Greetings from Scotland to Japan, Australia & France!! did I get your countries correct?
I'm not a great forum junkie, but occasionally look at this and the Les Paul Forum...but only if I'm really bored!
This discussion caught my eye...Villager how are you? You will know my identitiy as I bought the CS 1981 LS-200 earlier this year??
In light of tone of some posts in this thread, I would add the caveat that I am absolutely not complaining to you some 10+ months after the sale, nor attempting to discredit your business in any way, shape or form as that is very serious, and may even have legal implications. Phew...I'm not normally so careful about what I say!
However I was intrigued to read your statement:-
'each guitar is checked before i get it, and returned to the seller if not perfect... and the fees i pay for this are rather higher than 5%'
You will recall when I received the guitar from you there were two significant issues I would have expected to be covered by the above statement, but which you freely admitted to me you didn't notice.
1) Four loose frets on the treble side Nos. 18 - 22. Was obvious someone had tried to hammer them back down, denting the frets. I sent you a photo of this. (for anyone reading my long winded diatribe, I should mention that the guitar had been refretted and was advertised as such, however a refret shouldn't mean loose frets)
2) Collapsed bridge - (concave rather than flat) Again you admitted you didn't notice this, and we discussed this at length as I recall, as you mentioned the same issue on the OS LS 150 which was for sale at the time. Again, I sent you a pic, and advised on methods for correcting it , i.e. careful use of 3 small wooden blocks and a vise.
The issues with my LS 200 are long resolved to my by my own fair hand, however my point is this...you state you are paying 'rather more that 5%' to have a guitar checked. In my opinion Villager, you/we are being ripped off, as the checker does not appear to be capable of detecting very obvious faults such as these, at least in my case. The loose frets were immediately apparent when playing it in the upper register by the sharp fret ends nearly cutting my hand, and the collapsed bridge gave a very poor playing radius which would not facilitate low action without buzzing...compounded by the poor cutting of the bridge saddles in the past with what appeared to be a triangle file. I didn't include the bridge saddles as an issue, as I believe they should be considered a consumable item like top nuts, output jacks etc.
To reiterate my point, I am not reactively reading other posts in this thread, then accusing you of maliciously ignoring faults on what is a 26 year old secondhand guitar. But as you/we are paying handsomely for a checking service, then this instrument should have been 'returned to the seller' as it was not 'perfect'
Moving on, it is great to see you have more stock that ever of these wonderful instruments, and my sincere apologies for not getting back to you re Greco EGF-1800, but I couldn't live with the dark area on the back....please find another as the Led Zep O2 gig has further wetted my appetite for all things sunburst! (no i didn't get a ticket, but youtube had some great footage...until Warner pulled it!)
As it's nearly Christmas, may I just add goodwill to all men, and if there's any women reading, my number is....
Lester Polfus