Scott Henderson Discussion

[rdnzl]

Hey Scott!

Though we've met a few times (once at a gig Tribal Tech played in Willimantic, CT in the early 90's for me and 3 friends, where you recalled the heinous hookers around your hotel shouting "Blow for $5!;" another time at a workshop at Ron's Guitars in Groton, CT), I'm sure you don't remember me.

Anyhow, I recently pulled the trigger on a green Suhr Scott Henderson signature. Had to go the mail pre-order route, as these are scarce. While I'm sure that Suhr treats you well, I thought you might like to know how they treat the little guy in your name.

I was surprised right out of the box, as it weighs 7 lbs. 14 ounces. As their literature reads "Body weight is important to Scott, so we take great care to procure Alder that will produce a guitar that is close to the weight of Scott’s actual instruments," I was wondering how far off mine actually is.

The next thing I noticed was the set-up. It was hard to find a note anywhere on the neck that didn't buzz, and the low E string likes to slide right off the side of the neck!

But the real kicker came when I plugged her in. No sound from the middle pickup. I took her apart, wired the bridge pickup to the middle position on the switch and the middle to the bridge position; still no sound from the questionable pickup, so I knew it was the pickup and not the switch.

I immediately emailed all this info (the weight, the setup, the diagnosis procedure) to Suhr customer service; this was early last Saturday morning. Tuesday I get an email back asking if the pickup was dead in all switch positions; I confirmed again that the pickup was dead. Wednesday afternoon I called them to ask what was up, and was told that the rep handling my case had to leave the office early, and that there were "no notes in the system" on the case, so I'd have to wait for him to return. Frustrated, I confirmed that you use the neck pickup in all 3 positions, and went ahead and ordered one from another retailer. By Thursday afternoon I'd still not heard back from Suhr, so I called again, and got the rep that was assigned to my case. He said they'd send me another pickup; I told him I got tired of waiting for them and ordered it elsewhere, maybe they could reimburse me. He said he'd have to check with his team and get back to me. Later that day I got an email asking "what did you have in mind in regards to compensation for your trouble?" I did some calculations, and suggested that fees for diagnosis, parts, pickup installation, re-string and set-up would conservatively cost me $200. They responded by saying they'll reimburse me the $80 it cost me for the pickup, and that's it. I'm still waiting to see if they actually send it to me.

Again, I'm positive that Suhr treats you very well. If I were in your position, however, I'd think twice about endorsing a company that treated my fans so unresponsively and dismissively. But how are you to know without us telling you about it?

Aside from that, thanks for the music and the inspiration; I look forward to seeing you again!

winn

[Scott Henderson]

Sorry to hear you had problems. I know a lot of their customers and I've never heard of anyone who had these kind of major problems. I'll send John the link to your post.

[rdnzl]

Yikes! Didn't know if I'd hear back from you at all, much less so quickly! Thank you so much; I'll let you know if there's any more news on this.

[Scott Henderson]

It is a fluke but certainly possible the pickup worked here but there was something intermittent or a cold solder joint. I assure you it worked when it left. A pickup change out shouldn't be more than $35 but chances are the terminals could have just been re soldered and any tech could have fixed it for that money. We would have been happy to send a replacement pickup. He really should have gone straight back to the dealer though or contact me directly if he wasn't feeling it was handled in a timely matter. Yes 7&3/4 is a good weight for Alder considering the SSC is almost 1/2 lb and there is a steel block at 1/2lb.

John Suhr
Sent from mobile

[JohnSuhr]

Yes what Scott said. Unfortunately as well, I hate making excuses but it was a weird week. Both of my QC testers who final inspect were out. One on vacation, I was filling in and the other was involved in a rear end accident and was pretty banged up, car totaled and had to go to ER and missed half the week. The Customer service people help fill in so we could do our final testing but that delayed them a few days. Please also understand that everyone seems to send in questions on the weekend and Monday gets jam packed so I don't believe a response on Tuesday is out of control. I'm sure the buzzing would have been a simple neck adjustment and the E close to the edge sounds like the guitar was bumped in shipping but that is easy to correct. We would have been happy to get the guitar back and correct absolutely any and all issues for you. Last week was just a little crazy, sorry for the experience but the best thing for anyone to do is if you receive an instrument that has some issue the dealer should be the first call, he would have it taken care of it the quickest and might even have had the pickup in stock. I'm also extremely easy to find on my message board as well as at TGP. I'm here to help if you give me the chance.
Thanks

[rdnzl]

Hope your QC tester is okay.

I wasn't complaining that it took 'til Tuesday for a response, but it was irritating that the response I got was a question that had already been addressed in my initial inquiry. That I then had to track folks down by phone is explained now by the staffing issues.

By "a simple neck adjustment" I'm assuming you mean a slight turn of the truss rod? How is it "easy to correct" the E slipping off the fretboard?

At no time was an offer made to take the guitar back for corrections; in fact, the only offer that was ever made was on Thursday (after my 2nd call and 3rd email) for a replacement pickup that I had already ordered. I was unaware that you had your own message board; I figured that your customer service folks spoke for you, thereby giving you "the chance." Perhaps they're in need of training? I don't know what "TGP" is.

FYI, I cc'd the dealer (which isn't in my time zone either, and doesn't carry your pickups) on my original email to your customer support. Their response was "we're sorry to hear about these issues you're having with the guitar. Suhr should be able to get back to you to resolve everything but if you don't hear back or need anything else just let us know."

[manolopez]

was that a brand new guitar or a used one?hard to imagine that it past a quality test...

[rdnzl]

Brand spankin' new; like I originally said, I had to pre-order (reserve) it at the dealership before manufacture. I wouldn't have posted any of this were it used!