Neptune Apex is a Horrible company

T

ThanhNguyen

Premium Member
If anyone here is deciding on buying an Apex system. Please read my horror story.

Neptune Customer service is the worst experience I've ever had with a company. I bought their Apex system with IO and WXM. From the start. The dates kept jumping to some 2014 date for no reason. Causing my data to not create a graph. So I of course contacted them. After about a Week of talking back n forth. A customer service rep said oh. It's a known issue, send the unit back in. Is it within 30 days? I said no. It's 31 days old now. He said he do me a favor and pay for shipping. Well thanks. It would've been less than 30 days if it didn't take you a Whole Week to figure out a KNOWN issue. Well. I sent it in. Waited 3 weeks, then called them. Where's my unit. You should've fixed it by now. "Oh, we sent you an email. Did you not receive it?" Lies. Because every email afterwards I got. So they said we'll ship out today. They had to replace the board. So why did they have to wait on an email from me, and not just fix it and return it. Also Lies from this company. Well. I get it back. It messes up again. Multiple modules were burnt out. I said. Ok. It's now pissing me off. Oh, I sent it back. $135 to repair because of liquid Damage. I was like. You're kidding, it's under my stand. No water gets there. Maybe a little splash during a water change or when I clean my glass. Ok. So that's my fault I guess. So I pay the $135. It comes home. Doesn't function at All! Email tech. He tells me I programmed it wrong. Uh, hello? I loaded a saved profile. How could it be wrong. So I contacted them again. No luck, the guy gives me some BS. And so I Asked to speak to his supervisor. He said. I'm the lead engineer. There's no one up higher than me. WoW! So. I take it to my buddy, apparently a bad connector or something. He replaces for me. Works good. Then I plug in the Display module. Guess what? It fried it. So I am pretty pissed. Contacted them again. They said some things got fried. Whole board needs to be replaced. $149. Kidding me. A new one didn't even cost that much. So I told them to go **** themselves. I will never ever buy another Neptune product again. And I will tell my friends and Everyone on DFWMAS. The exact same. Horrible, just horrible. If you've already bought one. Good luck, I hope it never craps out on you. I don't anyone else to ever have to experience what I've been through.
 
Oh. I have emails of our whole conversations. If you don't believe me, give me your email address and I'll forward them to you. I laugh at how amazingly bad something can be. Obviously this company knows nothing about the importance of customer service. They act like everyone is stupid. Do yourself a favor. Stay AWAY. This unit is very very cheaply made. It takes very little to ruin it.
 
First of all, do not try to go around our website's profanity filter. I edited that word out of your post; do not put it back.

I"m sorry you had a bad experience. I've not had the same, and have been one of their customers since the first one I got... used with a tank I bought from another person. They actually did flood it and I paid for the replacement board, which fixed it. Later I upgraded to the AC3, and then a few years later to the Apex. I don't know why you had so many problems over and over and over but it definitely sounds like a nightmare.

Hopefully you can find a different controller that you like. There are a few other ones available.
 
Weird
Had problems from me being stupid and they spent hours on the phone helping me on multiple occasions
sorry you had such a bad experience
maybe they have new employees now
 
Yea, definitely seems like a one off experience if anything. I've owned three of them now, a jr, ac3, and now an apex with only minor troubles. The one time it needed a repair it was completely my fault and when I explained what I did, I was told 'thanks for being honest, we will replace it this time'. I covered shipping and had my controller fixed very quickly. Sorry you had problems, but it's not the norm. Kurt has a great company with a really good product.
 
Nope. I'm still using a system. If I spent $800 on this system i'm Going to run it to the grave or find some other sucker here that is willing to buy it from me. Oh, I've read some other people's horror stories with Neptune. I'm not the only one, just never thought it would happen to me. So. Back to the point. Avoid Avoid Avoid This company. When something else comes out I'm definitely going to sell this piece of junk. Until then. I'm just going to use my Broken display with no back light. Yes, it was brand new bought in March. because I was honest with them. told them that it got fried when i connected it to the Main unit that had liquid damage and that was why it got fried. they would not cover it even though the display unit was fine, just lights don't work. I'm sure everyone here has some good experience, and some bad. I'm just telling you, Mine was beyond BAD. And i'm giving a warning to everyone here that is deciding on buying one..... You better hope you didn't buy a bad unit.... These guys are very unprofessional.
 
Might look at ghl profilux as a replacement or if you are technical savvy go with Reef Angel. Sorry about your situation
 
Sorry to hear you had a bad experience with them. It can happen with any company.

My personal experience with them, however, has been great. I had programming questions and would get responses in the evenings and on weekends to me. I also bought a used VDM module that turned out to be bad. I told them what happened and that I had bought it used. I was told to send it in and they would let me know the repair cost. They ended up sending me a new VDM at no charge even though the one I sent in was used and probably out of warranty.

There are other controllers out there if you want to look at something else. Profilux and Reef Angel come to mind.
 
I've had nothing but good experiences with Neptune sys. I fried two of my outlets and had my DC8 back within a week. They even helped me troubleshoot the email when I could not get it working.

I have and continue to recommend the apex to people. That being said it is a fragile piece of electronics and should never come in contact with saltwater or salt spray. From one of your earlier posts you mentioned it may have gotten wet during water changes that would be enough to kill it.

I'm truly sorry you had a bad experience with them.


Mike
 
That's a terrible experience. As someone that works in a customer support role, I cringe when I hear about experiences like that. I've had some problems with my Apex, but Neptune has treated me well the three times I've had to deal with them.

When I first bought my Apex, the housing for the controller was only attached with one screw (out of four). I contacted them and they sent me the additional screws on their dime.

My second issue was when I updated the firmware. There was a bug in that specific release version of the software which basically bricked the controller. I had to send it in so they could reset the firmware. Again, it was on their dime and I got my controller back in just over a week.

My last issue was when my cat chewed through the cord for the display. I emailed them and explained what happened. They said if I sent them my display, they would replace the cord for $35. I paid for shipping to them, they paid for shipping back. I'm pretty satisfied with that outcome.

My controller is three years old, so that's one problem a year. All told, I would still recommend them.
 
There is a known issue with the back light on the controller. Mine went out after a couple years. If you google it, some of them can be fixed with firmware some how. I have one of the early units, so I didn't bother. Since my unit pages me and I have the app on the phone, I don't really care. May want to check your firmware.
 
+1 "sort of". Enough for me to never use a controller again. I dont trust them. I thought I was buying top of the line reliability when it came to the APEX but was wrong. Mine and my neighbor got an APEX at the same time and both our display units got super laggy, displayed bad numbers, and eventually froze up after only about 6 months. I thought no biggy, Ill just use my computer/phone to control it.... well about another 6 months later the base unit malfunctioned/broke which defaulted all of my ports to OFF. So I came home to a dead, oxygen deprived 300 gallon tank. Sent it in, got charged $120 and shipping for them to fix it...paid them the money and 3 weeks later I ask where it is and their response is "oops, sorry sir" and so they sent it. 3 months later, the base unit malfunctioned again to turning all ports to off and the unability to control it from the computer and broken display module......

Sold it, safe to say I am done with aquacontrollers, or at least the APEX. People talk about controllers as being more reliability for your system...but if you think about it, resting all the reliability on one piece of equipment isnt reliable at all IMO. To this day I have never had regular plugs, old timers, or DJ switch boards fail on me, so thats what I will use from now on.
 
I just got excellent service with help getting my phone app back to working correctly after uverse messed it up putting new updated cable in my house, after a few emails I called and the guy took over my computer and got it all working in 5 mins. I had got if figured out real close but was lacking knowledge on the finer area of the firewall.
 
Texas Travis, exactly my point! Their customer service is wretched! See, just in this forum. I'm not the only one. So think about it. You can say all the great things about this company, but they sell a raw product full of bugs and cheaply made. For the premium you pay, you should expect, no, deserve more. I've sent complaints to Neptune,but that's not the only way they will ever improve. Once they get more competition, they'll be forced to provide better service to their customers, and if they don't soon, they might not be around much longer, and frankly, I won't miss them.
 
Ive had to replace three displays and the base unit once in the three years ive had my apex. You would think they would design them better to protect from moisture...most users will have it near water. The display is so fragile im afraid to even touch the thing..lol. they use to have good support when I needed them but that was two years ago and they prob sold 10k more since than and lack tech support. Neptune systems has the market on controllers so you gonna have to deal with there #%/$!!. :)
 
I know Uchin. You would think that hey.... it's made for salt water aquarium.... lets see... salt water... electronics... maybe we should design it to be a little more water resistant... Nah cost too much for that rubber seal....
 
@ThanhNguyen wrote:
I know Uchin. You would think that hey.... it's made for salt water aquarium.... lets see... salt water... electronics... maybe we should design it to be a little more water resistant... Nah cost too much for that rubber seal.... said:
A rubber seal won't seal it from moisture. Unless you create a vacuum you will always have air in the controller

I own a profilux and an apex both are sealed the same way.

If you are worried about moisture mount your controller not inside the stand but on the outside of the stand

Like I stated earlier if you are not happy with apex try reef angel or profilux. I would sell the parts that are working to try to recoup some of the money you spent and buy one of those two

"You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar." I don't know how the conversation went with Neptune Systems but my observation from this thread is you are very aggressive and that can be taken the wrong way. Especially if it is through emails as your conversation can be taken out of context.

If you feel you were sold a piece of junk did you dispute the transaction if you paid by credit card. I know when I had trouble similar to yours but with a TV Amex took care of it when I filed a dispute
Click to expand...
 
Nope. You're probably right Pampee. I may have been aggresive and demanding. But, trust me, the conversation did not start out that way, it only ended that way. Look, put yourself in my shoes. I bought a brand new unit in Feb. from the start i had problems with the Graph function not working. After weeks of research i contacted Neptune.. After Weeks of back and forth and countless hours of my time. it was a "known issue" that the date sometimes jumps to 2014 on a daily basis.. thus making a graph not function properly. So how come it tooke over 3 weeks to figure out something that was "known"? during those three weeks it went out of the 90 day warranty. and they tried to charge me for the repair because it was 1-2 days out of the warranty period. Well, if it didn't take me 3 weeks of talking back and forth with their customer service. it would've still be under warranty.. Then i was told the repair usually takes one day... I waited 3 weeks.. and They didn't send it out UNTIL i called, because they had forgot to fix it, and it just sat there for over 2 weeks. so.. lets see.. sum this up... I spent almost $800 on this thing.. hasn't worked properly since i got it, with no fault of mine, for over 3 months, and then when i sent it in, another 3 weeks of waiting until I called.. Yes, I should've reported it and got me a new unit, but i figured i opened it and used it, that it'd be wrong to claim something like that. Oh and looking back on some of the emails. It was because i got different technicians each time. because they kept closing the case everytime they ask me to do something new. thinking it fixed it.
 
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