Booksniffer
Well-known member
In the fall of 2019 I ordered some Living Water strings, directly from Ken Middleton.
Life was busy, so it took a while for me to notice that they hadn't shown up.
I contacted him in November and after a couple of emails (I never received a reply to the first two I sent) he said he would send the order again.
(We double-checked my address - which came from Paypal, which I use a lot and know is correct)
Lots of life stuff happening, mostly sad unfortunately - and the other day I realized that the strings still had not shown up.
I did all the usual things; ask the neighbours if they'd seen them, enquired at the post office (I had done all those things before emailing him the first time, too) but nothing turned up - so I emailed Ken again.
This time, he replied that he had sent me the strings, that mail never goes missing in the Netherlands (I wish!) and that there was nothing he could do for me.
I've met Ken a few times in person at various ukulele festivals etc, and he always seemed like a nice guy, so his response surprised me.
There could, of course, be all sorts of things going on in his life as well.
The order was for 4 or 5 sets of strings, so not a huge fortune - but still a rather disappointing experience.
I'm not quite sure what to do now.
I trust he did in fact send the strings; but Dutch mail is (increasingly) not perfect, and I suspect the same goes for UK mail - I've also heard stories about the Brexit kerfuffle causing chaos in various ways.
Still, I paid for the strings, and one or two of my ukuleles are very much due for a change (and good fluorocarbons are not easy to find here).
The whole thing just makes me sad and, as I realize in writing this, a bit anxious as well.
Does anyone here have any recent experience with Ken?
For anyone reading this: what would you do in my place?
Life was busy, so it took a while for me to notice that they hadn't shown up.
I contacted him in November and after a couple of emails (I never received a reply to the first two I sent) he said he would send the order again.
(We double-checked my address - which came from Paypal, which I use a lot and know is correct)
Lots of life stuff happening, mostly sad unfortunately - and the other day I realized that the strings still had not shown up.
I did all the usual things; ask the neighbours if they'd seen them, enquired at the post office (I had done all those things before emailing him the first time, too) but nothing turned up - so I emailed Ken again.
This time, he replied that he had sent me the strings, that mail never goes missing in the Netherlands (I wish!) and that there was nothing he could do for me.
I've met Ken a few times in person at various ukulele festivals etc, and he always seemed like a nice guy, so his response surprised me.
There could, of course, be all sorts of things going on in his life as well.
The order was for 4 or 5 sets of strings, so not a huge fortune - but still a rather disappointing experience.
I'm not quite sure what to do now.
I trust he did in fact send the strings; but Dutch mail is (increasingly) not perfect, and I suspect the same goes for UK mail - I've also heard stories about the Brexit kerfuffle causing chaos in various ways.
Still, I paid for the strings, and one or two of my ukuleles are very much due for a change (and good fluorocarbons are not easy to find here).
The whole thing just makes me sad and, as I realize in writing this, a bit anxious as well.
Does anyone here have any recent experience with Ken?
For anyone reading this: what would you do in my place?