Dissatisfaction, Complaint, and Unhappy... Any other's with similar stories?

My wife chanced buying the Etaco ER900 translator direct from Etaco for Latin American Spanish as we were destined for South America three weeks following. It arrived three days prior to my opening as a gift. The translator was designed for “Russian”! In the course of trying to correct the problem with Etaco customer service, the seven day return period lapsed. Mr. James Barry, purportedly with Etaco customer service, refused offering a return merchandise authorization albeit the initial cause for concern was the company’s fault. Time went by trying to resolve this problem, ultimately my wife and I departed without the translator. (Russian served no purpose in South America!) Finding remedy for the situation was done via internet whenever able to do so. Almost six weeks to the day of receiving the translator the correct software was received by my son, the translator was forwarded to me.

In terms of quality, the ER900 has a build similar to a $10.00 calculator. It feels cheap and unlikely to hold up to the rigors of travel. The software consists of an “SD” card which later I found to have inadequate content for most of the purposes it was advertised for. (There is no differing between European Spanish and Latin American Spanish.) In addition, the scanning device designed to interpret written Spanish such as a restaurant menu failed to work as described. To further my disappointment, upon enrolling to learn Spanish at the local “Universidad” in Quito, Ecuador, the Spanish teacher, with nothing to gain, confirmed the inadequacies of this translator from a practical point of view!

Essentially the founder of Etaco is selling the “IDEA” of easing through a specified language barrier. Regretfully for my wife and me, our finding is there is no substitute for actually learning a designated language. As to Etaco customer support, customer relations, and service after the sale, my belief is they know this too. With inferior electronics and a litany of protocols one must follow to return their merchandise, they make it most difficult to acquire an “RMA” for return, (impossible within 7- days), consequently by the time you realize this, it is too late… as Mr. Barry stated! The near $500.00 spent on the ER900 and its peripherals was money thrown away. A word of caution is simply "Caveat Emptor" regarding Etaco and its products. If you are still tempted, advice is to purchase through “Amazon.com” to take advantage of “Amazon’s A thru Z” customer satisfaction program. Here to I imagine Etaco customer service and support would find a way around an inevitable request for an "RMA".

Unable to find a way to edit this post, please note it was three weeks, not six weeks as miss-represented.

GeorgeFries wrote:My wife chanced buying the Etaco ER900 translator direct from Etaco for Latin American Spanish as we were destined for South America three weeks following. It arrived three days prior to my opening as a gift. The translator was designed for “Russian”! In the course of trying to correct the problem with Etaco customer service, the seven day return period lapsed. Mr. James Barry, purportedly with Etaco customer service, refused offering a return merchandise authorization albeit the initial cause for concern was the company’s fault. Time went by trying to resolve this problem, ultimately my wife and I departed without the translator. (Russian served no purpose in South America!) Finding remedy for the situation was done via internet whenever able to do so. Almost six weeks to the day of receiving the translator the correct software was received by my son, the translator was forwarded to me.

In terms of quality, the ER900 has a build similar to a $10.00 calculator. It feels cheap and unlikely to hold up to the rigors of travel. The software consists of an “SD” card which later I found to have inadequate content for most of the purposes it was advertised for. (There is no differing between European Spanish and Latin American Spanish.) In addition, the scanning device designed to interpret written Spanish such as a restaurant menu failed to work as described. To further my disappointment, upon enrolling to learn Spanish at the local “Universidad” in Quito, Ecuador, the Spanish teacher, with nothing to gain, confirmed the inadequacies of this translator from a practical point of view!

Essentially the founder of Etaco is selling the “IDEA” of easing through a specified language barrier. Regretfully for my wife and me, our finding is there is no substitute for actually learning a designated language. As to Etaco customer support, customer relations, and service after the sale, my belief is they know this too. With inferior electronics and a litany of protocols one must follow to return their merchandise, they make it most difficult to acquire an “RMA” for return, (impossible within 7- days), consequently by the time you realize this, it is too late… as Mr. Barry stated! The near $500.00 spent on the ER900 and its peripherals was money thrown away. A word of caution is simply "Caveat Emptor" regarding Etaco and its products. If you are still tempted, advice is to purchase through “Amazon.com” to take advantage of “Amazon’s A thru Z” customer satisfaction program. Here to I imagine Etaco customer service and support would find a way around an inevitable request for an "RMA".

Hi,

Thanks for the message and sorry to hear about your difficult experience. Allow me to comment on your message point by point.
-The ER900, by name, is English-Russian. Hence the ER. All product descriptions will indicate the language pair on the device.
-The return policy was agreed upon by the person making the purchase, it is on the website and is in bold on the invoice you have received.
-The Partner 900 is made of hardened plastic and a metal shell. It is the same materials which passed multiple quality tests by the US Military, In fact you can read about the US military and some of their purchases here. http://www.speechguard.com/military.html
-I have used the C-Pen scanner successfully in 4 countries. Can you explain how it 'failed' to work?
-You are paying the Spanish teacher to help you learn aren't you? Isn't she going to dismiss other methods of learning because she wants your business? The fact is the Partner 900 series has helped thousands of people learn a language, we receive feedback, thnak you letters and the like all the time.

The strict return policy is to prevent customers from 'renting' the item. In days past we used to have issues like this all the time. Customers would buy the item, go on vacation and return it when they can back, while it is unfortunate we have to do what we can to protect ourselves as a company.

I am really surprised you disliked the item, the fact is that it is the best self contained device in the world for learning a language or communicating. If you have a suggestion for some self contained hardware device which will work better i would love to hear it. Our company has been in business for 22 years and we have won multiple awards and thousands of professional clients. https://www.ectaco.com/awards/ As i already alluded too, i have used the product in Germany, Mexico, Hong Kong and here in the USA and it has been a continuous help for me.

We would be glad to provide you with a personal phone training lesson on the product in order to help you with using it. Moreover i can offer you a free 13 language SD card for any inconvenience. The SD card costs $190 and you can see it here. https://www.ectaco.com/sd-13mt900/

Hope this helps!

GeorgeFries wrote:(There is no differing between European Spanish and Latin American Spanish.)

Really there is not much difference, you can talk Spanish every where only few words are used differently in each country. Latin American Spanish doesn't exist at all, it is more correct to talk about differences between each country, and then we are talking about few words. The same applies to English... Few differences at all...

Wow! Jerry you are an awesome example of customer service! Hopefully George takes you up on that offer and lets us know an update to his review of your product.