So I was originally very excited when I first went on the site a few weeks back and found a Malaysian torch coral that I've been searching for but couldn't find for a long time now so I placed an order immediately and added a scoly and a frag of bernardpora just so that way I'd qualify for the free shipping and get a few cool frags added into that same order. Unfortunately right when the package arrived and I opened the box I knew the torch coral wasn't going to make it so I called them and let them know right away before even taking the coral out of the bag yet. We agreed on me giving it a chance in the system to see if maybe it would be able to bounce back so I did that. After maybe 2 days I knew that next morning I would be filing the doa claim on my account because I was able to see some brown jelly happening in between the head and the stalk of the coral due to the tissue being totally gone around the head where it meets the stalk. That's actually how I knew it didn't stand a chance when it arrived because it had shown up that way right out of the package all of the tissue was totally gone. Which I understand that definitely is bound to happen from time to time when ordering corals online, especially when your dealing with sps/ lps corals going through the shipping process. That's a lot of stress on some corals and it's just something you have to accept will happen once in a while when you do shop for live stock online. I had 2 customer service workers help me through the process so that way I knew that I was handling the situation the right way. I wasn't completely sure how to go about it with saltwaterfish.com due to that being my first time ever ordering from their website. They were both very polite and responsive to all of my questions and emails. Even on Saturday and Sunday I was getting fast responses to my emails. They did end up giving me that amount of money back that I spent on that torch as store credit so I was happy it all went well. I recently just decided to use that money to buy 3 corals that I saw in the wysiwyg section of the site because it seems they do have some great prices corals added there very often so I was excited to place the order and give the site another shot. So keep in mind my original order for the torch I wanted I purposely spent enough money to guarantee myself the free shipping ( which at check out you are still charged and other 15 dollars for packaging fees so…). But anyway on this new order placed between the money refunded to myself and the money I was spending on the other corals I added into the new order I was happy to know I would receive free shipping again as well! I did it that way on purpose again because it just makes more sense to do things that way rather than paying for the shipping and packaging fees because chances are it would end up around that same price anyway when it's all said and done. I filled out the information in the check out and selected the option to use the money added into my account and on the final step of the checkout it says " you only need to spend another $145.00 dollars to receive free shipping " that made no sense because the money on the account for my refund was already $120.00 and with the 2 other corals added to that second order I was definitely over the $175.00 spent for the free shipping. So after reading a bit I saw that the $120.00 I had gotten refunded to my account does not count towards free shipping…… ID STILL HAVE TO SPEND ANOTHER $175.00 ON TOP OF THAT AMOUNT FOR FREE SHIPPING! So let me get this straight for anyone checking this out. You buy corals from their and they send out an unhealthy one that literally is practically dead before even getting into your tank. You made sure to spend the amount to get the free shipping and pay for the additional 15$ box fee during that first purchase. They refund you the money THAT YOU LOST EXCEPT THAT MONEY NOW DOES NOT COUNT AS YOUR OWN MONEY BEING SPENT WHEN ADDING TO A NEW ORDER TO REPLACE THE DEAD CORAL THAT SHOWED UP TO YOUR HOME. They basically treat it as a gift from their company or so teething apparently?! But no it's not it's money I worked for and spent with you. I didn't ship the unhealthy coral to myself you guys did that all I did was choose to shop with you and spend MY MONEY WITH YOU. I made sure to spend enough for the free shipping the first time around and still go on to find out I had to pay for a "box fee" another $15 bucks and then I'm held responsible and have to do all of that over again when I get an unhealthy coral shipped to my home? That's not right AT ALL AND I WAS NEVER TOLD ANY OF THIS INFORMATION OTHERWISE I WOULD HAVE GOTTEN THE MONEY ADDED STRAIGHT BACK INTO MY CARD AND NEVER SHOPPED WITH THIS COMPANY AGAIN! I'm very upset that this is considered to be okay to do. Their are much better companies to shop with that have much better shipping prices and still have great prices on corals as well as shipping prices…. Never again will I be back to your site even if this next order has another dead coral in it I will get my money back TO MY CARD IN MY OWN POSSESSION BEFORE I GIVE IT BACK TO YOU! Shipping fees to my home from you guys are $36.00 and on top of that they make you pay the packaging fee another $15.00 bucks that's $51.00 in shipping and not one penny of the 120 I spent with your company was put towards those charges. You still expected me to pay the full 175$ on top of the 120 I spent and LOST THW FIRST TIME AROUND! Ridiculous and so wrong to do business this way and I completely changed my mind on how I feel about your company. Not cool at all considering I'm the one who lost out the first time. It was your fault I even had to place a second order. If the first had gone right I would have just been happy and left things at that. I will never take that chance with you guys again. For all I know you probably want a coral to die because that just guarantees you another 200 bucks the second time around. Screw that! Never again will I do business with you and I don't suggest anyone else even takes the chance. Their are much better companies with much better policies

Ordered a ritteri anemone, fed ex delivers day late and dead. Happens, was told one would be reshipped when became available. The following weekend again they had ritteri anemones for sale, but not for me. When I reach out I'm told they didn't pass inspection (seems to be the go to lie). I wasn't even contacted to be told some were available for "inspection" just see they're for sale on the website. I wait a full ten days, now keeping an eye on the website to see what they're selling. Now they have a WYSIWYG ritteri, two and a half times the price, but looks good in the pictures. I order online, pay, and contact to take the price of the DOA of the price of the upsale anemone. Which they graciously did. Day to ship comes, midday I get a text. Wouldn't you know, didn't pass inspection. No worries though, they have another anemone they can offer me. This one is $467.97 on sale from $719.90. The original anemone was $95, then $259, now $467.97... wow... more money than I'm going to spend. Knowing the answer, I asked if they were prepared to ship the alternative at the same price. They offer me a $15 discount, I declined. I had two orders pending totaling almost $500, I canceled both. As one contained the anemone and the other clown fish for it. Bummed about my experience, later in the evening I troll some other livestock sites. You can imagine my extreme disappointment when I find the exact WYSIWYG anemone (the high dollar one) for $50 less on the other site. For all the hassle for all the inconvenience, they still wanted to charge $35 more than another site. I've purchased from both saltwaterfish.com and the other site (which, out of proper form I won't mention, but google will easily bring you to) on many occasions and they are comparable in quality. The other site ALWAYS has better prices. I'm sure you can imagine who I will order from in the future, knowing they draw from the same pool. Customer service can sometimes make the up charge worth while this is for sure not the case with this company.

If 0 stars were an option, that would be my rating! They are scam artists! Do not order from them!
I placed an order for some corals, inverts and 1 fish from saltwater.com, because I would always get ads from them in my email, and they had a few items that the other sites I was ordering from did not sell. The website seemed professional, and they did have a 15 day guarantee, so after deliberating I went ahead and placed an order during their 4th of July sale.
When my shipment arrived, the first thing I noticed was that 4 of the bags had the darkest, dirtiest straight-from-the-ocean-water I had ever seen! Seriously! After acclimating the livestock in those bags, I put them into a vessel to inspect them and was absolutely appalled. The 3 different frags I ordered of various polyp corals, literally were 4 inch rocks straight from the ocean, with other growth and hitchhikers all over them. The pictures that I ordered from online, were clearly nice clean frags, not nasty overrun-with-pests rocks! I did a 5 minute freshwater/iodine dip, and numerous sea spiders, various worms etc came off. No way would any sane person put that in their tank! While the 2 feather dusters I ordered seemed healthy, they also came in that same nasty water, so I have kept them in quarantine as well. Additionally, 4 of the 10 nassarius snails were DOA, which I didn't even complain about; the Emerald Crab I ordered is white with gray spots, and clearly not emerald (didn't complain about that either); the 4 green leg hermits I ordered were supposed to be under 1/2 inch, and were each 2 to 3 inches.
I immediately initiated refund/RMA, and explained my dissatisfaction. I also included photos of what I received compared to their thumbnails of what I had ordered. The site says they will respond within 3 days. On day 4 I sent an email complaining they had not resolved my issue. She replied and apologized that the crabs were too big issued me a whopping $5.99 refund for the crabs, and gave me the following response about the corals:

"The photos we provide show these corals fully open. The corals you received would look similar if given the chance to live... with proper care and lighting. Did you throw them out, where are they now? Also, the feather dusters are alive and well. Why are they being claimed? -Mary-"

I told her I was well aware of the lighting and corals, and the issue was that I had received nasty rocks from the ocean with pests all over, not nice little frags like they advertised to be sending. I also told her they were being humanely kept in a quarantine tank until she sent return authorization.

Her Response: "The photos provided are a representation of the species. Sizes and color variations, etc are noted in the description of each item, as each item is unique. You didn't purchase frags, you purchased full size corals which are collected legally from the ocean. They are attached to rock and the rock will have sediment. Please feel free to review the description of each item. The Green Star Polyps for example are collected from Indonesia. Our EIBI area shows the exact item being shipped and has more of the aqua-cultured frag corals. While you are entitled to your opinion, we have not misrepresented our marine life and I am sure the issue is more relevant to what was expected."

I have attached a photo of what I received in some cleaner water that I acclimated them to. While the feathers look healthy, they were also in that nasty water, and I'm afraid they have parasites. The thumbnails are from the website, and are what I naively thought I was ordering, but apparently according to Mary, are only a "representation of what I might be shipped."