Don’t buy a Drone from Sam Joubert

!!IMPORTANT NOTICE!! - KNOW THIS WHEN DEALING WITH SAM JOUBERT

At Dronegear our values are are driven by honesty, integrity and always putting our customer first. As a store with 7years of history in DJI products we absolutely MUST stick to these values and never forfeit quality and service excellence. We, as so many other businesses, do drop the ball from time to time but our motto is learn from mistakes and try perfect our approach to leave minimal room for errors.

The problem with these values are that we hold our independent traders around the country to these same standards. This might be a big ask, but we as physical store offer nothing but the best in new and used machines to our customers. We approach the industry from a different angle. We believe when you buy, sell or repair your unit you MUST be protected and MUST be safe in all aspects of those transactions. Therefore we have created these platforms to ensure your safety and protection.

www.dronegear.co.za - A Safe and secure platform to buy new or used drones and accessories.

www.sellyourdrones.co.za - A Safe and secure platform for you to sell your drone to us.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/povhddro*****up - A Facebook page created for buying, selling & swopping drones and accessories. Be cautious though as this opens up buyers and sellers to communicate directly and still leaves the chance for ***** etc. Contact us to assist with deals, we are here to help YOU.

Gumtree, Facebook and other methods are really good as long as you trade safely.

With all this above we felt it to be necessary to share our experience with our followers and loyal customer base. Especially during this pandemic we all work very hard for our income and spending money on drones etc MUST leave you safe and looked after. It is wit tis in mind that we share our experience with you.

Sam Joubert is an independent dealer working alone and does not have any affiliation with any store or brand in SA. We often support him by buying used machines when our customers are needing specific machines within a specific time and budget in mind. We LOVE supporting our community within the drone industry and so we bought a Mavic Pro 2 machine from Sam for one of our clients. +- R20k The machine arrived and was sold to our client and all seemed in order. The next day our client returned and said the machine fell our of the sky without crashing or any explanation. Our flight log inspection confirmed this to be true and the client even recorder the incident showing this bizarre incident. We apologised to our client and started communicating with Sam. Sam was not going to entertain any assistance and we then started a repair process on this machine. We found, once opened, that the machine was repaired SO BADLY that the cables soldered inside was all melted and touching each other caution an electrical fault and machine shut down in flight. I sent these images to Sam and asked why I was sold a badly repaired machine, after MUCH back and forth Sam indicated its not his problem and although we did buy from him he was not going to contribute towards the repaired and blamed the client for not securing the battery in place. I sent the images clearly showing the electrical damage but Sam brushed these aside stating we should check machines we buy from him. I asked if this included opening machines up for inspection and he laughed saying don’t be silly? The matter was put to bed and I spent R6,000 repairing the machine out of my pocket and it was tested and delivered to a happy client that will be one for life.

Sadly we didn’t learn our lesson and again supported Sam in good faith by buying another machine a Phantom 4 Pro R17k after a client needed a machine urgently for work related matters. The Machine arrived in shop and I took Sam’s advice and inspected the machine carefully upon arrival. I noticed when starting it up that the compass showed an error as compass 1 was not connected. Meaning its a hardware issue and physically not connected. I also noticed that one of the antenna cables could be seen through the front of the machines vision sensor. This was not normal. Further inspection showed that the roll arm on the gimbal was a different colour to the rest of the camera. This showed that it was replaced.

These are all fairly small matters to resolve but showed the machine had work done in a way that didn’t satisfy our payment value and didn’t meet our standard of repairs. We contacted Sam and explained the matter. Sam refused to entertain the conversation and stated that he disclosed to us the machine had been worked on. Going back on our messages showed none of this. There was mention of a ribbon replacement on the machines camera. (Again small repair and acceptable.) We couldn’t sell a machine like this in our store and asked Sam to assist by rather taking it back and crediting us accordingly. Sam Refused and said our courier had damaged the machine. I entertained this theory and agreed to send the machine to Sam and explained that im putting his integrity to the test with this return. Once the machine was delivered to Sam I received a WhatsApp stating he will not be opening the machine from our packaging and will return it just like this to us stating he thinks we sending him a different machine and how can he be sure this is even the right machine. We went on to explain that Sam would see the flight logs on his own machine and could easily identify the machine as all our machines bought, sold and repaired are logged in carefully in a serial no fashion. He refused and packed the machine and returned it to us with candid videos of him filming the Courrier collecting the machine.

Lessons: Although there are many many independent agents selling around the country from their homes, they are NOT ALL BAD. We work with many of these agents and they always honour their word in situations that are good or bad. Our advise to you is this. DO NOT SUPPORT any business or agent that you don’t know personally and can’t see reviews online. Ask before you support someone. DO NOT LET YOUR HARD EARNED MONEY GO TO ANYONE YOU CANT TRUST. Twice now, we have been burnt and we have given Sam plenty of opportunity to rectify these matters. Be very very careful.

Anyone wishing to obtain further information regarding how to safeguard yourself contact us on Cell: *** or Email: ***