Reply from R.S. HughesOct 28, 2020
Michael,
Thank you for taking the time to come and review us, despite your bad experience. To start, I would just like to apologize for the situation you were put in. We take responsibility for our lack of initiative to communicate with you about delays to your order.
For a little context, I would like to explain to you why this happened and why it is an usual scenario for us. During February 2020, we were "all hands on deck" as the fear of COVID reached the United States. As a trusted supplier of medical PPE, safety gear, and industrial contamination clean up equipment we experienced a difficult disruption to our supply chain as supplies of N95 compliant materials were in low numbers, and appropriated by government agencies.
Despite these disruptions, we at R.S. Hughes treat our business relationships very seriously. We are relied upon by hospitals, labs, clinics and testing facilities for Personal Protective Equipment for front line medical responders, and we have long standing relationships with many of these facilities. Because of this, we were forced to ration our PPE stock, this includes N95 respirators and filters such as the one you ordered. To meet the needs of medical responders around the country, we had to prioritize supplying facilities that we have long term commitments to. The unfortunate side affect of this unprecedented situation is that first time shoppers at R.S. Hughes, buying single items, such as yourself were put on the back burner so we could keep hospitals and medical clinics stocked.
It is never our plan to have critical safety equipment on back order, and we are very sorry for your long wait period for your item. Again, we take full responsibility for our lack of initiative to reach out to you, a valued customer to let you know that your item would be delayed prior to your email to us. There were many customers like you that were affected, and we weren't prepared for the mass delays we experienced from our suppliers, and that inconvenience was ultimately passed on to you. At the time we did our best to advise our longstanding customers of delays, but some of our customers weren't adequately informed, and I'm sorry to hear that you were included in that number.
We understand our responsibility as suppliers of critically needed PPE, and at this point, we feel we owe you an apology for this experience. Your experience with us was not indicative of how we treat our customers under normal circumstances, and we hope to regain your trust on future orders.
Again, thank you for your time to come and review us. Let me once again apologize for your long wait without communication initiated by us.
Thank you for your understanding,
R.S. Hughes Customer Service.
