Kev

Nice! Haven't checked for spoilers but the 4th is comfortably my favourite, really nice with the flats and rounds, a real rubbery tone. Least favourite is 3, seems a bit odd and unbalanced in the mids and woolly by comparison. 1 & 2 are very nice, 1 probably edges it, but 4 is a bit special.

Hi Harry, you've chose one of the best luthiers in the country! Chris will generally run everything past you stage by stage, you'll choose all the wood blanks (he let me choose directly from the supplier, not just stock he had), the exact hardware you want etc. You'll get photos every time he works on it and isn't precious about changing spec during the build (provided he hasn't already done the work!) I can't give any recommendations on what spec your bass will be, but whatever you ask for Chris and Alex will deliver, and their communication is terrific.

They don't basically, which is what Mark is alluding to. I feel its likely someone in a Parcelforce uniform has a very good idea of where this ended up

Sorry I didn't use the best term, what I was alluding to more was the legal protection insurance you have bundled with your home insurer that can assist sometimes in cases like this. They usually have a 50:50 threshold of success that needs to be met before they take a case on, which is at no cost to the policyholder either way. Hence, they don't want to lose, so they'll almost certainly never take on something like this.

I don't know what else to say or how else to say it Jonny. You have two people very experienced in the industry giving advice, it's up to you if you choose not to take it

So in the case you are talking about, you are effectively talking about the Post Office, and the salesperson there who has taken your money as an agent for the insurer, correct? On this basis, the insurers/parcelforce will 100% decline the claim and you would stand zero change of overturning that, so I guess what you're actually left with is taking the post office to court, with any legal assistance you have have with your home insurance or similar. The prospect of success there would be so low I doubt any no win no fee would take it on for you. What would you be relying on, CCTV, audio recordings at the desk? You'll have nothing to prove you were told the wrong thing. And the terms and condition explicitly state the guitar contents of your parcel are not covered for enhance protection. Of course, there could be things in the package that are covered, the guitar case perhaps, string packs in the case etc so you have still been sold insurance for the right reasons, complicating it further. Don't get confused with PPI and all that business, entirely different kettle of fish. Here we're just talking about straightforward exclusions in an insurance product that you're choosing to buy, and are only able to buy after you have confirmed you have read the prohibited list. Best advise; don't use Parcelforce if you want you're guitars covered, and definitely don't on the basis that you can challenge them if something happens. You'll lose, sadly.

Working in insurance, I can tell you that it would very much stand up to challenge. The same way that if you buy a home insurance policy in a flood plain and your insurers exclude flood damage, there is zero chance if you get flooded you will be able to make your insurer pay you. Exclusions are exclusions, and it is not reasonable to expect a salesperson to read out every single exclusion to check it suits your needs. These are what are called non-advised insurance sales, where the customer is provided with the information to make a decision. The onus is on you to check if it suitable and tick the box. Its why Insurers have to offer cooling off periods, to allow you time to do this, though this obviously doesn't apply with cover like this. There is a separate, highly regulated type of insurance sale called Advised, where the onus is on the broker to take a risk presentation and find the most suitable policy, but this is mostly commercial and certainly wouldn't apply here. Again, if you have evidence that you asked the specific question of a salesperson and they told you that the exclusion would not apply for whatever reason they could give, its a different matter and misselling may raise its head, but if I read that exclusion I'd want something in writing off them explaining why it doesn't apply, as otherwise I'd be buying something I can read is not suitable.

Unfortunately its like any other insurance policy, if there's an exclusion excluding something it doesn't matter if you've paid for it or not, that's on you to check the coverage is suitable. If you specifically ask the question and the Parcelforce employee or whoever tells you it would be covered, whole different story. Otherwise, the website links to you Terms and Conditions before you buy.

I would assume they arrange insurance elsewhere for the shipment.

It was sent through interparcel, who sell their own insurance rather than rely on the couriers, or at least used to. You'd have to pay for it of course, but can't imagine any shop would send anything uninsured, surely?

Not the cleverest theft, shouldn't be top easy to sell on! Hopefully insurance has covered it though and no-one is out of pocket? If Parcelforce are declaring it lost, they've accepted liability for it.

Yup, that's exactly why the MXR has been so successful. Would be REALLY interesting if Panda changed direction fully and brought out something like the original Deep Impact crossed with the MXR, all the new tech, quality processing and tracking etc but with only a set number of parameters to mess with and all adjustable from the pedal. Get a decent influencer type on board and it'd easily be as successful as the MXR, perhaps less so now the MXR exists but it'd still do very well.