Bait and switch  

Re: Bait and switch

Bait and switch? Prusa is currently shipping the stickered PEI sheets which actually cost about 15% more than the powder coated ones will and they work flawlessly.

Giving you a more expensive product in replacement is something that few companies would do as the result of a parts shortage. I see no valid reason for your negative comments.

Prusa Research have proved many times they are an honourable company.

They're not handing out stickered sheets out of the goodness of their own hearts. They're doing it because $750 worth of printer is being held up by a $25 or whatever part.

The stickered sheets do not work flawlessly. Whatever they're doing this time around is slightly more fragile than what was on the Mk2 for some reason (or maybe the application of the sheets is just more sloppy from factory). I would prefer a powder coated sheet myself, but I understand and respect the decision to throw the PEI stickered sheet on there and am willing to wait until they get the powder coating right.

But the fact that they don't fix their product page to try to correct this misunderstanding up front at every possible point is unfortunately par for the course. Hanlon's Razor.

Re: Bait and switch

Weird. The way everyone is talking I must have one of the only properly functioning MK3's. No filament sensor problems. No belt alignment problems. No PEI sheet problems. I guess I should count myself as lucky. 😛

Re: Bait and switch

Please not again this "Prusa is bad" posts... If you can't wait or a coated sheet is a must have, feel free to cancel the order.
There is nothing the forum community, which is trying to help people, can do for you.

Re: Bait and switch

Please not again this "Prusa is bad" posts... If you can't wait or a coated sheet is a must have, feel free to cancel the order.
There is nothing the forum community, which is trying to help people, can do for you.

Yes, there is. The community forums are a great place for the community to communicate. As such, it is an excellent way for Prusa Research to see what the community thinks. Any company that truly cares about its user base will actively read and engage with forum members.

Yes, there are thousands of printers shipped (as per Josef, himself) and there are probably many, many users who are happy. However, there are many, many users who are experiencing problem after problem. The printer was definitely oversold. Growing pains or not, when Josef introduced the printer he didn't say "... this printer will have this feature and that feature after 6 to 12 months of the users debugging it for us." He introduced it as a done deal. Furthermore, shipping with one bed type and the asking for more money for the correct, advertised bed type is somewhat of a "bait and switch".

I fully understand that a new model like this will not be perfect. I didn't expect it to be perfect. That's why I've been reading and waiting until the printer gets to an acceptable to me quality level before ordering. However, it's a fact that communication from Prusa is lacking and that post by Josef, which was pretty sarcastic and places blame on the user did not help.

No matter what, ignoring the troubled launch of the MK3 and hiding behind the "growing pains" argument is sticking our heads in the sand.

Re: Bait and switch

Please not again this "Prusa is bad" posts... If you can't wait or a coated sheet is a must have, feel free to cancel the order.
There is nothing the forum community, which is trying to help people, can do for you.

Yes, there is. The community forums are a great place for the community to communicate. As such, it is an excellent way for Prusa Research to see what the community thinks. Any company that truly cares about its user base will actively read and engage with forum members.

Yes, there are thousands of printers shipped (as per Josef, himself) and there are probably many, many users who are happy. However, there are many, many users who are experiencing problem after problem. The printer was definitely oversold. Growing pains or not, when Josef introduced the printer he didn't say "... this printer will have this feature and that feature after 6 to 12 months of the users debugging it for us." He introduced it as a done deal. Furthermore, shipping with one bed type and the asking for more money for the correct, advertised bed type is somewhat of a "bait and switch".

I fully understand that a new model like this will not be perfect. I didn't expect it to be perfect. That's why I've been reading and waiting until the printer gets to an acceptable to me quality level before ordering. However, it's a fact that communication from Prusa is lacking and that post by Josef, which was pretty sarcastic and places blame on the user did not help.

No matter what, ignoring the troubled launch of the MK3 and hiding behind the "growing pains" argument is sticking our heads in the sand.

A voice of reason, I would upvote you if I could. I would just add that for many of us, this is our first go with a Prusa product and after having a couple printers from other manufacturers, this is a little bit of a shock. Many of us didn't know we needed to watch and wait to see how this plays out, we expected it to work like advertised. Especially so with the respect the Prusa name seems to carry. 🙂

Re: Bait and switch

Furthermore, shipping with one bed type and the asking for more money for the correct, advertised bed type is somewhat of a "bait and switch".

You can ask to wait until the correct, advertised bed is available if you want to wait, then you don't have to pay anything extra.

The people complaining about Prusa are actually looking more angry than the comments on the Kickstarter for a book I backed where the guy running it just disappeared with the money and I have no hope of ever seeing anything meaningful from it. Just as a point of reference.

Re: Bait and switch

Furthermore, shipping with one bed type and the asking for more money for the correct, advertised bed type is somewhat of a "bait and switch".

You can ask to wait until the correct, advertised bed is available if you want to wait, then you don't have to pay anything extra.

The people complaining about Prusa are actually looking more angry than the comments on the Kickstarter for a book I backed where the guy running it just disappeared with the money and I have no hope of ever seeing anything meaningful from it. Just as a point of reference.

Quite right. A company like Prusa has a reputation and a brand to maintain. Continuing to advertise the product as having specification A until your money is handed over then telling you it's actually specification B is not okay.

Kickstarter is where people donate to startups in the hope that a product might actually happen. If someone takes your money and runs on Kickstarter, well, that's half expected.

Re: Bait and switch

Kickstarter is where people donate to startups in the hope that a product might actually happen. If someone takes your money and runs on Kickstarter, well, that's half expected.

Eh, when under the risks the Kickstarter says that all work is 100% complete, and it just needs to be sent to the printers, and the guy disappears, it's pretty much just theft.

What Prusa are doing isn't theft. It's obviously not ideal, but they're still shipping a very good printer. Bait and Switch would be "oh, by the way you can never have the sheet we advertised". People are getting unreasonably upset over how they're interpreting something.

"We don't have the textured sheet yet, so there's going to be potentially several months wait until we can ship. If you want it to ship earlier with a non-textured sheet, let us know and we'll sort that out for you"
vs.
"We're going to ship with a non-textured sheet. You can wait for the textured sheet if you like".

Both of those describe the same situation, but people are acting like the second is Prusa deceiving them in some way, but I suspect they'd be ok with the first one.

Re: Bait and switch

Quite right. A company like Prusa has a reputation and a brand to maintain. Continuing to advertise the product as having specification A until your money is handed over then telling you it's actually specification B is not okay.

Advertising is usually not being changed based on shipping situation. Looks like it's a first time buying experience for some people. If you see a product which has a waiting time for 3 Months (right now), I would contact support or ask in live chat about the shipping conditions before placing an order. Even if you can't wait to click on the buy button, you are getting an immediate response about the current shipping situation. It's up to you to decide to cancel for free or go with it.
I don't see a need to change the advertisement on the PR home page. Because the coat sheet is a default which will be shipped with a printer once available. If you're on a back order you could get either default coat sheet or the more expensive clear sheet which is a "free" replacement because of the current shipping situation.
Even if the availability will change tomorrow, you can contact support and modify your order adding/changing sheets. What kind of service do you guys expect more?

Re: Bait and switch

I don't see a need to change the advertisement on the PR home page.

It's false advertising that misleads customers - the proof of which is that this thread exists. QED.

Re: Bait and switch

Weird. The way everyone is talking I must have one of the only properly functioning MK3's. No filament sensor problems. No belt alignment problems. No PEI sheet problems. I guess I should count myself as lucky. 😛

How is this helpful?

Re: Bait and switch

It's false advertising that misleads customers - the proof of which is that this thread exists. QED.

Hey, during my grocery shopping there are only green bananas available. But the Add is clearly showing yellow bananas. "Clearly false advertising"!

Re: Bait and switch

^^^^^ that is the dumbest comparison I've ever heard. Good job Nikolai. Lol

Re: Bait and switch

It's false advertising that misleads customers - the proof of which is that this thread exists. QED.

Hey, during my grocery shopping there are only green bananas available. But the Add is clearly showing yellow bananas. "Clearly false advertising"!

Can you see them before you pay for it? Are you actually arguing that Prusa can show whatever the heck they like and ship something totally different? "Thanks for ordering the new Mk3, here is a dead fish. Happy printing!" Where is your line between the spec that you see when ordering not being the product on offer, if there is one? For me, it's black and white, the spec I see before I order should be the spec that is available now - the exception being if the manufacturer/retailer genuinely does not know.

I got my Mk3 before Christmas. When I ordered, Prusa (I assume) did not know that there would be a problem with the textured sheets. What they did then was fine.

However, when they *do* know, and choose not to tell people about it proactively (and by this, I mean before you order, where it currently shows and talks about the bed that you will not get), that is out of order.

You, and Prusa, in a broader sense seem to think that owning a printer should mean that you do trawl the forums daily before, during and after purchase, or you deserve to have a bad experience somehow. I do not believe users should be required to do this, the onus should be on Prusa to keep the customer informed. This isnt AliExpress.

Examples:
1: This thread - the bed issue. How do you find out? Read lots of forums before purchase.
2: Ordered early? Your rods are all probably soft and need replacing. How do you find out? Trawl forums & blogs yourself, Prusa won't contact you.
3: Ordered early? Your spiral wrap might tear out your bed thermisor. How do you find out? See above.
4: Ordered early? Your firmware and drivers mean your prints (and other various issues) will be bad. How do you find out? See above.
5: Ordered early? Prusa has revised lots of parts on github you might want to print (including fixing issues we'd previously brushed off as user error). How do you find out? See above.

3D printing needs to be more accessible, this printer promised features that should work towards this. If my car has a fault, the manufacturer contacts me about fixing it. If my graphics card has a new driver the computer tells me. If my OS gets patched, well it just bloody does it whether I want it or not - OK, you can go too far with this.

How many of the hundreds of owners are using a Mk3 that will kill it's own rods and tear out thermistors or are using the original firmware? Prusa should mailshot all owners about this stuff, not just blog it or post to github or drive-by youtube comment it.

Re: Bait and switch

totally agree

Re: Bait and switch

You, and Prusa, in a broader sense seem to think that owning a printer should mean that you do trawl the forums daily before, during and after purchase, or you deserve to have a bad experience somehow. I do not believe users should be required to do this, the onus should be on Prusa to keep the customer informed. This isnt AliExpress.

While I generally agree with your argument, we do have to remember that 3D printers are nearly at the same level as a desktop HP paper printer. They are not fire-and-forget and won't be for a long time. Therefore, a certain level of digging through the forums when things don't work perfectly is expected.

My main objection to how things have been going is the level of communication from Prusa. As I said, I don't expect it to be perfect out the gate. I am even OK with waiting for the powder coated bed sheet because I understand that production issues do come up. However, I do expect that when the printer is plagues by such issues and the community on the forums is actively and loudly concerned about them, that they would give more frequent and accurate state of affairs.

One such example is Linear Advance. As it was said before, it was turned off in order to make OctoPrint and printing from USB work. The understanding here is that the processor just doesn't have enough juice for everything. Now, this is a major concern not only for Linear Advance. What other features would you have to turn off in order to regain clock cycles on the CPU? In this case, I would have liked that we get an bit of an update how Prusa is planning on compensating for the computational intensity of Linear Advance. Are they planning on leaving Linear Advance off forever? Are they planning on turning something else off instead? What would that thing be? Are they planning on optimizing the code to a level where everything can be enabled? Are they planning on overclocking the CPU?

Again, I do strongly believe that a lot of the dissatisfaction can be averted by frequent and precise communication from the company, itself.

Re: Bait and switch

+1 for Stuart. The updated parts should be dispatched to the people that ordered bwfore they were implemented. We paid same price for inferior product. And WE ARE THE ONES that flushed these problems out for them.

"But we can print and fix our own stuff"
"Buy your own filament to do so"

How about the braided sleeve?? Hrmmmmm

Re: Bait and switch

While I generally agree with your argument, we do have to remember that 3D printers are nearly at the same level as a desktop HP paper printer. They are not fire-and-forget and won't be for a long time. Therefore, a certain level of digging through the forums when things don't work perfectly is expected.

I agree with this entirely - but not all problems will be something that the users will recognise as an issue and seek support for, and that's a problem.

They're sitting on defects that range from sub-optimal prints to their printer just not working any more one day - and they don't know that all these things can be fixed.

Re: Bait and switch

While I generally agree with your argument, we do have to remember that 3D printers are nearly at the same level as a desktop HP paper printer. They are not fire-and-forget and won't be for a long time. Therefore, a certain level of digging through the forums when things don't work perfectly is expected.

I agree with this entirely - but not all problems will be something that the users will recognise as an issue and seek support for, and that's a problem.

They're sitting on defects that range from sub-optimal prints to their printer just not working any more one day - and they don't know that all these things can be fixed.

Hence, my later statement that communication from Prusa is key.

Re: Bait and switch

Examples:
1: This thread - the bed issue. How do you find out? Read lots of forums before purchase.
2: Ordered early? Your rods are all probably soft and need replacing. How do you find out? Trawl forums & blogs yourself, Prusa won't contact you.
3: Ordered early? Your spiral wrap might tear out your bed thermisor. How do you find out? See above.
4: Ordered early? Your firmware and drivers mean your prints (and other various issues) will be bad. How do you find out? See above.
5: Ordered early? Prusa has revised lots of parts on github you might want to print (including fixing issues we'd previously brushed off as user error). How do you find out? See above.

3D printing needs to be more accessible, this printer promised features that should work towards this. If my car has a fault, the manufacturer contacts me about fixing it. If my graphics card has a new driver the computer tells me. If my OS gets patched, well it just bloody does it whether I want it or not - OK, you can go too far with this.

How many of the hundreds of owners are using a Mk3 that will kill it's own rods and tear out thermistors or are using the original firmware? Prusa should mailshot all owners about this stuff, not just blog it or post to github or drive-by youtube comment it.

You have to remember that when you order tech that's on the cutting edge there will always be bugs early. Crap, you remember the Samsung Note 7 with the explosive battery? What about iPhone users who had to deal with issues with their new phones at launch. This is not an isolated issue with Prusa, every company more or less handles it in a similar way, wait for their customers to complain and the issues will get resolved. When's the last time you had a piece of technology and a bug was discovered and the company contacted you proactively? I'll wait.... Never. I'm not an apologist for the company or the product but I expected bugs when I ordered early, it comes with the territory. Crap, I actually cancelled my order over the PSU thread and thought better of it and decided to proceed with my order. If you mailshot your entire customer base with a laundry list of bugs that may or may not impact them you will generate hysteria. Prusa support is fantastic, you have an issue and they will correct it for you.