Arlington, TX
I’ve been collecting pinball games for a good number of years but have only bought used machines from individuals in the past. But when Stern announced the Rush pinball games back in January, I knew it was a dream theme I had to have and could now afford, having enjoyed a period of business success in recent years. Having also read the rave reviews for Godzilla, I decided I would buy both a Rush Premium AND a Godzilla Pro. My dinosaur-loving five-year-old grandson was walking on air after I told him we were getting a Godzilla pinball machine, and we started counting down the weeks until our first new-in-box pinball purchase experience(s).
I checked into some out-of-state dealers who offered free shipping and white glove delivery, but not knowing much about those dealers, I decided to look closer to home.
Enter Fun! Billiards & Gameroom Superstore just across the DFW Metroplex from me in Mesquite, Texas. I drove over to Fun! and talked to owner Craig Hassell about purchasing the two NIB machines, pointing out that some dealers were offering free shipping to my door. I asked if he would offer free delivery. “No,” he replied, “we charge a $150.00 delivery fee per game.” He went on to point out the benefit of buying locally: if there were problems with the machines after delivery, he would send someone out to do any needed repairs/adjustments as part of his 30-day warranty. That seemed reasonable to me. Knowing the ETA on Rush Premium would be early March and the ETA on the Godzilla Pro would be early April, I asked if he would be willing to deliver both machines for a single $150.00 delivery fee, and he agreed to do that (note that there was never any assumption both games would be delivered at the same time). I put down deposits for both machines and walked out with a bill of sale.
The problems started as soon as my Rush Premium shipped out from Stern on March 3rd. Craig texted me to say that he expected the game in by mid-week the following week but added that “your Godzilla hasn’t arrived yet, and since it’s two deliveries, another $150 delivery fee will apply.” I pointed out to him that on the day I put down my deposits we had discussed that the games would be delivered on two different dates, and that he had agreed on a single $150 delivery fee for both deliveries (which is documented on my bill of sale).
Now by this point in my dealings with Craig, I had started getting a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach about him… arrogant and dismissive, he just put off a “these pesky customers” kind of vibe, at least toward me. I started searching Pinside and the all-but-defunct rec.games.pinball forums for any past history of Fun! Billiards & Gameroom Superstore and its owners, including Craig Hassell. My search led to the discovery that the previous owners, Steve Nordseth and Gideon Graves, seem to have firmly established Fun! as one of the most dishonest, disreputable pinball dealerships in the United States. Especially disconcerting was a “buyer beware” Pinside thread from four years ago in which, under Craig Hassell’s management, Fun! was refusing to both (a). deliver an expensive LE pinball game a customer had paid for in full, and (b). refund the customer’s money. In that thread, Hassell got caught in a number of careless, blatant lies regarding the customer’s refund that he was holding back, and it was soon unanimous among forum participants that Hassell was in the wrong, with even some of his buddies calling him out… yet he kept vacillating between admitting he was at fault and then flying off the handle and spewing insults, making himself look worse with every comment he made. After reading that thread in its entirety, I was pretty certain I was in for a rough ride with my first NIB pinball purchase experience with Fun!.
I decided that rather than wait on Fun! to deliver the Rush Premium, I preferred to drive over to the store and pick it up myself. I texted Craig and politely asked him to let me know when the game arrived and that I would like to pick it up. He immediately called and said he couldn’t allow me to do that. “We have to unbox the game, set it up, and check it out prior to letting it leave the store,” he said. I explained my understanding that I was purchasing new-in-box games and that I preferred to unbox them at home, but he wouldn’t budge. I had no choice but to go along with his “policy” and await delivery of my non-NIB game.
Upon their request, I paid Fun! the full balance owed on the Rush Premium on March 8th, and it was delivered on March 11th. During the first couple of games I played, I noticed that the LED under the action (lockdown) button was not lighting, and one of the playfield pop bumper rings was jamming in the down position when struck by the ball. Apparently, these issues were not discovered when Fun! had set up the machine to “check it out”.
I texted Craig about the issues asked if someone could look into them at the time of my upcoming Godzilla Pro delivery. “Sure,” he replied, “but check to make sure the LED board is plugged in.” I texted him back that it was plugged in, but received no reply, and that feeling in the pit of my stomach came back.
On April 4th, a Fun! employee called to collect the remaining balance for my Godzilla Pro, which I paid in full over the phone, and we scheduled delivery for April 14th.
On April 7th I again texted Craig about the problems with my Rush Premium and politely asked if he could send a replacement LED board when they delivered my Godzilla Pro. This time, his answer was a flat “no, we don’t have the part and my delivery guys are not techs, call Stern, they’ll probably send you the part and walk you through the repair.” Becoming angry at this point, and preferring not to attempt a repair that could potentially void the factory warranty on my game, I asked if he was really going to blow off his supposed 30-day store warranty that easily. I mean, he could have said “try to work it out with Stern; if that doesn’t work, we’ll come out and fix it when we get the part in,” but just flat “no, we don’t have the part, call Stern, you’re on your own” didn’t seem reasonable to me (just try getting a human being on the phone at Stern – ain’t gonna happen).
By this point, having my Godzilla Pro paid in full and receiving a very dismissive string of “no… no… no…” from Craig on what I felt were perfectly reasonable customer expectations, I texted him to express my disappointment and ask if I could just come pick the game up at his store. “I’m sorry you are disappointed,” he replied, “you can pick up tomorrow.”
I texted back and asked, “Will you keep the original box and packing so I can use it to protect the game during transit in a U-Haul trailer?” Well, that question, which I thought was perfectly reasonable, didn’t go over well with Craig…
Now, I have to pause for a moment and ask: why is Craig Hassell and Fun! so hesitant to sell unopened, NIB games? That just seems “off” to me. For most pinball owners, unboxing their first NIB machine is a rite-of-passage. Youtube has plenty of pinball unboxing videos, including old guys like me sharing the experience with their grandsons (like I was looking forward to doing). Reluctantly, I went along with Craig’s policy that they needed to “check out the game” before delivering it, even though they had “checked out” my Rush Premium, yet failed to find the two glaring problems with the game prior to delivering it to me. So, again, something seems weird about this policy. It doesn’t make sense that they would unbox, set up, and “check out” a machine, only to then deliver it with obvious issues.
I next received a text from Craig saying he would not be offering any warranty on the Godzilla Pro since I was picking it up at his store. That was fine, I replied (since he had refused to honor his warranty on my Rush Premium anyway). I also added that I would review accordingly, and his response was, since “you refuse to even work with me, I CAN JUST SELL IT TO SOMEONE ELSE.”
Now, my mention of “reviewing accordingly” obviously hit a nerve with Craig. In the ensuing exchange of texts, he accused me of “threatening” him. Only someone who knows they’re not doing business on the up-and-up would consider the potential of an honest customer review to be a “threat”. At this point, I remembered the Pinside thread four years ago in which Hassell was holding on to another customer’s LE game AND money. When that customer had emailed Fun! to demand the refund he was rightfully entitled to, Fun! had emailed him back: “GOOD LUCK WITH THAT.” In fact, they held on to that customer’s money for many, many months, telling him all the while, “the check’s in the mail.”
Fun! first came into prominence years back on rec.games.pinball because of their practice of staging private eBay auctions and, by the consensus of forum members, having shill bidders drive their prices up to insane levels. Apparently, eBay finally caught on and banned them from selling on the platform. There are also numerous online accounts of Fun! misrepresenting games and then delivering garbage to their customers. Several current Google reviewers have been taken to the cleaners by them, including customers who have received incomplete shipments, only to have Fun! respond that they would do “dock checks”, but ultimately neither “finding” the missing goods NOR returning the customers’ money.
There are reports of game repairs after which customers got home with their equipment only to find the paid for repairs were either not done at all or were done incorrectly. There are reports of customers purchasing machines represented as being “completely refurbished, excellent condition”, only to receive trashed-out, malfunctioning machines. There is an abundant history of negative reviews about this company and their business practices.
In my case, Hassell changed virtually every parameter of the deal we had agreed upon after I had paid him in full for the games - refusing to honor his agreement to provide two deliveries for a single delivery fee, refusing to honor his promised 30-day warranty, refusing to let me take possession of new-in-box, unused games, telling me I could not pick the games up at his store, then telling me I could, then finally refusing to let me take possession at all – in the case of my Godzilla Pro, I can only assume he did indeed “SELL IT TO SOMEONE ELSE.”
During the course of doing business with Fun!, I got the strong sense that Hassell, irrespective of his misgivings about any disappointment I expressed, expects his customers to grovel to him for games they’ve already paid for in full. And if they’re not willing to do that (as I certainly wasn’t), he’ll “punish” them by selling the machine to someone else.
After he decided to “punish” me (and my five-year-old grandson) by refusing to deliver or let me pick up the Godzilla Pro we had been eagerly anticipating since January (and I had paid him for in full), I did receive a refund, but only after getting law enforcement involved. As luck would have it, I contacted an out-of-state dealer the next day that had just had a customer cancel on a Godzilla Pro. Not only was that dealer friendly, helpful, and genuinely excited about getting the game to me, but I got it at a lower price with free shipping and no sales tax.
Now, I know a lot of people in these forums tend to side with the sellers, and I’m not seeking a “verdict” here. Some are going to reply to this post with positive experiences they’ve had with Craig Hassell – which doesn’t change my experience – to me, in all honesty, he has come off as an arrogant, vindictive predator (seems people should readily recognize that something is off-kilter with a businessman who has a world view in which he is the only one telling the truth while most of his customers are lying).
Nonetheless, I’m simply reporting what happened to me (and quite a few others) so that folks can make informed decisions about doing business with a company that has a verifiable track record of unhappy customers. And with the kind of money involved in pinball purchases these days, it’s totally your choice as to whether or not you make the mistake of assuming it won’t happen to you.
pinside)
