Maelstrom Games

[Hive Carnithrope]

Hey Hive!

Well, as the title says, this thread is all about Maelstrom Games (http://www.maelstromgames.co.uk/) and my experiences with them.

Well, around 10 months ago, I placed an order for some decals from Maelstrom Games. They were in stock, I believe, and I received a conformation email once my order was placed. It said it would take around a week to arrive. I live in the UK, so they should be able to send it quickly.

A week, two weeks, a month and no word. I sent them an email (on their website, as they don't post their email on the site so they don't get SPAM) asking where they were, and they said there was a delay. Understandable. I eventually received them a month or so after my order. I was apprehensive to order from them again, preferring Wayland Games.

But recently, I found myself in need of some spray paint. Now, UK laws forbid the overseas sending of aerosols, and they must be transported specially (by courier) within the UK. Now, Wayland Games had some in stock, but I did not want to spend the extra £5 for a courier, so went to other sites.

Maelstrom Games stocked the spray, but, at the time, did not have any in stock. I ordered anyway (with another model to make the total up to £10 for free postage) and received another conformation email. I expected a delay due to the nature of the item and the fact it was out of stock.

Around two weeks later, I received another email saying my order had been split, and the in stock model had been sent. I received this two days later. I am now just waiting on the spray paint.

Everytime I check the website, it is out of stock. Recently, they had an overhaul of their site, and the spray is no longer available for purchase. As I already ordered before, I would presume my order was still going to be sent. My order detail never changes from 'processing'. I sent them an email again, asking where it was, but have received no reply. I will do so again today.

They seem to be a reputable company, and the in stock items arrived on time, and I understand spray paint is difficult to sent by Royal Mail, but over three months with no word is ridiculous. I am tempted to cancel my order and buy elsewhere, but have found nowhere else. My local gaming shop does not stock it.

tl;dr: Have any of you had any bad experiences with Maelstrom Games, and what should I do about my order?


Thanks,

Hive Carnithrope

[Overread]

There have been a few threads on Maelstrom around the net recently. They appear to be a reputable company who have fallen on hard times and suffered a cash flow problem. I think they even updated their website/sent out a notice regarding this about a week or two ago. In short they worked themselves into a situation where they were unable to order in the purchases people were making in a timely fashion. Couple that with a sudden inability to respond to communications (I assume that they were simply very short staffed and focused on packaging what orders they could to get over the backlog and didn't have time to respond to contact) and they've suffered a major loss of reputation over recent months.

Most do feel that they are a reputable company and that they have had a good track record in the past, however the hard times that have hit them has drastically affected their service. As a result its a difficult situation as to dig themselves out they need to continue trading even though they've problems with trading (which means more and more people are shifting to other services such as Wayland or Firestorm games or even traders on ebay like Troll Trader).

I don't think any wish evil on Maelstrom, but they are currently simply not a reliable ordering service with their cash and stock flow problems. In time they might be able to restore their service to a more suitable standard, the kicker is how long its going to take them to get over this hump and if they can get over it whilst losing trade to other services.

[Geneva]

I've used Maelstrom several times in the past and they've always been great in regards of service. I've had to wait a long time for orders in the past but that's usually the case with everything in Ireland as, with the exception of Dublin, we have no zip codes in our country.

I haven't ordered anything from them in recent months but I know that they have a solid reputation and have done well by me in the past. They accidentally shipped me an extra box of Guardsmen once a couple years ago without charging me and when I emailed them about it they pretty much just shrugged their shoulders and said I was lucky. They even refused when I offered to pay for the extra Guardsmen (I was going to have to buy them anyway).

I hope they get out of the rut they're in soon. It would be a shame for them to lose customers and confidence after years of good service.

[Hive Carnithrope]

Well that's the thing. I've only heard good things about them, and they seemed to be good, but I can't not have the item, so I'll have to cancel soon if I don't get a reply.

It's a shame, as I first heard about them on here, saying how good they were.

[Psychichobo]

I've heard they do take forever to get things sent to people - Overread's reasons for it make sense. I've ordered from them before and so have a few friends, and they do take a significantly longer than other companies.

[mantisstalker]

I'v ordered from them once and when I did it took a while and some parts where missing but I don't blame them fore that. As for other people I know that have used them, most have had the same experience and I'v never really heard anything good about them apart from being cheap. And since they can no longer ship GW stuff over here any more I started using other companies like Phoenix foge for combat company for my mods now.

[Overread]

Just an update ,but they are also moving to a new (larger) warehouse and it seems that, at present, they are basically clearing their stock. So they are only selling what they have so that they can make their move as cheaply as possible and as quickly as possible. Wayland games also had some problems (not nearly as many though) when they did their warehouse moves and it does seem to be something that messes up these kind of operations. That said Maelstrom has other problems, but hopefully they'll be able to clear their stock - restore their cashflow - move house and get re-established and get their services in order.


edit - having a look at their site they've very very little actually in stock now! Just ran through several lines and everything was out of stock.

[Hive Carnithrope]

Yeah, they had a large stock clearance. Was tempted to buy some Flames of War stuff, but lack of funds, and my apprehensions stopped me.

No reply yet, but I'm gonna keep the order active. In the end, it's only £10, but still. It would be nice to have it.


Thanks for all your help, guys.

[Illithid]

Early last year, I had about $800 worth of nods shipped to Australia (before the GW crackdown on overseas sales). No issues, had everything within 3 weeks even with splitting of the order. Recently bought paints etc, but was turned off after reading the huge thread over on Dakka.

[Hive Carnithrope]

Oct 28, 2012 20:36:19 GMT Illithid said:

Early last year, I had about $800 worth of nods shipped to Australia (before the GW crackdown on overseas sales). No issues, had everything within 3 weeks even with splitting of the order. Recently bought paints etc, but was turned off after reading the huge thread over on Dakka.

What have Dakka been saying? In brief, of course.

[Illithid]

www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/464643.page - full 26 page article. basically speculation that Maelstrom have massive outstanding debt and that they have been blacklisted by certain suppliers.

I take everything with a pinch of salt, but there are some people have quite a bit of patience over there, I would have been screaming for a refund well and truly before they did.

[Overread]

Well if they suffered a cash flow problem and miss-management I can well see that they could indeed end up on a blacklist from some distributors. Hopefully the warehouse move and stock clearance has let them generate some income to clear their debts (or at the very least given them enough to allow them to take out a loan to cover the debts and get back into the game).

[Hive Carnithrope]

UPDATE: *I can necro my own posts, right?*

Maelstrom Games are no more. Apparently, they've been in huge debt for some time, and in an effort to save both Maelstrom and the industry as a whole, Wayland Games payed their debt. Maelstrom couldn't pay them back so have ceased trading.

Their website says that orders in certain lines (Battlefront is included, thankfully) will still be sent (so there's still a chance I'll receive my item), but otherwise, they are gone completely.

Sad news indeed. I just hope this problem does not extend to other companies as Wayland feared. I'm gonna make a large order tomorrow incase anything happens.

More details in their websites:

www.maelstromgames.co.uk/index.php
www.waylandgames.co.uk/downloads/Maelstrom-Action.pdf

[Overread]

Reading the comment left on the Maelstrom site it sounds like a mess - nearly £100,000 in debt, and we must assume more as they were paying £500 a month. Odd move by Wayland though to buy that much debt and then force liquidation after 7 days. Just seems odd as a business choice to buy £100,000 worth of debt and then close any chance of return upon it (that said perhaps Wayland is banking that the sale of assets such as site, remaining stock, etc.... will cover the debt?).

A great shame to lose them as didn't Maelstrom also support some gaming tables as well?


Edit - read the PDF if goes into a bit more detail from one side. Seems that Wayland has moved in to prevent a crash for customers of Maelstrom, which explains the 7day sudden forced demand for the full owed amount from them after purchase.
This is either then preventing a long ongoing problem in the UK games market for customers and suppliers (if we assume that the debt owed was not static was increasing). If they kept up to sales as they were they could have cleared it in 200 days, but one expects that the sales would have reduced if they lost more and more customers, esp since they ran themselves totally out of stock and most likely had problems getting distributors to sign with them.

Wayland stabilizes the market a little and removes competition - one hopes that the large debt they paid for won't crash them in turn (though I would expect to make such a move they must have had some insurance against losing the full amount long or short term).

[Hive Carnithrope]

Wayland are a lot larger company, so I'd expect them to have the money or at least be able to pay it off quickly. They'd be shooting themselves in the foot otherwise.

It's a pity Maelstrom didn't take up their offer when they could. If Maelstrom had become part of Wayland, a lot less people would be out of work.

But heyho. Hopefully, Wayland can make something of this and buy back some of Maelstrom's goods, staff and locations. :/