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Review 10/17/2007
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Very surprised to see such a low rating of Cool Cabins in Big Bear. My wife saw a posting on Craig's Lists detailing a slandering experience with Cool Cabins. The listing pointed all to read the BBB rating for Cool Cabins and to read the reviews located on this web site. So, the wife insisted I look at the recent reviews before we schedule our usual cabin for our 5th Christmas season in a row with them.
Here I see a positive experience from over a month ago by "sparkasian" and a negative one from "Treehouse" this week, and then yet another from Treehouse's "cousins", and now "CharlesD" days later. Now Donatella parrots up the exact same complains almost word for word of "CharlesD" months later. This is not at all sounding Kosher.
While here, I decided to compare the Cool Cabins rating to another company up there conducting the same business. Not going to drag them into this by name, but they too currently have F rating and even more complaints. The "cousins" launched an apparent onslaught of public complaints with slanderous defamation ("liars", "crooks", "fakes", unethicals, "dangerous", etc). They say Cool Cabins has "50 complaints in just 2007". Not true. This very same web site says there are just over 50 listed over the last _3_ years. That averages to be 1.27 complaints per month. I don't know how many cabin's Cool Cabins rents out on a monthly average, but if I had a company that rented out a hundred or more cabins per month, I would not be afraid of that 1.27%, even less so if I rented out more than 100. We chalk it up to what we call the "slime ball" factor. There's always a customer willing to be that factor in most business. Other than the F rating, the BBB cannot say anything good or bad about either of the companies in support of the rating. I see Cool Cabins made adjustments and credits when necessary, but all of the BBB inquiries were apparently addressed, answered and met to their satisfaction - whatever that means.
This is all confusing because in our opinion and experience, only judging only by the 40 or 50 nights WE have done business with them, Cool Cabins has done a much better job at their business than most of the other companies doing the same up there.
Many things can go wrong with renting cabins. We've had similar experiences when renting from other Big Bear cabin companies, motels and bed and breakfasts, as well as in other resort areas like Lake Arrowhead, Mammoth and Sun Valley. What the previous reviewer lists as problems with Cool Cabins happens all the time when renting, not just all at once in one weekend and that's unfortunate for them. No one is saying the things that happened to them didn't really happen (so far). The cabins they rent are not owned by Cool Cabins themselves. They have to rely on the owners of the cabins to make sure they are rentable. That's the way it was explained to us by another Big Bear cabin company that we no longer use (Blue Skies).
If the cabin was known to have the problems they knew of in advance, we would think they would remove it from their listings. One year, our favorite winter Big Bear cabin had a badly broken front door and broken bathroom window after the previous renters checked out. Cool Cabins told us in advance and we used another cabin, no big deal.
We believe the complaints about rental conditions in general in the Big Bear area are not exclusive to just cabin companies; It's pretty much the same with all the companies that operate overnight accommodations. It's those others that have left a much more sour taste in our mouths in the 19 years we have vacationed up there.
To the "cousins"; it could have been worse. Consider yourselves lucky you didn't get rat poop or dead rats themselves under your bed, in your pantry or floating inside the hot tub as well. An experienced renter knows that the more you pay for a night of rent will never guarantee you won't have problems.
Again in our experience, when there has been a problem with the cabin that Cool Cabins could not resolve after we checked-in, like a heater issue once, they offered to move us to another up-graded cabin. We will be the first to admit that they appear to have grown their business by leaps and bounds in recent years judging by the increase of rental signs we see all over Big Bear. That is perhaps nod to their success.
That being said, not managing the simple details like making sure a cabin is clean and usable for someone who rents from any cabin company is inexcusable. That, once again, has not been our experience with Cool Cabins.
As the "cousins" insinuate in their "reviews" posted here; we are not employees, friends, nor owners of Cool Cabins. We are long time customers and that is all. We are well educated and level headed people. My wife and I are in our mid 50's. We are semi-retired after selling a successful OC business we both built from the ground up. We have kids and grandkids that join us on our holiday vacations in Big Bear, as well as other places.
If what happened to the "cousins" happened to us, we would never use Cool Cabins again. However until then, we will continue to do so.
UPDATE EDIT: I contacted Cool Cabins and spoke to the owner herself about this BBB rating issue. She says she's been closely following the neg reviews and says she knows the person behind them by his original rental details, not complaints. Guess what everyone, it's an 20 something year old kid who's parents were the actual customers, and who had themselves not filed any kind of complaint. The kid has a loose cannon vendetta towards Cool Cabins, the owner is considering responding in kind legally.
I really don't blame her given the effort he has put into his public libelous task.
Jason Walker and Family
Orange County, CA
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