FireGear SA - **** - No Delivery!

Cobus Oosthuizen, who goes by the name of Koos, sent us a quote for a fuel trailer for which we paid a deposit of R18,630 on 29/03/2019 with a promised delivery date of 02/04/2019.

The first excuse for a no-show was that there was a roadworthy issue and that the trailer had incorrectly been registered as a flat-bed trailer and had to be re-registered as a fuel trailer. A week passed with the same excuse each time he was contacted. Apparently the Roadworthy Center was offline etc.

When given an ultimatum to resolve the roadworthy issue or refund our deposit, Koos soon after confirmed that the roadworthy issues had been resolved and that we could expect a delivery the following day.

Of course, that did not happen. He informed us that the tow vehicle had broken down in Colesberg and that he was personally on his way to remedy the issue. We gave him time to sort that out and called the following Monday, only to be told by Koos that the fuel trailer was now in Cape Town and that for some or other reason, he was trying to find a way to get it to us in Knysna (one wonders what happened to the vehicle that towed the trailer to Cape Town).

On 12/04/2019, Koos emailed to inform us that the courier company Time Freight would be towing the trailer from Cape Town to us and that we could expect the delivery by 1pm that day. Of course, this didn’t materialize.

We attempted to contact Koos on Monday 15/04/2019 and received no reply. On Tuesday 16/04/2019 at 11h42 Koos messaged us to say, “… trailer was collected at film studio cape town by time freight 1 Hour ago straight to Knysna should be by u 3:30pm Regards Koos”.

As expected, no trailer arrived and Koos messaged us the following day to say that it would be delivered then and that he would forward the tracking number (never received). We called the local Time Freight office in George and we were hardly surprised to hear that there was no trailer destined for us, they know nothing of the sort.

Having had enough of one excuse after the next with no realistic prospect of a delivery (as confirmed by Time Freight), we messaged Koos on Thursday 18/04/2019 demanding our deposit back, stipulating our bank details and the amount. Koos acknowledged receipt and rep**** as follows, “… will do just finishing up in meeting”. At 15h48 on that same day (18/04/2019), Koos sent us a message saying “Busy doing payment now”. We rep**** seeking a proof of payment.

He subsequently stopped replying in writing but was happy to talk on the phone. He promised that the refund payment had been done. Apparently there was no proof of payment received when he made the payment, but his Absa Private Banker had confirmed to him that the payment had been processed and that we should already have the money.

Fast forward to Wednesday 24/04/2019 (3 weeks after the deposit payment & promised delivery date) and we have as yet not received a proof of payment or any funds into our bank account, despite all the assurances from Koos.

Who knows what happened to the supposed trailer in Cape Town, which we would still be happy to accept and pay him the balance.

Simply put, it would appear that we have been ****med by Mr Cobus “Koos” Oosthuizen to the sum of R18,630 – which we expect to be refunded to us.