“Buying from sweetwater was a terrible. Bought a Squier classic vibe 70s Stratocaster a while back for my daughter. Had a bad neck sent it back. Sweetwater took it back no questions asked. Full refund was send back to my credit card no problems. Was told buy a sales engineer. When the they come back in stock he would call me so I could get one. Months went buy. Called on a Monday to see if they had any more. Talked to my sales engineer Jeff. He said he thinks there was one left. This guitar has been discountinued by Squier. He found one sent it out. I got it in about four days. I watched the tracking of the guitar. I seen at one point the lable got destroyed and fedex had to put a new lable on. Guitar was delivered bottom of the box was opened. Opened the guitar was damaged scratched. Pickgaurd screws no screwed down all the way some were in sideways sticking up. Frets had a gritty feeling to them. I called back to tell Sweetwater about the problems. Got a younger man on the phone. And he basically told me that it was a 300.00 dollar guitar what do u expect. And he bragged about paying for the guitar the have it pleked. That’s where there put in this machine and the neck gets read by a computer and levels any high frets. Buffs and polishes them. I told him I wasn’t going to spend the money on that. He went on and on about there 55 point inspection and customer service. That’s what sets them apart from guitar center musicians friend Sam ash etc. I’m completely besides myself with this company. Will never order anything again from them. They don’t care about you. I sent the guitar back for a full refund. Will do buisness at guitar center of musicians friends. Was going to buy a 2k Gibson les paul from them. Not now. After 2 guitars that were basically junk according to them. Stay away buy else where.”
“I have never had such a horrible experience with a business like Sweetwater. Months ago I tried to make some purchases with their installment plans, but my credit score was not good enough, and the orders were cancelled. So I asked a family member recently if they would help me out and they obliged. I made a new order with a shared credit card with my family member (installment plans since their credit is great), and a second order on a Sweetwater credit card that was offered to us during browsing the Sweetwater site via Synchrony Bank (my family member has Synchrony bank cards elsewhere too).
WELL, apparently Sweetwater does NOT want our business or money, because ALL orders were cancelled and the account was blacklisted as "fraud"... SIMPLY BECAUSE OF DIFFERENT ADDRESSES ON FILE / NAMES OF PEOPLE (again, FAMILY members).
E-mails with the original sales representative went ignored or just told "try again" (to order), and even after my family member sent in multiple forms of identification like drivers license and the full credit card info, they still hem and haw about selling. Just absolutely ridiculous. ARE YOU GUYS IN BUSINESS TO MAKE MONEY, OR TO BE CREDIT GATEKEEPERS? The second sales rep we spoke to even was almost ready to deny us business, and their manager wanted a WIRE TRANSFER to pay for everything. EXCUSE ME? Credit cards and YOUR OWN COMPANY'S CREDIT CARD WAS OFFERED TO US to buy from you.
On the other hand, my family member has helped me purchase from Zzounds issue free, AND super fast shipping from them too. It sucks because Sweetwater is the only place we have a credit card with AND the products I am after (modular).
Now they want SYNCHRONY BANK to verify my family member's identity over the phone? Or something, in order to even complete any orders with them. Just absolutely ridiculous. DO NOT try to buy from Sweetwater on credit or with their credit card offers, if your credit score is less than perfect they will cancel your order and never speak to you again if you try to have anyone else help you and gift you purchases from them. Apparently they don't understand that PEOPLE (family) LIVE TOGETHER.”
“Let Me start out by saying Sweetwater has great Prices and great Gear. The problem is not the Merchandise but the fact that the Customer Service Agents are Useless and liars. I had 2 People aka Reps tell Me My Order was modified before it shipped out and My order total would be adjusted. That however is not true because the Items I ordered by mistake for a Friend were not removed from the Package before shipping out and so therefore the order total was not adjusted. My Friend mistakenly gave Me an outdated list of Drum gear and not the updated one and the 2nd after I placed the order I had realized My Friend already had 3 of the Items I had ordered. I tried reaching out by phone and Email etc and got no help just a bunch of useless incompetent waste of my time Reps that just lie to You about modifying a dang order. I will never order from that awful Company again.”
“My Husband is a musician he really wanted this headphone amp. He wanted it so he can practice around me safely due too my type epilepsy the bass can trigger seizures. I ordered the 26th my order was shipped the 29th. The site said I would receive my item in 3 days from.shipping. Day 10!! No amp!!! They used USPS to save money on shipping which btw is way less than what I was charged for shipping. I have emailed Alan twice as in the past he has helped my husband. Sadly he has ignored my emails and offered me no hey we are sorry or anything. My advice check Guitar Centar I ordered from them and they shipped it from California and I had my item in 3 days via FedEx.”
“Took over a week to receive my packages and then it was the wrong guitar, and then after emailing them two people back and forth several times blamed me and said that’s what I ordered but it is not because I hate black why tf would I put that in my cart...and furthermore never once took accountability for very slow shipping and instead insisting they have other methods if you pay a nice extra enormous shipping cost on top of an order that was nearly 1300 dollars, this was complete non sense and Sweetwater is definitely not the company these reviews rave about”
“WORST EXPERIENCE EVER..... WILL NEVER RECOMMEND TO ANYONE. LACK OF COMMUNICATION on Sweetwater part. They cancelled and rerouted some music equipment back to themselves before it even reached my city limits. And they still haven't returned my money! Crappy business!”
“This was the WORST experience I have ever been thru and will NEVER RECOMMEND this store to anyone!
The equipment was cancelled by Sweetwater and returned back to Sweetwater before it even reached my city and I still don't have my $$$$!!!”
“I was given a gift card from Sweetwater which I used to purchase a guitar tuner and some strings for my acoustic guitar. It wasn’t a huge purchase and certainly was not urgent, so I fully understand not getting it for weeks at this time. The order was out right cancelled within 24 hours with no refund to the card and no explanation other than we’re not shipping orders. Since it was not an exceptional order or urgent matter I’m sure the arrangements could’ve been made for shipping after the pandemic however that option was never made available. Been almost a week and I can’t get anyone on the phone, no email replies from my “ personalized customer rep”, And worst of all not even money put back on the card or any financial retribution for the transaction. Cancel the order, keep the money that somebody paid in good faith, and then shut the door. I don’t find that great service.”
