Backordered Beginner Box Information

[Sara Marie]

This thread is intended to provide information and updates on the status of Beginner Box backorders and will be updated as we have details to share.

We expect to begin receiving our first sets from the reprint in early May. We anticipate to be able to wrap up fulfillment of all currently submitted Humble Bundle Beginner Box orders and paizo.com backorders by late July 2016.

Very Important Information You Should Be Aware of if You Have a Pending Beginner Box Order

• We only settle payment methods when we are shipping orders. If we have not shipped your order, we have not charged your payment method.
  
• When your order is submitted, you may have seen an authorization on your online banking (we also note the authorization on your order's order history page).
  
• Authorizations are not settlements, it merely checks the account number is valid and funds are available; however, many banks will "hold" the authorized funds until either the order is shipped and we initiate the settlement or the authorization reaches its expiration date.
  
• Due to the backordered Beginner Boxes's expected shipping timeframe, most, if not all, authorizations will have expired by the time orders are expected to ship.
  
• When your order is being prepared for shipping, we will re-authorize your payment method. If we are unable to authorize you payment method, you will receive an email notifying you. You can adjust your payment method or retry the payment method from your order history.

If you need to make changes to your Beginner Box shipment or payment method, you can visit your Order History on your My Account page: https://secure.paizo.com/paizo/account/orders

At this time we are not able to determine when a specific Beginner Box backorder might be ready to ship other than "by late July", but please let our customer service department know if you have any other questions about your order by starting a new thread for your individual question or emailing us at [e-mail].

[Sara Marie]

We have an email with the above details for shipping expectations being prepared to be sent out this evening.

[Sara Marie]

We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the first shipment of Beginner Boxes from our manufacturer. They are supposed to arrive end of this week or possibly next. Our warehouse is prepping for the pallets to hit the loading dock so we can start shipping them out as soon as possible. The next update will hopefully be when they arrive!

[Sara Marie]

Update! The first pallets of our Beginner Boxes reprint have arrived from the manufacturer! Our warehouse staff is going to begin shipping these soon (very likely if all goes well, we will start to see some orders shipping out tomorrow, May 11th, possibly maybe even late this afternoon).

[Sara Marie]

Link to picture of first shipment of Beginner Boxes in our warehouse: http://officialpaizo.tumblr.com/.

~sara

[Andrew Kurowski]

I moved to a new address. How do I update the address? I went to the link but see no edit button.

[Katina Davis]

Andrew Kurowski wrote:

I moved to a new address. How do I update the address? I went to the link but see no edit button.

Hello Andrew,

You should be able to adjust your address on the My Addresses page, but if you are unable to do so, you can send the new address to [e-mail] and we'll change it for you.

Please don't hesitate to let me know if there are any further questions or concerns that you may have in the meantime, and I'll be more than happy to help out.

Thanks!
Katina

[Arufets of Canada]

Can you send out an email update to those who aren't going to have there set mailed to them?

This waiting game and not email updates is saddening

[Sara Marie]

As long as you have your address and shipping + handling payment method entered correctly, we will ship out your set sometime between now and the end of July*. Unfortunately, we are not able to provide individual estimates for which wave of Beginner Box shipments a particular order will fall into.

*Current estimate of when we expect to wrap up all currently submitted Humble Bundle Beginner Box orders.

[Joshua Sturms]

Sara Marie wrote:

As long as you have your address and shipping + handling payment method entered correctly, we will ship out your set sometime between now and the end of July*. Unfortunately, we are not able to provide individual estimates for which wave of Beginner Box shipments a particular order will fall into.

*Current estimate of when we expect to wrap up all currently submitted Humble Bundle Beginner Box orders.

I am moving in June. I dont want to change my address pre-maturely. I also dont want to have it shipped to my old address if I already moved. Is there anyway to get notification that my order is coming up on the list so I can ensure that I have the right shipping information entered.

[Sara Marie]

Unfortunately not. However, we can always suspend the order until a specific date so that if it is ready to ship before then, it will be held until that date.

[Arufets of Canada]

Are you sending out the order first in first out at least?

[Sara Marie]

Our system is designed to generate packing lists in the order that they were submitted and in a manner that is useable and efficient for the warehouse staff.

[Diego Valdez]

Hello Everyone,

If you are checking on your Humble Bundle order, but can’t find it in your order history page, you will want to check that the order was fully submitted from the redemption page. The last step is a confirmation tab with the "Submit Order" button. You can access the redemption page and complete the order submission process by clicking on ‘My Account’ at the top of the page. On your account page scroll down, and near the bottom of the right hand column you will see a box that says “Humble Bundle Redemption." Clicking on that will take you to the page that you redeemed the codes on. Scroll down past the little box to redeem the codes and past the larger box that has all of the redeemed codes in it. You should see 3 tabs for billing, shipping, and confirm. Clicking on the confirm tab will show you a page where you can review all of the information you put in, but it also has a submit order button. Click that button. Once you do this you should receive an email confirmation and should be able to see the order on your order history page.

If your order has been submitted and you still cannot see it on your order history page please let us know.

[Revilo Qin]

Hi,
Notice that since the last time I checked, the order no longer says "backordered" under the Shipment Information. Does that mean that it will be shipping to me at some point soon?

I realize you guys were slammed, and appreciate your updates; I'm just a curious type.

Thank you.

[Sharaya]

Revilo Qin wrote:

Hi,

Notice that since the last time I checked, the order no longer says "backordered" under the Shipment Information. Does that mean that it will be shipping to me at some point soon?

I realize you guys were slammed, and appreciate your updates; I'm just a curious type.

Thank you.

That means that we have the inventory here and entered into the system. But because we have so many orders to ship, we cannot provide any more specific estimates than that it should ship sometime between now and mid to late July.

[guswadsworth]

So i am just verifying that the status "pending" means that you have the stock and it will be shipped some time in the next couple months. Sorry if this is a redundant question.

[Diego Valdez]

Hello guswadsworth,

Yes. As Sharaya mentioned above we have received the boxes and they are now in our inventory. That is why it says pending. Our warehouse is shipping them out and we still expect to have them all shipped out by the end of July.

[anneth42]

Just got mine today.
Thank you and I have been nothing but impressed with how all of this has been handled.
Keep up the good work!

I appreciate the updates and info as they came out.

[bugleyman]

anneth42 wrote:

Just got mine today.

Thank you and I have been nothing but impressed with how all of this has been handled.
Keep up the good work!

I appreciate the updates and info as they came out.

Out of curiosity, does the newest printing have different sized pawns for small creatures (goblins, etc.), and do the pawns have a symbol to indicate they came with the BB?

Thanks! :)

[bugleyman]

No one who has received the latest printing of the Beginner Box is willing to comment, eh? :-/

[Arufets of Canada]

bugleyman wrote:

No one who has received the latest printing of the Beginner Box is willing to comment, eh? :-/

Once I have mine I'll make a note if someone else doesn't.

[bugleyman]

Arufets of Canada wrote:

Once I have mine I'll make a note if someone else doesn't.

Thanks!

[Katina Davis]

bugleyman wrote:

anneth42 wrote:

Just got mine today.

Thank you and I have been nothing but impressed with how all of this has been handled.
Keep up the good work!

I appreciate the updates and info as they came out.

Out of curiosity, does the newest printing have different sized pawns for small creatures (goblins, etc.), and do the pawns have a symbol to indicate they came with the BB?

Thanks! :)

Hi there,

So sorry we missed this thread! I've taken a look, and the pawns in the Beginner Box are all medium-sized except for the few Large monsters. No smaller pawns for lil' guys like goblins. And there are no markings to denote that they are from the Beginner Box.

I hope this helps! Please let me know if there are any further questions or concerns that you may have and I'll be glad to help out.

Thanks!
Katina

[godofallcows]

Will we be given a notice when our order is ready? I really don't like waiting for a charge out of the blue, that's not a very great business strategy.

[bugleyman]

Katina Davis wrote:

So sorry we missed this thread! I've taken a look, and the pawns in the Beginner Box are all medium-sized except for the few Large monsters. No smaller pawns for lil' guys like goblins. And there are no markings to denote that they are from the Beginner Box.

I hope this helps! Please let me know if there are any further questions or concerns that you may have and I'll be glad to help out.

Thanks!
Katina

Yup; just what I wanted to know. Thanks!

[DharmaBummed]

godofallcows. No they will not. A charge out of the blue was exactly what I got and since I only move money when it's actually needed it delayed my order over a week. I'd also let them know when you that you've re-submitted payment, if it's declined the first time, I waited several days after resubmitting with no change in the order status and the order was shipped the day after they responded to my post about the delay.

[Aka Gambit]

DharmaBummed wrote:

godofallcows. No they will not. A charge out of the blue was exactly what I got and since I only move money when it's actually needed it delayed my order over a week. I'd also let them know when you that you've re-submitted payment, if it's declined the first time, I waited several days after resubmitting with no change in the order status and the order was shipped the day after they responded to my post about the delay.

Yeah my payment failed 2 times as when I ordered I had the money set aside, finally had to use a new cc to get it through...still says pending for me though..so from what is above I think its being shipped now.

[Steve Geddes]

It's probably a little late for this advice. However, one way you can manage this is to buy yourself a gift voucher and then redeem it for store credit. Then, when your order is ready, the system will clear your credit first and the CC has already been processed when you initially made the purchase.

As I understand things, the issue arises due to the various merchant/credit card company agreements. The merchant isn't supposed to charge your card until the product ships. So situations like this mean a hold is placed when you initially order, then it lapses a week or so later, then another hold is placed as shipping looms and then finally the charge is settled as the freight label is printed.

It's invisible when Paizo have lots of stock and aren't swamped by a huge number of orders. The "buy yourself credit" strategy is useful if you don't have unlimited credit (or if you use a debit card or similar).

The downside is you can't change your mind and cancel the order between ordering and shipping. The gift voucher settles immediately and is (I'm pretty sure) non-refundable.

[kevinadnd]

Any updates to the shipping of the Beginner Boxes?

It's been a month since the last real update.

[Sara Marie]

We are still shipping Beginner Boxes out as quickly as we can!

Unfortunately we do not have the ability to notify people prior to preparing the Beginner Box orders for shipping that their backordered product is about to ship.

As noted by Steve Geddes, if you're worried about the funds being available, purchasing store credit in the amount of your shipping and handling and asking customer service to apply it to the order is a good way to bypass that.

Otherwise, make sure your address is up to date. If you need to, we can suspend the order until a certain point if you need to delay shipping until an address change has taken place (i.e; moving).

[DharmaBummed]

You're also very slow at actually getting the payment through. I re-authorized on Sunday 6/12/16. Was told by the website the package shipped Friday 6/17/16, but the money wasn't withdrawn until Monday 6/20/2016. This is hands down the worst e-commerce experience I've had. I was a bit understanding of the 4 month delay for allowing Humble Bundle to continue taking money for product you knew you didn't have, but it being additionally delayed weeks more because of your inadequate POS(point of sale) system I'm not so understanding of. On top of that you overcharged me on sales tax unless it's 9.5% where you are in Washington. For me it's 8.5% and for almost $10 shipping I didn't even get a tracking number.

[Aka Gambit]

DharmaBummed wrote:

You're also very slow at actually getting the payment through. I re-authorized on Sunday 6/12/16. Was told by the website the package shipped Friday 6/17/16, but the money wasn't withdrawn until Monday 6/20/2016. This is hands down the worst e-commerce experience I've had. I was a bit understanding of the 4 month delay for allowing Humble Bundle to continue taking money for product you knew you didn't have, but it being additionally delayed weeks more because of your inadequate POS(point of sale) system I'm not so understanding of. On top of that you overcharged me on sales tax unless it's 9.5% where you are in Washington. For me it's 8.5% and for almost $10 shipping I didn't even get a tracking number.

Be happy your shipping was not almost $60 like me and still no tracking number lol (still waiting on it to arrive..ever so patiently xD)

[DharmaBummed]

Aka Gambit wrote:

DharmaBummed wrote:

You're also very slow at actually getting the payment through. I re-authorized on Sunday 6/12/16. Was told by the website the package shipped Friday 6/17/16, but the money wasn't withdrawn until Monday 6/20/2016. This is hands down the worst e-commerce experience I've had. I was a bit understanding of the 4 month delay for allowing Humble Bundle to continue taking money for product you knew you didn't have, but it being additionally delayed weeks more because of your inadequate POS(point of sale) system I'm not so understanding of. On top of that you overcharged me on sales tax unless it's 9.5% where you are in Washington. For me it's 8.5% and for almost $10 shipping I didn't even get a tracking number.

Be happy your shipping was not almost $60 like me and still no tracking number lol (still waiting on it to arrive..ever so patiently xD)

You must not be in the Continental US. If you are that's highway robbery.

[Aka Gambit]

DharmaBummed wrote:

You must not be in the Continental US. If you are that's highway robbery.

Haha no. I'm from Canada, so it's the cost for shipping over the border and then also the conversion rate from American to Canadian funds that shoots it up. I think shipping was like 3x the amount I payed for the bundle itself lol (I forget how much it costed already. It has been too long)

[Ed Reppert]

I look at it this way: I didn't buy a Beginner Box. I made a charitable donation, and Paizo gratefully gave me a Beginner Box for just the cost of shipping. Less ten dollars from the total shipping for that and my June subscription order, which left Redmond about 9 PM Monday and is expected to be delivered here on Friday.

Complain if you like; IMO Paizo does a pretty good job.

[DharmaBummed]

Mine came today. Does have a tracking number but just wasn't given it. Disney Movie Club does this also. Just cheapness not to give the customer a tracking number if available. Not that they couldn't they just didn't most likely to save money You're totally entitled to your opinion Ed. Forgive me if my opinion is shaped by my experience with other companies and online orders and not on what you think. Plenty of people in this world who get walked over and plenty of people who kiss the butt of those who did it to them. Just because you choose to remain silent doesn't mean you aren't being done wrong. Look at the glowing reviews for Trump U. And that is still alot for shipping in North America. I hope you live in Nova Scotia for the price you paid.

[Ed Reppert]

Sixty-nine years on this earth and I haven't kissed anybody's butt yet. And I didn't say anything about how much I paid for anything.

Everyone's opinion is shaped by his experience. That doesn't make either yours or mine invalid.

[Steve Geddes]

DharmaBummed wrote:

Mine came today. Does have a tracking number but just wasn't given it. Disney Movie Club does this also. Just cheapness not to give the customer a tracking number if available. Not that they couldn't they just didn't most likely to save money

I seem to remember Paizo explaining why tracking numbers are an issue once. It's something to do with the way USPS generate tracking numbers - their system doesn't talk to Paizo's system, so that when Paizo generate the confirmation email and the shipping label they don't know what the tracking number will be. They could wait for USPS to generate it, locate it and then amend the email and/or send a new email but that would slow things down (especially at peak times such as subscription shipments or with this one-off event which seriously outpaced anything they had predicted.

I don't think there's anything wrong with being vocal if you don't like something. However, I'm pretty sure it's not cost (Paizo charge shipping at cost, so it wouldn't really cost them anything anyhow - the shipping charges would just go up). It's more a technical issue.

Caveat: That's just a half-remembered discussion from a few years ago. I don't work for Paizo, so could well be way off. :/

[Joana]

Steve Geddes wrote:

I seem to remember Paizo explaining why tracking numbers are an issue once. It's something to do with the way USPS generate tracking numbers - their system doesn't talk to Paizo's system, so that when Paizo generate the confirmation email and the shipping label they don't know what the tracking number will be. They could wait for USPS to generate it, locate it and then amend the email and/or send a new email but that would slow things down (especially at peak times such as subscription shipments or with this one-off event which seriously outpaced anything they had predicted.

Vic Wertz explaining why not all shipments get tracking numbers

[godofallcows]

DharmaBummed wrote:

godofallcows. No they will not. A charge out of the blue was exactly what I got and since I only move money when it's actually needed it delayed my order over a week. I'd also let them know when you that you've re-submitted payment, if it's declined the first time, I waited several days after resubmitting with no change in the order status and the order was shipped the day after they responded to my post about the delay.

Thank you for this response. That's incredibly disappointing. I'm pretty sure I'll be avoiding most Paizo products in the future. I want to play Pthfinder but this entire ordeal was handled so poorly from lack of planning to this horrible shipping system. It's up to the game it's now to impress me... whenever the hell it will get here. I don't have a lot of money in my account all the time (disabled vet unemployed and too broken to work) and I have no idea if they've tried to charge it or not. Zero communication is just bad for businesses. I should have just refund the bundle the moment I realized I had to pay for shipping on top of waiting months and just bought the set from Amazon.

[DharmaBummed]

Not saying you were kissing any butt Ed. Just have seen a bit of it on this board for, in my opinion, lackluster services in some areas. I realize they are a small company but first impressions for new customers usually decides whether they will be a repeat customer. The tracking number for me is so I can try to be around the time my mail delivery comes on delivery day so I don't have to worry about my package being lifted if the delivery person decides to leave it at the door instead of leaving a notice. It's also helpful to the company since we can try to avoid any delivery disputes that can arise upon theft of packages. I work and live alone. I'd prefer my packages not providing temptation for many hours. As for notification of pending charge, I prefer to keep my money in a separate savings account in another bank and move it when needed so if my checking account is ever compromised I won't see the majority of my money disappear. I don't usually leave money floating in my checking account for 4 months or more. To each their own and that is how I do it with my own. It's not that they couldn't do it. They just didn't want to spend the time=money to do it. I would think that since this back order was a special circumstance they maybe could have made a special exception for that purpose. And it's not that they couldn't acquire a program that integrates their API with USPS. I'll admit I'm guessing it exists because I've done plenty of business with companies shipping USPS that provide a tracking number the day it's shipped. Considering my product said it shipped on Friday and didn't arrive until Wednesday within the same state I think they had time to pass that info on. In fact based on my experiences with USPS and intrastate delivery I don't think it shipped until Monday because in my experience it would have been here Monday/Tues depending whether it was dropped off before or after last pick up at 5:30p. Also thanks for the info @Steve and Joana. @godofallcows just try to remember that for the cost of the box we also got a plethora of the manuals in PDF form although I will admit wishing I had asked for a refund did cross my mind a few times last month which was a first for my Humble Bundle experience. And as was pointed out some o that cash went to a good cause after salaries and operating expenses. Also from what I've read what we got in the box is a much better value and quality than the D&D starter box.

[Joana]

DharmaBummed wrote:

I don't think it shipped until Monday because in my experience it would have been here Monday/Tues depending whether it was dropped off before or after last pick up at 5:30p.

This is entirely possible. The website considers a package "shipped" when its shipping label is printed (and thus Paizo has paid for the shipment), not when it enters the delivery chain. If that happened on Friday but after the daily pickup at the Paizo warehouse, it probably didn't actually get picked up by the shipper until Monday since the warehouse doesn't work on the weekends.

In the case of monthly subscribers who receive access to PDFs when their package "ships," this works out for the benefit of the purchaser, because you can read your PDFs earlier even if your package is still waiting for pickup.

[Emily Brumfield]

I completely redeemed my Beginner Box on Humble Bundle and entered my shipping address and payment method, but it's not showing up in my Order History on this site. I've checked to make absolutely sure I finished the Humble Bundle portion, but I can't do anything further there because it says it was redeemed.

I probably need to change my payment method for shipping. Is there any chance your system tried to charge shipping for me, got rejected because the card no longer had funds, and erased it from my Order History?

[Diego Valdez]

Hello Emily,

It is not showing up in your order history because you have not completed the order. Log in and click on My Account. Scroll down until you see the box that says Humble Bundle Redemption on the right hand column near the bottom. Clicking on that will take you to the screen where you redeemed the codes. Scroll down past the box that has all of the redeemed codes in it and you will see the Beginner Box and some tabs for shipping, billing, and confirmation. Clicking on shipping and billing boxes will let you put in the information you need. Clicking on the confirm tab will show you a review of the order. Make sure to push the Submit Order button on that tab to submit your order. When you do that you will receive an email confirmation and will be able to see the order in your order history.

[Emily Brumfield]

Thanks! Sorry, I must have been looking at the wrong order page before. It's fixed now. Much appreciated.

[Arryu]

I was about the ask about the status of my order, but I just saw the withdrawal of funds from my banking yesterday. I'm in Canada, so for those of you who haven't gotten yours yet because of international reasons be sure its on the way.

[Destrumar]

I just received the email stating that my order has been completed and is shipping at 6:25 PM yesterday, June 28, 2016. Which means that I know to expect the shipping and handling charges to show up against my account within the next 24 hours or so. Any issue I have had with money being held against my account as a pending charge has been an issue with someone (usually it has been a restaurant) not finishing the charge cycle on their end, which has been very frustrating at times. I have not been too upset by this whole process, as I understand that the sudden influx of orders due to the Humble Bundle Pathfinder package was considerably larger than what was likely expected, and quite probably larger by far than what is normally ordered at one time. I am happy to have been able to participate in the whole thing, as it afforded me the opportunity to purchase a great many PDF's that I normally would not have been able to get for a long while, and help out with charity as well. I have made purchases through Amazon and had the same issue with no tracking for my orders, and only twice have I not received anything that I ordered, which was resolved by the vendor to my satisfaction. I look forward to continuing my Pathfinder adventures both as a player and soon as a GM. Thank you to everyone that has been instrumental in getting these orders filled and shipped as quickly as possible, and as with everything that we do in life, perhaps there are areas that can be improved upon, and keep up the good work!

[Destrumar]

Just wanted to say that I received my Beginner Box on Saturday, whilst I was out and about for a time. Everything was in order, and it is great to finally have it, since I can now use it to ease some of my young players into the world of Pathfinder. I have 7 kids that play RPGs with me every Tuesday at the public library, and only one of them has actually played and knows very much about Pathfinder. I look forward to spending some time with them working on learning the system and having fun. Thanks again for the commitment to the customers from Paizo. It hasn't been easy for any of us I think, but in the end, the game is why we ordered what we ordered.

[AveGaruda]

Hi there! I ordered the beginner box around the middle of the sale on Humble Bundle, and I've been keeping track of the responses to others in regards to what i can do. However, I think my account may have an issue. I have made sure to "Submit Order" in the Confirm Tab after all of my correct information is input. When I do, though, I am redirected back to the Payment Information tab. No items show up in my Order History, however I do see a pending charge on my bank information, although it has never gone through any time I've retried submitting. Any way I can fix this?