Thursday, March 15, 2007

Bad business

I'm a huge fan of business. No, really. I'm a fan of businesses that give you what you want, when you want it, at a fair price.

So am I a fan of Import CDs of Irvine, California? No, I am not. But why? What can a small CD-selling operation in sunny Irvine have done to incur the wrath of Zen?

As you may know, Dr Zen is a habitue of Amazon. I spend many hours happily browsing its catalogue, finding CDs that I might like to buy. Because I am old, I have not become used to stealing all of my music, like youngsters do, but buy CDs. I am a thorough materialist when it comes to recorded music.

Recently, I had a few dollars to spend, so I was looking through my wishlist to see what I fancied. That's a task in itself because it contains more than a hundred CDs. I was delighted to note though that Company of Justice by Play Dead has become available, and what's more, was available for just a tenner from Import CDs.

(Some will be asking at this point, who the fuck are Play Dead? Well, don't spread it around, but Dr Zen was a teen goff. I had many goff records: Dead Can Dance, Cocteau Twins, Gene Loves Jezebel, March Violets, that kind of thing. Play Dead are at the rockier end of goff and specialise in incomprehensible but enjoyable angst.)

So I snapped it up. Weirdly, the order processed without giving me the address option. But never mind, I had just bought some CDs, so it was clearly using the same addy.

A confirmation email arrived, telling me that the CD would soon be winging its way to... my sister's old address, the house she moved out of two months ago.

No need for panic though. A simple email to Import CDs and problem solved.

At least, you would have thought so. But Import CDs does not believe in customer service. It believes in teh Roolz. Import CDs wrote back and said, sorry, it's teh Roolz of Amazon that we can't change your address. You must cancel the order if you don't want it.

Now, Dr Zen understands the need of some sad losers to shroud their sorry lives in bureaucracy, but here was a situation brewing. These people were not going to send the CD to the place where I was. They were going to insist on sending it to the place where I definitely wasn't.

So I cancelled the order immediately, with a serve of "you are fuckwits", just in case Import CDs thought that refusing to change a delivery address is a reasonable thing for a business to do:

You are joking. Why on earth not? I am the customer and I'm asking you
to send it somewhere else. I paid for it, not Amazon. It has nothing
to do with them whether you send it here, there or to the moon.

This is the order number:
736-5190049-0987351

If you won't change the address, cancel the order. I'll be giving you
a negative review on the site. It's absolute bullshit that you won't
actually agree to send me the CD I've already paid for.

Dr Zen
- Hide quoted text -

On 3/10/07, Import CD Specialists wrote:
> We are not permitted by Amazon to make any changes to your shipping
> address If you wish to cancel, please provide your order number.
>


To which, Import CD replied four days later:

I'm afraid this order has already shipped and it is too late for us to
now cancel.


Yes. Too late because you waited until you had shipped it to bother replying, not because I didn't cancel it in time. Import CDs could of course pretend they did not receive the email cancelling the order. That's what your ordinary shithead would do.

But no. These clowns didn't even have the sense to do that. They replied to the email cancelling the order. Just not until they had shipped it. To someone else's house.

Of course, I emailed them to demand a refund. They said, you can have one when the CD is returned.

What teh fuck? I have to wait for someone I don't know to return a CD to some place in America, rather than simply binning it, before the company that purposely sent it somewhere that I'm not will pay me back the money for the CD they sent to someone I don't know?

Here is the problem with business on the interwebnets: I can't go round to these people's shop and call them a cunt to their face. They would never behave like this with real, flesh and blood customers because they would be too afraid that I would punch their teeth in. Particularly after saying that they weren't the ones who made a mistake. Yes, dude, you were. You made two. The first was to send a CD to an address they knew I wasn't at after I had cancelled the order. The second was not to do the right thing and give my money back. Because now they will be receiving a ton of whiny emails from me until they do. I might even sue the cunts. I'm guessing that California has a statute that says that if a customer cancels an order before dispatch, they get a full refund.

I know, big deal, it's only a tenner. But it isn't. It's the many times these fuckers do something to people who they don't think can stop them. It's the businesses like them who fuck you over because they are not providing a service but making a dollar. Like governments, who also fuck you from behind a curtain of anonymity and bureaucracy, these people should be serving us, not using us. I am furious that these people do not feel they should do the right thing, and hide behind teh Roolz as a means of not doing it.

posted by Dr Zen @ 2:05 pm

13 Comments:

At 12:40 am, Blogger Paula said...

I work in Irvine. You want me to go over there and give them what-for? Send me an email with the details. :)

 
At 2:34 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I was just going to refer you to Paula, LOL...

And you're right, it's not about the AMOUNT, it's about the principle of providing reasonable customer service.

Give 'em hell, dude.

 
At 10:00 am, Blogger Kos said...

Did you purchase with a credit card? If so, just tell the card-issuing bank to deny the charges. I've had to do it, and for a similar thing. I just had to fill out a challenge form. Didn't cost me a cent.

 
At 10:08 am, Blogger Dr Zen said...

Jeff, I don't really know how that works. I was hoping to shame them into doing the right thing. It never works though. I mean, how can you expect decency from someone who insists on sending a CD to the wrong address because it's teh Roolz? That's just demented. You'd think the least they would do is put a hold on the order.

 
At 2:10 am, Blogger Kos said...

Some businesses just don't, um, appreciate business.

 
At 3:02 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I purchased a DVD set through Import CD specialists, and they sent me the wrong one. In order to get a refund on the return shipping, I was instructed to order the DVD set from them again on Amazon. I just went to Amazon and Import CD Specialists no longer have the DVD set in stock. I am going to leave some nasty feedback for them. Very poor business!!!

 
At 2:01 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sounds like your beef should be with amazon, which supplied the incorrect address to the supplier. They're just following the rules set by amazon; the rules which allows them to sell through amazon. I've gotten some decent customer service from amazon. When they've screwed up, I've even gotten additional $$$ to ensure currency conversion fees were covered on my credit card (I was impressed).

 
At 8:03 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

import cd specialists are crooks. Something similar happened to me, I told them to cancel an order I had placed and they said it was too late as it had already been shipped. I had placed the order the previoius evening, and it was morning when I got that reply. A day later I get an e-mail saying my item had shipped that day. They obviously lied to me and refused to cancel it. Now I'm waiting for it to see if it even gets here. Beware!

 
At 2:08 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I am a seller through Amazon and unfortunately there are rules that need to be adhered to in order to do business with them. It seems like common sense to always check your "ship to" address before clicking on process order, but I know mistakes are made. I have never had a problem with any order placed using ImportCD through Amazon, but that doesn't mean others have had my luck. Their prices are excellent.

 
At 10:48 am, Blogger Dr Zen said...

Please read the post through. They purposely sent the CD to an address I had let them know was not mine or that of anyone I knew, and that the CD would not be returned. There's following the rules and then there's following the rules.

The thing with having to follow the rules to do business with Amazon is that the rules exist to protect the customer, and are not simply arbitrary impositions by Amazon. You can't change address because if someone hijacks my order, I will ask Amazon to reimburse me. That was quite clearly not the case here. It was pretty obvious to Import CDs that they were sending the CD into the void. They didn't care, because they had the money. They simply weren't bothered that both I and Amazon would be inconvenienced because there was no inconvenience to them. They had the money and that's all they cared about.

Well, in a small way, they have been inconvenienced. My blog is little read, but maybe 200 different people have hit this post. Hopefully, it's cost them some business.

 
At 9:17 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm having problems with this Co. now.They really suck! Amazon seems to go along with everything they do. Import cds is CRAP!!!!!!!!!!!!

 
At 10:49 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I just bought a movie from them on Amazon and emailed them serveral times regarding the tracking info. Each time they replied it was via automated message.

The last email I sent...

Why has my item been in Des Plaines, IL for the last 4 days!!!!!!???? It should have been here by now! I WANT A REAL ANSWER NOT AN AUTOMATED MESSAGE! I know my delivery window, DO NOT SEND ME ANOTHER EMAIL OF IT! I WANT A REAL ANSWER FROMA PERSON!

Their reply...

Greetings,

Thank you for placing your order with us through Amazon.com. The date range for order delivery is:

Expedited: 2-6 business days

Standard: 4-14 business days (may take up to 21 business days).

Please keep in mind these are estimates only and will not necessarily take up until the last day for delivery.

If it is the end of the delivery estimate for your order and your order has still not arrived, please do the following:

1.) reply to this email (please be sure to include your order number if you have not already done so)

2.) confirm your shipping address by providing the full address to us so we can be sure there were no mistakes with the delivery address provided.

Kind Regards,

ImportCDs

17822 Gillette Ave Suite A

Irvine, CA 92614

USA


They really don't listen to their customer or provide good customer service or satisfaction. Won't buy another thing from them!!!!

 
At 4:48 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

The samething happen to me too. I order a movie and still havent got it...i even called usps and told me that my package was going round and round...i contact them and still havent recieve a respond.....so dr zen did u ever get ur money back??

 

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