We have ordered deluxe stone kit from the company JOOLTOOL by Annie from USA last month. She had made so many stupid mistakes. First of all, we send the payment to her officially through our bank $1097.52 where she insisted that i should pay her another $35 which were deducted by her bank. We requested some friend to pay her $35. When we received the documents from her, the invoice she sent to us was in the name of different company. Moreover, she send the invoice for $50 only. We never asked her to under value the invoice because we send her the payment through our bank after proper permission from our central bank that shows she was hiding money from IRS USA. Although she said that she will provide us the proper invoice which she didnāt and wrote us that we should not contact her in future through email etc. When we received our consignee after paying heavy fine found that she had no send all items mentioned in the proforma invoice. This is not the behaviour the seller shows to his buyer and i am really disappointed to do any business with US companies. Please guide us what we do.
I purchased Jootool items from Annie a few years ago and I had none of the experiences that you are referring to. I found her helpful and prompt in sending my equipment and she answered all my questions when ordering. I am only writing this because you are maligning someone in business that I have dealt with and had the opposite experience that you appear to have had. I donāt know what actually happened, but I am suspicious of your motives in your letter to this forum.
Your perceived experience doesnāt matter because international purchases are at the buyerās risk.
I have made several international wire transfers, out of the US to foreign banks, and it is common practice in my experience for the seller to require an adjustment to cover what the bank charges them on their end.
I believe that the price of a product or service quoted does not tyically cover bank charges when funds need to be wire transferred.
Dear Sameul Brown,
Thank you very much for your comments. Annie is a smart lady and i really like her. I didnāt required this machine because i have fully automatic stone cutting machines but its my hobby to collect any machine just to see what the manufacturer is offering. I donāt want to offend or complain about any person or company unless i am really offended by their behaviour. I have imported small big CNC and other machinery for gemstones for almost more than dozen countries from the world including USA, Poland, Korea, Switzerland, Japan, China, Taiwan, UK, etc. Annie send me a proforma invoice for $1097.52, i send her the payment through my bank officially and the payment was sent by one of my company SBMC. When we received the goods through FEDEX, they were in the name of another our associate company and invoice she sent with the goods was $50 only. We never asked her to undervalue the invoice because the payment was sent officially. When we asked her you have made two major mistakes . First you have sent the goods in the name of the company which didnāt send you the amount then we never asked you to undervalue the invoice instead of cooperating with us. What can be done to correct these mistakes she said that everybody asked me to undervalue the invoice so i did it myself and she also said that donāt send any email to me in future. I have sent you the goods is your headache, how you get them cleared from the customs. If you are interested we can email all the documents which she produced without giving any invoice number and without giving any packing list so we are in trouble, we wrote her that we are going to complain to US Embassy, Chamber of commerce and IRS but she never bother to answer.
It would be interesting to hear her version of the story.
On second thought no it wouldnāt. This is a place for discussion and questions about making jewelry. We are not an international shipping vigilance committee.
Yes it is!
This is the first time I have posted on this forum in years. I just felt I needed to chime in on this issue.
Annie is one of the hardest working women I know. I just canāt see her not responding to a valued customer. Perhaps there is something that we are missing here.
If for some reason this did happen then I would agree that it is not right that she didnāt respond. Iām just saying there must be another side to this story.
Thatās all. Donāt mean to drag this thread on but felt a need to defend a very valued member of the community.
You claim to be highly experienced in the international buying of machinery for your many companies.
You are here to whine about the incorrect paperwork you received with an international purchase for a small tool you bought for your hobby.
Some of the members of this community seem to appreciate the US company which you claim will not give you the correct paperwork. Now, combine those warm feelings with your confession of having threatened the company over paperwork.
It may be difficult for you to elicit validation for your point of view because your allegations seem frivolous.
Betty 2: Some of the things you say about Suhail Afzalās import problems are not correct: the International seller IS responsible for making sure all paperwork is filled out properly and all regulations met up to ādocksideā that is where the shipment actually passes into the authority of the foreign buyers country. But to do this, the exporter (the American company) should ask in depth the paperwork and other requirements of the company they are exporting to. Clearly this wasnāt done, but also, I would say that Suhail Afzal should have reminded them about this too. So may things can go wrong in an international shipment.Most of them concern paperwork and to a much lesser degree, bank payments. My business is basically an importer with some export and I do work like this on a daily basis. If both sides do not work together and keep each other fully informed, expensive and time consuming errors can be made, and I feel that they are possibly the fault of both sides.
@Bill.Tokyo,
Have you ever enlisted the help of a āfriendā to pay a portion of your payment to an international vendor? And if you have done that, then would you also blame the seller for putting the wrong name on the invoice, and then complain because the seller would not cooperate with you after you threatened him?
Since you have experience as both buyer and seller, switch sides in this transaction. If as an exporter, two different businesses made payments which if combined are the total payment for one purchase. How would you address the invoice? And how do you show on the paperwork what was paid by each company that paid? The paperwork does not usually allow for the explanation of creative financing.
If Suhail Afzal has as much international buying experience as he claims, why would he invite a third party to participate in the payment process, and then expect the vendor to understand how to clean up the resulting mess of paperwork?
Suhail Afzal has no control over the seller, but he has control over what he does and says. Suhail Afzal ruined his relationship with the vendor, and now he wants someone to validate his point of view. Surely you are aware that it does not matter what any of us think about his situation. But some of us are disturbed when he says negative things about a US company that was started by a bench jeweler. Even those of us who are not customers of that company might feel like he is maligning one of our own.
Suhail Afzal does not seem to be able to clarify his convoluted story. His attitude makes me wonder how the folks in his country respond when one of their fellow citizens wastes other peopleās time with frivolous accusations; and why does he think we would be a more patient audience?
Hi Betty 2,
You have a number of questions for me. Let me quote you and answer one by one:
" Have you ever enlisted the help of a āfriendā to pay a portion of your payment to an international vendor? And if you have done that, then would you also blame the seller for putting the wrong name on the invoice, and then complain because the seller would not cooperate with you after you threatened him?"
As a matter of fact, for various payments, depending on the country, I have used more than one payment channel and also been paid that way too. Iām in Asia, by the way, in case that makes any difference. Iāve also had mistaken information of all sorts end up on invoice, payment documents and various bank documents. Itās just something that can happen. And no, Iāve never threatened anyone over it, however.
" Since you have experience as both buyer and seller, switch sides in this transaction. If as an exporter, two different businesses made payments which if combined are the total payment for one purchase. How would you address the invoice? And how do you show on the paperwork what was paid by each company that paid? The paperwork does not usually allow for the explanation of creative financing."
Having been in this situation any number of times I know that itās as simple as creating two partial invoices. Thereās nothing illegal about this as long as the correct amounts of money are shown.
" If Suhail Afzal has as much international buying experience as he claims, why would he invite a third party to participate in the payment process, and then expect the vendor to understand how to clean up the resulting mess of paperwork?"
Here we agree completely. Suhail Afzai is at fault for not issuing detailed and easily understandable instructions to his sellers and various parties involved in payments.
" Suhail Afzal has no control over the seller, but he has control over what he does and says. Suhail Afzal ruined his relationship with the vendor, and now he wants someone to validate his point of view. ā¦"
I canāt disagree here either. A disagreement should be stated as clearly as possible so we can all draw our own conclusions. Incidentally, Iām not sure that English is Suhail Afzaiās first language, so he may have had some trouble find exact nuances for what he wanted to say. As I face every day the problem of working in a foreign language (Japanese) when I have to complain, I usually have my complaint that Iāve written in Japanese re written by a native speaker so that the manner of complaining is truly Japanese. Often the manner of complaining is as important as the content.
But I will say that I wish more Americans would come to the defense of their manufacturers the way you do. I always try to buy American. That way Iām sure of good quality, but to be honest with you, not always of good service.
Dear Bill,
I have only two questions.
- We gave her the address of our company and send the payment through bank to JOOL TOOL.
- We paid $1097.52 and she without asking anything made the invoice for $50.
This is she is not answering instead of saying sorry or correcting the documents. She said to us donāt send any email in future.
Regards,
Muhammad Suhail
Dear Muhammed,
Itās been my experience that international trade can easily go wrong, no matter how experienced the companies are doing it. If I had any advice, I would tell you to really tell future shippers in great detail all documentation they need to ship to your country. Also, I would say that the person at Jool Tool needs to learn more patience and perhaps better manners. As I said, American quality is second to none, but unfortunately sometimes our manners and ways of dealing with people are not what they should be.
Dear Bill,
Thank you very much for what you have said about service and untrained people. We have closing the matter now. 
Regards,
Muhammad Suhail
Betty2,
For some reason you chose to
take sides and blame and criticize the person
who posted and I do not see the logic of
your assumptions.
If the person posting was trying to get help
or advice for resolution of what seems to
be a mishandled transaction, your post was
not constructive.
The person posting was reaching out for
a way to resolve the issue.
I think you were disrespectful to a member
of this group post what you did.
This is getting nasty and Iām not sure that airing this on this forum can achieve anything constructive. There are three sides to any story: what one said happened, what the other said happened, and what really happened. I donāt think this forum is the place to get at āfactsā such as they may be, and further exchanges will only cause rancour and may well do damage to relationships. Can we move on please?
I am just guessing here.
JoolTool by Anie is most likely a DBA, (doing business as) and there is a Corporation (Inc, LLC) that is the legal name registered through the IRS and the bank. It is a common practice. I assure you, the government agencies knew about her incoming wire transfer before she did!
JoolTool is a federally registered and trademarked name. It is partnered with some of the largest corporate companies in the USA.
I have never seen a JoolTool product, but was reminded of an incident that happened to me. I had sold an 18kt and .950 platinum product to someone that was worn to an international event. The customer wore the item to the event and showed it to people at his table after he had just paid in excess of $100,000 US dollars to participate in an international function. Well, someone commented on the 18kt PLAT inscription and said he paid to much for an 18kt Plated item. The scathing texts, emails and reviews I received were incredible. I replied with links to the FTC sites listing how an item was to be Hallmarked. Offered to pay for him to have it Xray Assayed at the jeweler of his choice. It did not matter, the damage was done and everyone he had involved was on his side.
Yes, there are three sides to every story.
Can āweā put this discussion to permanent rest! Maybe you should all go and use a little invention called ā¦āemailsā ā¦;(
Gerry! On my Teaching iPhone!
This thread started out on a rather nasty tone of accusation. With words like Stupid, and negative comments about doing business in the US.
That opening tone sparked a similar tone in some of the responses.
Can we just close this, and start over again, if there is a legitament question?