Bad review of CoffeeSource in Prague


1. Stressful payment experience

I ordered a Mazzer Major grinder and La Marzocco Linea Mini for a total of 146,000 CZK from CoffeeSource in Prague. Their online order form asked me to pay to a certain bank account, which I did but then an emailed proforma invoice requested payment to a different account, so I crossed my fingers and hoped that first account was still under their control, which after some emailing with CoffeeSource, fortunately turned out to be the case.

2. Shipment delayed to save money for CoffeeSource

Shipping was free, but CoffeeSource delayed shipping the order for a full week because they apparently intended to save their substantial cost of shipping for the very heavy shipment by having one of their employees bring it to us, passing by on a trip. This employee, named Tomas, called me to make an appointment for this and kept calling me, and kept delaying "no space in the car after all" and "I got sick so I can't come after all". Some of his calls came when I was asleep. A lot of hassle and delays and ultimately no money was saved by them, while we got the machine a week delayed.

3. CoffeeSource's "experts" will not help prevent a wrong purchase

I spoke to Tomas in (2) several times, and he told me he could explain me how to use the equipment, which he would personally deliver. So Tomas claimed to be an expert with coffee grinders and espresso makers in general and likely that equipment in particular, since his employer sells it. But Tomas never told me that the grinder I had purchased was not designed to work with the coffee maker I had bought alongside of it. The Mazzer Major has a bag holder that gets in the way of a portafilter, because it's designed for drogerias, for people to fill up bags of coffee. The Mazzer Major has no portafilter holder and has a very high spout but more of a serious impediment is the large diameter of the spout, spraying coffee over, and past the edges of the portafilter, no matter how careful you aim. I ended up hammering the pin that holds that bag holder in place out and still have serious problems using the device and have to improvise with a cup underneath the spout and then spoon the coffee from the cup into the portafilter.


4. CoffeeSource sells defective equipment

Both machines malfunctioned and damaged as soon as I turned them on. The Mazzer Major's motor capacitor literally exploded with a loud bang, seconds after turning it on, as it was grinding coffee. The Linea Mini's water pump was unable to prime itself and made a loud whining noise for six minutes every time I turned on the machine, which I did many times, not understanding whether that noise was normal. Water pumps damage very quickly when "pumping air", since they are designed to be cooled/lubricated by the water. The noise I heard was the ballbearings and mounting assembly overheating and vibrating from the enormous friction and vibrations. The pump operated "pumping air" for almost an hour. When you realize that under average operating conditions it pumps water for about ten seconds a day and that pumping air is about a 100 times as wearing on the pump as pumping water, the pump incurred a wear-and-tear equivalent of (60 mins * 60 secs * 100 times) / 10 secs of water pumping/day = nearly 100 years of ordinary pump life. Meaning it can break any day now.

5. CoffeeSource's service techs lack tools and spare parts

CoffeeSource sent a service tech over, named Petr. He correctly guessed the capacitor had gone up in smoke, but he was unable to verify this because he lacked the tool to unscrew the star-shaped bolt in the base of the machine. I did have that bit and we saw a large capacitor, blown into two pieces. Petr, in spite of the heavy tool bag on wheels he had with him and a car full of other stuff "Especially brought for you, to replace your faulty machines", neither had a replacement capacitor. I assume he did not bring it because he had arrogantly assumed it was user error. I base my assumption on the fact that he had sent me an email with the advice to remove any stuck beans from the burrs. I also noticed that they do seem to have those caps in stock, since they later sent me one at short notice, but that's another story - those caps are a fire hazard and should NOT be used at all!

6. CoffeeSource ignored my expert opinion on the worn-out pump

I had asked for a replacement machine or at least a pump replacement, but Petr told me in an email: "Don't worry, the pump worked fine when I left". I happen to be educated both as an electrical as well as an electronic engineer and my profession is designing, prototyping, testing and building medical equipment and irrigation equipment containing pumps and valves. Even though I told him all that and explain exactly the technical reason why I knew the water pump in the Linea Mini was about to die any moment now due to the prolonged priming failure, he was not willing to fix that issue when he was here.

7. CoffeeSource insists on replacing faulty components with the same dangerous components

Foil capacitors do not age in storage and also should never be able to explode, since they contain no liquid electrolyte that can evaporate. The fact that such a component literally explodes as soon at it is used, is a strong indication that it has fundamental flaws by design, as especially Chinese-made capacitors of questionable origin have often shown to suffer from. The Mazzer Major's design makes it a significant fire hazard, when that capacitor explodes. The motor directly above it has hollow channels, sucking and channeling any flames right into the compartment with the powdered coffee, which has an enormous internal surface/combustion area as well as flammable oils. So we told CoffeeSource were did not want that capacitor to be replaced with the same type, but instead gave them the link to a more reliable replacement. They did not want to spend the extra 7 dollars, since it would "void the warranty".
 

8. There was no invoice enclosed and CoffeeSource broke their promise to send me one

For this expensive purchase (CZK 146,000), I expected an invoice to be enclosed so that I could prove I had paid for it, later, when I would need (more...) service for the system.  CoffeeSource promised to send me the invoice, but they never did.

After a lot of explaining my position and eventually threatening a bad review if the pump and capacitor would not be fixed, CoffeeSource ultimately offered a refund for both machines, if I'd send them back. The problem is, the coffee maker is too heavy to carry for one person and besides, I had already discarded the very bulky packaging material. There was no realistic way for me to economically ship these things back at my expense. So I still have a grinder with a capacitor that can blow up any time and a coffee machine with a pump that can stop working any moment.



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