Great Customer Service
Hank Knight from SC
>A while back I ordered replacement irons and chipbreakers for several of my old Stanley planes from Lie-Nielsen. They arrived and are wonderful, except the chipbreaker for my #603 Bedrock was off. The slot for the blade advance pawl was too far from the edge, which meant that I couldn't retract the blade all the way into the body of the plane. I contacted Lie-Nielsen and told them the problem. They asked me to send them the specifications for the chipbreaker and said they would make me a custom one. I photocopied the original chipbreaker, added appropriate measurements and e-mailed the specs to Lie-Nielsen. They made me a custom job and sent it via UPS. The package arrived, but, alas, it was empty; someone had opened it, removed the chipbreaker and resealed the package with tape. Who would want such a thing - except an owner of a #603 Stanley Bedrock - of which I am one of maybe 3 in the whole state of South Carolina? Go figure. In any case, I reported the problem to UPS and called Lie-Nielsen. UPS did nothing, but last night a new custom chipbreaker arrived from Lie-Nielsen. No charge - even though I expressly told them I would be happy to pay for the missing one because it was probably taken form my porch where the first UPS delivery was left. On top of that, they only charged me the standard price for a #3 chipbreaker on the original invoice even though it was a completely custom made piece. I asked, and they said they don't charge extra for custom chipbreakers - at least not currently, but that practice may change. They get my vote as a great place to do business and they'll get more of my business in the future.
No affiliation, etc. Just a VERY satisfied customer.