Don't Buy from
RussianArtSoul.com or DIADA USA

Don't buy from RussianArtSoul.com, owned by DIADA USA, which also markets under the name Unigift. RussianArtSoul.com sells Russian gifts and souviners , such as Russian matryoshka nesting dolls. There are lots of other online Russian gift shops. Avoid the risk of buying from this firm, which has sent us a defective watch, twice broken its promise to replace the watch, refuses to provide a refund or replacement, and now has both our money and the defective watch.

This page details the horrible experience we have had with russianartsoul.com The case concerns a Russian Poljot Albatross watch. It's a beautiful watch. I'd enjoy wearing it - if it worked. According to Poljot's specifications for the watch it should rune 37 hours with the stopwatch turned on and 43 hours with the stopwatch turned off. This particular watch never made it for 24 hours, often stopping after as little as 6 to 8 hours on a full winding.

This problem was quickly evident to me once I received the watch from russianartsoul.com. It's pretty obvious when your new watch stops in less than a day. I put it on the shelf to observe it - at russianartsoul.com's suggestion - and it continued to stop after just a few hours. After a few days' testing like this, russianartsoul.com said I could return it for replacement - in accordance with their return policy giving 14 days to return items for replacement or refund. So, I promptly shipped it off.

No replacement or refund ever arrived. Eventually russianartsoul.com responded to my reminders that they owed me a watch. The "replacement" was received 65 days after the watch was returned to russianartsoul.com. It was no replacement, but the same watch. At first I assumed that they had repaired it, but, in fact this was not the case. They just shipped it back to me in the same, non-functioning condition.

Again I contacted russianartsoul.com and was told that I could return the watch and that they would immediately replace it. I shipped off the watch, and again heard nothing from russianartsoul.com. After reminding them again about the situation, russianartsoul.com responded, 44 days after the watch was returned to them, that they had no intention of replacing the watch (as promised) or of refunding our money. In fact, unless I paid them $8.60 to have them ship the watch to me they were going to keep it!

At this point I requested mediation from SquareTrade.com. Russianartsoul.com refused to acknowledge the mediation attempt.

My wife then posted negative feedback on russianartsoul.com's online guestbook. This resulted in the following message from russianartsoul.com (all caps in the original): "WE WILL CONTACT WITH LOCAL INTERNET POLICE OFFICER ABOUT HOOLIGANISM OF YOUR WIFE TO THE GUESTBOOK OF MY SITE. WE HAVE SUFFICIENT EVIDENCE ABOUT THAT. I THINK COAST FOR THAT WILL BE MORE IF SHE WILL CONTINUE DO THAT."

Great customer service, huh? Read the entire email correspondence and decide for yourself if you want to take a risk buying from russianartsoul.com.