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Royal Equestrian Collection - issues?

Dressage
#1

Anyone have any experience purchasing stuff from Royal Equestrian Collection (based in CA)? https://www.royalequestriancollection.com/

I bought an item a month ago…granted it was hard to find and out of stock everywhere else, so I took a chance that this place might have had one lying around (odd size). Didn’t get a shipping confirmation, so a week later I email (nothing) and call - was told the item had to come from UK and that would take about 2 weeks then ship to me. Okay, no problem…I just wanted to make sure the item existed and would get to me at some point. Now, it is 4 weeks and the item still hasn’t shipped to me. I email…nothing. I message in FB (told they don’t have it yet, but no follow up response to a question). I call - voicemail and no answer.

In the meantime, I ordered another item (very common and easy to get anywhere - but their price was especially good). That hasn’t shipped a week later either.

I am fine if there is a delay, but I am getting very concerned that they are not communicating or answering calls/messages. The only good thing is they’ve not yet charged my cc…so if I need to cancel and order elsewhere, I should be okay without a big fight.

Curious if anyone has had good experiences ordering? Am I just too used to Amazon Prime and getting my stuff in 2 days?! LOL

#2

yes, I ordered a crown piece (PS of Sweden) about 30 days ago… nada. The order is shown as “processing”. So I gave up and ordered it from PS last night and am now attempting to cancel the royal eq order before I kill it on the credit card end.

I get that PS products are a little notorious in this regard, and if it wasn’t cheaper to convert my PS snaffle to a full bridle I would probably spare myself the headache in general. But 30 days of a black hole does not make me happy.

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#3

They posted on their Facebook page 7 hrs ago. I suggest asking them on their post…might get some attention.

#4

So I left emails, voice mails (they don’t answer the phone) and posted on the FB page (which I see they removed my post). But I did finally get a response. I asked them to cancel both orders…as it’s not worth trying to continue the orders at this point. When I posted on FB I was sent messages by two other people who were also having issues not getting their orders after several weeks…so I decided canceling was safest. They did finally respond to say they canceled the orders. Won’t try ordering from them again!

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#5

wow good to know! Sounds like scammers or very poor organization.

2 Likes
#6

There’s a post on the FB group Saddle Pads Anonymous USA about this store right now, several people are sharing their stories of being ripped off. It’s a private group so it won’t let me link it here.

2 Likes
#7

Wow…I am really glad they had not yet charged my credit card. After someone finally answered my email to say they cancelled my order, a different person must have answered my FB message to say that the blanket had not come in and they could cancel. I politely told them someone else had already cancelled my orders. So they don’t even communicate within those running it! Not good business practices.

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#8

OMG! I had absolutely horrible service from them and never did get the reins I ordered which supposedly were in store! Could never get anyone on the phone and emails were not great either.

IMHO. This is a store front for PS of Sweden and everything is handled from the factory, no live person at the CA location. The response emails were definitely not from someone in the US.

I will say, I was trying to order during the height of the original Corona pandemic.

Never again! I ended up getting my reins from a tack shop in MI and they were easy to work with.

#9

I’m pretty sure it isn’t a store front for PS, only because I ordered the same crown piece (ummm, and an ear bonnet, because I have a little problem resisting!) directly from PS of Sweden a few days ago when I realized nothing was happening at royal crown. The ups tracking order from PS just showed up in my email this AM. If they were the same entitiy I doubt I would have got so prompt a response.

Royal crown sent me an email saying my order had been cancelled a few weeks ago but I didn’t get the email because of my spam filter (and provided evidence, so I don’t doubt them). Fair enough, although I asked it to be cancelled a few days ago, not a few weeks and the order is still shown as “processing”, so that’s odd, and I did check my spam folder and nothing was in there, so more odd. And my spam folder filter isn’t set terribly high on that particular email account since I use it for non personal communication, so I’m not sure what doesn’t make it it through short of erectile dysfunction ads.

But points for resolving the issue and responding back to me.

#10

Did anyone else notice the Vita Per Tutti charity, on the Royal Equestrians website? Interesting, group of board of directors. A bunch of what looks like models, sans last names and whose descriptions may have different first names? Boy oh boy, this Vita Per Tutti claims to be doing truly amazing things for horses, handicapped kids and well; the entire world. Kudos!! My hats off to them. Very impressive time clickers; too.

I must admit, I was surprised and perplexed that their charity profile was not available on Guidestar. Then I checked online at registered corporations for the state of CA. I was disappointed to see the charity was registered in 2007 but has since been dissolved. Since what 2008? For over a decade? Say it isn’t so…

Is it the Attorney General of CA that takes reports of fraudulent charities based in CA?

Sigh.

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#11

While the rest of it is bizarre enough, that part appears to be because they used a website template and never changed any of the filler information. If you search the fake charity name in those profiles, the template can be found, although it is no longer available to download. Most of the starving African children stuff appears to be leftovers as well. Some at the bottom of the page even has the nonsense Latin placeholder text.

#12

I had similar issues. With PS Sweden breeches. Took more than a month. They said don’t cancel the order, we have a shipment coming in. Then the shipment didn’t arrive. Then they tried to substitute a different model & color. Did not finally receive an approximation to my order 'til 2 months later.

Bear in mind this was during the first Covid phase in U.S. … there were lockdowns, the customer service person was working from home, shipments from Sweden were affected. Pretty sure Trump had forbidden shipments from anywhere but U.K. This may still be in effect.

I had trouble with Dover also, btw? They shut down on the East Coast. Later heard they merged with Royal Equestrian. ??

#13

I think Dover merged with Dressage Extensions, not Royal Equestrian Collection. I get the feeling Royal Equestrian is run out of someone’s home and they just have things drop shipped from the manufacturer.

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#14

Yes, I was :100: certain that merger never happened!

Also I don’t think there was any limitation on EU/UK purchasing/overseas delivery at any point this year, or if there was, you couldn’t tell it by the humpty gazillion things I bought steadily all year from the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK (in fact the UK stuff was beating amazon prime at one point for delivery speed)

#15

There was at least for a little while. I ordered something from Bulgaria and they told me they weren’t allowed to ship to the US at that point. They held it for me until they were able to ship - it was only a few weeks later. I think that was around May.

#16

I don’t know - I ordered an item from the Netherlands on 12/4. It finally arrived today. It wasn’t tracking and I think got swallowed in Customs for most of the time. Another item took about 3 weeks. But something my brother ordered came in about a week. Go figure!

I also sent my brother some homemade cookies after Christmas via USPS…then went from NJ to Kansas City to him in Connecticut! Two weeks later he got them…a bit stale though!!

#17

“I think Dover merged with Dressage Extensions, not Royal Equestrian Collection. I get the feeling Royal Equestrian is run out of someone’s home and they just have things drop shipped from the manufacturer.”

@Critter
Ah yes … I was thinking there was another West Coast seller I had REC confused with. Was having the same type problems with Dressage Extensions.
Not sure Royal Equestrian is out of someone’s home … was working that way during last Covid lockdown. Drop-ship would have been great, but not an option.

#18

I recently bought online from Dapper Horse for the first time. A blingy PS of Sweden browband and an AP saddle pad. Arrived in a timely manner and included a thank you note with a chocolate horse coin. I loved the items and of course the thoughtful note/goodie.

I’ll be back!!

#19

Must have been country specific, because at about that time I had a carriage shipped (container) promptly followed by a carriage part (regular shipping). Both had to do a little travel within the EU before shipping to the US, and the whole affair happened right about the time there was the confusion about people vs. goods border confusion.

#20

I returned a bunch of expensive bits to dapperhorse and they were prompt about it as well. I’ll order from them again, definitely.

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