Vendor warning

[LatakiaLover]

This outfit plays a tricky game.

http://www.mhctools.com/

They're probably legit, but what you DON'T know until stuff doesn't arrive after 6 weeks and you start digging to see what's up, is that they're in China. As in, everything is shipped from there. 30 days to process your order, then on a cargo ship for who knows how long, and then two months to clear the port on this end.

There is no indication that you are doing international business, either, unless you check the fine print on the shipping page and track down the country code of the phone number.

Sneaky bastids.

The problem is do you do without the tools for several months (ones you need or wouldn't have ordered in the first place); buy duplicates somewhere else and try to return the 'from China' ones when/if they finally arrive; or buy dupes and keep the 'from China' ones as spares.

What a pain.

[KurtHuhn]

I've been burned from joints like that before. It sucks. Ever since then, I tend to do digging on the vendor before I even consider placing an order. I don't mind buying from China from time to time, but when I do, it's usually because the item isn't available anywhere else, and the vendor somes recommended.

Truthfully, when it comes to incidental tools, if it isn't available at McMaster-Carr or MSC, I probably don't need it.

[JHowell]

Which is exactly why every engineer and every foreman in every factory and shop in the US has McMaster and MSC catalogs on his desk. I use McMaster. Whatever I order is on my doorstep the next morning, customer service is second to none. They aren't the cheapest, but if it's worth paying a little more for a tool that is well made and dead reliable, then the service that supplies the tool is worth it as well.

[LatakiaLover]

Believe it or not, no one but this funky outfit had what I was looking for. Which is why I jumped without checking them out when I finally found it.

That'll learn me.

[Frank]

Judging from their client list, Travers, Grainger, et al, one might assume they are primarily wholesalers.
After reading their Terms & Conditions page, I could immediately tell they were overseas exporters, but then again I'm familiar with the payment & shipping terminology from having imported goods from Asia in the past. Obviously, the average consumer wouldn't necessarily be familiar with these terms.
Although they're probably not deliberately trying to mislead, one would think the least they would have is their physical address on the About MHC page.

[KurtHuhn]

Which is exactly why every engineer and every foreman in every factory and shop in the US has McMaster and MSC catalogs on his desk. I use McMaster. Whatever I order is on my doorstep the next morning, customer service is second to none. They aren't the cheapest, but if it's worth paying a little more for a tool that is well made and dead reliable, then the service that supplies the tool is worth it as well.

McMaster's website also beats the pants off of MSC's. Their search function, I swear, knows what I mean, even if *I* don't. More than once I've typed something in, only to find that they found what I want *and* it's called something completely different.