I bought an Arai Chaser V from a company called ‘Bikers Bargains’
They ship goods via CityLink. Where I work we deal with a lot of logistics and CityLink are notorious for deliveing damaged or mistreated mackages.
My helmet arrived today and was signed for as unchecked goods.
Main question: Is it possible that the helmet could have been damaged during transit?
I’ve taken a few pics… There was a light cardboard outer box, which shows some considerable signs of damage. There is then a slightly smaller box inside, the Arai box, which contains the helmet. There was no packing material between the two boxes. The only packing material is some foam chips inside the Arai box in a bag across the visor, and a thin layer of bubble wrap between the rear of the helmet and the inner wall of the box.
There was nothing to protect the top of the helmet from sustaining a knock, aside from the two thin layers of cardboard from the boxes.
I’m thinking I should speak to bikers bargains and tell them I’m not happy with the condition in which I received the helmet, and that it is quite feasible that it could have sustained some damage during transit. The helmet shows no visible signs of damage, but it could have had a drop, a knock, something heavy chucked on top etc…
Any input greatly appreciated so thank you in advance
I’m sorry this isn’t the most interesting topic, and it’s quite picture heavy, but it’s pretty important to me as my last helmet saved me from a serious head injury - I want to know this one is perfect.
judging by the conditions of the outer box i would have refused the goods.
but since you already got it, maybe you should send a pm to fellow friends who work in the industry, i.e. Ratty and FB Paul, maybe they can enlight you of the possible damage, if any.
I personally wouldn’t worry about that amount of damage to the outer box. The inner box looks fine. If you are worried though, let the seller know there is an issue asap - even if you decide to let it ride later.
looks to me, from the photos at least that the outerbox has had a heavy load on top,as opposed to having been dropped, and given that there doesn’t seem to be any damage to the internal box, i’d probably be happywith that. Not ideal, but ultimately it’s your head and if you dont have confidence in your lid you should get it swapped.
The outer cardboard box appears to have done it’s job, there appears to be no damage to the inner ‘Arai’ box. can’t see why you’d suspect the helmet to be damaged.
My worry is that, because the top of the box has obviously been squashed, the damage could have carried through to the top of the helmet.
There is nothing between the top of the box and the top of the helmet, if that makes sense.
The CityLink guy who comes our way is bloody awful. Chucks boxes around and everything. It’s even possible that he stood on the box my helmet was in to get to something else in the back of his van…
is it just me or is no-one else seeing the COMPLETE ABSENCE of fragile stickers on the outer box? how would the city link driver know to treat it with any care?
I don’t think delivery guys give much regard (if any) to “fragile” stickers…personally speaking, I would want that swapped and deliveerd in better condition given the price of such a lid…how you know that they won’t return the same lid in a different box unless if you left a “mark” on it…?
couriers are all equally bad when it comes to fragile goods, in my experience, unless you use someone specialized in fragile goods.
it does look to me too that something heavy has been put on top rather than them playing football with it, but i would be interested to know what them lot working with helmets think of it. if they always get delivered like that then be it.
just put it on your head and get on with it. the helmet has a hard shell. Its impact that affects it not weight so much. those vans are packed fairly high.
Couriers are notorious for badly loading and badly handling.
The parcels go from one van to another to another and they are usually thrown rather than placed.
note the ‘this way up’ arrows in the picture
My Caberg was delivered in a box in worse shape that that, but the inner ‘Caberg’ box appeared fine with just a small crease at the top corner. Ok, it was about half the price of your Chaser, but I wouldn’t have any hesitation about using that lid - seems fine to me. If you’re really not happy, you have 7 days to return it under the Distance Selling Regs anyway, and get a full refund. You could then buy it from somewhere else.
When I bought my £120 Caberg (along with an £80 RST Alpha jacket), I specifically told them when I ordered it over the phone, that if it came in a damaged box, it would be returned straight back to them. Given that the online shop has never charged me for the order (which I received 19 months ago), I think it might be a tad cheeky to have phoned them up to complain about the outer box damage! They even threw in a free disc-lock!!!
Jaime, I work in logistics, I see how consignments should and shouldn’t be treated on a daily basis. CityLink, or ‘ShittyLink’ as they are otherwise known, will literally throw boxes around the back of the van. Literally, throw them. Especially if they are small and light.
For a chile we had a mental ShittyLink driver who used to come round every day to make drops, he sat in the front driving and his son, cousin, nephew or whatever would be in the back of the van. He’d then open the side door, throw the stuff out, laugh, and then attempt to drive off. Now we always sign CityLink stuff as Unchecked Goods, if we even accept it at all.
Anyway… I called the UK distribution company for Arai and spoke to them, sent some pics etc, and they were extremely helpful. They told me it would be fine seeing as the inner box has sustained only the most minimal amount of damage. They still advised me to complain to the shop I bought it off though and said I could exchange the helmet at any point in its lifetime if I wasn’t happy with the state of it.
This post reminds me the the advert in last week’s MCN. Can’t remember the company and thrown the paper out now, but it was a helmet shop that apparently ‘guaranteed’ you would never be sent a helemt that had been returned from someone else.
Personally can’t see any discount helmet seller doing that. What do they do with their returns - punt them at bike shows? Sell them in their clearance section at cost? Doubt it. I reckon if it’s returned in perfect condition, it gets sent on to the next lucky customer.
I don’t want to offend you Conrad and I really try not to, but this is crash helmet as my dictionary stands word “crash” is a not drop or drop in two boxes and some foam inside. Your helmet is made of fiberglass, that is quite strong material. Itself its weight is about 1.5 kg so even thrown by Pudzianowski, inside these boxes it’s quite safe. When you add to the factor your head, which usually is about 8% of your body weight then forces which will be added to this are much greater (lets say at least 5 times) and then the speed factor etc, and now you have sort of idea what force this lid can survive. And I mention the fiberglass, this is very strong material, in general fiberglass helmets are very good in spreading the pointed force across whole shell (other than polycarbonate, I’ve read some very long article about pros and cons of both).
So it is fair that you were worried a bit as that’s quite invoice you had to pay to have it, but technically you will be perfectly fine. So probably next time when we meet, we going to have a tea and laugh about it, trust me.
got my arai recently from helmetcity and the box had tape over the arai box saying “cannot be returned to distributor if open”, i dont see that on yours… so potentially isnt brand new?
