Josh W.
Yelp
We are American tourists and visited this ceramic factory on our vacation to Amalfi Coast in Spring of 2012. We loved their beautiful hand-made ceramics and decided to buy a lovely large vase (300 euros) to ship back to us in the states as a memorable piece from our Amalfi vacation. The vendor tells you that they will arrange shipping back to the US or any other country for nominal charge. That's where the good ended and the regrets began.
Once we were back in the states, we ran into many problems with both the ceramic company and the Mailboxes Etc shipping company. First, the shipping company tried to charge us more than double what was quoted when we purchased the vase (150 euro vs 50-75 euro quoted). They would not ship the purchased vase until we provided a credit card number. We settled on an 80 euro charge to ship the vase (the vendor than charged our card for 105 euro, which we had to dispute).
Then, the vase arrived completely shattered because it was inadequately packed. Artistica Ceramica was not helpful in resolving the claim. Language barriers and lack of email responses made it impossible to resolve the claim directly with the vendor, so we had to dispute the credit card transaction. The vendor still fought us and would not resolve the situation. Their final argument was that it took us more than allowable 14 day timeframe (it was 15 days) to provide written documentation of claim, which is outside their required window despite our repeated phone calls within the 14 day window. Terrible customer service that leaves us holding the bag.
There's a lot of trust placed in a company when you buy goods on international travel that they will follow-through on the promises they've made when selling you the goods. Unfortunately, that trust was misplaced with Ceramica Artistica and we're out 300 euros for the vase and 80 euros for the shipping. And all we have to show for it is a shattered vase.
I would recommend international tourists stay far away from this company unless you can pack your purchase in your suitcase home.