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Russell Apiaries

231K views 504 replies 148 participants last post by  jim lyon 
#1 ·
Anyone have recent contact with Russell Apiaries? Placed an on-line order for queens with them on Jan 20. Payment went through but I have never received an order confirmation from them and all attempt to contact them have failed.
 
#327 · (Edited)
Hopefully, many of us that have had our cash stolen by Russell can recover our money via our card carrier. Eventually, if enough of us make claims, the companies will refuse to process payments for Russell. However, I don't know the number of claims required for them to stop. In addition, I can't imagine that Paypal will continue to do business with Russell if enough card companies make claims against them as they hold the payment from Paypal.

So - all of you that have been screwed and used a card, call your carrier and make a claim regardless of how long ago you placed the order. You may have to ask for a supervisor and lay out why their 60-day policy can't work when ordering queens/nucs, but I know that most of the cards are pretty tolerant of the card holder in the case of obvious scumballism like what is going on with Russell. The worst that happens is the card carrier tells you no. Oh wait - the worst that could happen already has - you have lost your money with no reasonable chance of recovering it.

Good luck.
 
#330 ·
I too waited and waited with no reply to multiple emails and letters sent to RA about queens which I ordered last November...that is until I requested a refund. Then I received and email offer to have the queens supplied by a "Sub-Producer" of RA. I accepted that offer only because I didn't expect a refund and I didn't want to wait until next year and go through all of this again. I didn't get the Cordovan's I had ordered and paid for...had to accept an alternative. Certainly wouldn't do business with them again...if they were still in business!
 
#331 ·
SideYard - that is interesting as that just happened to me as well. Two days ago I posted on the RA forum asking why I couldn't get a refund. Those posts were removed but I very quickly received a PM from a sub-producer asking if I wanted his queens now or Russell queens come spring. I was clear I wanted neither but a refund. I also made several suggestons that would help show that RA was serious about fixing the mess they created. These included: 1) not billing until they ship 2) Posting on both their, and other websites, about how they intend to make those of us that have had their money taken whole. Interestingly, no response was provided to those comments. Silence sometimes says a lot.

I will be very curious whether the "hey, you can get queens now" offer is an honest one or a ploy to try and muddy the credit card dispute. If the offer was honest and not a ploy to throw mud - I intend to post that as well as the sub-producer may be a good guy stuck with a very lousy business situation. Conversely, if it is mud, well the phrase scumball keeps coming to mind.

Finally, I would like to thank Barry for letting us post on how we are working through getting our money back. I have found that at least one other forum has an "enabler" mentality in that you can only post good experiences. Even very carefully worded posts that lay out how money was taken without getting the bees/refund are immediately deleted (I expected my posts on the RA website to be deleted but this experience happened at another site as well). The ability to honestly express the situtation, and our frustration, on this thread is extremely appreciated.
 
#334 ·
Could be the cc companies believe you should have a product if you paid for it. If the vendor doesn't communicate with the buyer that's when the cc companies step in. No email response, no phone response, no forum response. There seems to be a 15 day window that the vendor has to provide a resolution, product, response. That hasn't happened in a lot of these cases. Let's cross our fingers that we have some positive results.
 
#338 ·
That is NOT the Sheriffs phone number, it's Russell Apiaries useless number with the full voice mail that
no-one ever answers. $238.50 was my admission fee for an education to this fellow in Mississippi.

Good Luck all who have been relieved of their hard earned cash.

BM
 
#336 ·
K9 - could you mention to the AGs office that there are multiple parties involved. AG's tend to not get worked up for what they consider smaller amounts but get more interested when you have "numerosity". Also - they will assign your call a case number (or something similar). You will want to post the pertinent information here and any other forums (with the exception of the one that will remain anonomys but acts as an enabler by allowing only positive reviews - anyone that posts over there will know who I am talking about).

Those of us that have been denied refunds/bees will then need to contact the AG's office with your info/documentation of the claim. The AG's office will start off by collecting as much info/documentation as possible. The process is way slow as they are juggling our claims along with a lot of others. However, I have had several clients receive letter requests for info and that always gets their attention. Once the process gets rolling - it is a steam roller and folks like Russell tend to pony up pretty quick to get out of the process. Also, defending a criminal suit against an AG gets stupidly expensive for the defendants so that tends to force them to pay up as they are paying money to defend on the front-end and then have to refund our money or pay fines/penalties on the back-end.

In any case, thanks for taking the time to deal with the AG.
 
#337 ·
I'm only into RA for $ 120.00 for a late spring nuc. Mr. Hughes did contact me recently saying the nuc had been re-hived and suggested I wait till spring for delivery. I do appreciate his pm and will wait for the nuc. Probably better to be patient then get all excited and have to overwinter a nuc.

Hopefully I'll get early delivery of the spring nuc and I'll be a happy beekeeper. As mentioned earlier we all have the opportunity to vote with our feet and I guess we all decide on the true cost and benefit of doing business with a vendor. My opinion might be different if I depended on bees to earn a living but I do this because it is a nice hobby. Good luck to everyone waiting on their orders to be filled maybe after reading all these posts new customers will better understand the potential delays and adjust their schedules accordingly. Isn't that what it really comes down to?
 
#341 ·
I am into RA for $617 paid 11 months ago. I will be calling the Miss AG tomorrow. I did send a few emails on their site and have not recieved a response yet. I tried my best to be patient but this is insane to take some ones money and not provide the product and stop all communication..

I am looking for their physical address so I can send them certified letter and will be looking for an attorney in Mississippi
 
#350 ·
Yes to the 11 months old. My first order was 15 months with no queens, no response etc.... I started my disbute on 9/14 so we'll see what happens.... Good luck, but don't give up and let them keep your money. I'm sure they think you will just get disgusted and quit, but don't if possible. Let your cc company know your not happy. They'll fix it, hopefully.
 
#354 ·
I found this posted on the Russell web site:

Holdover/Transfer orders and Cancellations

Due to the many struggles that we have faced during the 2012 season with the storm damages, the traggic loss of vital members of our crews, a large turn over of office staff, and the discovery of major health issues of our administration, there were significant breaks in our abilities to communicate with our customers. As a result, a small amount orders were not shipped. While the majority of the customers that were effected by this have rescheduled their deliveries to spring of 2013, you are welcome to request that we cancel your order instead if you would prefer. To have your 2012 order shipped in 2013 by the main company, shipped by your Local Russell Apiaries location, or request a cancellation, please send an email to russelltransfers@yahoo.com
 
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