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Posted: 9/7/2006 7:48:58 AM EDT
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I understand that I must purchase a suppressor BEFORE I have been approved by the ATF for ownership, what happens if your not approved? I have a clear background and clean record, ownership is legal in my state, but my CLEO is a possible hurdle. I really dont know which way he will fall on this issue. anyone know of a class 3 dealer in Wyoming? thanks for your time |
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what i would do, thought i have never had a customer declined. I would refund the money minus a restocking fee (unless it was a custom sup. order) Try to sell the suppressor for the customer as long as its at your dealer on a Form 3, its much easier to move. Its when it is tranfered to you on a Form 4, it gets expensive |
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I would just call your CLEO and ask, that's what I did before going forward with my first. If your cleo will not sign there are multiple other people who can OR you can go corporate. Easiest way to find your dealer is probably to find the suppressor you like and aks the mfr who in the area has done business with them. |
Purchasing it BEFORE the paperwork goes through is not some sort of legal requirement, it's just the order of operations. Like paying for a car before the dealer initiates title transfer. Once the Form 4 is approved he MUST give you physical possession of the suppressor and if you haven't yet paid for it, it's his potential loss. He cannot legally withhold the suppressor in order to compel you to pay him for it. Regarding dealers, Small Arms Review has a great resouce, I think it's on their website, that lists Class 3 dealers by state. Check it out. If not, then pick up a copy of it or get a subscription and poke around. Your local gunstore might know of a C3 in the area and they may well be C3 dealer anyway. Sometimes C3s keep a low profile and you'd never know they sell NFA. I would NOT however ask your local LEO about C3s. They tend to be the least knowledgable about laws and you might get their panties in a bind if you walk in there and tell them you're interested in buying machine guns. It's sort of rare that a local LEO will even use a C3 for their needs as they can go directly to a manufacturer with their orders. Chances are they'll tell you that machine guns are illegal and that will be that. A C3 will also be the best resource about which CLEO is signing the Form 4s. |
Exactly WTF is a restocking fee? You're charging the guy to basically leave the suppressor on the shelf and remove the SOLD tag from it? And then turn around and sell it to someone else at the same price? I kind of understand restocking fee as being justified in big distribution retailers where it goes back into a huge warehouse or something and might actually require some semblence of labor and some tracking records/database needs to be adjusted... but how many suppressors do you actually have in stock to justify a restocking fee? |
The restocking fee is basically because you are tying up inventory that could otherwise be sold. It could be a problem resulting in loss of sale to other customers. Hope that makes sense. Mark |
I don't see the loss of sale logic... that's pretty unlikely that once the guy decides not to buy it nobody else will either. It's far more likely to get sold than not to. The entire process the ATF places upon suppressors is what ties up inventory... and even then, it's not stopping the dealer from buying more of them. I don't know much about class III dealings so if there is a certain limit a dealer can have in stock at any given time tell me... because as far as I know it's not like as long as that one sits on the shelf waiting to be taken home the dealer can't have any others. The sale has been made at that point and the dealer is just holding it for him... so technically it's not even stock, it's someone else's property... I think. Property he can't actually have, but he did pay for it... ok i'm losing this arguement for myself by stretching this out too far. Point is it seems like BS to me. |
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This is my thinking, a person special orders a suppressor, pays for it and then get nixed by the ATF. So he gave me say $800 bucks for a steel and alum. tube. I tell him, i can try and sell it for you being new and on a form 3. If it doesn't sell, then i would try and help him out by refunding him most of his money. Because chances are if its been sittng in the safe/case for 4 months then its not a hot seller reason being, suppressor cost a lot of money and the profit margin is not great. One lesson i have learned is that inventory sitting around for a long time can really kill your business. IE, look at the inventory reduction sale my company is having. I wouldn't try to shaft someone and if they wanted to wait and see if it sold i would be happy to sell it for them. I have sold a lot of stuff for my customers and charged them CC fees and shipping only. If your a big company with a large profit margin then you can eat things like that. Small business on the other hand can't so well. Especially on special order items that tie up a lot of money. Reguardless, its def. not a way to make more money off a person. hope this helps Brian ETA: spelling errors |
Sorry you don't understand the issue from the dealer side. Say I sell a guy a couple silencers worth $1800 and it takes him a month to get his forms (fingerprints, CLEO signature, etc.) done. Then he submits his forms and a month later the form comes back rejected for whatever reason. That is two months that went by that I could not sell those two silencers to someone else. I've yet to have someone get rejected, so it hasn't been an issue. The amount of money or time might seem insignificant to you, but it is relative to the size (and wallet depth) of the business I guess. Imagine if some guy wanted some silencer that is in very little demand. You as a dealer special order the can and then the guy gets denied. Are you now stuck with the product that you probably cannot move? Surely you aren't suggesting a dealer not hold the customer's money, right? I could never do that to someone. (I'm referring to the part of your post in red.) Just wanting to clarify that point. Oh, there is no limit to how many NFA items a dealer stocks. Well, except for the size of your safe.  Best regards, Mark 
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No, he is not REQUIRED to do that. If you do not pay him, he can have the form 4 invalidated, as long as he has not phyisically transferred the silencer. EDIT: Documented via Item 5 on page 3 of Form 4. |
Easiest answer is discuss with dealer what will happen if not approved, or cannot get CLEO, or whatever. Problem solved. |
There it is. Ok... so you don't actually keep a "running stock" of suppressors. This wasn't like customer: "I want a suppressor" dealer: "We have these in stock." So you're restocking something that you don't normally carry in your store, correct? If that's the case, it makes sense to me now. Sorry for the confusion and seeming a little confrontational about it. |
I've never talked to a customer about a restocking fee. Most guys buying cans are also actively purchasing firearms. In other words, they should have no problem passing the background check for the NFA item. I have had one or two guys ask what would happen if they got rejected and I told them they'd get 100% refund. These guys were purchasing something I keep in stock though. Honestly, if it was a special order, I'd have to think about what to tell them. If the item was something that would be hard to sell, I could see then asking for some restocking fee. There are ways to transfer the item if CLEO signature is the only thing holding up the transfer though. So, I don't really see that as an issue. |
correct, if its a suppressor i keep in stock, say a Surefire, SWR, SRT, or AAC then their money back is no prob. someone else will buy it. Not all suppressors move fast, especially the special order ones. They can sometimes be specialized items |
The easiest way to solve all of this is to have a conversation with your dealer. Tell him you are interested in XYZ, ask if they have it in stock, what the procedure is and then what happens if you are denied, etc. A good dealer should be able to walk you through all of the details. If you get a bad feeling or if any of the info doesn't jive with stuff you see in this forum, then find another dealer. Same routine for the CLEO. In MA I had to get my CLEO to help justify my class 3 purchases since he has to approve the application to the state before you even go to the Federal level. I asked what his requirements were and we worked out a plan (he wanted me to get a C&R FFL to justify that I was a 'bona fide collector'). Once you have the conversation with both parties, you should be comfortable enough to get the process going. Good luck and let us know how it goes. |
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