Have been trying via mobile which I'm getting a dead line on this morning, maybe the network is down? his workshop number is going to fax aftr not being picked up and his other landline to an answer phone.

On going issues, so I'd rather speak to him than leave messages that don't very often get returned.

anyone any ideas? i don't bother emailing him as he rarely responds to those either, or if he does it takes him ages.

cheers,

Ned.

I must admit im getting quite disheartned by the lack of being able to get hold of darren.
I ve decided to use sierra parts for my car but need a dedion rear tube and was hoping to buy from GTS, however been trying to ring him for a few days now and not been able to get through.
Are their any plans for a dedion rear anywhere? or any other makers?

i believe mk can supply a 'weld it yourself' dedion tube, you may be able to buy a blank tube if you speak nicely to dax, and there are plans on the locost cdrom, which i believe are also on the locost7.info site...

Ned.

I'm sure Darren is a nice guy, and when I have dealt with him I have had no problems, but surely this must cost him business in the long run.

Customer service is just as important as providing a quality product IMHO.

Cheers

Mark

"I'm sure Darren is a nice guy"
Maybe, but when I paid for my stuff 9 months ago and still waiting for 3, albeit minor, items, I begin to wonder...
Tim

Surely it would make sense to get the customer service sorted, he must loose loads of business.

Even if you can't supply stuff for some reason then customer service usually wins through and you keep the business but with no customer service and no goods most people will go elsewhere.

Rich.

Due to my recent dealings with GTS and the poor customer service i probably wont buy from them again which is a shame because i want to buy the gts shocks and loads of other bits and pieces. At present im out of pocket by 50 quid due to a refund i asked for 3 weeks ago.

Im not slagging Darren in anyway dont get me wrong just customer service wins business in my book. The bits ive had in the past ive had no troubles with.




[Edited on 9/8/05 by Danozeman]

Everything said before is true.
I paid for a lot of things 4 months back and a few minor (small) things were (and still are) missing.
I got answered twice by some chap in his workshop phone number. This chap promised to deliver a few things to my neighbour (who happens to be British and was staying in London) and nothing happened.
I guess a trip (from you, guys, I'm 2.500 km away) to Faversham is in order.

It's a shame as I agree that (in the past) he has been very helpful.

Joćo

[Edited on 9/8/05 by jcduroc]

Darren's on hoilday AFAIK.

HTH,
James

not disbelieving you James, but i spoke to him last week and said I'd chase him again this week and he didn't mention it...

Ned.

hmm, i was gonna order my poly bushes from these guys. their web site is a bit heath robinson at the mo (pics dont work, tec pdfs dont work) and wanst going to bothercos of the bad image thats gives a "company"decided i would cos i thought he had a good rep on here. guess thats not true then.

I tryed calling his moby and i got a foreign type ringing back, he must be abroad

Is there anyone else doing +4 bodywork. I am getting a bit worried as he seems to be the only one.

he needs some staff i guess!

His lack of customer service cost him my buisiness

But maybe he is doing that well that he didnt need it

I had a dedion from him it at x-mas and must say I was well chuffed I got it quick and the quality was exelant.
BUT when I realised I would need special front arms to match the track and take the cortina front uprights ,He said he could and he would..... After many emails I gave up and flogged it ...

I lost £50 but he has lost much more .

[Edited on 9/8/05 by big_wasa]

Reading between the lines, Darren has found a new interest and has forsaken the Locost side of his business which is a pity after just getting some of the products sorted. The disrespect to customers is another matter.
If somebody was smart they'd get in there and offer to take the Locost side of the business off him before Chinese Whispers destroy the reputation of the quality of the parts. Really big group buy?

I spoke to Darren the other day. He is abroad on holiday at the moment, which I believe is long overdue!

As far as I can tell, the bodywork and all other production is carrying on without him. There has been a massive holdup on the shocks and also a slight holdup on bodywork, chassis, etc due to some extremely bad luck.

As people on here can testify, the quality of his parts is excellent and well priced. I am sure that Darren will be contactable again by the end of this week and hopefully will be refreshed and ready to rock.

I just want to make things clear (I've not had any remarks/comments from anyone, but just to cover myself )

I only posted this to try and get hold of Darren and as it now appears he is on holiday, which is fair enough, I will wait until next week before trying to get hold of him.

It seems odd he didn't mention it when I spoke to him only last week, but maybe that's just one of those things.

I have no quibble with the quality of Darrens producsts, only some 'administrative' issues and delays, which I don't want to go into detail on here about as I have no intention of slagging Darren off. I'm just trying resolve the problems surrounding a part that I've been waiting a while for.

Ned.

[ quote He also sent me the folowing : "For the benefit of the masses on Locost builders, which i refuse to use anymore, i'm busy because i'm taking care of customers needs. The quiter i am the more likely it is that i'm running around doing, than being at my computer talking about it."

It“s funny that some people always seems to have extremely bad luck.

quote:

---

Originally posted by nludkin
I spoke to Darren the other day. He is abroad on holiday at the moment, which I believe is long overdue!

As far as I can tell, the bodywork and all other production is carrying on without him. There has been a massive holdup on the shocks and also a slight holdup on bodywork, chassis, etc due to some extremely bad luck.

As people on here can testify, the quality of his parts is excellent and well priced. I am sure that Darren will be contactable again by the end of this week and hopefully will be refreshed and ready to rock.

---

Getting hold of Darren on the phone has seemed almost imposible since picking up most of my kit in March 2005.
Did arrange to pick up ( yes another UK trip disguised as a holiday) missing bits ai pedals ( no bushes shouldn't their be on per pedal?) steering shaft ext. by txt on his mobile.
Was at the workshop on Tuesday and Darren is on Holl's.

the being left in the dark about delivery times is most frustrating in buying abroad. specialy since you can just drop in and have a face to face chat or ask.

Perhaps the lure of bigger things has drawn GTS away from the Locost?

Hi all,

Thanks for all your concern!

GTS is still around a thriving, i'm just keeping the company at a low profile at the moment, due to some of the technical developments we are working on, plus the expansion of the company in terms of kit sales and aquisitions of other kit car companies, has led to a lot of work that we are getting through. We are taking on more staff to resolve issues with delivery and volume of manufacture.

I have actually been on holiday for the last two weeks, and for some reason my phone worked in Turkey for the first week, but could only make calls out in the second week. This probably explains the dead line when you tried to call my mobile.

I'm away to Lanzarote on Thursday for a week so you'll probably find it hard to get hold of me again.


The reason i don't reply on here anymore, is cos its not good to air dirty laundry ona public forum, and its best to let you girls get on with bitching about me behind my back. It means i can sleep better at night, and don't get all stressed during the day cos you've pissed me off.

Darren

lol

I have just quickly read some of the later responses.

GTS's level of orders has rocketed month on month since i started the company.

18 months ago we were making parts in batches of 1, now we are making batches of 20 parts per month, we have a batch of over 200 sets of shocks on order.

It is frustrating to me that no matter how much we appear to make, orders seem to out weigh the batches we make.

The suppliers aren't totally on the ball it true, they like the rest of this great country, myself included, suffer from over optimism on delivery dates. Suppliers agree that 2 weeks is achievable and then make in around 6 weeks if i'm lucky.

To be fair to them though the current production levels are so high that its very difficult to keep in touch with everything. The product range that we are making is vast and expanding daily.

For example i have launched more than a dozen new products since returning from holiday to do with Duratec installations, each part is being made in 20 off at a time. Thats a lot to manage, and it takes time to get to grips with all of it properly.

It would be nice to have been in the position to have set the company up to meet this level of demand from day one, but, without vast amounts of capital thats impossible, so you must grow with the demand. The result is you are automatically one step behind the demand and always trying to play catch up.

I think the term is a victim of your own success. The equation i ask you all to work with in reference to GTS is:-

If you want a quality product, with innovative features, a vast product range of useful parts but with the downside of potentially long lead times, then shop with GTS. If you have to have it tomorrow, then buy from a limited range of GTS products direct from Rally Design, or go to Luego or MK.

Its often assumed that GTS take longer to deliver than Luego or MK, fact is that is not neccessarily true anyhow. I know for a fact that they can be equally as bad or take even longer to deliver when they want to. We are only human, we work in a competitive market place in a cottage industry we are not Tesco's after all. Not everything is on the shelf ready to be sent out by an army of pack and wrappers, connected to a bank of computers.

quote:

---

Originally posted by dozracing
Hi all,

Thanks for all your concern!

GTS is still around a thriving, i'm just keeping the company at a low profile at the moment, due to some of the technical developments we are working on, plus the expansion of the company in terms of kit sales and aquisitions of other kit car companies, has led to a lot of work that we are getting through. We are taking on more staff to resolve issues with delivery and volume of manufacture.

I have actually been on holiday for the last two weeks, and for some reason my phone worked in Turkey for the first week, but could only make calls out in the second week. This probably explains the dead line when you tried to call my mobile.

I'm away to Lanzarote on Thursday for a week so you'll probably find it hard to get hold of me again.


The reason i don't reply on here anymore, is cos its not good to air dirty laundry ona public forum, and its best to let you girls get on with bitching about me behind my back. It means i can sleep better at night, and don't get all stressed during the day cos you've pissed me off.

Darren

---

I think you've just pissed on your strawberries there Darren . When the going gets tough, the tough wazz off to Lanzarote, sound business strategy? It looks like you're going to be at least another week CJ. The bitching isn't behind your back Darren it's on an open forum populated by many and openly visible to yourself and many others. There are people who seem to defend you saying your 2 week break was probably well deserved but you've just got back and you're going to leave everything in the air again. Enjoy Lanzarote anyway. Reality really sucks sometimes but we all live there so we have to face up to it sometime. Do yourself a favour and offer CJ a full refund.

I must admit I'm really surprised at Darren; I used to hold him in quite high regard, but I would sooner build a Robin Hood than give him any business now...if I was in the market.
With that attitude he may not have to keep chasing his suppliers much longer.

Iam really shocked. This all looks a bit suss to me. If people didnt know the circumstances they could conclude - "Too many holidays, no customer cares,
lots of people waiting for spares,
I can't see Darren lasting too much longer
He's f***ed off to Spain with all their wonga!!"

It would be a shame if there was an adverse reaction but all of this could have been avoided.

Hope you get everything sorted Darren.

I retract the comments I made here earlier.

[Edited on 25/8/05 by blueshift]

from someone who often puts his foot in his mouth........ I can see what darren was trying to say and how everyone is taking it. The first time i read it i was rather flabbergasted. A few hours later i suspect (and hope) its a case of .....

Darren is really busy and gets lots of hassle. Hassle = stress. Suppliers not delivering = more stress and then to read things on here saying "oi, where's my stuff" just makes matters worse for him as he's stuck in the middle.

Hence, if he doesn't come on here, he doesn't read the points, cuts out some stress, isn't on here so is spending time doing and hopefully solving the problems.

Of course - that doesn't matter one iota to anyone on here. We're paying our money and quite rightly want our goods. We can't contact Darren and know he does read the forum so use this to contact him. Which puts him back in the vicious circle.

Darren - you've got to break the circle before its too late! If you want any help / advice on doing so - u2u me.

You might be best reading the post with a little sense of humour.

The bitching girls comment, was meant far more as a tongue in cheek comment to a bunch of people that i hold dear as friends and not to cause offence. Most of the people on here have dealt with me directly at one time or other and i felt that we knew each other well enough to take the comment as meant for a laugh and not as a serious dig at anyone.

To those who read it the wrong way i apologise.

I have made the following comment a hundred times. You can contact me in one fo the following ways:-

Phone me: You all have my home number, mobile number and workshop numbers on the website.

Test me to my mobile.

Send email to darren@gtstuning.co.uk

If you have repeatedly tried each method than i can accept your point that i'm difficult to get hold of.

In reality people like Ned complain on here that they can't get hold of me, and yet they have tried only one method and very few times at that. This i find frustrating.

During the day i will be almost constantly on the phone, and will regularly miss multiple calls during each conversation, there are only so many missed calls that i can return under these conditions. Ned is one of those people who call from "number with held" phone systems, rendering me helpless to call him back.

I start work at 5am and don't stop until 10.30pm, and i have customers calling me 7 days a week up until 11pm sometimes. Try asking some of them what they think to the customer service i provide.

I bend over backwards for the majority of my customers but there i'm only human. There are only so many hours in the day, and there is only one of me.

As for when and how often i take my holidays thats up to me. I think you'll find that Luego were closed all of last August and they have many employees that could have manned the phones. I don't see anyone moaning about that.


As i haven't been away at all this year so far and i work 7 days a week, and i shan't be taking another holiday all year i think i can justify the time off. How many of you would settle for 3 weeks holiday a year, and unpaid at that.

In the 6 years GTS has been running there has not been a single customer who hasn't received their order, and not a single customer has had a request for a refund turned down. In fact only 4 people have ever needed a refund, and all of those were offered by me, because i couldn't supply in the time frame that they had requested. I can't promise to do everything overnight all i ask is a little patience and a few reminders where neccesary.

If you don't want to buy from GTS thats your perogative. Try the others, they will be grateful for the trade. Don't be surprised though if you come across similar problems. I know i pick up a lot of trade when the others have messed up and i'm sure that it will work in reverse.


GTS is going no where, we are in a much stronger position than we have ever been. We are almost certainly in a stronger position than the majority of our competition. According to Which Kit and TotalKitcar most of the industry is reporting very low sales, i've never sold more than at present. My bills from Business Post each month underline the amount of parcels going out the door. Most of you would need several months wages to cover my monthly courier costs alone.

Every order is important to me, and thats oneof the reasons that i'm driving 60,000 plus miles a year and spend 8 hours a day running around chasing orders, and collecting stuff. Business Post get pissed off with me running in at midnight to get someones order sent out urgently.

I'm sorry if a small percentage of people are having some trouble, but rest assured i'm doing all i can, and you'll be the first person in 6 years not to receive your goods. You have plenty of ways to get in touch, use them all. Don't use this forum though cos i refuse to use it. I'm only here because i got a load of phone calls from customers telling me whats going on.

Blueshift how many other Locost suppliers would have gone out in the middle of the night to have provided you with your parts? Trying getting Luego to meet a customer in the freezing cold late one night.

Can someone please tell James that his scuttle is at Raceline ready to collect. I don't have a number to hand to call him on.

[Edited on 23/8/05 by dozracing]

quote:

---

Originally posted by dozracing
You have plenty of ways to get in touch, use them all. Don't use this forum though cos i refuse to use it. I'm only here because i got a load of phone calls from customers telling me whats going on.

---

Hi CJ,

I have now read your posts on this matter.

I have received complaints before that i don't keep people well informed. As you can probably appreciate i have an order book that at no time has less than 50 active orders. It is therefore almost impossible for inform customers on a regular bassis where each order is.

I rely on being asked the question directly usually via email. Sometimes in order to reply i will have to wait for the following day in order to chase the supplier and get an answer, then i have to remember to go back over the hundred emails or so i get a day and update you on what i found.

English companies are great for spouting bullshit about when they are sending stuff out. I've heard all of the excuses and used some of them myself. In short until the stuff arrives i don't often believe a word that they say.

The shocks however have arrived, and are waiting for me to collect from the couriers. Strange how Protech are better at sending Invoices and chasing them up than they are at sending out the goods.

I'm so frustrated, because i faught so hard to get almost every last order out the door before i went on holiday in order to stop this situation arising. Didn't work obviously!

[Edited on 23/8/05 by dozracing]

Its quite clear why i don't use this forum anymore.

If people think they can contact me by putting out a "wheres Darren" post then it sends out a bad message to the general public. By not using this forum the hope was to make people use the normal lines of communication, and avoid such situations.

I don't need to tell people about new products anymore, the website and news letters do this for me and are far more effective.

www.gtstunning.co.uk stopped working however the web link at the bottom of darrens posts does work, i assume that becasue the website has stopped working also his mail for that address has.
Ive been using a freeserve address for email which he responded to. doz@gtscougar.freeserve.co.uk

and the website: www.gtscougar.freeserve.co.uk

[The shocks however have arrived, and are waiting for me to collect from the couriers. Strange how Protech are better at sending Invoices and chasing them up than they are at sending out the goods.

[Edited on 23/8/05 by dozracing]

I should add this, because I know exactly what Darren is going through.

Many years ago I too dabbled in the kit car market. Ended up working 18 hour days, seven days a week. Got my actual work done between 7pm and 10 pm, when I ignored the phone!! I gave it away when the doctor told me 'shut down or fall down, your choice'.

You see, everyone wants to talk to you about cars, and theirs in particular, and wants to think of you (the manufacturer/builder) as their friend. In all of this, the customer 'friend' forgets that there are others, and that the supplier has a life outside of the business.

I'm sure all of the manufacturers get this from customers. It's nice, but infringes on everyones lives.

So, when ringing your chosen manufacturer, please remember what 'working hours' means. Would you like to be phoned at 8pm on a Sunday night, by someone wanting to know which wishbone he should be fitting, and how to drill the holes for the brake pipe clips; when you've just spent the last week making the rotten things!

I'm not excusing Darren for what he has said on here, but I can understand what's behind it, if he actually is as busy as he says. But to have your business mobile on holiday with you????crazy.

Still, I'm grateful for the kit industry, and the 'legup' that it gave me into what I do today. I too, had dealings with Racing Developments and Mr.Barnard, and Prost, and that's where I know of Darren from.

Syd.

Well, I must be one of those four people that had a refund, (asked not offered) and i bet my left gonad we can find more than three more!

Clown!

I always try and phone at sensible time not at night or sundays. I always left a number where I could be reached on the answering machine, that I use a second carier for my phone services abroad is a cost choice. This is why I got agro for not being contacted, Usualy tried three methods of contact and numbers, E-mail are prob stacking up, home number to start with mobile next, and leaving a message and a number where I could be contacted. Sometimes a text on the mobile aswell and then an E-mail to follow up on those.
No I didn't try 10 times a day, but I don't see the point in leaving more messages on machines than need be.

Quality is good just hope contact will be a lot better in future.

It seems to me that there's one underlying problem here: -

Darren may be highly skilled as an engineer and innovator, but from everything I have seen here his ability to run a business is not where it needs to be.

I see this a lot with small start up enterprises - and even with some BIG businesses - look at Easyjet for example. You have some great ideas and in a case such as this a skill-set that enables you to turn ideas into reality. The product comes to market and demand is strong - too strong for one man with limited experience of running a business.

The only way in my experience, and this assumes that you are as committed to growing GTS and making it a success, is to bite the bullet employ a Manager allowing you to:
1. Concentrate on innovation and NPD.
2. Allow someone who really knows how to get the best from suppliers to do that.
3. Get someone else to do the customer facing bit more effectively.
4. Manage your stock more effectively - this is money in another form!
5. Get some week-in-week-out quality of life back.

This does require some investment - I cannot deny that, but if your order book is that strong and you are prepared to really commit, it's the only way.

IMHO - my 2p well and truly spent!

I'd second and confirm all of what Tim has said, from very hard earned experience.

Letting go so someone else can do it...now that is something else. Difficult, but has to be done. You see costs go up, profits down, initially. But, long term everything goes up, because of customer satisfaction.

Syd.

I have removed my earlier comments, I was in a pissy mood and took darren's "girls" comment the wrong way. Perhaps that shows darren's decision to stop using a public forum is a good one (it is a PR minefield).

Perhaps we got in before the rush, but yes I did get some excellent service from Darren, I was the first one with a custom made +4" dedion axle, and he was happy to discuss my car over the phone, when I got through (I didn't have too much trouble). All the products are of excellent quality and low price - as you get when you're lucky enough to find a small business run by someone who really cares about their product, rather than a profiteering "minimum acceptable standard" corporation.

So, I'm sorry I went off at you Darren. You mentioned something about taking on more staff, I hope you are doing yourself and us all a favour by taking on some administrative help.

Good luck in the future, but I think I might be too embarrased to order from you again :/

doh.

[Edited on 25/8/05 by blueshift]

I'm the CJ refered to in one of Darrens posts above. I have deleted all of my posts on this matter. I don't want to make it harder for anyone to do business, includi8ng myself. I was getting very frustrated after not hearing anything through the normal channels.

Today I have finally been able to get through to Darrens e-mail server and have received an automated response, which states he is closed for the holiday and will be back Sept 1st. It sounds like he is doing his best and things are in the works. I will keep everyone posted hoping things are resolved properly. All I wanted was to know what was going on.

CJ Shaw



[Edited on 9/9/05 by madman280]