the product – unfortunately, I found several packing slips and invoices to another customer (from June 2008) that indicated the machine had shipped to another Seattle Coffee Gear's customer in Utah six months earlier.

I contacted Seattle Coffee Gear and was told by Gail that the machine was not supposed to have been sold and should not have been “out front” as it WAS sent to, and quite possibly used, by another customer. I was also told that no additional money could be taken off sales price as it was already priced so low. I will be returning the product ASAP -- but be warned, Gail's statement tells me that they will fix up the box and remove the evidence of prior shipment from the box and once again try to sell the product as new.

Be very wary of purchasing new products from Seattle Coffee Gear as they appear to have an informal company policy of reselling returned, opened, and possibly used products as "New". Doing some basic searches on the Internet will I turned up another review on this board that revealed another user in a similar situation: http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/seattle-coffee-gear-c141192.html

Consumers be aware, this company sells refurbished espresso machines but advertize them as new. I ordered one for a gift and it was too late to return it. I didn't realized it was not a new machine until I sent my gift.

I purchased a Gaggia Evolution cappuccino maker in August 2007; within 5 weeks it started to malfunction (water began dripping from the milk foaming device). I was instructed by Seattle Coffee Gear to contact their importer directly; it took several days and telephone calls before anybody from that company got back to me. I then mailed the "new" machine--at my own expense ($20)--for repair. When it came back to me almost 2 weeks later, it was not fixed. Another round of telephone calls and e-mails and sending the machine back to the importer; it's now been almost 3 weeks! Seattle refuses to refund my money and tells me that they will "try" to get the importer to send me a new machine rather than fixing the old one. In short, since I purchased this machine 14 weeks ago, it has been out of my possession for almost 5 weeks--and Seattle Coffee Gear (and their importer, Importika) have been SLOW and INCOMPETENT in rectifying the problem. I would seriously advise doing business with this company unless you want to go through the consumer nightmare I have gone through. Beware of their so-called product guarantees! All in all, pretty outrageous treatment for having spent $250 to make my own cuppa.