EvolutionM - Mitsubishi Lancer and Lancer Evolution Community - I've been SCAMMED by Serenity Sound Performance

Guys, I think trashing a company online is a crappy thing to do, as there are so many other option one can take. But I’m at my wits end at this point and feel I should protect others from making the same mistake I did.

I have actually omitted about half of what I originally typed here, because it just sounded so unbelievable that I didn't want people to think I was exaggerating. I've dealt with over a dozen (at least) different audio shops in my life, and I am just speechless about Serenity Sound Performance.

To put it bluntly, Serenity Sound Performance in Costa Mesa, or more specifically, John Stanford, one of the owners there, has scammed me out of more than $1,000.

Now, I do alright in life, and this isn't going to affect my life one way or another, but it could really put a hurting on some young guy that is spending every penny he as on upgrading his car, if this happened to him, so this post is for you guys.

I should point out that I have only been dealing with the newer partner at “Serenity Sound performance” , John “Tex” Stanford, in all of this and have never spoken to the original owner, Thai Nguyen, although I have tried.

This all started when I posted online one of the Evo forums (I am a previous Evo owner) to find a good sound system shop that could do a variety of work on a vehicle I have. The vehicle was a brand new custom RV worth well into the 6 figures, and I wanted a top end shop to do this work. I was going to put one of the new Pioneer Avic head units in, along with new speakers, an alarm system, a 50” plasma, a subwoofer for the stereo in the other room, Xbox 360, Cameras, Tire pressure sensors, some train horns and a variety of other custom things. Because this vehicle was nearly 50 feet long, we came to the agreement that it would be best to work on it where the vehicle was stored, and not at their shop.

I’m not going to get into all the times they showed up late and hosed up my schedule. Let’s just get into the issues.

I should start off that as of right now, I don't have my Plasma TV in, I dont have the cameras up, I dont have a subwoofer for the main room, I dont have an alarm system, etc. But that's a different story I don't feel like talking about, as I just get frustrated thinking about.

OK, so Serenity Sound Performance weren’t able to locate the head unit I wanted, even though they said they would be one of the first to get them in the country. Not a big deal, really, but I ended up ordering the unit myself and got it before they got theirs, and I ordered the 50 inch plasma TV at the same time since they weren't dealers of what I wanted. They would just do the intalls.

There are about 5 things that went terribly wrong to where they had to come back out to fix. One time, the subwoofer for the stereo system in the cab was way too large behind the passenger seat and the seat would no longer move. Then they brought the wrong speaker sizes to fit the doors and we wasted a day. Then only the speakers in one door worked. Then they came back and fixed all that and left without telling me, and when I go to check it all out, all my instrument gauges don’t work. Then for the air horns, they installed the on/off toggle switch outside the vehicle behind the gas tank lid! They came back and fixed this.

My fiancé stabbed her toe on some of the copper savings that were on the carpet all around the passenger seat that they never vaccumed up (wires, rubber casings, etc.) It was as if they were in a hurry to get out of there.

To this day, my stereo subwoofer settings cant be adjusted, and they wired the radio so that you can’t listen to it unless the vehicle is running (accessory setting with the key wont allow you to turn it on.) It should be noted that they came out about 5 or 6 times to fix all of these issues.

There are other things that are bad, like the leaky air horn system they put on and other minor annoyances, but I wont get into that.

I was willing to forget all of that. I’m a nice guy, I am sure John Stanford of Serenity Sound Performance would even attest to that. I never lost my temper or yelled or did anything that 90% of the population would have done when things go wrong over and over and over, and you’re constantly being pulled away from work for it.

Well, the final straw on all of this was when they were installing the 50” plasma TV. I asked John Stanford of Serenity Sound Performance to make sure his mount was going to be secure because when we drive, our dog lays right under where the TV goes, and we have little kids that sit real close to it to watch their shows, etc He said it was not problem and it wasn’t going anywhere. If this TV fell on a 3 year old, it could kill her.

While John Stanford of Serenity Sound Performance was showing me the newly mounted TV and how you could angle the TV towards the couch, etc., the whole thing rips out of the wall and the plasma TV hits me, then John, then the ground (where my dog or the kids would have been!!!) I was boiling at this point, but I said nothing. The brand new (never turned on) TV was toast, all busted up.

After we get over the shock of everything, John Stanford from Serenity Sound Performance tells me he’d be willing to cover half the cost of a replacement. He wanted me to pay for half of another TV!!!! His installer had a look on his face of disbelief that he was hearing the same thing I was hearing, at least that is how I interpreted that look. I told him that wasn’t happening and I left the RV to cool off.

When I returned, John Stanford had come to his senses (probably from his installer telling him I would have to be a fool to accept his offer) and said that the shops insurance would pay for the damage. He needed some time to file the claim, and being the nice guy I am, I agreed.

Weeks went by and I called him about the check. John said he would come out and give me the check real soon. True to his word this time, he came out and did so and wrote me a check for $1015.75 which was what I paid for the TV (I had gotten a really good deal on it due to some business I did with that owner, otherwise it would have been almost $1,800.) So John Stanford got a lucky break on this whole thing. I would take a guess that his insurance company paid him more for that TV if they pulled the new value out of a book.

I deposited his check that day.

So anyway, 10 days later, the bank tells me the check from Serenity Sound Performance has bounced!

I call John up and he says he doesn’t know why, that there is money in the account right now, but maybe he didn’t get money into his account fast enough after writing me the check. The bank had already tried running the check twice, so I asked him to send me another check or money order. He said he was in Las Vegas (I think at SEMA) and would do so when he got back in town. I was OK with this.

I got busy and another week or 2 went by and I realize that Serenity Sound Performance never sent the check. I call John Stanford up on his cell phone and he says they are moving to a new shop and money is tight, but he PROMISES me up and down that he will make sure the check gets to my by December 1st. I ask him again, “John, you give me your word? Because you have been leading me around in circles here, and I have been nothing but courteous about the whole thing.”

“You have my word.”

OK, December 1st comes and goes. My Fiance is livid and is ready to sue Serenity Sound Performance and report their shop and owners for insurance fraud (because they got paid for the damage, but never paid out the customer.) I told her to hold off just a few days to see if the check arrives. Still trying to be somewhat understanding of their situation, as a business owner, I know how much it sucks when you just don’t have cash to pay something, even though you might want to.

So I called John Stanford up at Serenity Sound Performance and left him a message reiterating that he promised he would send me a check by the 1st and that it was now a week past that time. I asked him to call me back.

He never did. A few days later, I left another voice mail on his cell phone. No call back. I left a message at the Serenity Sound Performance shop…. Nothing. I text messaged him. Nothing.

So here we are, two weeks later, and the shop owner, John Stanford, has stopped taking my calls and wont return them. I have been stiffed for the $1,015.00, and while I am not happy about it, but fiancé is freaking out and is pissed since she was the one that bought the TV for me as a gift.

At this point she is going after the owners of Serenity Sound Performance and will be contacting the authorities for insurance fraud and a host of other illegal stuff she dug up unless they overnight a cashiers check immediately.

I just wanted to let you guys know my story, because if they are having financial problems to the point where a $1,000 check bounces, and they won’t return the calls of customers, then you should really look for an alternative before you go through a nightmare situation like I did.

Perhaps this message (and the others I will post at other forums) will get back to the original owner, Thai Nguyen, and he’ll do the right thing and step up and overnight us a cashiers check.

-Manny

PS: You may have had a great experience with them in the past, and that is a good thing. I wish that could have been me. The bottom line is they should do the right thing here and honor their bounced check and I would have looked the other way with all of these issues. Because of how they are treating the issue, I am now disclosing how bad they were on this particular job. I hate doing this... I really do.