I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience as the policy was recently set in place. Unfortunately we no longer offer to ship to addresses that lead to UPS locations. Please provide another shipping address in which we can direct your package to.

Quoted:
I had an order pending with 80% arms for several months now on an out-of-stock item. I have two previous orders with them shipped to my receiving address. When I inquired about my order recently, they said they won't ship it to my ship-to address (the same address to which prior orders were shipped) because their new "policy" is that they don't ship to UPS stores. When I asked about the motivation for the policy, I got back evasion in the form of the following:



I wrote back and said the lack of responding to my question was disconcerting and requested that all my pending orders be canceled. They didn't cancel them but instead asked for my personal phone number so they could "discuss" the situation with me.

I can maybe understand the position as a super-clumsy attempt to avoid fraud if I had no purchase history.

Does anyone know if they're under subpoena or something? This smells super fishy to me.

Quoted:


They may be cooperating with the Feds to build a list of all the people who've bought any kind of 80% products from them.  I hope not, but it wouldn't surprise me if the Biden administration would try to force them to do that.

Quoted:
Why do you need to ship to a UPS store anyway? Just ship to your home. Tinfoil hat?

Quoted:
Why do you need to ship to a UPS store anyway? Just ship to your home. Tinfoil hat?

Me:
Nope. Please cancel all of my outstanding orders.

You took my order and agreed to ship to my ship-to address which hasn't changed from any of my prior orders. You're now reneging on your part of the deal.

Your explanation of avoiding fraud makes no sense as applied here, since you've already dealt with me and have made shipments to the same address.

Further, I purchased [ORDER YYY] close in time to [ORDER ZZZ]. The delay between shipping the two was yours, not mine. You already know that the [PRODUCT] I received is useless without the thing you now won't ship to the address you already agreed to. I did not discover until recently that you would breach our agreement. The fault is yours for trying to change the deal after the fact.

I am tired of the back-and-forth. I no longer wish to argue with you. Because of your material breach and continued frustration and delay, I have already made arrangements to purchase replacement products from another vender.

Please immediately cancel all outstanding orders and issue a refund. Please indicate when you have done so.

Quoted:
UPS may also have issued them a notice that they can't send their merchandise to ship-to addresses. Shit happens.

Quoted:
UPS may also have issued them a notice that they can't send their merchandise to ship-to addresses. Shit happens.

I HAVE NOT YET RECEIVED CONFIRMATION THAT MY ORDER HAS BEEN CANCELED. PLEASE CANCEL IMMEDIATELY AND REFUND. PLEASE DO THIS NOW. I DO NOT WISH TO HEAR ABOUT “ESCALATIONS” TO “MANAGEMENT TEAMS” OR EXPLORE ANY ALTERNATIVES. I DO NOT WANT MY ORDER. I WISH TO CANCEL AND CEASE MY BUSINESS RELATIONSHIP WITH YOU IMMEDIATELY.

Quoted:
"We are unable to take returns on your other 2 orders as they are outside our 30-day return window."

Quoted:
Why do you need to ship to a UPS store anyway? Just ship to your home. Tinfoil hat?

Quoted:
…

OP should just do a charge back then post about them in GD to make sure everybody knows what's going on in my opinion.

Quoted:

Da fuq? The 30-day return window can expire before they've ever shipped the product? Or is this on the other thing you ordered to use with the thing they won't ship?

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No. If vendor has charged your account, but have not shipped items, you are entitled to contest the charge. If they provide a tracking number, it is trivial to find out if it's real. If real, then great, if not real, then the contest goes through and you are done.

Customers and CC companies go through this hundreds of times a day. Use it, it is for your protection. It's your money, protect it.

Quoted:


That's as much your business as it is 80% Arms'. The why is irrelevant. It is my preference and that is where they agreed to ship when they took my order.

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Potentially they suspect an ITAR issue with it being a non descript address such as a UPS store. The potato and his cronies would just love a headline that said "Taliban being supplied by online firearm parts stores, congress to rush in legislation to stop this". Nothing like a false morale narrative to help with an agenda.

My name is Dustin and I am the Customer Service Manager for 80 Percent Arms. I have been recently informed of the issues that you were experiencing with our support team, and I want to personally take responsibility for that and apologize. I completely understand your frustration, and it was a bit painful for me to read the interactions you had with my team, because I would feel the same way you do. We're actively changing a few policies, and anytime changes roll out, some things get lost in translation. When that happens, it falls on me for not effectively communicating with my team. Let me explain:

We've recently made a few changes in the past month to better defend against fraud, which has significantly increased this year. We've also ceased automatically shipping to UPS Boxes, simply because we use FedEx and USPS as our carriers, and delivery to UPS boxes is spotty at best. A lot of the time they end up being returned to us, and it comes out of our pocket. So, unfortunately, the representative you dealt with assumed that this was another fraud prevention method, because I failed to communicate why the UPS change was made, and so he took a hard stance in a good-natured attempt to protect us against fraud. We've since talked, because we want our representatives to feel empowered to make the right choice for the customer, and that means every situation is unique. Regardless, I take responsibility here.

So, that brings us to the present, and what to do now. I want you to get your order, and we completely understand the privacy concerns in dealing with our products, so I want to use the address you feel comfortable with. Luckily, I was able to tactically acquire your products from the warehouse, and there's a UPS Store not too far from here. So by the time you're reading this, your products will be in the mail to you. We learned an important lesson and appreciate the feedback so we can make things right.

If you ever want to talk, I'd love to speak to you on the matter so that you can personally explain everything and provide us with further information that help us improve our Customer Service team. My direct line is (949) 354-2767 EXT. 8699.

And if you're ever in Southern California, we owe you a beer. Our apologies again.

PLEASE DO NOT SHIP ANYTHING. I don’t want to deal with you anymore. I don’t want your products. I don’t want any more emails, phone conversations, “escalations”, policy changes, excuses, or explanations. I don’t want a beer. I don’t want to spend any more time on this. I have already invested hours.

WHAT I WANT IS MY MONEY BACK, NOW. I struggle to think how I can be or could have been any clearer on this over the many, MANY emails I have sent you, and yet you STILL refuse to comply or even pretend to understand. If you REALLY want to take “responsibility”, as you claim, you will stop ignoring my requests and personally ensure my refund is processed as quickly as possible.

I tried calling your number and extension to explain this to you personally, but reached a recording telling me to send an email instead before being hung up on.

I have been requesting that this order be canceled since Sep 3. One of your agents has already confirmed cancelation. I expect a refund and nothing else. Because of your obstinance, I have begun dispute proceedings with my credit card issuer.

I will refuse/return all shipments from you. You keep pushing against canceling this order. I want my money back. Plain and simple. Period. End of story. Please confirm ASAP.

Quoted:
That's as much your business as it is 80% Arms'. The why is irrelevant. It is my preference and that is where they agreed to ship when they took my order.

Quoted:

A few years ago, I tried to ship some parts to be cerakoted via a UPS Store.  I was told by the clerk that it was their policy (apparently a UPS Store wide policy and not just a policy of that specific store), to not ship any firearm related components and that I had to go to the main UPS depot at the airport.  The clerk had asked me what was in the sealed box and I told her it was gun parts not suspecting that they had such a policy.  If I had told them car parts, they would have shipped the box without further ado.  So I wonder if the UPS Store is refusing to receive gun parts from known firearm component vendors?

This doesn't excuse the behavior of 80percentarms.com, however.  This is certainly true if they already were aware of the UPS Store policy.

Quoted:

A few years ago, I tried to ship some parts to be cerakoted via a UPS Store.  I was told by the clerk that it was their policy (apparently a UPS Store wide policy and not just a policy of that specific store), to not ship any firearm related components and that I had to go to the main UPS depot at the airport.  The clerk had asked me what was in the sealed box and I told her it was gun parts not suspecting that they had such a policy.  If I had told them car parts, they would have shipped the box without further ado.  So I wonder if the UPS Store is refusing to receive gun parts from known firearm component vendors?

This doesn't excuse the behavior of 80percentarms.com, however.  This is certainly true if they already were aware of the UPS Store policy.

Are you insolvent? Do you have the ability to refund my order or not? If you are not insolvent and have the ability to refund my order, then do so IMMEDIATELY. What I expect in your next response is, “I have canceled your order. Please expect a refund within [a reasonable number of] days,” or similar. ANY OTHER ACTION, STATEMENT, OR DELAY ON YOUR PART WILL BE CONSTRUED AS AN ADMISSION THAT YOUR COMPANY IS NO LONGER A VIABLE CONCERN. Please take note that I will publish your response.

Quoted:
If we think the government is t tracking transactions from these websites then we're fools. The government knows you're buying 80%ers

[source]

You are an idiot. They won't ship to UPS or Postal Annex due to fraud (shipping address not being the same as CC address).
Living back in the hills of TN has tightened your tin foil hat and fear of the revenuers. "I do not wish to receive any items not-yet-shipped if they are not legal to purchase or possess." is unfounded the Feds would shut them down in a heartbeat if they weren't.
Your request to refund was made outside of their clearly stated 30 day window.
Give them an address that matches your CC and get your stuff.

Quoted:

Why would you post a quote and link from another forum where somebody basically called you a wack job?

So they are shipping to your UPS store now, correct? While I think the whole thing is messed up, I think you should have called and spoke to them when they asked you to. At this point, if I was you, I'd just be glad to get my shit and be done with them and never do business with them again.

Quoted:


Interesting.  Where did you get the idea that "Government can track whatever it wants"?

I recall a time (and it really wasn't that long ago, really) when the very notion that the Government wanted a list of the books that you had borrowed from your local library would have been unthinkable.  But then--we understood way back then (before the PATRIOT Act) that surveillance states were inherently evil.

Quoted:


For clarity, I did call them. Many, many times. It's a phone tree tarpit. I've never been able to speak to a real person.

The primary point here is that they tried to force a material change the terms of the deal after the fact. I said no thanks, I'll take my money back instead. They pushed. And pushed. And pushed. I don't want to deal with anyone who's willing to engage in such bait-and-switch shenanigans, even if they reluctantly decide to make good on their original obligations, and then only after an exhausting fight. That alone should set off alarm bells for anyone watching, especially, given that they claim to have unprecedented demand with a huge backlog of orders.

Quoted:
As for UPS stores...  -snip-

And some credit card companies will EXTEND that chargeback timeline to after SHIPPING regardless of how long that is.
This is because vendors are not supposed to charge the card until shipment is expected in a very short time period (days, not weeks).
It's against most card processor agreements to collect payments when the vendors know that shipment will be multiple days/weeks/months away.
The sellers in those extended shipping situations are supposed to collect the card info and then run the card once they are ready to ship.

That's how big companies like Brownells/Midway always do it.