A co-worker of mine ordered a DPMS chrome plated bolt and bolt carrier a couple of months ago.  After a somewhat long wait a customer came in with a newly built rifle, complete with a DPMS chrome bolt and carrier. When asked how long ago he had ordered it he told us he had gotten it in just a few days.

My co-worker calls DPMS, is told they are still on back order and when he relateds the above story the phone helper says he'll check into it and call back. This was last Thursday.  No call back is recieved but yesterday, Tuesday, a chrome plated bolt and carrier shows up, so all is well.

Oops, maybe not. On opening the box and inspecting the parts it is discovered that there are no forward assist cuts on the bolt carrier.  Back on the phone to DPMS! This is were it gets really good. The phone helper informs my co-worker that DPMS offers them both ways and thats the one they shipped since it wasn't specified on the order which one was wanted.  He is then told that it would be no problem for him to return the bolt and carrier to exchange it for the correct one, my co-workers dime for the return shipping of course.

The funny part is that after looking through DPMS's current catalog, and their web site, we find no mention what so ever of them offering bolt carriers without foreward assist serrations. Every bolt and carrier listed in their catalog and web site shows serrations.  I wonder if their phone people just make this stuff up on the fly or if there is a company policy of bullshitting the customer when they screw up.

Needless to say we won't be ordering anything from DPMS again.

If it is a .308, there will be no notches on the bolt carrier. The forward assist only comes into play on the last 3/4" of travel to help with the chambering of a round in a tight or dirty chamber. It works, as our students have found out.

For the .223, the carriers should have the notches. I was not aware that DPMS sold 223 carriers without notches, but that doesn't really mean anything.

Tell your friend to call and speak with Dustin or Joe. I bet he gets squared away muey pronto.

EvilBert,

 DPMS has a lot of parts that they offer that are not in the catalog. My buddy got a JP comp for his .308 that was not in the catalog. All he did was call them and asked if they had one. Midway and Brownells do the same thing.have

I refuse to do business with dpms.  I tried ordering some stuff from them a few months back and got a "confirmation," but nothing ever showed up and they (thankfully) never billed my cc.

Quoted: EvilBert,  DPMS has a lot of parts that they offer that are not in the catalog. My buddy got a JP comp for his .308 that was not in the catalog. All he did was call them and asked if they had one. Midway and Brownells do the same thing.

I'm sure you're correct but that's not really the issue. The issue is they failed to fill the order when the parts became avaliable, didn't return a call as they said they would, shipped the wrong part, and then failed to offer to correct the mistake at their expense instead of the customers.

Mistakes happen. I'm a pretty easy going guy and tend to accept that  people and companies screw up sometimes. Orders fall through the cracks, sometimes the wrong item gets shipped. Maybe the phone guy figured that since he got the order shipped he didn't need to follow up with a return call. All this can be overlooked. What bugs me is that after all that they didn't offer to send a call tag to have the wrong item returned. That speaks more to me than all the rest of it combined.

I'm sure DPMS has many happy customers and will have many more in the future. But the real test isn't getting it right 999 times out of a 1000. The real test is what you do the one time you got it wrong.

Quoted: Quoted: I'm sure DPMS has many happy customers and will have many more in the future. But the real test isn't getting it right 999 times out of a 1000. The real test is what you do the one time you got it wrong.

You're right.

Last year I bought a DPMS .22 upper from Brownells. first mag - blew the extractor out, metal shards in my hand - the whole nine.

Called DPMS and asked to speak to Randy Luth - owner type guy.... doesn't know me from Adam...he takes the call...."whatever you want sir...cash (remember I bought this from Brownells), we fix it, we send you a new one...you just let me know". I go with fix or replace. He says "we will get a UPS call tag in the mail today". Call tag shows, I get busy it sits for weeks - I mean weeks. Guess what? They call and send me a new call tag. I ship the upper. They send a new one.

I bought 6 lowers the next week.

Just received a DPMS .308.

Anyone can have a bad day. It IS what they do about it that counts.

Sorry your friend didn't enjoy the experience.

Good luck

Quoted: EvilBert,  I have read your post and I would like to see what I can do to help. Please call 1-800-578-DPMS and ask for Jason. I will be available untill 5:00pm CST. Thanks, Jason Notch DPMS Panther Arms [email protected]

I will pass this on to my co-worker if he hasn't seen it already. (he's a lurker, not a poster)

I am happy with my DPMS bull 20 that I got last week. They said that they were backordered and that it might be 3 to 5 weeks before it arrived.  It arrived 2 weeks 5 days later. I was happy with customer service people I talked to, but like the others said everyone has a bad day now and again.

Just be patient they will make everything okay.