TW Racquet Matching Service: Really a Guesstimate

[TimothyO]

I just learned something new about the TW's $10 racquet matching service.

Last week I ordered a Biomimetic 200 Lite and paid $10 for the MRS. TW came back with the message that they found a racquet at "11.6 oz. and 7 pts HL strung without shrink wrap". Great! It's a little over spec weight but it's also 1 point further HL so I approved it.

When the racquet arrived the original Dunlop shrink wrap and associated dampener were still on the handle and there was a TW label indicating an unstrung static weight of 11.25 oz and unstrung balance point of 10 pts HL including shrink wrap and dampener.

Hmmm....

Even though the order status showed a measurement being taken sans shrink wrap that had obviously not been done.

Next I unwrapped the racquet and measured it: strung weight 11.5 oz and 6 points HL. Dead on Dunlop's specs! So why did I pay $10 to try to get a racquet lighter and/or more HL than spec and then approve one more pt HL than spec? :-?

So I call TW and after some conversation they agree to refund the $10 since there was clearly a disconnect between the order status info and what actually happened (kudos to TW for good CRM!)

But they also explained the reality of the matching service. It works as follows: they measure a shrink wrapped specimen including attached dampener and then guesstimate the specs based on their experience. So at best it's an educated approximation rather than an actual match.

I have no problem with that approach as it saves them from having to remove the MFG shrink wrap which could make it harder to sell.

However, that was never explained when I ordered the $10 matching service, the order status that I approved indicated values were determined sans packaging, and in the end their guesstimate margin of error is roughly in line with the usual Mfg. tolerances, so there's really little value to the service.

At this point I can't see using the matching service again as the result will still be as imprecise the mfg tolerances and, more importantly, still vary from whatever is approved.

BUT...TW will still be my first choice for online tennis stuff as they have the best customer service around! In this particular case I just wish the nature of the matching service had been fully explained when I placed the phone order.

 

[snoflewis]

yeah...i knew there was something fishy about the service. luckily, i got all my frames before their $10 fee, but i weighed the rackets on my own scale and the weights didnt line up. as long as they're close enough, im fine with it. it was a free service, so can't complain.
now that they're charging $10, i dont know. I actually thought they ran checks on them.

 

[Donny0627]

thanks for posting your experiences. Although I am now at the point at which even if TW did something majorly wrong, I would find it hard to complain because of all of the good things they have done for me...

 

[BobFL]

This just shows how dangerous an incompetence can be. Do you really expect them to remove plastic wraps from say 10-15 racquets just to measure them for you? Do you really think that $10 can buy that and leave ~10 unwrapped racquets as a collateral damage to be sold as 'used'?

That is exactly how I and many of my friends match racquets because paper inserts and plastic wraps weight THE SAME hence the differential remains the same. They take 1 racquet to take a few photos for the site and they weight its paper insert, dampener if included, plastic etc. From that point they do not have to repeat the same thing every time someone wants a matched racquets. For example, paper insert and plastic wrap on Pure Drives are exactly 13 grams (10 insert +3 plastic). Do you understand this? For $10 you are buying their time needed to measure as many racquets as necessary.

 

[snoflewis]

do they have to remove the plastic to measure the rackets? they only measure weight, SW, and balance. of the 3 specs, SW is the only one that has anythign to do w/ the handle.

the reason i ask is that i've had a lot of rackets matched w/ their MRT matching service and it never said anyting about taking plastic off or anything.
does TW care to chime in?

 

[goran_ace]

do they have to remove the plastic to measure the rackets? they only measure weight, SW, and balance. of the 3 specs, SW is the only one that has anythign to do w/ the handle.

the reason i ask is that i've had a lot of rackets matched w/ their MRT matching service and it never said anyting about taking plastic off or anything.
does TW care to chime in?

Furthermore, do you really think it's going to make a difference in how you play? It's close enough.

 

[snoflewis]

Furthermore, do you really think it's going to make a difference in how you play? It's close enough.

honestly, no. but i've had rackets where specs were off by a noticeable amount, im not talking about a couple grams here or there. if you're getting a set of the same rackets, wouldnt you wnat them all to be the same specs?

 

[TimothyO]

This just shows how dangerous an incompetence can be. Do you really expect them to remove plastic wraps from say 10-15 racquets just to measure them for you? Do you really think that $10 can buy that and leave ~10 unwrapped racquets as a collateral damage to be sold as 'used'?

That is exactly how I and many of my friends match racquets because paper inserts and plastic wraps weight THE SAME hence the differential remains the same. They take 1 racquet to take a few photos for the site and they weight its paper insert, dampener if included, plastic etc. From that point they do not have to repeat the same thing every time someone wants a matched racquets. For example, paper insert and plastic wrap on Pure Drives are exactly 13 grams (10 insert +3 plastic). Do you understand this? For $10 you are buying their time needed to measure as many racquets as necessary.

Do YOU understand that placement of the dampener is not always consistent and effects balance?

I also doubt that TW maintains a database of wrap and dampener weights so they accurately calculate net weight and determine balance.

Most importantly a few grams here and there and 1 pt in balance is not material and within mfg specs unless I'm paying for a racquet MATCHING service and not a racquet APPROXIMATION service. Their approach simply doesn't add value to the racquet selection process since it's clearly no more accurate than the usual mfg tolerances.

 

[Cup8489]

Do YOU understand that placement of the dampener is not always consistent and effects balance?

I also doubt that TW maintains a database of wrap and dampener weights so they accurately calculate net weight and determine balance.

Most importantly a few grams here and there and 1 pt in balance is not material and within mfg specs unless I'm paying for a racquet MATCHING service and not a racquet APPROXIMATION service. Their approach simply doesn't add value to the racquet selection process since it's clearly no more accurate than the usual mfg tolerances.

Actually, it's definitely more accurate. It's not uncommon to see racquets from a manufacturer vary by 1-4 pts on the hl balance, and 10 grams or more on the weight, both of which can change sw pretty dramatically. If I knew that my racquets were within 3 grams and 1 balance point, and thuse a few sw units, of each other, I could definitely be ok with that, and TW has also listed the specs of the sticks theyve matched for me, so if i want them matched perfectly i can figure out exactly what i need to do. That's much better than buying at the local tennis club, where i had two of the same racquets that played so differently that i couldn't switch between them unless i wanted to lose a match..

it sounds like you're being way too picky here, and very cheap as well. 10 dollars for relative peace of mind and the assurance that if the racquets are not quite right that you can mod them without drasically changing them is an awesome deal, and if you dont like it then send them in to be matched for 30 bucks a racquet.

Seriously, appreciate what theyre doing for you.

 

[0d1n]

This just shows how dangerous an incompetence can be. Do you really expect them to remove plastic wraps from say 10-15 racquets just to measure them for you? Do you really think that $10 can buy that and leave ~10 unwrapped racquets as a collateral damage to be sold as 'used'?

That is exactly how I and many of my friends match racquets because paper inserts and plastic wraps weight THE SAME hence the differential remains the same. They take 1 racquet to take a few photos for the site and they weight its paper insert, dampener if included, plastic etc. From that point they do not have to repeat the same thing every time someone wants a matched racquets. For example, paper insert and plastic wrap on Pure Drives are exactly 13 grams (10 insert +3 plastic). Do you understand this? For $10 you are buying their time needed to measure as many racquets as necessary.

Totally agreed.

honestly, no. but i've had rackets where specs were off by a noticeable amount, im not talking about a couple grams here or there. if you're getting a set of the same rackets, wouldnt you wnat them all to be the same specs?

But their so called approximation DOES get you within 1 or 2 grams...it is absolutely not the same with the manufacturing tolerances which can be 15 to 20 grams in some racquets.

Do YOU understand that placement of the dampener is not always consistent and effects balance?

I also doubt that TW maintains a database of wrap and dampener weights so they accurately calculate net weight and determine balance.

Most importantly a few grams here and there and 1 pt in balance is not material and within mfg specs unless I'm paying for a racquet MATCHING service and not a racquet APPROXIMATION service. Their approach simply doesn't add value to the racquet selection process since it's clearly no more accurate than the usual mfg tolerances.

It is CLEARLY very much different from the manufacturing tolerance which can get up there to 10-15-20 grams in some extreme cases.

Do YOU understand that placement of the dampener doesn't make a difference ??
Yes...it is not placed exactly at the same exact point...but the mass is consistent ...and the placement can't be that far off.
A 10 cm difference in placement is a huge one (means that one dampener should be placed at the top of the handle and another in the middle of the handle...which doesn't really happen in real life), but let's use a 10 cm difference for a practical experiment.

Let's take 2 "perfect" prestige MP racquets...320 grams unstrung 31 cm balance (as per manufacturer specs) with an unstrung sw of 300.

Lets say the plastic on the handle is 5 grams. That 5 grams mass is consistent ( I guess it can be 4.5 or 5.5...but we all agree that IN THE HANDLE 1 gram of difference is not perceivable or affects play quality and also...I guess we can agree that it can't really vary by more than 1 gram...since it's thin plastic over a fixed area...the handle...and the 1 gram is about 20 percent of the total mass of the plastic).

Using the customization tools provided by the TWU...we find out that we now have 2 Prestige MP which are 325 grams and 30.58 cm balance (4 mm deviation from 5 grams of mass added to the handle).

Let's say on Prestige no 1...the dampener is placed at the top of the handle...and on Prestige no 2...the dampener is placed in the middle of the handle.

That means ... 2-3 grams (that's a big dampener) placed at either 20 cm or 10 cm in the handle.

Using the 2 grams dampener...the data is below:

Prestige 1 (dampener @ 20 cm) - 327 grams 30.44 cm balance
Prestige 2 (dampener @ 10 cm) - 327 grams 30.42 cm balance

There is a 0.2 mm difference in balance between the two racquets...which is the only error introduced by the "approximation"...and obviously no mass or swing weight error...as those will be the same.
Are you going to tell me that an error of 0.2 mm difference will influence
performance and will matter to you as much as a 10 grams difference in mass distributed all over the place coming from manufacturing tolerance...as well as balance differences sometimes measured in cm's rather than mm's ??

Are you seriously complaining about a 10 dollar fee for the possibility of getting racquets matched up to 1-2 grams and a 1-2 mm (or even less) difference in balance ??
I only wish for that kind of service to be more popular with various stores. WTF is 10 dollars ??

 

[TimothyO]

WTF is 10 dollars ??

You're absolutely correct.

PM me you're e-mail address. I'll send you my street address and you can pop $10 in the mail to me.

Thanks!

I also have this relative in Nigeria. He's a former high level official. Maybe you could help him out?



You seem to be missing a critical point.

TW told me EXPLICITLY that the racquet was measured without the wrap/dampener and STRUNG. The order status report says (strung) approximately 11.6 oz and 7 points head light without shrink wrap. They set my expectations, not I.

So all this blathering about wrap weights is not material to my customer service experience. It's probably a miscommunication on their part, but they clearly conveyed to me a level of precision not intended or possible given their process.

That's fine and understandable. But I would prefer to have known that BEFORE making a decision on the service. That's all, no big deal.

As for the $10, that represents about 5% of the order value (200 Lite + half-set of VS 16 + full set of Hurricane Feel). If you want to go through life unnecessarily adding 5% to all of your consumer spending costs, be my guest!

And lest anyone forget, TW resolved the situation quickly and we both were very friendly about it. I made a quick call to them, made my request, and fully intended to drop it if they refused to refund the $10. A tempest in a tea pot. I posted here simply to let others know the service is more of an approximation so, even if your order status appears to state clearly that certain specs are available, it may not be what you receive.

 

[TimothyO]

Actually, it's definitely more accurate. It's not uncommon to see racquets from a manufacturer vary by 1-4 pts on the hl balance, and 10 grams or more on the weight, both of which can change sw pretty dramatically. If I knew that my racquets were within 3 grams and 1 balance point, and thuse a few sw units, of each other, I could definitely be ok with that, and TW has also listed the specs of the sticks theyve matched for me, so if i want them matched perfectly i can figure out exactly what i need to do. That's much better than buying at the local tennis club, where i had two of the same racquets that played so differently that i couldn't switch between them unless i wanted to lose a match..

it sounds like you're being way too picky here, and very cheap as well. 10 dollars for relative peace of mind and the assurance that if the racquets are not quite right that you can mod them without drasically changing them is an awesome deal, and if you dont like it then send them in to be matched for 30 bucks a racquet.

Seriously, appreciate what theyre doing for you.

I agree with everything you're saying BUT for the fact the order status and phone sales agent never indicated anything but precision for the service. The order status even shows specs for strung weight and balance without wrap.

Now that they've explained the details of the service I imagine it's really an issue of miscommunication.

The order status should have said PROJECTED or ANTICIPATED strung specs without wrap should be "X". Instead the order status indicates a precise set of specs.

And the phone agent should have explained the process up front as "matching" service also implies a certain level of precision not possible given the procedures.

Leaving all this aside, I will say this about the racquet: it's amazing! Hit a little with it, made some mods, did some more hitting last night, and it's prefect. Only problem is the "Lite" name. It's a solid, middle weight players racquet with room for customization. I believe that "Lite" designation is going to kill it. Tour would have been a better description.

 

[BobFL]

I would like to add one more thing: I am in disbelief that you asked for a refund. Everything aside, that is really bizarre. Btw, the dampener you mentioned is irrelevant. You always use unstrung racquet to measure SW because sw varies considerably with different strings. All variables are excluded in order to get accurate measurements (no strings, ogs, dampeners).

 

[TimothyO]

I would like to add one more thing: I am in disbelief that you asked for a refund. Everything aside, that is really bizarre. Btw, the dampener you mentioned is irrelevant. You always use unstrung racquet to measure SW because sw varies considerably with different strings. All variables are excluded in order to get accurate measurements (no strings, ogs, dampeners).

I want YOU as a customer! :wink:

You may want to take up your argument with TW. They included the dampener shrink wrapped to the handle when they measured swing weight and wrote the value on the little sticker on the handle...along with the balance, static weight, etc. all of which included the wrap and dampener stuck to the handle.

But I agree with you. Seems weird to measure swing weight and balance with a dampener stuck precisely where one grips the racquet!