Buying Equipment from KEH

[MattKing]

I took advantage of their recent Free Shipping promotion.

Best time to buy something like monopod (saved $56.00 shipping to Washington State).

[rthomas]

My latest experiences with KEH were both outstanding. I love their website but I have found that calling them is a good idea. I spoke to Mike at some length about the differences in several monorail 4x5 cameras, and he answered my questions, as did Josh when I actually ordered the camera. My new-to-me Cambo SCX, BGN grade for $159, is beautiful. The ground glass is clean, the bellows are fine, and everything works as it should. The BGN grade apparently applies only because the front standard focus knob is slightly crooked (no big deal). After receiving the camera, I discovered (the hard way!) that my Bogen 3221 with 804 head was not up to the task of holding this camera. So I called back and got more advice from Mike and ordered a Bogen 3036 with the 3047 head, again in BGN grade, for $149. BGN grade really is what it says - the gear works, it's just got some experience.

[reggie]

I recently bought a fair amount of stuff from them, mostly Pentax 6x7 gear. Last Sunday night, I ordered a Beattie Intenscreen and a Quick Focus Ring. I was especially excited about the Beattie screen. Well, I placed the order on their web site and paid for it via PayPal right then. On Tuesday, I got an email from them saying that they had gotten Sundays order, but that it was blank. The item detail information wasn't on the order in their system. By the time we'd figured everything out, they had sold the Beattie screen to someone else!! Since they are hard to find, I was pretty disappointed. I recalled that the other item on the non-order was a Quick Focus Ring, which they still had in stock. I told them to go ahead and send that to me and I asked for free shipping and a refund of the balance. They were willing to comp the shipping fees. But, they never apologized or did anything to help me get a replacement for that Beattie screen or even to offer to notify me if they get another one in.

I'm sure they are overall good to do business with. But, I missed out on a hard to find item because of their system and they weren't too helpful about offering to fix the situation.

I dealt with with Tim.

-R