I’ve got a request from fellow Zinc to share his recent bad pre-order experience here. Just a thought to customer service for the locals here. The below is exasperated by Zinc.
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This is my rather unpleasant (understatement) pre-order experience from da A.P. store.
To set the record straight and untarnished, I’ve refrained from voicing any opinions I have on this matter to save my a** from any legal issues (just in case) therefore what you read here is the truth… Nothing but the truth…
- 27 June 2007 : Placed order for Kureha @ shop (SGD10 deposit), was told by sales staff to expect delivery in Oct 2007
- Mid Oct 2007 : Kureha released in
- Nov 2007: No calls/SMS/announcement of any kind again, called several times but every reply was that it might arrive in the following week.
- Dec 2007: No calls/SMS/announcement of any kind yet again. Similar to Nov 2007, all replies indicated a delay.
- Late Dec 2007 : Called them and reply was that shipment is slated for mid Jan 2008.
- Mid Jan 2008: No calls/SMS/announcement of any kind yet again, called them and was told that shipment was cancelled due to some “problem” and they would refund my deposit.
- 30 Jan 2008: Went to collect deposit and their reason for the “problem” was the stock which was ready to ship from
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1 Feb 2008 : Got fed up. Bought from Ebay for SGD141 incl. shipping, rumors say that shop was selling SGD127 for those who pre-ordered the first shipment.
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11 Feb 2008: Kureha finally arrived in my house after many sleepless nights, countless phone calls, millions of brain cells, tons of frustration and more than half a year of waiting
Beautifully bubble wrapped to survive even an atomic bomb!
Kureha with friends. Yes lucky Seph gets all the girls again!
Mis-leading information
As you may noticed on the receipt, the shop’s name is printed as What!Comics instead of da real shop’s name, the address is correct but you won’t see What!Comics anywhere in
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I leave it to you to “guess” which shop and where :3. Anyway, I’ve personally never pre-ordered a single thing in my life before. I had this stubborn old streak in me that if I couldn’t have a chance to look, see, think and molest, oops I mean feel it before I buy it then I’ll rather wait for it to arrive at the shops.
Have you encountered such frustrating situations before?
alafista
Sunday, 16 March, 2008 at 23:57
Tough luck man. I never experience such delay before unless its a manufacturer delay where everyone is affected. I usually preorder my stuffs from either Hobby Search or TnT, and I haven gotten any bad experiences yet.
luvluvluv
Monday, 17 March, 2008 at 01:20
Sianz 1/2 =.= was desperately looking for some figures and just paid deposits for several orders @ the same shop… Hope i wont encounter such probs… Should had stick with KKnM and Latendo with my pre-orders..
Choo
Monday, 17 March, 2008 at 21:47
nice Kureha figure. Worth it eh? that gotta suck since it delay for 5 mths? Oh well, how about the deposit that you pay for that shop? Did they refund with apologies? lol
Lustrous Realm
Tuesday, 18 March, 2008 at 00:36
Awww that’s terrible to hear… 5 months of delay = DIE. Well, my Makoto figure from KKnM hasnt arrive yet.. I hope I wun encounter the same problem as u… Well im keeping my fingers crossed.
bj0rN
Tuesday, 18 March, 2008 at 03:28
Never really had problems. Maybe only with the case where my friend will delay online orders due to exchange rates.
Zinc
Tuesday, 18 March, 2008 at 17:16
I got my deposit on my final trip to the shop and that’s probably the last visit I’ll ever have in my life! In any case, I got better luck with ordering from forum otakus and online auctions so far.
Prim3
Thursday, 20 March, 2008 at 10:37
wow.. at least you got your Kureha finally :)
btw, who did you buy from Ebay? their packing is real nice :)
Zinc
Thursday, 20 March, 2008 at 15:55
His nick on Ebay is naka32542000, here’s the link to his Ebay shop http://stores.ebay.com/Anime-Japan-by-NRC
AS
Friday, 21 March, 2008 at 11:36
It’s sad to hear when people have bad experiences like that. But at least it was local and you could talk face to face, or rather over the phone in this matter. I have to deal with emails that might go unanswered, which some of them have, with dealers online.
gordon
Friday, 21 March, 2008 at 12:54
ah yes i know that shop. it’s just opposite KknM. the boss with specs seems like a pretty decent fellow. i seldom buy figures from them since they don’t have anything new in their shop. the last figure i bought from them was Freeing Haruhi (love it!).
the shop is pretty cramped. >.<
nowadays i only preorder my figures from ToynToys, their re-order prices are very attractive! or from my personal seller.
mervyn
Sunday, 30 March, 2008 at 16:25
@gordon: Yes, ToyNToys has been offering very attractive pre-order pricing and so far so good.
I pre-ordered 2 Kurehas from them as well. Didn’t contact me at all. I kept calling them from Japan and couldn’t even reach them. Ended up emailing and asking for a refund. Good thing was, managed to get a refund. Bad thing was, if I really wanted a Kureha so badly, the price would have gone up alot by now.