Fergo, Churchville Golf...

[Jerrymoo]

Gents,

Just a heads up: Fergo has lost all of his accounts, and is now out of business.

If you're like me and find yourself in the unenviable position of having ordered/paid for gear, it looks pretty bad (okay, extremely bad), feel free to PM me and commiserate.

Any thoughts/advice, feel free

[benno_r]

That's a shame, had lots of good dealings with him in the past.

I hope there is a good outcome for everyone with money's owing.

[mrbluu]

bugger, I hope it works out for you J-Mizzle.....

[3oneday]

Did Mizuno etc get wind of him heavily discounting? Surprised it took this long really.

If you have orders though he should be refunding regardless, as they wouldn't be taking orders off him.

[Hatchman]

Ouch, that's bad.
Any story behind what went wrong?

[PerryGroves]

Hatch, here is a post from ISG, I dont really get the eBay vs locals bit, given its a freeze I would have thought an ebay business would sustain you, but wtf would I know.

Unfortunately the worst winter in a very long time and at least a dozen other golf retailers in the area have closed due to a total lack of support.
Normally they loss about 2 weeks during the dead of winter, this year they lost the whole 12 weeks plus without trading at all.

Matt has closed the doors and is gone atm.

Unless he gets some independent backing quickly he will not recover in the near future. I personally hope that he's back up and running very soon, he has been a great help to me with some custom orders over the past couple of years and I feel he fits extremely well into a special part of the internet market-place !
Jon...

ps: shows what happens when you ebay to much and don't look after your local businesses

[3oneday]

Proshopwarehouse srpings to mind.

[Hatchman]

Yeh that doesn't make a whole lot of sense unless the evilbay side of things worked against him with the suppliers. Some are very protective about what price you can sell at and internet trading. The may have pulled supply of clubs?

[benno_r]

When I talked to him last, all bar Titleist had put him on hold.

[Jerrymoo]

This is the email I have:

***********************************

Unfortunately I am now out of business. I am so far behind with all the golf companies due to us being not able to stay open this Winter I have had all my accounts closed.

As for a refund it will take me a while...

When you guys pay me for a set I pay the golf company and it goes towards the oldest invoice as it can not go directly to your invoice as your gear has not been built yet. So it's not like I took it and just kept it, it's gone and so is my account.

When you placed the order there were no issues with my account and it was hard but I was hanging on the last time we emailed but because of the clubs not going into production later than we thought my account became past due in the process.

There is only a few guys that are caught in your position so I will try to make good on any refunds but as I said it will take me a while to make the money and I am going to issue refunds in order of date of purchase...

Matt

***********************************

I have redacted a little, but that's the brass tacks of it.

[live4golf]

Hope it works out for you and everyone else involved. His situation seems very dire

[Captain Nemo]

He's a good guy Ive dealt with him multiple times over the years and he's gone out of his way to help me.
As he said he hasnt taken the $$$, im sure he'll do his best to get it back to you.
Worst comes to worst, youve ordered the gear maybe the Company can ship them direct to you????
Id be taking that route!

[benno_r]

It is a definite shame. He certainly understood customer service more than most in the golfing world. He also had a great crew working with him, I hope they all find work soon. I reckon I used a fair bit of my monthly bandwidth going back and forth with Paul.

Can we get him to come back to Australia and take over Nike Golf so we can finally get some good deals there?

Failing that, I hope he can get back on his feet - I'd be more than happy to deal with him again in the future.

[Dotty]

So the new money was used to pay old invoices.

Sounds like he was paying himself with the old money, instead of his suppliers.

[wazandnic]

That's actually the bit I don't understand Dotty. New money comes in and goes to pay the old invoices?? Shouldn't it be the first order comes in, you take your cut and pay the rest to the supplier... next order comes in, take your cut and pay the supplier... and repeat...

Maybe first few orders used to set up the business... then suddenly behind in payments and unless contributing a little more each order you never actually catch up???

[Captain Nemo]

I reckon he should have kept doing it the old way and scrapped the internet shop he setup....

[3oneday]

As he said he hasnt taken the $$$, im sure he'll do his best to get it back to you.

I'm calling bs on this sorry, if the money "goes to the oldest invoice" well guess what, your money is paying for someone elses gear, and the profit he didn't send for the oldest invoice goes where?

Sorry, if he wasn't covering overheads and expenses this has been coming for a while, he simply hasn't been paying his bills. Companies issue 30 day accounts mostly, he'd have to be in excess of 60 and maybe 90 days for them to take this action.

[Jerrymoo]

Sorry, if he wasn't covering overheads and expenses this has been coming for a while, he simply hasn't been paying his bills. Companies issue 30 day accounts mostly, he'd have to be in excess of 60 and maybe 90 days for them to take this action.

Have to agree — I ordered and was fully paid up ~15th of Jan.

[3oneday]

Dispute with Paypal or credit card co?, or did you send cash?

[Jerrymoo]

Dispute with Paypal or credit card co?, or did you send cash?

CC, so looking into the possibility of some buyer protection.

I'm doubtful, though.

[8081travis]

as soon as he set the internet shop up that was going to kill him with his prices on there advertised for all to see

was about to place order for sm5 wedges a few weeks ago, pretty stoked I didnt

[3oneday]

Sounds his accounts were closed for delinquency, rather than had his accounts closed due to incorrect pricing etc.

[Hatchman]

Cash flow issues and/or mismanagement. Sounds very messy and think your chances of a refund are slim or could drag on for ever JMHO.
Hope I'm wrong and it all works out for you Jerrymoo.
It would be nice if there was a happy ending for the business and he can make good with customers and suppliers as there have been so many on forums in Australia say how good he was to deal with customer service wise.

[Jerrymoo]

I'd be more than happy to deal with him again in the future.

FYI, this isn't exactly a small amount of money I am owed.

[8081travis]

I ordered my irons from him last year, great bloke, service was amazing, had sticks within 10 days from ordering at around 600 less than drummond quote, real pity he has shut up shop