Amazon Orphans unite!

[Darrin Drader]

They just updated me saying that I won't get it until the last half of the month. If my FLGS has it in stock, I'm canceling my Amazon order.

 

[Fifth Element]

Definitely glad I decided to support my FLGS. Man these books are nice.

 

[kristov]

I ordered mine in freakin MARCH and paid for "standard shipping (not free" and I just got my dear customer letter.

WTH?!

 

[Demmero]

If it was because of rabid D&D lovers refreshing constantly, it looks like Amazon REALLY "screwed the pooch" by under-ordering the gift sets: Not only are they losing customers, but they lose something like 1-3 million bucks per hour they are down (according to NPR last night, who said they were down for about two hours).

To put it another way, we MIGHT have cost Amazon $2-6 million because they didn't order enough gift sets.

Even if it isn't true, I might choose to believe it is...sweet, sweet poetic justice

I'm pretty pissed off to have gotten a delay notice from Amazon for the gift set (which I ordered 4 months ago), but I think we may be fingering the wrong culprit. All the major online sellers seem to have the PHB in stock currently (buy.com says "ships in 1-2 days). It looks like individual books are readily available.

I'm thinking that Amazon put in plenty orders for the gift box as time went along and customer orders piled up. It just doesn't make much sense for them to not have the gift sets for so many customers who ordered 3-5 months in advance.

I bet its WotC's fault--I'm thinking they severely underestimated the demand for the gift box. After all, a 4E game's supposed to be 1 DM and 5 players, right? That means maybe one gift box and 5 individual PHBs required, since players don't required the DMG and MM. Yet it's consistently been the gift set appearing near the top of Amazon's Hot 100 (or whatever it's called).

I've got a suspicion that the second printing of 4E that we've heard about may be printings of the gift box exclusively.

Grumble, grumble, grumble....

 

[Agamon]

Definitely glad I decided to support my FLGS. Man these books are nice.

Damn, someone hit them with a beauty stick, eh? Very nice, indeed. I don't want to mar them by playing with them...

I ordered an extra PHB and the DM screen form Amazon.ca. They say end of August. Not in a hurry for the book, but I'd like the screen before more than a month after it's released. If it hasn't been shipped by the time the FLGS gets it in, screw 'em.

 

[Natural 20]

another twist...

Don't know what to make of this, but it is worrisome... I ordered May 29th and had an original delivery date of 6/6 - 6/10... well I also got the delay e-mail that changed my expectations to expected delivery of 6/18 - 6/28. When I went to Amazon though for order status I got this snippet:

Order Placed: May 29, 2008
Amazon.com order number: XXX-XXXXXXX-XXXXXXX
Order Total: $57.72

Shipment #1: Shipping Soon We are preparing these items for shipment and this portion of your order cannot be canceled or changed. Need information on returning an item?

Delivery estimate:June 18, 2008 - June 26, 2008​

Since I ordered via Prime, why would they "shipping soon" where soon (to them) is June 18th (not soon to me).

I wonder if they have frozen my order (changed the status to "shipping soon") to prevent me from cancelling the order and losing the sale? I do not think Amazon has handled this very well from a customer relations point of view.

 

[The_Universe]

My books have still not shipped. Grrrrrrrr.

 

[Darrin Drader]

Well, I did it. I canceled my Amazon order and went to my FLGS and paid full cover price for the gift box. It cost an extra $30, but I feel a lot less dirty this way, and I have my books! It's a win - win!

 

[Shining Dragon]

I'm pretty pissed off to have gotten a delay notice from Amazon for the gift set (which I ordered 4 months ago), but I think we may be fingering the wrong culprit. All the major online sellers seem to have the PHB in stock currently (buy.com says "ships in 1-2 days). It looks like individual books are readily available.

I'm thinking that Amazon put in plenty orders for the gift box as time went along and customer orders piled up. It just doesn't make much sense for them to not have the gift sets for so many customers who ordered 3-5 months in advance.

I was told by someone, so believe it or not, that Amazon does not send in their orders until time of shipping/release (or at least after printing has been done).

In the case of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, such a practice works - the publisher would have printed millions of copies, more than enough to fill any late orders from Amazon. But with roleplaying games, WotC doesn't want millions of copies languishing in a warehouse so they print enough to fill the initial orders (especially when you are talking about a limited product such as the gift set) and thats it.

I bet its WotC's fault--I'm thinking they severely underestimated the demand for the gift box.

Like any company, they would have produced an amount based on the orders the received (plus some). If Amazon don't send in their orders before printing then WotC can only guess. I would blame Amazon for this stuff up - only Amazon knows how many they require. Like any company if they need to estimate then they need to estimate themselves, its not WotC's responsibility to do Amazon's sales estimates for them.

 

[Teflon Billy]

My patience wore thin today, so I tried to upgrade my shipping. Now Amazon says I won't get my books until July! I thinking of cancelling my order and supporting my local hobby shop.

That's what I did.

Suddenly, for an added cost of about 20 bucks, my "shipping date went from "Mid-July" to "Today"

FLGS wins this round.