hellohell

Hello, first of all I want to say that I am posting this thread not to bash or damage Umnitza or its owner but rather to warn any potential buyers from the horrible products quality and customer service of Umnitza and its owner Matt Grintsaig.

Luckily I photographed each and every problem since I got the headlights and up until today so every claim will be backed up by a matched photo, also all of the emails I exchanged with Umnitza and Matt (over 200) are backed up, saved and screenshots will be posted if needed.

My ordeal begun in October of 2013 when I ordered complete set of front headlights for my BMW E90 LCI, I ordered two front headlights "E90 Projectors" with "Orion V4 120 LED Version" angel eyes and "FX-R retrofit 35W Xenon" Bixenon.

In this post I will number the events that I have had with the headlights and with Umnitza representatives and Matt in a chronological order, for the biggest and most severe problems you can jump to #3 and continue to #4:

1) In October of 2013 i ordered and received the headlights from Umnitza, as soon as I opened the package I noticed a odd piece of something fumbling inside my passenger side headlight, emailed umnitza about it to find out that it’s an UGLY "Piece of glue that got loose", after many attempts pulling it out umnitza emailed me the next solution:
"the next option would be to put the
headlight in an oven that's heated up to 215 degrees Fahrenheit, so that
will allow you to take out the lens from the headlight, letting you reach
and take out the glue piece that is stuck in there."
I haven’t got the headlights and I already need to freaking stuck them in the oven and open them while I have no mechanical knowledge what so ever.
Eventually I managed to pull out this piece after a lot of effort but only because I managed to get it loose from the side it was stuck on, otherwise I would have had to open the headlights myself.



2) Because installing the headlights grounds the car for a whole day it took me about 3 weeks to find time for the installation, I ordered my mechanic to my house to get them installed, as I got back to the the car I saw error lights on the main dash indicating that the two front headlights are faulty, I talked about this issue with umnitza prior to installing the headlights and here is a quote I got when I asked if I should expect any errors after install: "We have had no reports on errors for the 2008-2011, only 2006-7", my E90 is 2010 and guess what, It got errors, CC-ID 131 and CC-ID 132.



When I saw that the problems are mounting up I wanted Paypal buyer protection to be at my side so I decided to open a case for the transaction just in case any more problems are found and things won't work out with Umnitza, unfortunately 45 days had passed so I could only notify them I have a problem with the transaction but I was not eligible for their full protection.

3) OK, This is probably the biggest problem with Umnitza headlights that makes them totally unusable, the headlights are not 100% sealed for rain & car wash.

So as soon as I got my car back from the shop, saw all the errors and stuff I moved on and decided to wash the car in my garage, it was a sunny hot day and all I did was hose washing the outside of the car, no soap, no sprinkles, nothing.
5 minutes after I finish washing the car and letting in dry in the sun I see the passenger side headlight has fogginess and drops of water inside it.



I emailed umnitza right away about this and in the meanwhile opened the rear blubs caps and fanned it with cool air with an hair drier to evaporate the water from within the headlight.
I got an email back from umnitza saying
"The issue is something that happens only 1 or 2 times first and then it goes away. Please leave the car in the sun and it will go away."
Ok so ive done that, waited till it's gone, washed the car again and now not only do I have water drops inside my headlight but I notice that my headlight became A FREAKING AQUARIUM it accumulated like 3 inch of water inside it, so im looking at the connection of the black plastic and the transparent lens and I find out there is a gap in between them where a seal should be.



Now for umnitza comment to this I must dedicate a full paragraph:

"Let me explain a couple of things so you understand that it’s not entirely a defect.
We build headlights with the glue they have. When we open them, the glue gets a little separated and it’s warmed up. When we close them, the same thing happens. We do this in California where temperatures vary between 15-30 degrees Celsius.

Then we package them up sealed and ship them. They get put onto a truck, it gets shipped to the airport, and then the plane ships it to you. During the flight, the plane is at 35000ft elevation, where temperatures in the cargo area can reach -50 Celsius. Then of course when it reaches your country, the temperature is once again 20-39 Celsius.
So you can see that sometimes the seal gets hard in the cold, then soft in the warm and can develop microscopic bubbles. Putting a small bead of silicon around the edges of the lip will usually help settle this without any issues"

Do you get it? Umnitzas claiming that their headlights might not be sealed properly if they ship it via air, ISNT THAT CRAZY?

At that instant im rushing my mechanic back to take out the faulty headlight off while umnitzas telling me" The situation where you see the slight gap *MAY* be contributing, but the only way to know this is to put some black silicon in that area and run the car for a period of time to see if it solves the problem".
The mechanic got the headlight off (requiring a removal of the whole front bumper) and when it was out and angled it was literally pouring out water.
I am testing the gap and sees that water runs through it with no sealing what so ever.
So im listening to umnitzas technical support and not only do I silicone the gap but I silicone the whole headlight head to toe wherever there are joints and let it harden for a day.
Now im having the mechanic putting it back together so I can finally drive my vehicle, he finishes, we are washing the car again, hose only, to find out that AGAIN that there is condensation and water filling the headlight.
At that point im thinking "wait a minute, you are all bothered with that headlight but what about the other one? You haven’t looked at it" all sure its perfectly fine im looking inside the OTHER headlight to find out that although it does not have any condensation on the lens itself it is filled with 2 inch of water inside it.

Astonished I decide to make an experiment, I tape two toilet paper pieces to the inside of both blub caps of both headlights, close them and wash the car with only a hose, dries everything up, open the caps to find out the papers soaked with water, meaning there is a huge leak in the headlights (I made a video of the whole procedure and I will post it if needed).



Seeing the results Im ordering the mechanic yet again to remove both headlights asap, once they are out I examine them closely to find out that both of them have half an inch gap between the headlight unit and the caps that cover the bulbs.







Now those caps have sealing rubber on them because they should seal the headlights in that area only that mine do not seal what so ever and they are completely useless letting TONS of water pour in.

That problem is not in a single headlight but in both headlights, what does than say about umnitza products quality and quality inspection? 2 out of 2 faulty headlights, and even more so with the SAME problem?

At this point after glue pieces, error lights, three different leaking unsealed areas on both headlights, grounded car and an unpaid bill for all the mechanic work and without paypal buyers protection I demand a full refund of my money (for the headlights only nothing else) umnitza completely ignores me and address the back caps issue:
"All you need to do is put a larger seal on that spot, it’s very very easy."
So I continue trying to fix this horror and asking how to seal it and umnitza unbelievable response is: "Try just a small bit of silicon in that area." With that solution the rear caps that are supposed to be removable becomes unusable and there is no way to change bulbs if needed.

In my desperation I went online and posted anonymously about a "condensation problem in headlight" with no mention of umnitza or anything else that might indicate the brand of the headlights, I let umnitza know about this topic and what was their response? Straight up THREAT:

"If you feel you want to post something online, you are of course fully able to, just like we are also fully able to discontinue support. Everyone has free will "

Can you believe it? umnitza is latterly saying – keep the post up and we will stop support you.

Seeing nothing is working out with umnitza I took both headlights to an expert in my living area to have them properly sealed.

ok so now I will stop to summarize all of the events financially wise until that point:

1) Bringing a mechanic to disassemble and reassemble the headlights numerous times (each disassembly requires a removal of the whole front bumper as well) – 550$.
3) After both headlights were out again I sealed the left one with silicone as well just In case anything happens.
4) To seal the rear covers correctly I gave the headlights to and headlights expert in my area to add the extra gasket and he charged me 50$ for the work and materials.
5) The whole process took two weeks and my car had been jammed in the garage since the 22th of November, in that time I had to use taxis as my transportation, that cost me another 550$.
6) This process had consumed so much from my time in that two weeks and that cannot even be calculated.
Total sum of money spent: 1150$ in repairs only, not including headlight initial cost.

At that point I was jammed from both sides, I did not have paypal buyer protection so I had to deal a compensation with Matt Grintsaig the owner of Umnitza.
After all of this ordeal he offers me two choices, 300$ compensation (with over 2000$ in expenses until that point [incl` headlights]) or send them my headlights for repair (meaning having my car grounded for at least a month).
After declining his offer he did not budge until the final offer was 355$ refund + 1 year warranty take it or leave it.
With nothing else to do and ton of money wasted I decided to take this refund stay with crippled headlights, lose what ill lose and learn the lesson from this horror vendor.

The end NOT.

4) So now in August 2014, less than a year since I received the headlights I park my car at home, locks it and what do I see?





The freaking angel eyes ring in the driver side headlight just popped out and its loose inside the headlight.
With little hopes I contact matt via email with photos of this horror, what's his solution?:
"If you would like us to fix them, They are covered under a 1 year warranty but you would be responsible for shipping." – yeah, shipping, modest thing of around 400$.
Now I have the mechanic take off the headlight once again and I decide that this time I will try and fix this terror-light myself so I baked it open in the oven, and what do I find out once its opened? The plastic clip that should hold it to place is just broken.



I don’t care anymore, I just glued the angel eyes ring back to its place and at this point I do not even seek to talk to Matt or anyone from umnitza.
I only plan to try and fix those lights and get rid of my E90 and leave this whole horror story behind me.
At this point im -2500$~ and counting.

I post this even though I got threats from Matt warning me not to post anything bad about his company:
"There are many protections that vendors have – legal lawsuits, credit agency reporting where we can damage a person’s credit almost permanently, public reporting on various online vendor sites that can ruin a person’s reputation as well. Buyers aren’t the only ones that have resources. We are all people here, there is no need to go into this. It wastes everyone’s time." – yeah, and what about WHOLE DAYS I wasted because of those faulty products of his?

I have two last things to say:
1) from my own experience I would strongly avoid buying Umnitza products, the products I received were broken and of very low quality.

2) To my own personal view the customer service of umnitza is completely horrible.

Please spread this post, Thank you.

*I am sorry if this post is in the wrong section, if so, please move it to the proper one, thank you.

0umnitza

A scammer who has now posted this on 6 different forums.

This is a further attempt at blackmail by the customer. Due to the issues with the lights, we offered the customer $330 back or a full refund if he shipped the lights back in December 2013. The customer chose $330 instead.


Here is the email agreeing to the settlement:


And finally, the first attempt at blackmail 8 months ago:


Please allow me to reply to your misguided claims

FIRST:
We exchanged over 130+ Emails with the customer in an effort to resolve any and all issues.
With over 130 emails, we continued to try to explain to the best of our ability how to resolve issues.
The customer is located overseas - in Israel - so communication timing and potential language barriers/translation may have affected the overall user experience. Any company willing to spend over 130+ emails to communicate with a customer shows dedication to customer service! Buried in those emails the customer stated at least 3 separate times that he would like to forego any future warranty on the item and yet we still extended it to 1 year despite the above requests to cancel it.

Second:
The issues discussed are in order:
1) error code ccid 131/132 = is a turn signal error - means either a light bulb is out or a turn signal isn't making contact - resolution - use OEM turn signal holders or we can send new holders.
2) Fogging - requested to have the headlights shipped back numerous times - also explained (see 130+ emails) how to fix it. Customer used own solution to fix (we did not put the paper in there).
3) Issue with Ring falling off - this is an issue with some DEPO headlights, we use the same DEPO headlights that everyone else uses and unfortunately - in some cases, due to the environment (Israel is very hot and humid nearly year round) those clips can get soft over time and fall off through a hard impact or expansion and contraction.

Third:
Our terms and conditions are clearly listed on our site regarding the headlights. We build custom headlights to order. We consistently work with customers to resolve issues but we have standard terms and conditions. If you are located overseas - and it's been 8 months since your order - you are responsible for shipping the item back to us if you would like us to resolve it for you. It is written in our terms and conditions. We WILL fix the headlights for you within the 1 year warranty if you choose to ship back.

The $400 price is not completely true either. The product is under warranty so you are responsible for return shipping to us. However, as demonstrated, the item would be eligible for us to cover shipping back to you from us.

This isn't a pretty situation by any means, but the customer made the choice to keep the item without warranty and even still 8 months later, we continued to offer it anyways.

0umnitza

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hellohell

I want to emphasize the fact this this Umnitza review is meant to warn buyers from umnitza horrible service, this review of umnitza, and the review of matt gresteing is not alone, reviews about umnitza are well spread on the internet and by only typing Umnitza review, umnitza, Umnitza customer serive, or umnitza quality you can see numerous terrible reviews about umnitza company and matt gresteing itself.