the lure of amazon's free shipping option is always so enticing, until i realize that it may be weeks before i actually receive the items i've ordered.
case in point: on june 7 (please note--an entire 11 days before father's day) i order kelly's #1 wishlist item, season one of dark angel. in order to get free shipping, i must order $25 worth of goods. because i am a good steward of our family's resources (and a selfish spoiled princess) i also order greetings from knit cafe for myself. i make a mental note that the estimated delivery date is between june 14 and 16. "no problem," i think, because father's day is not until june 18. i immediately forget that i am having the order shipped to my office so no nosey husband of mine will figure out his awesome gift. also i forget to remember that all mail delivered to my office first goes through a clearinghouse which may add anywhere from 1 to 7 days to the estimated delivery date of ordered items (the clearinghouse is literally the black hole for mail).
every day since june 7 i've been tracking the status of my order. and today when my office mail arrived and it did not contain the best father's day present a man could hope for, i was crestfallen (not to mention, there was no sign of the spoiled rotten princess's book she so desperately needs!). i called amazon (actually, they call you...) and asked for an update on the status of my order. and surprisingly, the call center employee could not tell from their computer screen in india, where my order was, any better than i could.
lesson learned...pay the $4.98 for shipping and get your order in a timely manner or pay nothing and suffer the consequences.
2 comments:
Oh, Heidi, I have a feeling that Kelly will understand! (Happy Father's Day, Kelly!)
I learned this lesson about Amazon's "free" shipping two or three orders ago. I tracked the shipment all over the country and in the end, it was delivered by the US Postal Service! Why they just didn't ship it that way in the beginning was beyond me! I pay the extra shipping now because I'm way too much of a greedy piggy to wait so long!
Oh what a pain. I am so impatient I actually have done the Amazon Prime plan where you pay a one time shipping fee for the whole year. It sounded expensive at first but I have sooooo gotten my money's worth, shipping all sorts of gifts and other things all over the country, all for "free" since I paid in advance. Guaranteed within 2 days though which is way cool.
Post a Comment