...

Go Back   Lateral-g Forums > Help, Feedback and Testing > Vendor/Member Feedback
User Name
Password



Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 07-23-2014, 02:54 AM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Thumbs down Beware Of Scott Mock and/or Chubbys Welding!!!

MULTIPLE MISREPRESENTATIONS - NON EXISTENT QUALITY CONTROL - QUESTIONABLE BUSINESS PRACTICE

What follows is the “short version” of the ordeal I have undergone as a result of purchasing a Scott Mock front clip for my project. After being impressed with Scott’s new 2013 design, mandrel bent rails, A Body weld in option, along with his seemingly excellent rapport on the forums, I figured it'd be a reasonably safe bet to make an order from him. I paid Scott up front and in full via Paypal for a weld in A Body clip and C6 components. These were to be shipped across the globe to me in New Zealand.

However, what I eventually received was a clip that has rails that are not mandrel bent, not even parallel (3/4 out), a cross member that is not square and plumb with the rails, an obvious and dangerous design fault in the upper coil over mount, among numerous other faults and misrepresentations. What was advertised on the forums was vastly different compared to what Scott sent out.

Scott has admitted his failings and offered to make right the situation. But when it actually came down to making the agreed partial refund, he has so far failed to honor that agreement. Instead I have been dragged along for weeks, fed numerous lies, and the end result has been Scott walking away from his mistakes and leaving me $5000 + out of pocket.

Scott and I agreed on a partial refund via Paypal on the defective parts (clip minus C6 gear) and I was then to return the faulty parts to him in the US, shipping to be paid for at my own cost all the way to him in Kansas. Time went by and no funds had appeared in my Paypal account. I followed it up with Scott at he told me that his Paypal was locked. This was apparently due to an existing dispute he was having with another member over quality issues with their clip. So I waited for a week or so and emailed Scott again. No, apparently his Paypal account was still locked. Another week went by, nope, still locked. I then emailed Scott with instructions on how to unlock his account (and outlining numerous other methods how we could sort this out, outside of Paypal), to which he replied that HE IS BROKE AND HAD NO MONEY TO SEND ME! I then asked him whether or not he should still be taking money off other members here on Lateral G and Pro Touring if he was broke, and his story then changed again to that he had received advice from his attorney and was now NOT GOING TO SEND ANYBODY ANY MONEY. The story behind the missing money had changed three times within the space of a little over 24 hours…...so I began to get that sinking feeling…..

I personally cannot confirm if Scott is in financial difficulty and that is why his attorney apparently advised him not to send any money, or if his declaration to me that he was broke was just a very ill-considered attempt to make me go away. Only Scott knows the answer to this and as he is no longer responding to my emails. Unfortunately I don’t expect to get a truthful answer any time soon. All I can say is if Scott is supposed to be building you a clip or has any of your money, you may want to make a phone call or two.

Scott had told me that if I post my experience publically, he will just walk away and leave me with a $5000 + hole in my project budget to fill on my own. Having been fed numerous lies from Scott of late, I do have my doubts whether he ever intended to make this right from the outset. I do hope I am wrong. In light of the recent high profile vendor failings (thank you to those who bring these guys to our attention, via PM or publically) and Scott does walk away from this, I guess the only good that may come of it is that other honest hardworking car guys will be fully informed of my experience, to better gauge who they wish to deal with in the future, and hopefully they will avoid the sleepless nights, lost $$ and lost passion for their hobby that I am feeling right now.



__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 07-23-2014, 04:18 PM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Default







In the image above, the holes drilled didn't quite line up, so Scotts shop just cranked the thread cutting bolts up on an angle! Problem solved!

I also want to make it clear that I did not want to have to make this thread, as it appeared Scott was a popular member on the boards. I have put a number of hours into trying to sort this out with him, to avoid putting another cross against his name in this feedback forum. He has admitted to making some mistakes which is great, but so far he has failed to make any reasonable attempt to make it right. I have given Scott a lot of patience, along with a number of potential solutions on how we can sort this out without damaging his reputation. Most if not all of these solutions were largely in his favor, and still resulted in me being out of pocket well over a thousand $$$ in shipping and taxes. He did make some offers to repair or replace, I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about that idea, so we then agreed on a partial refund. He then changed the details of the refund, then retracted the offer, then told me he was broke. After telling me he was broke and had no money, he then wanted me to send the clip back to him at my cost first (funny as I sent the money to him in full, up front, via Paypal) so I'd be out more $$ and run the risk of him crying poor and/or changing his mind again when it came to the transfer of any partial refund.




************************************************** ************************************************** ****************************




What follows is the “long version” (for those that are interested) that clarifies a number of the other issues and circumstances surrounding my experience with Scott Mock/Chubbys Welding (that’s the business name on my invoice).

On the 23rd of April 2013 I paid Scott Mock $5350 USD in full, up front, via Paypal, for one of his weld-in A Body clips and all the C6 components to go with. This was followed up by a payment of $220 USD on the 7th June 2013 for an F Body Pan kit to suit the subframe, paid in full, in advance. The build time discussed was about a month, but unfortunately due to a number of hold ups at Scott’s end, and a number of unanswered emails and anxious moments from mine, it finally arrived at my shipper in CA on the 22nd of July – albeit without the requested invoice needed to get it out of the country. We did get there in the end however.

***Scott has only just told me in the last email I received (06.29.2014), that apparently Paypal held the funds for the clip for 21 days. Apparently this was another one of the “reasons” for the delay. I had also been told he was “busy in a one man shop” (yet at a later stage he blamed the shoddy work on my clip on one of his employees) other Lateral G members had “called favor’s in early”, and he chose to see to them first “my part’s guy is on leave, doing inventory and then he was away racing”..etc etc….. He did tell me Paypal held up the funds for the oil pan for 14 days. I actually told Scott that I would pay extra to ship the pan later, if he would just send my clip now, or at least send some images of the progress, or update one his threads with the progress. None of which happened, so I suspect the clip wasn’t at the stage I was being told it was***

I paid an extra $500+ for mandrel bent rails to suit/match my Art Morrison rear mandrel rails. AFTER the clip had left his shop, Scott emailed me to tell me I wasn't going to get the mandrel rails I had paid for, and that he had made CNC cut and welded rails with a wider 5 x 2 rear section to weld to the frame. Would have been nice to know. The CNC rails may have worked out okay (still not what I wanted, ordered and paid for – I don't need the 5 x 2 for my build), but they'd need to be rectangular and straight for a start. I was anxiously awaiting something, anything to show for my money so there was no way I wanted it going back to Scott for mandrel rails resulting in even more delay. I just accepted it and figured I'd just have to make it work - at that point I wasn't yet aware of any of the other issues.







Upon inspection when it arrived, there was one or two things that obviously weren't up to scratch and weren't "as advertised", but they appeared fixable/able to be modified with under about 10 hours fab/re-design work. After 3 months of anguish I was relieved to at least have something to show for my $5350 + shipping, + taxes (just over $7000 USD worth to me, landed here). I was mentally spent on the whole experience and figured I'd just have it fixed here. It's not like sending the clip back to Scott was a practical solution.

I then contacted Scott upon its arrival in New Zealand as he had incorrectly supplied a cheaper muscle car pan kit, instead of an F body pan kit. Scott told me he "thought it was the same" as the F body kit (after 50 + subframe sales at that stage) which I then accepted his explanation and had to sell it at a loss. When this was brought up later, Scott told me I should have given him a part number…….something I would have done if I had any reason to believe he didn't know better.

Beyond the control of myself, or Scott, I then had a health issue which prevented me from getting to work on the car as soon as I would have liked. The clip sat for another 7 or so months before I was in a condition to look at it again. Fast forward to March this year and I thought my builder and I would look at installing it. We cut the front of my frame up and did a rough mock-up. The following evening, I came across another feedback thread on Scott, and my heart sank. I'd never have thought to measure if the thing was square, I mean, why on earth wouldn't it be…he told me this clip would be jigged?

The clip rails are 3/4 of an INCH, out of parallel. The crossmember, which the LCA's mount off is 1/6 of an INCH out of square with the rails. It became obvious that the car won't have a hope of driving straight installed as is. On top of that, once I had the clip DA'd and could see the perspective of Scott’s handmade CNC rails, you could then make out that they varied in height and width and were not even rectangular.



In reference to the above pic, if you can see it with the naked eye you know it won’t be hidden on the alignment machine.
__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino

Last edited by Simmo; 07-23-2014 at 05:22 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 07-23-2014, 04:41 PM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Default







That's not at the worst point either ^^^^^^.

The most disappointing thing was the upper coil over mount design. One 3/8 bolt tapped through 1/8 thick steel was supposed to hold up one corner of a 3500 lb+ car? 3 - 4 threads max? No way I'd park my build on that let alone do 150mph in it. I note the clips on Scott’s cars that he posted on Lat-G to "advertise" (before the pics were removed) had a much thicker plate inside the frame/upstand, and two bolts securing the bracket.

This isn't even the end of the problems, there's the core support mounts that weren't supplied to weld on, the upper a arm bolt holes that were drilled different sizes......but this post is long enough already!













__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino

Last edited by Simmo; 07-23-2014 at 05:33 PM. Reason: clarification
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 07-23-2014, 05:14 PM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Default

In the interim I had paid more money to another builder to redesign the control arms and uprights all based around this clip, which it was now apparent wasn't going to be useful without a ton of additional fab and new, straight rails. More $$ down the drain as a result of the poor quality control out of at Scott Mock/Chubby’s Welding.

Scott initially offered to repair my clip if I sent it back to him in the US. Whilst I expressed gratitude for his offer, I explained to him that the cost of shipping, sales taxes, import fees, customs fees all add up to a large sum. To double up and send this clip back to him in Kansas and then back here to New Zealand would likely cost me more in duties and taxes than the value of the clip/frame itself. It would likely be cheaper for me to start over than send parts back and forth across the Pacific.

Then there’s the quality issue that carried through to when he offered to build me a new clip. Again, I expressed my gratitude for the offer, however I had concerns about the quality of the replacement, not to mention the second lot of customs/taxes/importation costs I would be paying. In my opinion, you don't just accidently make the type and number of errors outlined above when you actually set out to build a quality, safety critical component. I expect to be placing my life, that of my family, and other road users on this clip. One of the explanations that were given to me for the 3 months build time was that Scott was “checking things with my order”. How is it that in 3 months of checking not one of these issues above was picked up? How long would it take to get a second clip made up to standard, if that could be done at all?

I explained to Scott that with this option I would be hit with another lot of import fees, customs clearance fees, MAF fees, and 15% goods and service tax on top the value (not cost) of all of the goods imported, and another 15% on top goods and service tax of all the aforementioned fees (I also outlined how I could not accept a falsely discounted/zero invoice, this is a red flag at customs, and is illegal). End result would be significant $$ out of my pocket again to roll the dice on whether I end up with a usable/safe product or not. It'd be a safer bet in mind, given all of the above, for me to start again. These are the reasons that I have sought a refund from Scott rather than have him repair this clip, or build a new
one.

Scott initially understood this. He made an offer of a refund of $2000 via Paypal, or a refund of $3500 via Paypal for the return of this clip all the way to KS at my expense (unfortunately he later withdrew both these remedy options). This is the balance paid less the C6 components, rack etc. I would still be left out of pocket a sizeable sum of shipping and taxes that I’d have to forfeit, but I was at the point of cutting my losses and in the lack of a better outcome being offered, I went with it. My quote to freight this clip back to Scott was in the vicinity of $600 USD, and it had no real dollar value to me, so it worked out about $900 USD better off for me to send it back. In that case I'd still be losing circa $2000 USD in the deal including my costs to return this clip to him, rather than $2900 USD, through no fault of my own. I took this option as best case out of a bad situation, and we agreed.

That’s when the waiting began. This is where I was fed a number of lies as to why the funds weren't being transferred. Initially his Paypal was locked, he then told me he was broke, and then he had legal advice not to refund me any money. Then the very next day he told me he did have money and for me to send the clip to him first and then I might get my refund……...real reassuring considering I’d be spending even more money to send this clip to a guy, who in my experience, hasn't exactly acted in a trustworthy manner. I have no idea what truth is, or what’s going on at Scott Mock’s, so hopefully he'll chime in and enlighten us all.

I emailed the other member on here who was having issues with Scott’s work to “compare notes”. It would appear that he has a whole set of different issues to those that I am having with regard to build quality. Scott has continually used the fact that I made contact with this member as an excuse as to why he won’t sort things out with me. For some reason, despite this other member being in the US, closer to Scott than I am, Scott feels that because I contacted him I must be somehow collaborating with him and that he won’t resolve this issue with me, until he sorts the first unsatisfied customer out. Go figure. Whether he is just clutching at straws to avoid making this right, or has cash flow problems, or he truly believes that I have the time of day to piss around plotting with some other customer to “get him” who knows.

I’ve tried to be polite as possible to Scott in all of this, trying to bring his attention to the severity of these issues, without meaning to offend or bash his work. Unfortunately there has been a gradual decline in the tone as time has gone by, as I've been misled, messed around and have grown increasingly frustrated with Scotts handling of the matter. Scott chose to cc Jody into our later emails and made some false statements and made some false allegations regarding the circumstances of this transaction. He even went as far as making an implied threat that I “would need to see a dentist” as I mentioned similarities between my experience with Scott, and experiences that other members had been through with a certain ex--vendors of this site. Once the facts were laid out and explanations/evidence provided to counter Scott’s claims, he has failed to return any of my emails. I do have all the emails from day one in my dealings with Scott, and all the evidence to back every word of this post. I did get the impression he was trying to manipulate the facts in order to discredit me or my claims, so hopefully he will respond to this thread in an honest and professional manner.

All I have ever done in my dealings with Scott is pay in full, up front, to receive a safe quality product as advertised. I still haven't got one. I’ve then sought to come to a resolution with Scott to avoid having to make this public and the effect it will have on his reputation. In return I’ve been f*cked around to no end for my troubles, and been left with a smoking hole in my wallet which I'm now being expected to fill myself.

The last offer I got from Scott was:-

1. A partial refund – However he said - "I'm not refunding any money to anybody until the ***other member***/paypal is cleared up even if that takes a whole year".

2. He would build a new clip and send it to me - However he said "If you want a new clip I will not work on it until I finish something I working on now”

He actually expects me to spend more of my money to send this clip back to him, with no deposit of funds, no idea when a new clip would be shipped, or what additional costs I am being expected to cover. His other option involves him sorting out HIS problems first, with some other unrelated and unhappy customer, with which he appears in no hurry to resolve. All of this in addition to the potential quality and/or cash flow issues he may be having. I haven’t been left with a whole lot of options…

In a last ditch effort to come to a resolution with Scott, I told him I would pallet up and drop this clip off to any shipper or freight company he liked here, without paying me a cent in advance, and he could arrange to have it shipped directly to him. He could then deduct that shipping amount off the $3500 refund when it arrived in Kansas. I would have arranged the shipping from my end for him but I didn't want to expose myself to any number of claims of damage or failure of the clip to arrive to him in Kansas. Scott had nothing to lose with this option, and yet he’s chosen to not reply to the email, or any subsequent emails I've sent.

I feel like I have been misled from day 1 in my dealings with Scott Mock, and am now out a considerable amount of $$, not to mention time into my build. Hopefully armed with this knowledge other members can choose who they deal with a little more wisely than I.
__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 08-24-2014, 11:48 PM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Default

So it's been over a month now and I can't say I'm surprised that I have had no contact whatsoever from Scott Mock.

- No attempt to rectify the situation above, or to honor the refund agreement he made months ago to correct his poor workmanship.

- No attempt to explain the reasons for his shoddy work and fraudulent advertising.

- No reassurance that he is actually not bankrupt (who knows), and is actually in a position to refund any of my money, or to take any money off other members for new frames.

- No reply to my emails or this thread, despite logging in and being well aware of its existence.

If the posts above are not enough, I can only hope that his silence on the matter is enough to warn others to stay well away from Scott Mock. His refusal to even communicate confirms to me that he is entirely comfortable with ripping off fellow members out of their hard earned cash, unfortunately, just like too many others that we see come and go in this hobby.

The good news is I've now got a much, much better custom clip in the pipe work which will not only result in a better handling car, it will be safe and built properly FIRST time. Simple enough you would think...

I'm now resigned to the fact that I've been scammed out of thousands of dollars by Scott Mock, not to mention a huge amount of my time wasted back and forth with his empty promises. At least now the facts are out for all to see, to make sure members know exactly what sort of character they are dealing with when going near Scott Mock.
__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 04-18-2015, 06:31 PM
Simmo's Avatar
Simmo Simmo is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 116
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Default

BUMP

As I feel it is timely to ensure people read this before anybody even considers dealing with Scott Mock.

He is entirely comfortable with ripping off fellow members out of their hard earned cash, unfortunately, just like too many others that we see come and go in this hobby.

It's one thing to be incompetent in his line of work, but his attitude towards remedy of his blatant stuff ups is beyond belief. He then attempts to hold the customer to ransom should they attempt to warn others of his dodgy practices.

I could go on but in short - DON'T DO IT!
__________________
Chris
21 Toyota GR Yaris
98 FD RX7 RZ
335 square 68 El Camino
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 01:36 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
Copyright Lateral-g.net