Purpose: The purpose of this page is to inform potential newcomers of PDA's operating procedures. Many have joined our longest term client's, those who have been with us since our inception in 1990. They know that we have a unique mission and orderly system of execution. We are not set up to cater to every single possible type of client. And, we have no intention of ever doing so. Many will not fit in with our rigorously disciplined engineering perspective. Not to worry - they always have K-Mart.

PDA is an electronically driven engineering company. We do not have sales people. Our baseline design specifications are spelled out onsite. We provide more detail than any other company in the same business sector in the world. Each item page also indicates that any details will be addressed in follow up. Online pricing is for order requests that can be processed in that manner.

General Details Regarding Online Order Requests and Requests for Quotation: Online order requests are accepted from all over the world. Simply make your selection and submit your request as directed on the item page.

Our site answers all possible legitimate technical questions. Our quotation and order request processes are merged into the same system due to time constraints. Those that do not fit the system do not get processed.

Our website order request system does not automatically process anything - it simply transmits all relevant data to our office with three levels of security. Upon receipt of that core data, we wrap up any additional details and submit them to you for your approval.

Without an "order request" on file in the office, we have no place to store relevant data and there is no time to repeat. We simply continue processing requests that fit with an efficient system.

If you have requirements that cannot fit in with the system, we completely understand. If you would like a quotation, kindly submit your order request online and we will be pleased to follow thru as we do with all others for cost efficiency. If you require the expense of an individual specialized quotation and cannot fit in with the system, we completely understand, and we wish you great luck. We realize that all companies and potential clients are not necessarily good matches.

For Plate Order Requests: For Domestic orders, where the online cart automatically adds more than one S&H due to multiple selections, or your order is International, S&H will be properly reduced in our office and you will be informed. For International orders, we send you a follow up email with the Postal S&H and order total for your approval or revision before processing.

Plate prices are per pair and sets are clearly indicated in specific pairs unless noted otherwise. Shipping is via insured FedEx Ground on the US Mainland. All FedEx Ground orders are shipped WITHOUT "Signature Required" unless FedEx requires it because of the value or  because you request otherwise. International Postal orders are shipped with a signature required.

For Domestic Order Requests for Other Equipment: Submit your order request with the item(s) you would like. Any details, including customization, options not listed, etc., will be addressed in our follow up emails. Where applicable, as with Plates, the cart may list the standard S&H for that item, sometimes with a supplemental table for quantity or Mainland zone location. As noted,  for other items, where the shipping will vary based on weight and destination, we will follow up by email with your Domestic FedEx shipping options or International Postal or FedEx options for your approval or revision. Also in that email, where applicable, we will verify your preferred options on finish, etc. Shipping is via insured FedEx Ground on US mainland only. All FedEx Ground orders are shipped WITHOUT "Adult Signature Required" unless required by FedEx due to value or by your specific request. FedEx picks up daily.

U.S. Military Order Requests: APO, etc. orders ship Postal (usually Priority) via military planes at no extra charge. All of our personnel are paid by the piece. No one is on a salary. Our personnel voluntarily extend a discount to our military personal by not charging the additional handling incurred by Postal delivery.

Alaska and Hawaii: Postal or FedEx S&H for these destinations is submitted to you for approval or revision in follow up to properly submitted orders.

International Online Order Requests: Submit your order with the item(s) you would like. The shipping will vary based on weight and destination. Weight and size permitting, we will follow up by email with your Express Mail S&H. Also in that email, where applicable, we will verify your preferred options on sizes, finish, etc. Shipping is via insured, quick (3 days to most countries), expensive, and trackable online, only. We will not ship by methods that cannot be tracked for any reason whatsoever.

When size or weight are beyond the Postal limitations, international shipping will be via FedEx. Your country may require duty, taxes, a brokerage fee, etc. It is up to you to verify the requirements of your country. You are responsible to the regulations your government imposes. Any such requirements are not within the domain or responsibility of PDA. If you require that we determine those details for you, we will pass on your order request.

PDA currently ships several orders per week that go to the United Kingdom and Canada. Several orders per month go to Australia. We also ship continually, though less frequently, to every country in Europe, and China, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, South America, etc. The list of countries we ship directly to is longer than the list of those we do not ship to. Direct shipping is not our only avenue. We also rendezvous orders at the hotels of overseas visitors and coordinate employer forwarding to Americans working overseas. We currently ship for some foreign customers to their choice of destination within the U.S. Mainland and they arrange to get the package forwarded to the final destination. We would be pleased to serve you by any of these methods alternatives.

The Inquiry Process: Other than for custom equipment, direct personal quotes are no longer necessary, are redundant, and unfairly delay those who are on the ball. Our website contains all relevant equipment pricing. Where applicable, S&H quotes will be provided on properly submitted orders. Ballpark estimates will be provided for general inquiries. PDA is an electronically based engineering company. We do not have "salespersons". Our website provides our full and complete specifications. We will not field questions that are clearly addressed on our site. Our equipment is designed to detailed and specific functional criteria and for the benefit of serious trainees who know what they are doing and what they need. Nothing Ironhorse is marginal. Everything is as stated. If you feel you must talk with a salesperson, must be convinced of one facet or another, or must try something out to see if you like it, we kindly direct you to Dick's Sporting Goods.

As a business, we promptly respond to businesslike inquiries. Emails that do not specify the senders name, address, specific models and options, and any other information obviously necessary and pertinent to a meaningful reply are deleted without comment. We kindly direct them to 800 669-7729.

When inquiries request more than two email exchanges it becomes obvious that our order queue is being unfairly penalized and we are wasting time. Further communications are deflected in favor of our clients.

The Ordering Process: If your equipment selection offered equipment options and/or you are due quotes on your shipping options, we WILL email you to verify them. Orders are NEVER processed without proper and necessary full disclosure and consent from the client. Likewise, we will email you if you have submitted an incorrect credit card number (2% of orders), incorrect billing address (2% of orders), did not indicate the shipping address is residential or commercial (despite that request in two places, 4%), or include a phone number to put on the package (2%). Orders with these issues take a backseat to orders that are submitted properly - there is no reason those who can execute a simple procedure should be penalized by delay caused by those who cannot. Incorrectly submitted, incomplete, unconfirmed, and unverified orders remain in the Pending box for two weeks; then they are permanently cancelled. If you have submitted an incomplete, incorrect, or otherwise bogus email address, you are out of luck.

General Details for Domestic Snail Mail Order Requests: These are gladly accepted and processed promptly when they are properly submitted with the following:

• Name

• Shipping Address

• Indicate if the shipping address is residential or commercial

• Phone number to put on the package

• Email address (not required but that is how shipping confirmations are sent)

• Check or Money order made out in the proper amount

• If payment is by credit card:

1.                    the card Visa or MasterCard number

2.                    the expiration date

3.                    the three-digit security code on the back panel

4.                    the billing address for the card (the correct address that the monthly statement for the card submitted is mailed to).

Snail Mail orders cannot be processed without any of those details as applicable. We will follow up on incomplete orders via email if an email address is provided. Orders submitted incompletely and without email address await your telephone call. Incomplete orders are held in Pending for two weeks maximum, then shredded.

Checks and money orders can be made out to: PDA

Checks and money orders can be sent to: PDA   104 Bangor Street    Mauldin SC 29662     U.S.A.

When you order by phone 0700-1900 EST daily, 7 days a week with circumstances permitting, all the details are taken care of in a few minutes. If you call and the phone is unattended, please leave a message as directed - we do return US Mainland calls as appropriate.

PDA receives phone orders from all over the world. Many of you just do not want to use the Internet for security reasons. We welcome your calls to place orders if you have already done your homework with the online specs. If you are calling from overseas, feel free to email ahead to coordinate a telephone time. When we are out of town and the office is closed our telephone and Internet communications continue by forwarding the phone and using a laptop computer.

The PDA Online Process: Our system is audited by non-precocious teens. We are fully aware that it is very simple, very accurate, and there are no valid excuses that one "cannot make it work" or "it is too complicated" or "too confusing." Anyone who can read is able to use the system.

Among the necessary details, our order/account form clearly requests if the shipping address is residential or commercial. A whopping 90% of customers miss this somehow despite the bold colored callout. As a general safety net, when you submit your order request via the secure online server, you will immediately be told you will receive an autorespond from our server, which serves several purposes: 1. It adds a layer of security for other details. 2. To advise you that our server received your order. 3. To allow you to check your shipping address information is correct (1% of all orders are initially submitted with address errors). 3. To allow you to check your billing address information - the banking system considers an order fraudulent and declined (this is to protect you) if this information is not provided or is incorrect. 4. To be sure we get the correct shipping address category. We cannot ship if you have not specified if your shipping address is residential or commercial (this is for error free service). Incredibly, 2% of users miss the very specific residential/commercial query the second time too. We do not ask for any unnecessary details.

If you think it is an unnecessary waste to specify residential/commercial, simply tell us to guess and add $15 to your order total for the FedEx back charge and bookkeeping for sending it through the wrong leg of FedEx.  

If you have submitted your order request correctly and responded to the server autorespond, you will receive a prompt personal RSVP with a scheduled shipping departure target, or a verification follow up (where S&H and/or options need to be coordinated and approved by you, options or special requests addressed, etc.).

Subscribers of some services (e.g., AOL and Hotmail) will have to cut and paste the original Confirmation into a new message in order to have a complete and executable Confirmation. Or simply type the answers to the items in a return message. The ISPs noted are among those who delete the original message or truncate it in the reply to save server space. And, they do not train their subscribers how to use their system. The Confirmation provides thorough communication and full disclosure with the client regarding his order and the entire process, which any knowledgeable consumer would and should expect. It also provides the details necessary to implement the PPC program. Where else can a client email and say, "Send me a this-that-or-the-other and use my shipping and billing data on file"?

As noted, with the autorespond system, approximately 99% of online orders come through without a hitch. The remainder encounter difficulty of some sort. They are generally personal issues regarding tech support for their systems, etc., which is the job of their ISPs and their computer equipment suppliers. Some follow search or referral links to dead pages - they need to go to our home page and get on the live site. For those who are simply unable to use the online ordering system, we suggest you cut to the chase, do the homework, and pick up the phone.

The Custom Order Process: Custom orders are quoted, targeted with a "soonest" and "latest" shipping target, and processed, then placed in the next available workorder queue of the appropriate shop. Status Reports are emailed approximately weekly so clients can see the list being whittled down as equipment is delivered. The use of targets and Status Reports is the only honest and realistic way to schedule and inform. Pie-in-the-sky targets not realistic, do not permit the shop to "go out of order" if efficiency can be enhanced by doing so, and do not allow for unforeseen contingencies. If you absolutely insist you must have a firm date, or if you have other requirements clearly outside of our system, we completely understand that you will be disappointed, that we will not be able to help you, and that your time should not be wasted.  

PPC Ordering: PPCs have it easiest of all. The majority of our orders are PPC and we focus our energies on fulfilling their orders ASAP. We strive for the highest level of service for all PDA clients. We will not sacrifice the service level for 99% of our customers because of the 1% stragglers.

ALL shipment departures are followed the next day (at the latest) with emailed shipping confirmation including the applicable tracking or insured item number.

No matter where you are, we handle every order the same way - special and with dispatch. Only John Szimanski and Brenda Cauble, husband and wife, handle emails and phone calls. Realizing that respect is a two way street, we want to be sure our clients are treated as we like to be treated.

PDA only ships direct; we do not employ distributors. We found that distributors added a layer of confusion and added no value to our clients. And, after all, having local distributors did not make shipping expenses magically disappear. You can have our unique equipment delivered cost effectively wherever you live and experience the highest level of service.

We have the utmost respect for our clients. And, PDA primarily offers items that cannot be found elsewhere. When the same or similar items can be found elsewhere, PDA offers a lower price and/or superior product quality and service. Very infrequently potential clients who seem to think they have walked into a common store approach us. We feel it is an injustice to our very loyal clients to waste their deserved time on folks who ask to have the website read to them and who should be at Wal-Mart. As such, when applicable, we do we do direct people to try Wal-Mart.

We have no paid advertising. There are residual published references to a print catalog that had to be discontinued in ~2000. Emailed and Postal requests for print catalogs will continue to receive our form letter indicating the website is our only catalog. As an electronic engineering company without salespeople, we do not have personnel to respond to Postal RFQs or lengthy/multiple phone inquiries.

To sum up our general operations: Stick to the mission. Point to the site. Maintain the highest level of service to those in the system. Focus on productive work only.

Many of you are already aware of how PDA operates. PDA does its engineering in-house. Our design concepts, load and deflection calculations, materials and methods specifications, CADD shop drawings and bids, as well as most finishing, packaging and shipping, are done here in Mauldin, SC. The qualified low bidder of a select group of qualified fabricators located in the Eastern US, Texas and California fabricate the equipment. This eliminates high overhead, facilitates efficiency, permits greater flexibility and assures the best possible pricing. Our prices are set by what is required to produce and deliver, regardless of what anyone else is doing. Quality control is strict and substandard parts are rejected and destroyed. If you can find a better price at the same quality, please let us know - we will buy everything they have.

PDA has at least 18 new items come off the boards in any calendar year. Many of you asked to have us to make custom pieces, several of which went into production. We welcome the opportunity to address your project. However, please keep in mind it may require some patience - we will not change our already crowded schedule to accommodate a one-off. If there is something you want made in a hurry, please try your local machine shop. Get a line of credit before you go, and do not expect it to turn out the way you thought you said it should be.

PDA does not have a storefront or manufacturing facility per se here in Mauldin. We are not chartered for retail sales and have no parking or showroom facilities.

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