B&H is very good. Many times, they'll offer discount prices on high-end items. Shipping is prompt. Adorama is OK, but I prefer B&H - just personal preference.

Bill,

B&H has worked good for me I buy all my film,ink and paper from them. Always get what I ordered in three days. Not always friendly people but their service is good. Monte Johnson.

They're not unfriendly, just New Yorkers. Hey, you want film? I got your film right here! Anyway, I deal with them online, so it's not a problem.

B&H: two thumbs up; great selection and always prompt shipments; the very few times products had to go back, there wasn't any problem.
Abe's of Maine: mostly great; some issues with off-brand batteries.
Adorama: mixed review; they "lost" two lenses of mine that I had sent in for evaluation - they wanted to pay me a ridiculously low price and had to play hardball to get a reasonable compensation.
Many questionable dealers that advertise in the usual photo magazines: red alert; the usual sleazeball sales tactics; one example: "you need a special, not-available-in-most-stores $300 1GB memory card, the one you plan to buy doesn't work with the Nikon D70"; right!!!

Frans Waterlander
frans2001@netzero.net

For new equipment, I use B&H both personal and work. Good service for a large retailer.
For used I have found KEH to be the best.

Are there only 2 online retailers in the whole of the USA, B&H and Adorama? Living in little ol' UK I can name many more than that! My favourite 2 here are Jessops and cameramad though. Both are not so big in size but offer fantastic service and support.

Alan, there are hundreds of mail order companies here. Some of whom have a reputation for flim-flam. You can check things out at a site called resellerratings.

I use B&H for most of my mail-order (over the Web) stuff. However, I did use Porters once, and while there was a snafu in the shipping, they ended up making it right (which is about all you can ask for), and I got what I ordered in a timely fashion. Oh yeah, they were friendly too.

-EdT.

Ed,

I order a lot from B&H and have had good luck. Porters is not the far from me. I just got a flyer from them yesterday. I might give them a try for some things. Monte Johnson.

I have had extreemly bad experiences with both Autorama and B&H, Meyer at Autorama kept trying to give me the hard sell on the 3 year warrenty, despite my several no answers, B&H sat on my order that was suposed to be next day air, for three days before I finally had to call them, they were utterly useless when I got them on the phone, finally transfering me to somebody that hardly spoke english, this individual kept insisting my phone number was wrong and would not tell me what the hold-up was or why they had not emailed me, by the way on my printed invoice my #was exactly correct, this all resulted in a cancelled order and I am still waiting for the refund! I will never buy from either of these companies again and I would not recomend them to you!
Joe at Sammy's in Santa Barbra and Jody from Robert's distributors seem to know how to treat a customer, always honest and promp.

Where is "Autorama"? I have never heard of them before.

Ronk,

Probably a misspell of Adorama.

Good Morning,

I stumbled across a website called "Resellers Ratings", which apparently uses customer feedback to rate various dealers on a scale of 1 to 10. Adorama, B&H, KEH et al are all in there. Interesting, if not scientific. I won't say here who's high and low, because I'm not sure of the validity of the scoring system. Have a look, and draw your own conclusions. The URL is:

http://www.resellerratings.com/reseller_list.pl?browse=a&page=3

Have fun.....

When I first started 35mm photography 20 years ago, I bought cameras, film, bags, filters, everything from B&H Photo. With the advent of the internet, I found their prices for a lot of stuff to be no longer competitive.

However, they are scruplously honest. They don't advertise what they don't have in stock. No bait and switch. They have the largest inventory of photography products and equipment anywhere.

Last year I bought my son a Fuji digital at Abe's of Maine. Price was good and service was excellent.

Last month I bought my wife a Nikon 7600 from Broadway Photo. Even though the price on line was an error (it went up $50 the next day), the price was honored and shipped the same day! That's great service.

Glenn :grin:

Bill,

ResellerRatings information seems to mirror my own experiences with various companies. Others seem to agree as well. I haven't found a better source of information yet.

Frans Waterlander
frans2001@netzero.net

I think everybody's experience is completely related to the individual that you deal with. I have had nothing but great service from Adorama.

-a

Another place that I deal with is Freestyle Photo. Very good customer service. I like them alot.