The i-Deals Incident

[Mirror Image]

MI, it is clear that you have your stand and you are not gonna change it regardless. So the rest of the people should know now that they should stop even trying.

It should also be clear that just about everyone here would think otherwise. So just about everyone thinks that the right thing to do is otherwise.

So that's where everyone stands and that's where everyone will stay.

Hold your ground and STOP TRYING TO GROW MEMBERSHIP!

(That goes for both sides!)

Sounds like a fine idea, Paul. I will update this thread accordingly though just to see which orders get shipped.

[springrite]

Hey, I sound like a decent moderator.  0:)

[Mirror Image]

So far, here is what is on the way:

[bigshot]

That's right: negative feedback whether it's their fault or no! That's so very helpful to other customers, isn't it?

I never leave feedback, and I never read it on either Amazon or eBay. I find that either people are afraid to say anything and leave positive feedback when they don't really mean it, or it is abused for blackmail or punishment for petty mistakes that don't rate a negative.

It really doesn't matter, because the tiny handful of times when I truly have been ripped off, Amazon and PayPal's guarantees stepped up to the bat and made good.

[bigshot]

You go past a shop and see that the owner has neglected to lock the door.  Well, you think, if he didn't want me to take everything in the shop he would have locked the door, no?  Of course, you come back with a wheelbarrow to cart it all away.

We had a lot of fine, upstanding citizens do that here in LA after the Rodney King trial. It ended up backfiring on them though, because although they had a nice new TV set for free, just about every legitimate business in the neighborhoods where the riots took place shut down and moved out of town. They were left without a single supermarket for 15 miles in every direction. Luckily for them, pawn shops and liquor stores sprung up to replace the grocery stores and pharmacies.

[Mirror Image]

Looks like they've already received 10 negative feedback votes. If you guys think this stuff doesn't matter, then you're wrong. As I suspected, a negative backlash from customers has already started. What's interesting is when they cancelled my order, the only reason they gave was that the item was out-of-stock, which is blatant lie as the items were clearly in-stock when I bought them. Yeah, I saw this coming. People here on GMG only make-up what percentage of the world? Hmmm....not much at all. You have to remember that I-Deals doesn't just sell classical CDs, there were many rock and jazz fans online that night snatching up CDs too.

[Gurn Blanston]

Hey, I sound like a decent moderator.  0:)

I have reliable information (it comes from so many!) that such a thing doesn't exist...

[Karl Henning]

Looks like they've already received 10 negative feedback votes. If you guys think this stuff doesn't matter, then you're wrong.

Point of order:

... Hold your ground and STOP TRYING TO GROW MEMBERSHIP!

(That goes for both sides!)

So, John, consider yourself switched off.

[Mirror Image]

So, John, consider yourself switched off.

That's fine, but go over to their storefront and witness the crumbling of a once successful online retailer.

[bigshot]

An online business can make a mistake with a single push of a button, but a forum participant has to keep making the same mistake over and over and over again.

[springrite]

Nice haul, John, especially the WERGO Ligeti.

[Karl Henning]

That's fine, but go over to their storefront and witness the crumbling of a once successful online retailer.

John, no surprise, you require people who disagree with you to hold silent, but you act as though Paul didn't include you in the advisory.

My point has been made, so this post is simply to advise you that at this point, you have lost even the least shred of any respect I might entertain toward you.

That is all.

[Mirror Image]

Nice haul, John, especially the WERGO Ligeti.

Thanks, Paul. Yeah, they looked so interesting so I snatched them up.

[Scarpia]

That's fine, but go over to their storefront and witness the crumbling of a once successful online retailer.

I see more than 470,000 feedbacks with a 99% positive rating.   Good luck in making their storefront 'crumble' with your 10 negative feedbacks.   If they have a problem it is that too many of their customers are ungrateful sociopaths who would give them negative feedback after getting dozens of discs and box sets for $1 each.

Maybe we should start a pole on whether MI gets banned from Amazon.  They do have a policy of blacklisting predatory 'customers.'   

[Mirror Image]

John, no surprise, you require people who disagree with you to hold silent, but you act as though Paul didn't include you in the advisory.

My point has been made, so this post is simply to advise you that at this point, you have lost even the least shred of any respect I might entertain toward you.

That is all.

So let me get this straight, Karl, you and I disagree about something and you're willing to throw our friendship down the tubes because of this disagreement? I never disrespected you or lost respect for you for a minute even if I disagreed with you, but if this is how little you think of me, then maybe we shouldn't be friends.

[kishnevi]

Looks like they've already received 10 negative feedback votes. If you guys think this stuff doesn't matter, then you're wrong. As I suspected, a negative backlash from customers has already started. What's interesting is when they cancelled my order, the only reason they gave was that the item was out-of-stock, which is blatant lie as the items were clearly in-stock when I bought them. Yeah, I saw this coming. People here on GMG only make-up what percentage of the world? Hmmm....not much at all. You have to remember that I-Deals doesn't just sell classical CDs, there were many rock and jazz fans online that night snatching up CDs too.

I come across similar situations in my work all the time--it boils down to the fact that what the computer says we have in inventory and what we have physically on hand don't match, for a variety of reasons, including the fact that the system can be up to a day behind in updating inventory. 

Especially in a case like this, when orders were being placed fast and furious, it's easy to envisage the system not updating orders efficiently, and still showing that four copies of Kidzbop sings Mozart are on hand, despite the fact that six orders have been placed.  Which means that two customers won't be receiving Kidzbop sings Mozart despite the computer system saying it was in stock when they ordered it.

To take a roughly parallel case--I've learned over the past year or so that if I order a CD from Arkivmusic --whom I am pretty sure everyone here would consider a very reputable vendor--which their website lists as 'low stock',  there's a high probability that it will turn into a back order situation.  Their system apparently is slow to catch up to the fact that the last order but one sold out their on hand inventory.
So I think you're too quick to assume intentional reneging on their part. 

Be glad that they've shipped even some of your items.  I think the fact that they shipped those shows they intend to honor the orders if they can.
IOW, it may be simply a slow update of the inventory in the computer, and not I-deals deciding it does not need to honor your order.  They may really have sold out of the item before you placed you order, but the computer system was too slow to update the status.

[Mirror Image]

I come across similar situations in my work all the time--it boils down to the fact that what the computer says we have in inventory and what we have physically on hand don't match, for a variety of reasons, including the fact that the system can be up to a day behind in updating inventory. 

Especially in a case like this, when orders were being placed fast and furious, it's easy to envisage the system not updating orders efficiently, and still showing that four copies of Kidzbop sings Mozart are on hand, despite the fact that six orders have been placed.  Which means that two customers won't be receiving Kidzbop sings Mozart despite the computer system saying it was in stock when they ordered it.

To take a roughly parallel case--I've learned over the past year or so that if I order a CD from Arkivmusic --whom I am pretty sure everyone here would consider a very reputable vendor--which their website lists as 'low stock',  there's a high probability that it will turn into a back order situation.  Their system apparently is slow to catch up to the fact that the last order but one sold out their on hand inventory.
So I think you're too quick to assume intentional reneging on their part. 

Be glad that they've shipped even some of your items.  I think the fact that they shipped those shows they intend to honor the orders if they can.
IOW, it may be simply a slow update of the inventory in the computer, and not I-deals deciding it does not need to honor your order.  They may really have sold out of the item before you placed you order, but the computer system was too slow to update the status.

I don't buy into that line of reasoning for a second. They knew what they were doing when they cancelled one of my orders. They didn't want to sell the items for the price I paid so they used the "it's currently out-of-stock" routine, which I've seen many, many times on Amazon.

I'm quite thrilled they shipped three orders I placed, but I will be even more thrilled if they ship all of them. They cancelled one order, but I contacted Amazon and they took care of this one for me thankfully. We'll just wait and see what happens with the rest of my orders.

[springrite]

I have reliable information (it comes from so many!) that such a thing doesn't exist...

Such a thing doesn't exist because such a thing would never work and be effective, as evidenced by what followed by my "moderation".

[Madiel]

What's interesting is when they cancelled my order, the only reason they gave was that the item was out-of-stock, which is blatant lie as the items were clearly in-stock when I bought them.

This genuinely made me laugh.  A person sees the words "In Stock" on a computer screen from half a world away and takes this as conclusive proof that the disc is in fact sitting in the warehouse.

I've recently had a (pop music) order where the company came back to me and said 'terribly sorry, we can't get that from the supply source we thought we could. You have an opportunity to cancel the order, otherwise we'll try to get it from one of our other suppliers'.  And it transpired that they were successful in getting it from the other supplier.  But really, what I should have done was screech "YOU'RE LYING!! MY COMPUTER SCREEN SAID YOU HAD IT!!"

[Mirror Image]

This genuinely made me laugh.  A person sees the words "In Stock" on a computer screen from half a world away and takes this as conclusive proof that the disc is in fact sitting in the warehouse.

I've recently had a (pop music) order where the company came back to me and said 'terribly sorry, we can't get that from the supply source we thought we could. You have an opportunity to cancel the order, otherwise we'll try to get it from one of our other suppliers'.  And it transpired that they were successful in getting it from the other supplier.  But really, what I should have done was screech "YOU'RE LYING!! MY COMPUTER SCREEN SAID YOU HAD IT!!"

It is the job of the online seller to keep their inventory up to date. Whether you believe this or not is irrelevant. At the end of the day, they will continue to cancel orders and customers will continue to leave negative feedback. That's just the way online business works.