Online Purchases

K

kyleb

Final Approach
Joined
Jun 13, 2008
Messages
7,554
Location
Marietta, GA
Display Name
Display name:
Drake the Outlaw
We're going to be returning a bunch of online purchases. Note to retailers: Just because you sell an item online doesn't mean I'm going to accept diminished quality. (We've made several online purchases of items we'd bought previously. More than a few of the items were value engineered since the last time we purchased.)

And damage... Just because the item is going out the warehouse door in a box doesn't mean you can stick damaged merchandise in the box. I have a new pair of pants which arrived complete with a small stain and pen (?) marks. SWMBO opened a gift that was obviously damaged before it went into the shipping box.

Please don't make me go back to standing in line at the mall.
 
Also deductions for not naming brands, suppliers, sellers...
 
Disappointed in the rant, overall low-quality for content reasons. 9/10 points for correct spelling and grammar.
 
I don’t order a lot online. As a matter of fact, I’m all for supporting local businesses when I can. But the big advantage of ordering online is the unlimited supply of every item in every size and color.

And sometimes price. I needed a replacement bumper for my truck and stopped by a used parts retailer the other day. $550 for a used bumper and $450 for the receiver hitch. That sounded crazy to me so I looked the parts up online. Found a NEW bumper for $211 and a new hitch for $100. I took the ipad in to the used parts retailer because I didn’t want to wait for shipping and figured they’d negotiate. They did - came down to $400 on the bumper and $300 on the hitch. I scratched my head and left, order the parts online Thursday and they both arrived at my front door before noon Saturday. Perfect looks, perfect fits.
 
flhrci said:
Disappointed in the rant, overall low-quality for content reasons. 9/10 points for correct spelling and grammar.
Click to expand...

I really considered it more of a PSA than a rant.

If you want a rant, we'll have to choose a subject more near and dear to my heart like my wife's difficulties answering direct questions. EG:

Q: "Honey, what time is it?"

A: "We won't be leaving until 3:00."
 
I must be lucky. I don't have any online-shopping horror stories that I can blame on the vendor that I dealt with.

I've had a couple of items mangled by the shipping companies. They typically notice it and own up to it. I also had the entire contents of a package disappear once. UPS caught it, owned up to it, and notified Amazon. They shipped a replacement via overnight.

I had one improperly-packaged glass bowl of a set of six from a third-party Amazon seller shatter in transit. I negotiated a one-sixth refund from Amazon. I really didn't need six anyway.

I've had the occasional bizarre routing by FedEx SmartPost result in very long shipping delays when buying from Sam's Club online. I don't know if it was incidental to my complaining, but Sam's Club doesn't use FedEx SmartPost to ship to me anymore. They've used FedEx Ground, UPS Ground, UPS SurePost, R&L, and occasionally USPS end-to-end; but they haven't sent me anything by SmartPost since I complained. The same is true for Amazon. They use all kinds of shipping methods, but haven't used SmartPost since I called them to complain.

I'm presently waiting for some lithium batteries that I ordered from a company in Texas more than two weeks ago, but that was because I specified USPS Parcel Select, which was the cheapest method. What didn't occur to me until later was that USPS uses scheduled passenger carriers for shipping, so lithium batteries have to move by train and truck. (FedEx and UPS, on the other hand, use their own cargo planes.) Oh, well. It wasn't like I needed them right away, anyway.

I had to meet an R&L driver in a village about ten miles away to pick up my generator from Sam's Club because there was no way he would have been able to get a 55-foot trailer up the winding road to my house. But I knew that when I placed the order, so it was no big deal.

Offhand, those are the only problems that come to mind. Considering that I get two or three online orders most weeks, I really can't complain.

As for local mom-and-pop vendors, there really are none for most of the stuff I buy online. I'll give an independent mom-and-pop store preference if they have what I need, but not a company-owned chain store like Tractor Supply or Best Buy. They have to compete with Amazon and the rest in either price or convenience if they want my business.

Rich
 
I’ve been doing online shopping almost since it became a thing. Only had a couple of times I had to return something and it was usually not a big deal. The big ones like Amazon have it pretty well streamlined, I would say the larger problem is with items that cost < $20 or so. Because of return shipping it rapidly becomes not worth the hassle or cost to return it.

I do buy a lot of stuff on amazon. Where I live going to the store for something quickly ends up taking at least half a day so it’s pretty handy to just throw stuff that’s not needed right this minute in the Amazon cart and have it delivered.
 
Gerhardt said:
As a matter of fact, I’m all for supporting local businesses when I can
Click to expand...

I try to do the same. Walmart has not ruined this small town. We even have a sewing machine and vacuum cleaner repair shop, and one Tv repair shop still in business. But he is getting on in years, when he retires I am thinking that shop will close.

Actually, the nearby casino is ruining the local economy by sucking up all the lose change from the folks that can least afford to lose money. The casinos lie. Everyone is not a winner.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top