Well, the mail person dropped off Michael?s strap, to my surprise. When things go right, integrity is not a factor that needs to be addressed, usually. It is when things go wrong that you find out what level of integrity individuals possess. Michael showed a definite lack of integrity by accepting no responsibility for any of his questionable actions, lying to me, patronizing me to placate me, and in the end sending me the most poorly made strap I have seen, out side of a children?s Sunday school crafts class. Plus, he used the Alembic stamp without authorization and kept the second payment of fees. Right from the start, Allison accepted all responsibilities in this matter and told me she would remake the strap for me at no charge. The strap was bought from Moody, she is Moody the company, and she was instantly ready to back it all up. I told her to go ahead and made the strap and I would handle getting a refund from Michael, as best I could. I sent Allison pictures of the strap and she is to estimate its value and I will pay her that amount. I do not want something for nothing, or to come out ahead on anything. I just want what I paid for and what is fair. I never use credit cards, so no route for recovery there. I closed all my PayPal accounts, as eBay owns PayPal and I find both places no help at all when anything goes wrong. PayPal will be little help in the recovery of funds here. They charge a deductible of $25 per transaction, and there were three transactions. By sending me any piece of leather, he has stalled an already ?make it as hard to collect? system into an almost impossible to work system for getting back anything at all. Time is money, and I have wasted a couple of hundred dollars in time on this already. What Allison says the strap he made me is worth, I will pay her. For the money he just kept, I have paid for the right to call him a thief in public, as it is the truth. Allison will need to have her lawyer collect. But that is getting into her business, and Michael's unauthorized use of the Alembic stamps are Alembic's business now. The one thing he did right on this strap was the pressing of the Alembic logo on the tobacco colored side. It looks great! If you are thinking about ordering a suede strap from Allison with an Alembic logo stamped into it, it looks great on the tobacco, but not so good on the curry colored suede - which seems very inferior in quality to begin with. Did I get a strap made from the scraps drawer? Hey Kevin. Not paying attention to what customers order seems to be a trademark of Michael. I do not like squared corners on the ends of straps, so I specifically ordered rounded ?U? shaped ones. I got square corners. I specifically stated not to make a cut up the strap button hole, but to just make the holes the same size as the Schaller Strap Locks he sells fits. He cut the holes too small and cut a slit up the center. I specifically asked he use tobacco colored thread, so he used curry colored thread. The strap was to be reversible, with an Alembic logo stamped into one side, then the strap turn over and a logo stamped at the opposite end, at the same height. I specifically asked him if he understood what I wanted on this. He flipped the strap over and stamped the second logo at the same end of the strap. This is actually a simple strap order. No rocket science here, just someone who got the money and then just did what they do on all other straps made. He even got the length wrong by a whole inch. If you got awesome quality in your straps, Kevin, I am thinking Michael took the order, but they were made by Allison. I compare the quality of what I received to be as low or lower than the quality he instills in his One-Strap company's products. At $39, no one is going to get ripped to badly there. This is where Michael belongs, not in the high-end strap making market. That is Allison's forte. This is what I paid $293 for: Note: I apologize for the poor quality this camera does on close-ups.
Hard to see, but that is a glitch on the side of the strap where the edge was crushed up and will not go back down.
There is an awful center join of pieces with crooked sticking on both sides, crooked stictching down the side of the strap, and another side glitch where the edge was crushed and ruined.
This edge was sloppily cut and stitched. It looks much worse in person. All these look worse in person. Poor camera, sorry.
The suede on this end is filth, cut exactly as I told him not to do, and the stitching very poorly done. This also shows the too small of button hole with the slit up them. The grime on the suede will have to be cleaned by a pro, as it does not brush out.
Sorry, yet another poor shot. This strap is supposed to be reversible, but the workmanship on this side it totally unacceptable. Ugly crooked stitching across a poor glued join, with glue that oozed out of the seam and into the suede. A very large and noticible lump that lies right across the top ridge of my shoulder for some added uncomfort. This is not a $39 One-Strap. This was a couple of hundred dollar custom strap. Would I show this strap to anyone and let them know how much was paid for it? Too many people already belive me an idiot. I don't need excessive examples hanging around to provide the needed support on their assumptions to elicit a proof of such. For the money paid to this person of little talent, this is simply not acceptable quality for even a standard $79 strap. I will do one more posting to this thread when I get the proper strap from Allison. I sent her full-sized pictures of this strap and she was shocked. I am not running a personal grudge against Michael here. There is no forward movent in such matters. I feel he burned me good and stole from me. Best to learn from mistakes and move on. Therefore, this is all a warning to other to be aware of all this before you do business with him and possibly get burned, too. Hopefully on the last post, I will have my proper strap and it will be great, Allison is paid and kicking out lots of strap orders, and Michael just fades away, handyman, con artist, and thief that he is (I paid for that right!). Perfect! Note: This strap was taken out of the box it came in for pictures. It was not bent, twisted or any physical action, except to unroll it for picture taking. (Message edited by poor_nigel on October 20, 2004)
