HeliPalReviews 34

After ordering over 1500$ worth of equipment using PayPal. They refused to ship our order until they received a copy of my utility bill? WTF? PayPal confirmed they received the payment. So why wouldn't they ship it? Fraud! Don't do business with this company. Untrustworthy!

I needed a specific frame and saw that HeliPal had it in stock. After contacting the company, they kindly let me know that their website was incorrect and they did not have the item in stock. This was okay, and we moved on.

A few weeks went by, and I had to make another purchase of a different frame item. As we needed it quickly, the item was purchased with the 'Expedited Shipping' option, adding $75 to the $400+ item cost. A day later, and I received an email from HeliPal support that their website was again wrong, and they did not have that item in stock, and would not have it for at least another week.

I requested a refund for my expedited shipping cost, and the representative, Yannis, told me "Sorry about that we cannot to waive the shipping cost and the expected restock date is around one week".

I immediately asked to cancel my order, and heard nothing back for three days. I ended up disputing the fraudulent charge in PayPal. A few hours later and Yannis again sent me an email telling me to cancel the PayPal dispute in order to send my refund.

DO NOT CLOSE A PAYPAL DISPUTE. If you do this, there is no way to open another dispute if HeliPal does not give your money back. Instead, you are supposed to wait for them to process the refund, and the dispute will be closed automatically.

As of now, I am still waiting for my refund.

Overall, I experienced:
1) Incorrect stock on the website
2) Non refund for 4 day shipping for an item which would not even be in stock for another week
3) Vendor ignored my request for a refund and to cancel the order until prompted by a PayPal dispute
4) Vendor not understanding the way PayPal operates, or was trying to trick me into canceling my dispute

Outcome and Takeaway:
There are many different websites to purchase the items that HeliPal has. Do yourself a favor, do not shop at HeliPal.

I recently purchased a Walkera RC Helicopter from HeliPal and the total experience was flawless. There website is extremely easy to navigate and the customer service is outstanding. I had concerns about my purchase, if it was the right RC Helicopter for me since I am a novice. There was no pressure to buy that particular RC Helicopter and was given other options that would fit me better if I chose at a significant reduction in the total price. That showed me they are not there to sell the highest priced merchandise but are there to guide there customers toward the product hat fits there needs best and they will enjoy. My purchase arrived 3 days after I ordered it and was exactly what I was hoping for.I would definitely recommend HeliPal to anyone looking to buy any RC product.

Other than the terrible customer service and shoddy workmanship of their products, helipal reps (namely jackey lee) couldn't give a flying f**k about you. I've been in need of a main deck for my srd260 for quite some time and after several requests to helipal I receive a response that the part is no longer available. It and the srd260 have been discontinued. But they are still selling the remaining units they have. Wouldnt it be so easy to disassemble a particular unit to keep a loyal customer happy? Nooooo. Can't do that.

They state on your invoice to contact and tell them if your order takes longer than the time they quote for shipping. Which is ridiculous in how it is quoted to begin with. Shipping options from their site depend on what item you are ordering (not just batteries either), I logged in and put a single motor in my cart, these are the mailing Options; Option 1 is 8-16 days for $5.50 for a single 1106 Micro Brush-less motor 3400KV (Shipping weight is. 135 Kg). Option 2 is 3 - 4 days for $21.49 (LOL). I have ordered several times from this company, shipping is ALWAYS painfully slow. My orders always seem to be delivered on the last day of the week - month range stated by Helipal or the day after the last day in the range. They rarely (almost never) provide a tracking number. The shipping options they provide are inconsistent. I am waiting on an order that was shipped on the 19th of June according to my invoice. Today is the 2nd of July. 12 days. The item was to be delivered 7-15 BUSINESS days, non-work days don't count, (FIRST GOTCHA). It's been 12 days but only 9 business days. If it arrives in 15 business days it will actually have been 22 days (that's a whole extra week they are covering their $#*! with). If you need a part and its not on E-bay, not available in any other country or from any other supplier or the manufacturer, and you cant cobble it together with sticks and glue, but Helipal has it then either you pay extra for express shipping (which is also always late by the way) or you wait for the slow boat.

I'm done with them. I have lost weeks of flying cause they cant seem to find the DHL truck or a reliable shipping process.

I was a little wary buying from Helipal.com after reading the reviews here. So after receiving my DJI Spark remote and portable battery charger in double quick time I headed here to write this review. The portable battery charger was out of stock so they sent me the remote separately which arrived in Sydney in four days. They then sent the charger a week later when it was in stock with no extra shipping costs. They communicated with numerous emails. Very happy customer!

Despite what their site says or what any of the employees suggest, you will never receive your order in the timeframe that is suggested by HeliPal.

If your product arrives at all, it will be shipped by the cheapest and slowest method possible.

DO NOT PAY FOR FASTER SHIPPING!

They will just keep the extra money and the delivery will still likely take 6 weeks or more.

Customer service contact is futile.

Employees must get tired of spewing the same drivel that blames the postal system (with no proof BTW), because they always offer the same excuse in almost the same syntax every time!

If you do not mind waiting for a few months to get your purchases, you may find value here. Otherwise they are only good for wasting a LOT of time.

I just ordered a storm srd127 drone rtf, like anything u buy u go through and tighten all the bolts up, they where all loose for one for two I ran 1 3s 450 mah through the drone with no problem, and then I ran the 2nd battery 2 minutes into the flight and it dropped out of the sky, it turns out the 15a ESC and maybe the control board went up in smoke, so it say on there website you have 3 day from the day u purchase it to contact them if there has bin any problems with my purchase via email, i tried 3 time yesterday the day I received it, and today several time email and paypal filed a claim so maybe now I, ll hear something, all I want is them to fix it or replace it, seeing how I really enjoy the SRD127 I think its great, they would be a much better company if they had a way different customer service, love the drones but hate the people that work for them, all I want is a working drone, seeinf how I have stage 4 colon rectal cancer and all I, m trying to do is enjoy and have fun with the time I have left on this earth...

I bought a storm srd 280 v3. Looked great. They say they are tested. When armed this one would instantly want to flip. When that had been sorted. Reflash of fc i kept crashing it and blaming myself. Turns out it wasn't me not on any ocassion. It just falls out of the air like a Rock.
I took it apart and found 2 crushed wires. That wasn't the problem.
Turns out it is probably a sync issue. Ii was trying to solder ground wires to the escs because apparently they should be there. Problem is solder won't stick to the ground pads. Not on any of them. Weird is that.
I have also purchased a s rew kit. The are 2 piece screws that break under normal tightening. They charged me 36 dollars for that kit and it's rubbish.
I also had to order numerous arms because of its fall from the sky problem. The original arms bent. The ones I had to order snap. So a difference in carbon quality.
I initially emailed them and they said send it back at my expense. 100 dollars plus.
I emailed thier tech support and recieved no answer. Yet they say they have answered all emails... no they haven't.
This rtf package cost me 700 dollars and 0ver 300 in parts to replace all the broken bits.
Perhaps I got a lemon. Bit that don't explain he dodgy screws... who makes 2 piece alloy screws... it doesn't explain the unsolderable ground pad on the escs ot the shoddy carbon arms that snap. Totally unlike the original arms.

I ordered a SRD 280 RTF. Never flew a drone before a day in my life. Needless to say my 3rd try on flight ended up 1000 feet in the air, lost control and hit the ground pretty hard. Got ahold of them and they said to send it back for repair. It cost me $80 to send it back with the the 3 day shipping. They received it on a Wednesday and the following Tuesday I got an email from them letting me know the repair was complete and to send $40 paypal. To make a long story short the $40 covered the repair and shipping back to me, with an email and tracking to let me know when it shipped and when it was to arrive. WOW!
I learned how to fly and am in the process of ordering another new drone from them. There customer service is excellent and I wont buy from anywhere else. Highly recommend them to all drone enthusiast and newbies.

I ordered the ninja 250.
None of the bolts were locktited. Arm came apart in first 5 mins of flight causing bad crash.
Escs stopped working after three flights.
Unwrapped escs to find soldering not connected. Had to resolder
Flying in any mode that will let you flip or roll is a bad idea.
The quad rolls like 6 times and slams into the ground.
The body is basically useless and does absolutely nothing to protect the electronics in a crash as it literally explodes upon impact. The remote has sticky throttle. The camera is extremely glitchy. Ive spent more time repairing this quad than actually flying it. I really am beyond dissapointed. It was quite a bit of money to spend on something i could have built three of them with extremely better quality. This product was a complete and total letdown. They dont do refunds which is understandable but i have built more than a handful of quads and flown for a very long time now. It is not pilot error. After reinstalling allnew bolts... having to reflash the flight controller and resolder the escs and flying with no body i seriously should have built my own. Also... one of the motors died on the 5th flight. Very very dissapointed.

I've ordered two SRD 370's as well as replacement parts as well as parts for upgrades. Everything arrived within a week in perfect working order. With all the complaints about defective parts, they send out a lot of stuff there are obviously going to be a few defective parts. It just seems that people who have a negative experience are much more likely to post a review. I couldn't be happier with helipal, they've answered all my emails quickly and in great detail and the drones I purchased are amazing.

I believe that Helipal is an amazing website. I bought a storm racing drone and it was in perfect condition. I had a nasty crash and blew one of the motors, we emailed Helipal and they sent us 4 replacements for free without question. They usually respond on time but it is difficult with the time differences. For all of you people saying that your GPS is broken it is not Helipal's fault, it is the supplier that has made it incorrectly.

I wanted to put in my two cents - I also purchased an SRD370 from them - with extras it came out to ~ $1300 US. My NAZA2 GPS module was also defective as someone else had claimed in another review. I cannot fault Helipal for that, as they do not make the product, DJI does. I received fairly good troubleshooting information from them and quick email response times (within 1 day accounting for the HK and US EST time difference). All said, everything took about 1 week to resolve due to shipping transit times but they sent me a replacement once they narrowed down the issue - at first they thought it may have been the main control board so I had sent that back first.

In my opinion, for the breadth of products, competitive pricing, and selection that Helipal offers on their site, the transit time and shipping costs from HK to the Eastern US is a manageable trade-off for me.