Hi there Paizo -
I was just curious about the status of my order 838216 - it is for several Green Ronin products, and was made back on November 18. I checked my order history, and it still says that my order is pending. Any idea when you guys might be able to ship the books to me? Thanks.
- David Eitelbach
Mine said "back order" on several items, then one went to "cancelled" and the rest to "pending", then two days later mine was shipped and I got my GR order this past Thursday. So I bet when you get an official response it will literally be any day now, and it took 3 days after the day it was shipped to get to me in no where AZ.
Ordered mine November 16th and still no word...
I was waiting for the Medieval PHB, which was backordered, for a while. I decided I would just wait it out, figuring that copies of the stuff I ordered which was pending would be earmarked for me. However, Vic advised me on another thread (and I have read this from others) not to wait, since some of the books are going and never coming back. So I canceled the Medieval PHB and am hoping to get the other stuff. This is an awesome sale, and I would be bummed if my stuff sold out.
I was waiting for the Medieval PHB, which was backordered, for a while. I decided I would just wait it out, figuring that copies of the stuff I ordered which was pending would be earmarked for me. However, Vic advised me on another thread (and I have read this from others) not to wait, since some of the books are going and never coming back. So I canceled the Medieval PHB and am hoping to get the other stuff. This is an awesome sale, and I would be bummed if my stuff sold out.
Are you sure this is the case? Because I would be a little pissed if I had ordered my books before someone else, but they got their copy and I missed out because my order happened to contain an item that they backordered. It doesn't seem like a very good way to do things if you want to keep your customer base happy.
Olaf the Stout
Ditto to what Olaf said...
Hey guys, don't feel bad, my order from this sale is on its 13th business day of pending status. In theory, according to my order, it should ship sometime before Friday. That is subject to change, of course.
Hey guys, don't feel bad, my order from this sale is on its 13th business day of pending status. In theory, according to my order, it should ship sometime before Friday. That is subject to change, of course.
Mine is on it's 18th business day. I ordered on the 16th of November, it got held up by Egyptian Adventures: Hamunaptra being on backorder, and then on the 6th of December Crisis in Freeport was ditched from my order because it now sold out.
I would be very disappointed (to the point of canceling my Pathfinder subscription and not ordering from Paizo again) if I found out that orders are filled by the order in which they are shipped, not the order in which they were received. If someone from Paizo could let me know which one is the case it would be appreciated.
Olaf the Stout
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I would be very disappointed (to the point of canceling my Pathfinder subscription and not ordering from Paizo again) if I found out that orders are filled by the order in which they are shipped, not the order in which they were received. If someone from Paizo could let me know which one is the case it would be appreciated.
Olaf the Stout
In the last two weeks, I've read a lot of the comments, requests and complaints about the GR sale and all the disappointed people.
When I see comments like yours, I can't help but feel you would be punishing yourself a lot more than anyone else by cancelling PF and not ordering at Paizo anymore.
I'm just trying to understand your point of view here. I understand you could be disappointed and frustrated, after the way the sale turned out. But to the extend of cutting yourself from products you most probably enjoy?
I mean, as much as you want that Crisis in Freeport book, would you buy it at normal sales prices? It was for sale for a long time, but you never actualy bought it before, either because you didn't knew it existed, or because you thought you would never use the book, or because it was too expensive for the content you would get. Now, it gets on sale for 2$, and like everyone else, discover the book and decide you should take the opportunity to buy it, as the price is very low. If it wasn't for the fact that GR decided they wanted to sell out all their remaining inventory before 4e comes in, you would probably never have waited for that book. Which is why I'm thinking that cutting yourself from PF would hurt you more than anybody else.
As a last comment, Lisa posted somewhere else, saying this sale became a lot bigger than they expected, and that it was the first time it happened to them, and that they (and the whole supply chain) probably weren't prepared to handle a success like that. They've probably made errors, or done things in a way that could appear to be counter-intuitive or illogical to people that don't know everything that happened. They'll learn from that, and do better next time.
EDIT: And while I was posting, here's an answer by Vic, at the bottom :)
I would be very disappointed (to the point of canceling my Pathfinder subscription and not ordering from Paizo again) if I found out that orders are filled by the order in which they are shipped, not the order in which they were received. If someone from Paizo could let me know which one is the case it would be appreciated.
Olaf the Stout
In the last two weeks, I've read a lot of the comments, requests and complaints about the GR sale and all the disappointed people.
When I see comments like yours, I can't help but feel you would be punishing yourself a lot more than anyone else by cancelling PF and not ordering at Paizo anymore.
I'm just trying to understand your point of view here. I understand you could be disappointed and frustrated, after the way the sale turned out. But to the extend of cutting yourself from products you most probably enjoy?
I mean, as much as you want that Crisis in Freeport book, would you buy it at normal sales prices? It was for sale for a long time, but you never actualy bought it before, either because you didn't knew it existed, or because you thought you would never use the book, or because it was too expensive for the content you would get. Now, it gets on sale for 2$, and like everyone else, discover the book and decide you should take the opportunity to buy it, as the price is very low. If it wasn't for the fact that GR decided they wanted to sell out all their remaining inventory before 4e comes in, you would probably never have waited for that book. Which is why I'm thinking that cutting yourself from PF would hurt you more than anybody else.
As a last comment, Lisa posted somewhere else, saying this sale became a lot bigger than they expected, and that it was the first time it happened to them, and that they (and the whole supply chain) probably weren't prepared to handle a success like that. They've probably made errors, or done things in a way that could appear to be counter-intuitive or illogical to people that...
My disappointment is probably more related to the way that Paizo decide which orders to fill first than missing out on the Crisis in Freeport book.
From reading some posts on the messageboards here it seems like orders are filled by the order in which they are ready to ship, not the order in which they were received. This doesn't sound like a particularly fair way to do things to me. Let me give an example of why.
Say Person A orders 4 products. At the time of Person A's order 1 of the 4 items is on backorder. The way I understand it, Paizo does not reserve Person A a copy of the 3 items that are in stock. As a result, the backordered item could come in and one of the other 3 items is now out of stock. Person A again has to wait, with no guarantee that one of the other items is again sold out while they wait. Person A may have to wait months for all 4 products to finally be in stock together and their order to ship.
At the same time, Person B could place an order for some of the same products as Person A and get them straight away. Let's say now that Person B orders one of the products that Person A ordered and it is the last one available (they can't restock as the distributor has also sold out). Because Person A is waiting on a backordered product, they miss out but Person B, who could have placed his order weeks after Person A gets a copy. How is that fair?
Sure, that situation may not happen very often normally, but when you have something like the Green Ronin sale I imagine it could happen quite frequently. Many people would have had orders of 20+ products making it more likely that one item might be out of stock and holding up their order. On top of that, lots of people have been placing orders. This means that while there might have been 50 copies of a product when you place your order, if your other items aren't held when you wait for a backorder, they can still sell out while you wait. That is why I am not happy about it.
Just to give you some perspective on my situation, yes, I had considered buying the Crisis in Freeport book before it went on sale. My current campaign began with the Freeport Trilogy so it would have been nice to revisit it sometime later in the campaign. However, I live in Australia. Shipping RPG books to Australia is expensive so I try to wait and order a lot of products in one go to save on shipping costs. As a result, I hadn't put an order in for RPG books since Crisis in Freeport was released. When the $2 sale came up I thought it was a great opportunity to finally get it since the cheap sale price offset the shipping charges.
Olaf the Stout
Chief Technical Officer
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I've posted further explanation—including why we the allocation method we're using provides better service to more people—in this thread.
I've posted further explanation—including why we the allocation method we're using provides better service to more people—in this thread.
Better service to more people, but at the same time, favouring people who place small orders over those who place large ones.
Olaf the Stout
I think the bottom line here is that either way SOMEONE is going to get the order before somone else.
There is little that customer service can do about it now. I am sure they will take this GR sale into consideration when running other such promotions in the future, but we cannot fault them for a system that, as of yet, has served most of us fairly well.
I too placed a large GR order and will be disappointed if I miss things, but, as I said earlier, there is little to be done about it now.
I just hope everyone takes that into consideration and also we should note that the Customer Service Team has been forthright and availble to us, which is much more than many online stores can say.
I think a dialogue like this can be beneficial as it lets Paizo know our concerns and allows for them to realize the popularity (unexpectedly so) of some of their promotions. I can only imagine it is a growing pain, and hopefully a good one.
I know money talks, but I have a hard time understanding Olaf the Stout's assertation that he would cancel his subscription over the course of this one error.
Like I said, better to open a dialogue and figure things out, which seems to be the course of action most are taking.
Which means my above post had little utility and I can't quite recall why I was moved to write it.
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I know money talks, but I have a hard time understanding Olaf the Stout's assertation that he would cancel his subscription over the course of this one error.
I had a nice little response to this, with example and everything, but it looks like the message board ate it (hit submit and it went to the main page, if you're watching Gary :P). And since its almost 8pm and I'm still at work, I'm gonna head home before responding (if someone hasn't beat me to the punch).
I think the bottom line here is that either way SOMEONE is going to get the order before somone else.
There is little that customer service can do about it now. I am sure they will take this GR sale into consideration when running other such promotions in the future, but we cannot fault them for a system that, as of yet, has served most of us fairly well.
I too placed a large GR order and will be disappointed if I miss things, but, as I said earlier, there is little to be done about it now.
I just hope everyone takes that into consideration and also we should note that the Customer Service Team has been forthright and availble to us, which is much more than many online stores can say.
I think a dialogue like this can be beneficial as it lets Paizo know our concerns and allows for them to realize the popularity (unexpectedly so) of some of their promotions. I can only imagine it is a growing pain, and hopefully a good one.
I know money talks, but I have a hard time understanding Olaf the Stout's assertation that he would cancel his subscription over the course of this one error.
Like I said, better to open a dialogue and figure things out, which seems to be the course of action most are taking.
Which means my above post had little utility and I can't quite recall why I was moved to write it.
It isn't an error though. Vic has stated that the system is operating exactly as it should be. The system is doing what it is designed to do. I don't agree with that design though.
I do appreciate that Paizo staff are taking the time to discuss this with us (as I think that they should) and I have thanked them for it a couple of times. It is polite and good business sense to discuss customer complaints with them and to try and resolve them instead of ignoring them.
Just because they are discussing it with us, doesn't necessarily mean that they are going to change anything though. Vic has stated in reply to one of my posts that he thinks the current system gives the best outcome to most people. While it may give quicker shipping times to smaller orders, it makes things worse for larger orders, as I (and quite a few others) have experienced first-hand.
From his replies so far, it doesn't appear that Paizo have any plans to change their system so that this doesn't happen again. I understand that this could change once they consider people's reactions but currently this is all I have to go on.
As such, I am left with 2 options:
- Put up with it
- Do something about it
Since I don't work at Paizo I can't change the system. The only other thing I can do is voice my opinion on the matter and do one of the few other things I can to get a business's attention, take my money elsewhere.
Yes, Paizo do make great products that I like. However, do I like their products enough to offset how much I disagree with how decide who gets products from their store? At the moment my answer is no. Yes, I will be penalising myself to some extent in that I miss out on good adventures. There isn't any other option for me to take, other than to put up with the situation, something I don't want to do.
Olaf the Stout
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Chief Technical Officer
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I'm happy to continue discussing this, but can we please leave that discussion to a single thread?
I'm happy to continue discussing this, but can we please leave that discussion to a single thread?
Sure. Apologies for the threadjack.
Olaf the Stout