Thanks for info MIOdude. Pretty interesting since they advertise 3-5 business days in U.S. 7-14 in Canada. I think that RHP'rs should give feedback on their experiences with commercial vendors to avoid problems. Chesscafe, for example, is very prompt and efficient. I had a problem with one of their DVD's and emailed them. They called back by telephone and straightened everything out. When I order a book or cd, etc. from Chesscafe, it arrives amazingly fast. I would have stuck with them, but they didn't have this particular DVD in stock. It was the new Korchnoi series. I'm a great admirer of Korchnoi and was looking forward to it, but...oh well...
Thanks, wulbgr. Sounds like a good, reliable site, and prompt. We Rhp people spend a lot on books, dvds, cds, etc. and want to hear from people who have had a good experience and avoid the clunkers, like Chess Central. So far chesswholesale and chess cafe look like the good guys. Anybody else have a good, reliable, prompt supplier out there?
Last summer I ordered Deep Fritz 8 and CT ART 3.0 from Chess Central. I used two day delivery and the items arrived on time (as I recall, I ordered on a Wednesday, and I wanted the items to be delivered to me at my office by Friday, so I could use them over the weekend).
Chess Central seems to be a pretty reliable site.
What can I say, Lebloop? Got a "thanks for your order" on 1 April. My credit card company paid them on 4th. Then nothing. I emailed them twice--no answer. I called by telephone and left a message (of course, no one live was there)--no answer. If there was a problem, they should have gotten back. I just know I would never use them again and don't recommend them to anyone. If the material ever arrives I'll post a halleluja message on this site.
Hi Buddy,
We strive to have great customer service at ChessCentral. We answer all messages left by phone within 24 hours (business days) and most emails gets answered within 1-3 hours (during business hours).
It sounds that some way, some how, you fell through the cracks - but we have no record of any purchase from anybody recently in your town. Possibly you ordered from another company? In any case, we apologize that you had to seek out a forum just to be heard.
If you woiuld email me at:
email@chesscentral.com
With the name you purchased the product with, order number if available, and email address, I promise to look into this situation immediately and take care of you personally.
Again, I apologize for the inconvenience this has caused you.
Sincerely,
Sid Pickard
Owner
www.ChessCentral.com
Pickard & Son, Ltd.
I have written Mr. Pickard an email with the relevant information, and I'll report back to this forum the outcome (if any). I encourage all RHP'rs to give feedback to the other players the successes and failures in purchasing products or other chess related activities. Unfortunately, we can't always rely on advertising for good information, so we must rely on each other.
Originally posted by buddy2
... I encourage all RHP'rs to give feedback to the other players the successes and failures in purchasing products or other chess related activities. Unfortunately, we can't always rely on advertising for good information, so we must rely on each other.
You're absolutely right on that Buddy... and I hope that Sid is able to take care of the problem and get the merchandise to you soon...
And, it's important to post both successes and failures in ordering/receiving merchandise... word of mouth is undoubtedly the best advertising there is...
It used to be said that if a person has a good experience with a business, they might tell 2 people about it... but a bad experience will cause a person to tell about 7 people about the bad experience.. (and with the explosion of the internet, those "negative" numbers increase exponentially... )
I ordered a chess clock from CajunChess once. When it didn't arrive they sent out another right away at no charge. A week or two after it had arrived my wife happened to be talking to an elderly woman who lived down the street when something my wife said rang a bell with the woman. She retrieved the package which was the original lost shipment. It turned out there was a typo on my original order and it went to the wrong address. Since my buddy was after a clock as well, I paid Cajun for the second item and sold it to him.
Well, here's the resolution after much back and forth communication between me and Chess Central. It seems they got my email wrong, even though they had the right email address thanking me for the order, so they were unable to communicate--get this--that the post office said my address in Florida did not exist. CC was supposed to send the DVD by UPS (not post office). The reason I do this is that I get my mail forwarded to my N.J. address from Florida. But CC sent it by post office anyway and of course the P.O. sent it right back to them. Because of the screwup with the email, CC couldn't relay this info to me. Only by the intervention of Thebloop (see previous postings) did CC get my full email address and tell me what was going on. Janet, apparently a secretary at CC was very nice, and apologized for the confusion. She even game me a free ebook from site. Well, I wrote her, now that this mess is straightened out, can I reorder the Korchnoi DVD cause I really wanted it. Sorry, she wrote, they have no more copies and have to wait for a resupply from Germany. Aaaargh. Well, in the end, CC credited my account so I wasn't out any money. There was no sinister plot behind CC's activities, just honest confusion.
Originally posted by arrakisIn my experience this is sometimes the results of holdups in customs. They seem very inconsistant. From the story in my earlier post, the first clock was delivered directly (to the wrong address) without any customs charges, but the second clock had to be picked up at a post office and there was a $12 customs charge.
3 weeks is a very long time... 🙁
In a related story, I had to reorder a pawn from my House of Staunton set that my 3 y.o. daughter had chomped. The pawn was $3 and the shipping was $5. HoS insured the shipment for a value of $20 and customs charged me using this as a value and added a $5 processing charge. With exchange the pawn wound up costing me $20. The moral I guess is request that small items not be insured when shipping internationally.