Brad H.

After I recently purchased a Powermatic benchtop mortiser, I went to the Powermatic company website looking for the riser block I had read about in various woodworking forums. I had looked at many of the "usual places" and not found it, in keeping with the experience many others had reported.

I was surprised to see that I couldn't purchase the accessory directly from the manufacturer's site, but instead was encouraged to purchase from one of two listed "recommended" vendors. I selected ToolOrbit and made the purchase.

A couple of weeks after I received the order confirmation email I had still not heard from them (ToolOrbit) about shipping the part, so I contacted them, initially by email. I received a generic form letter which did not tell me anything about the status of my item, so I then telephoned the company.

I was told that the item was back-ordered and would not ship for approximately 2-3 *more* weeks, making it a 4-5 week delivery from the purchase date. Now, I was not in a huge hurry for the part and I would probably have been okay with waiting that long to receive it... if I had known when I ordered it, or had at least been told that after ordering it - without me having to wait, and then pry it out of them. I wasn't terribly happy with their service, and since I purchased a premium tool (Powermatic), I decided I should let them know about the performance of one of their recommended vendors. I then called Powermatic's customer service.

I spoke with a very helpful woman who took my information and said she'd look into it for me. A few hours went by and at about 5 pm that (Friday) evening, I received an email from the manager of the parent company of ToolOrbit (Eric House, GM of Toolmart), who explained what had happened and said they would waive all charges for this order and I would receive the part free of charge, due to their internal problems. He also said the part would be shipped "late next week" - and it was in fact 3 1/2 weeks later that I received it. And I was charged for the part - but not for the shipping.

All in all, I did receive the part, and they do indeed have good prices, but I can't recommend them very highly, due to their poor communications, both with the customer, and apparently internally as well.