How to get an F-Stop Tilopa… quickly!

My new bag pack has arrived, the F-Stop Tilopa. Read on and learn how to get one quickly even though the makers say they can’t ship it.

Tilopa – A sad story…

The bag pack is an f-stop Tilopa Nasturtium (which means orange color). I ordered in April. And it only arrived yesterday. What had happened?

I consider myself lucky because these days F-Stop Gear cannot deliver any backpacks. If you order one today, they tell you that you must wait 4-6 weeks. However, given the experience I have made I think it is highly unlikely that the company can live up to this promise. I have been waiting for mine for more than three months and have contacted them several times via their customer support live chat. I ended up being put off from month to month. Two days ago they told me that I would have to wait until the end of August. So I cancelled my order because I need the pack for my trip to Scotland in 2.5 weeks. As if  this wasn’t unpleasant enough, they told me I’d have to wait 4-6 weeks for the refund because it is their refund policy. I responded that my patience should have earned me a little goodwill but they were not ready to make concessions. Too bad.

… with a happy end

So, while was browsing Amazon for the 2nd best solutions from Mindshift Gear and Lowe Pro, I remembered a friend of mine who he had bought his f-stop pack from a dealer in the Netherlands 2-3 years ago. And sure enough, I found them and they had my pack in stock. You can imagine my surprise to see it there after being told for month that it was not available. My thinking was that if the manufacturer cannot ship a product, then it isn’t available anywhere else. Apparently I was wrong.

I ordered it in the afternoon and at 10AM on the next day a friendly UPS guy was at my door with the pack. YES! F-stop have build up a reputation of producing back packs that are among the (if not the) best on the market. And my Tilopa didn’t disappoint. It feels really sturdy and premium quality. F-Stop have neither lied nor exaggerated in their product description.

Want one, too?

If you are waiting for your gear from F-Stop, you might want to check out www.cameranu.nl. You might get lucky there. It is a bit tricky because the website is in Dutch and not completely translated to English. But it can be done. And they are quick!

An open message to F-Stop

So, to F-Stop I say this: Your products are truly gorgeous. Great stuff all around. But your customer service is appalling. Instead of putting me off from month after month you might have told me that there might be other stores who might have it in stock. And as for the refund, well, I wonder what takes you so long to send me the money via PayPal. It takes 5 minutes. So, please, get it done!

Adventure awaits…

Now the only thing I need is a 3rd party rain cover because the one from f-stop was out of stock. I will try to get one that is actually a little too large for my pack so that I can use it with my tripod attached to it. Scotland, here I come!! ☔️