Opened for inspection?
 

I have been buying a lot of cigars lately from Cbid. I received my latest order today and my box of Tatuaje Series P was unsealed and opened. They put a little sticker on it that said 'opened for inspection'. This is the second time this has happened. The same happened with a Padron Sampler.

Both the Padron Sampler and Tat Series P had damaged cigars. First why would they open them and second if they did inspect it why were there damaged cigars?

4 of the 5 Padron had rips in the wrapper with big stems protruding from them. The Tats had 5 cigars with big cracks in the wrapper.

Has anyone else experienced this from Cbid?

In their defense they did let me exchange the Padrons free of charge but now that it happened again I am getting annoyed....

I never seems to happen with the sealed boxes.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

In all my cbid history (and it is long:bh) I've never gotten an opened box from them.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I wouldn't be surprised if they were refilling the box with singles from other damaged boxes.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Shame on them if this is the case :td

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

That is what is seems like. When I opened the box there were 5 cigars face down and they were all damaged. They are a slightly different color than all of the other cigars.

I do not want to accuse them of this but I cannot think of a valid reason for them to open the boxes.

I did ask them and they could not give me an answer. If they are going to sell an open box they should at least put it in the description.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Tell them it's unacceptable. Refund or you will dispute the charge with your CC.

They seem to be really good about refunds, etc.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

They were good about exchanging the Padrons.

I can understand if they were damaged in a sealed box but the fact that they open the boxes is shady.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Sounds like the Postal Inspectors to me.:2

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

There were 2 boxes and only one was opened. The cardboard box they were in was not opened.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Never heard of that happening.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Maybe the sticks got damaged in transit and it's just a coincidence that they were inspected? Or maybe they have bad standards for what passes inspection.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I bought 7 boxes and only 2 were 'inspected' and only 2 had damaged cigars.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

How about pics of the "Inspected" sticker and pics of the boxes?

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

:tpd:

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Do you have a platinum membership? See post 7
http://www.cigarbid.com/auction/foru...=0000000332374

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

The Padrons were a while ago so no pics. Here is the Tat box from today...
I do not have a platinum membership. I think that was a joke...
Only one out of 2 boxes in the same package was opened.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

that is odd, you want to think its for quality control, but if you have some bum sticks in there, i wonder if they were up to shenanigans

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I had the JR rep come in and swap out cigars in a pallet dried up Hoyo Excalliburs we recieved at work for our Fathers Day display. She went thru every box and tried to pick out the ones that didn't have obvious damage.

She took back about 40 boxes and we sold the rest. Right about then was the last time I ordered from them.

I imagine these kind of things happen more than we realize.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I wonder about this too as the it seems rather unlikely that both boxes had been inspected prior to leaving their facility and both had a bunch of bum sticks in them. Unless of course they have a blind guy doing their inspections. I have never had any of my packages opened so it is weird nonetheless. I'm wondering if they swapped sticks out figuring who ever won them would be fine with it since they got it for a deal, well I guess you can't always think that with C-Bid as the sticks you mentioned often times go above retail.:D Either way I would be calling and getting an exchange and definitely letting them know my concern about the frequency in which it has happened.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I wrote an e-mail to them last night and again they agreed to exchange them but could not offer a reason they would open the box no less why only one of two boxes.

It is an inconvienence and make me feel like they are trying to put one over on me. They place some damaged sticks in a box and hope you will not go throught the trouble of exchanging them. I work a lot of hours and do not appreciate having to repackage the box and take the time to ship the box back to them and wait a week just to get what I originally paid for.

I understand that things happen and cigars get damaged. I am more than willing to work with a company if something like this happens. My problem here is that it seems the cigars were damaged and then sold to me not after they were sold to me.

I had good luck with Egars.com and they are generally cheaper than most auctions anyway. They sell a fiver of Padron 1964 Corona's for $39 which generally go for well over $50 on Cbid. They will be getting my business going forward.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

The "Platinum Membership" is a cbid forum joke, although it's caused quite a bit of trouble for customer service department at Cbid with people who blow through the forum, see a post about it, don't realize it's a joke, call customer service asking for an upgrade and then don't believe C/S when they say no such membership exists. So much aggravation that finally after probably about 9 months of asking people nicely to knock off the joke, C/S has made it clear that they are going to start revoking posting privileges for people who continue the platinum membership joke.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

After thinking about this and I know they have done it in the past with humidors so I am thinking maybe it's the same deal but I wonder if they shipped them to someone, and there were damaged sticks in the box so they exchanged them and than they sent the same box out again but just marked it as opened for inspection hoping the person who got them a second time would not complain. Sounds shady but I know for a fact that they have done it with humidors in the past because a buddy of mine won a humidor from them and it came damaged so he returned it and he wrote on the box "Damaged." They sent him another which was also damaged, so again he called and they agreed to exchange it for another and low and behold the third one that came was the same one he got the first time because it had damaged in Sharpie matching what he put on the first one. With that he said F-it and returned it for a refund, and this to was through C-Bid.:2

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Cbid ships either UPS (who does not open packages for inspection) or USPS Priority. USPS Domestic Priority mail is sealed against inspection without a federal search warrant or consent form.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Just got this reply from Cbid

"Thank you for your email! I’m sorry for any inconvenience this has caused you! We do inspect the boxes to make sure there isn’t any damage to the cigars in general. However, when they are inspected we do have to manually open the box which may cause the cigars to shift while in transit causing damage to the cigars."

They apparently open the box to inspect for damage knowing it can lead to the cigars shifting and getting damaged???

Sounds counter productive no?:rolleyes:

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Sounds like :bs. They are in damage control mode.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

To me it sounds like either a cut-and-paste answer or they didn't fully understand your original communication.

I would just call them on Monday. They tend to be very good about making things right.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

They are willing to exchange the box but it is not fair that I need to keep repackaging boxes and resending them and waiting for a new box because they are trying to sell damaged cigars.

There are a lot of cigar retailers out there that will shipped undamaged cigars as a consumer would expect.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

I've been buying cigars for a long time and I've found that eventually all vendors make mistakes and problems can arise at times. **** always happens, it's how a company chooses to react that distinguishes them. In this case, what separates the good from the bad is their willingness to replace/refund and provide and ARS label without argument.

I really don't think that the problem is CI/Cbid as a whole either, just a few individuals that might not grasp the bigger picture.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

:tpd: I thought this was only an Habanos issue, but apparently NC vendors are doing the same thing.

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Again a mistake is one thing. Opening a box to switch good cigars with bad is another...

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Here is my guess - they were opening boxes to switch good cigars for bad and accidentally shipped you the box they were collecting the bad cigars in. I'm betting their intentions were pure and you just got the wrong end of it by mistake.

I once had a vendor ship me the wrong order.....twice. They eventually made it right but it was a pain in the buttox.

You aren't making me feel very good about the box I have on the way from them :D

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I think I figured out why Carlos isn't getting plugged CCs anymore though, the guy who was pulling and shipping them now works for CI and it appears that he has a crush on you.



*shrug* We don't know if that's what happened or not. You're making an assumption.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

sounds like a moneymaking opportunity to me. i would immediately start offering a platinum membership subscription!

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

*shrug* We don't know if that's what happened or not. You're making an assumption.[/quote]

You are right but my assumption is based on my experiences with them. The first time there were 4 very damaged padrons out of a fiver sample. Stevie Wonder could have picked them out if he opened the box for inspection. I thought it was wierd but chalked it up to a mistake.

Now I get a second box that was 'opened for inspection' and again it is a collection of damaged cigars. Something is wrong here....

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

It looks like they tried to slip one by you, in hopes that you would not complain. Whether or not they are free or a million dollar a box, the quality should remain the same. It is not your fault that you got a good deal. Let us know what happens when you get your new sticks.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

This thread leaves a bad taste in my mouth ( I know it's not the cigar I'm smoking...it's a Tat). CI's prices aren't the best, but the deals on CBID can be great. I just hope I don't encounter the "Opened for inspection" sticker. :2

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

Wow, had no idea about that. Just did a google search on the inspection stickers and found that.

Re: Opened for inspection?
 

always inspect.. its a long ride over; who knows what can happen, or what your putting in your humi..

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Exactly. I only smoke one cigar a day and look forward to it. I do not want to smoke a stick with a big crack in it or a big stem hanging out of it no matter how cheap it is.

Most of all I feel it is dishonest. All the sealed boxes are fine and the ones they open are full of damaged cigars. I cannot give them my business now as a matter of principal.