We became a customer of Elite about a year ago as we searched for a new anodizing and electroless nickel vendor for our products. We do higher volume, not super precise parts. Initially Elite was eager to earn my business because of the steady, weekly anodizing and nickel plating they'd get with me. They agreed to maintain the prices I had with my previous vendor. They told me that anodizing would get done fast... within a few days. Plating would take a bit longer. Great!
Well, we just has issues from the get go, and we tried to get things to work for about seven months. Finding a new vendor is sometimes harder than fixing your current one so we tried.
But we'd end up with weeks of delays, them running the wrong colors on parts, them losing our parts, etc. etc. etc.
Worst, we'd send them parts to process with a formal PO every single time. They'd process our parts alright, but then send us a bill that was way, way higher than what we had on our purchase order!!! What business does this?
Their explanation was that they cannot possible review the parts as they come in and know what it will cost to process. Only after they process do they have someone who figures out what they think the price should be. Huh, what happened to meeting the prices I had set with a previous vendor? Huh, what happened to getting a call BEFORE they are processed so we, the customer, can decide whether or not we agree to the significant cost increases.
So things had gone really south with Elite at this point. We took our business elsewhere. Months later they are still on us about paying the exorbitant fees when we told them months ago that we would only pay what was on our PO. Their owner agreed to that months ago.
Today we got another mean e-mail from them. I called the owner, Joe, who rudely gave me the "well, we have no future ~ you are no longer a customer" and literally hung up on me. Huh, go figure. Fine.
But then we get an e-mail from their accounting department with the credit memo (thank you, that is appreciated) but the end of the e-mail closes with "Have a nice life."
How petty. I see there are other very positive reviews of Elite, but all of them are quite old. This company is under new management and, I guess, a lot has changed.
If you are SpaceX (Elite's biggest customer), then I guess you get good service. Otherwise, watch out with Elite. read more
