O14 wagon parts

The taster kit comes with a little bag containing the parts for a simple wagon. Or at least it should have done. When I opened the bag I discovered that a packing error had left me without the chassis hoop and sideframes. Disappointing.
Never mind, I thought, a quick e-mail should be enough to sort this out and so I fired one off before going to work.

By lunchtime I had had a reply apologising and promising the missing parts would be sent out. 48 hours later a jiffy bag had arrived with the extra sprue.

This is what I call amazing customer service.

Being pragmatic, I accept that a business based on supplying parts for people building model railways in an unusual scale/gauge combination is at best a "cottage industry". We aren't talking about a global giant like Toyota here, but a couple of people knocking out kits from a shed. They aren't going to become rich doing this - the KB Scale car park will be empty of Ferrari's and Bentley's I suspect. Mistakes happen in all the best businesses, it's how they are dealt with that makes the difference.

As it was, the response was far faster than I had expected. If sorting things out had taken a couple of weeks I wouldn't have worried. It's a model railway, not lifesaving surgery after all.

Now there are people reading this who think that the response I got is the least I should have expected. I think we've been conditioned by the ever faster pace of web services such as Amazon to expect delivery tomorrow. Not in 28 days but now ! And if we don't get it we'll be on the web forums slagging off the unfortunate trader who has "let me down". Remember the early days of eBay ? Payment by cheque, goods sent when this cleared. The whole deal took a couple of weeks. Now the auction is over, payment usually means Paypal and if the item isn't on the doorstep the next morning feedback is along the lines of, "RUBISH SELLER.TWO SLOW,I HATE THEM Z-----".

Well, not from me. KB Scale's service has swayed me toward O14 even more. I've only bought a wagon and a bit of track but they are tempting me towards more. On this basis I'd certainly heartily recomend them to anyone.

KB Scale website