Robert’s Rants & Rationalizations

It only takes one mess-up and response to drop a company from my vendor list. B&H Photo Video Pro Audio whatever is the latest. I received two packages via U.S. Postal Service (did you read my other posts, yet?). These were separate orders from B&H (out of New York city). One order was just what I expected…copy of invoice and items ordered. Primo.

The second box was less than spectactular. The first thing I noticed is that it was missing the copy of the invoice (other companies may have a shipping page which is commonly folded and used as part of the exterior shipping label, usually in a pouch, while automated shipping centers of these e-tailers print directly on adhesive labels which are literally slapped onto the recently taped-up, read to ship boxes.

I found with the air bladders (instead of the ’shipping popcorn’) one item, my camera battery that I ordered. The battery was in the expected retail blister packaging sized to approximately, 7″x3″x1″, and very noticeable. But, nothing else was in the box, which is approx. 8″ L x 6″ W x 4″ D. And, in this sized box, you really can’t miss the Sandisk 2GB Compact Flash Card blister pack. It is larger than the battery that successfully made the trip!

I called their customer support and talked to “Moses”. I had to repeat several times the issue about the missing copy of the invoice or shipping document that normally accompanies the orders. It almost sounded like there wasn’t a process for my situation as he paused for uncomfortable periods of time between exchanges (no, I wasn’t yelling or very stern with him! I’ve been on the other side of the phone, so I am aware of the process flow).

One week later and before I was going to call, I received an email from someone called “B&H Customer Service” (the email had the closing salutation signed as “B&H Customer Service”…oh! There was no closing salutation, just “B&H Customer Service” to close the email!)

They said they shipped everything as ordered, or to be more specific…

Since they didn’t support their “definitely in the box” statement with anything more, I wrote that I am not happy and would have liked a statement which backed their investigation. Bottom line, I’m dropping B&H, and I will bring this up with others who use their services. I, of course, will offer suggestions for other companies friends and associates could use.

So, this 2GB CF card will cost me 2x as much when I could have simply got it from Best Buy down the street or Fry’s a bit farther away.

And, not to bring up a somewhat related issue, but you should ask yourself, do you want to support companies out of state where there is no taxes to you thereby no taxes to your local government which provide services to you? It is something I will consider more often and can easily support by balancing out the after-sales-support (similar to value added resellers or “VARs”) versus lower price via online purchasing.

Sincerely (closing salutation, which B&H Support staff/department doesn’t do!),
Robert (yes, a real name and person!)

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Update: same day, July 31, 2006…

They only state:
“Ok, we will check on that and get back to you. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused you.”

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Update: about one to two weeks later…

Well, I received a box with the memory card! Sorry that I didn’t update this earlier. I can’t remember if it came with the invoice, but I do know that not a call was made to me, nor a note in the box. They just sent the missing item and washed their hands of the issue.

Well, not really. How would you like to wake to nail pounding, and then see that they blocked your exit from your apartment? I knew it was happening, but wasn’t sure when they’d either begin my section or finish.

Around 11:30 PM, a man tells his South San Jose apartment neighbor to turn down the music. The music playing man takes a bat and hits the other man. The San Jose Police describe it as a “417″ (four-seventeen), or “Person with a weapon.” First, two units are assigned to the 417. Within minutes, five additional units are “attached” to this incident.

The bat weilding man is described as 20-30 years in age, white t-shirt and blue pants.

Five minutes pass, and an officer radios to the dispatcher, “We are Code-four” or “no further assistance is needed” or “situation under control.”

Ahh, the power of control, the feeling you ARE in control!

After many hours, the joy of making the scripted routine actually work the way I thought it out in my head came early, early this AM. And, later, I made another successful, although stuck on a bonehead error (wrong directory upon upload), script update!

Huh?

I added another table to the db fro tracking some actions within the site.

Success and progress this weekend!