On-line chandleries: how hard can it be? (rant)

OR4751 said:
1. They don't price match electronics
2. Not a fan of this price match bollox - I'd rather spend my money with the outfit selling an item at the best price off the bat.
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Your second point is a bit unrealistic - how do you define "best price"? Zero percent profit? It's easy for the big three or four supermarkets to make price match promises - there are far more chandleries around and they can't afford the time to go exhaustively through each other's web sites checking prices every few days. I try to always deal with my local chandery - for most day-to-day items they are within a whisker of the "best price" I can find on the internet and I don't quibble over a few tens of pence difference on an item costing, say, £50. When I've wanted larger items such as expensive electronics, I know that they will probably not have it in stock. It's generally more convenient to let them order it in for me rather than purchase on-line and have to be pinned to the house to accept a delivery. I will usually go to them asking if they can get it for me and pointing to the "best price" I've found on the internet - in almost every case, they have been able to source the item within two or three days and match the internet price. The advantages of purchasing locally are considerable - if I have any problem with the item, I can simply return it to them and they will take responsibility for getting it replaced.
 
maby said:
Your second point is a bit unrealistic - how do you define "best price"? Zero percent profit? It's easy for the big three or four supermarkets to make price match promises - there are far more chandleries around and they can't afford the time to go exhaustively through each other's web sites checking prices every few days. I try to always deal with my local chandery - for most day-to-day items they are within a whisker of the "best price" I can find on the internet and I don't quibble over a few tens of pence difference on an item costing, say, £50. When I've wanted larger items such as expensive electronics, I know that they will probably not have it in stock. It's generally more convenient to let them order it in for me rather than purchase on-line and have to be pinned to the house to accept a delivery. I will usually go to them asking if they can get it for me and pointing to the "best price" I've found on the internet - in almost every case, they have been able to source the item within two or three days and match the internet price. The advantages of purchasing locally are considerable - if I have any problem with the item, I can simply return it to them and they will take responsibility for getting it replaced.
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+1 with addendum - Buying mail order actually gives you MORE consumer rights than purchasing from store, the nasty, nasty (from a retailers point of view) Distance Selling Regulations come into force with mail order.
 
maby said:
Your second point is a bit unrealistic - how do you define "best price"? Zero percent profit? It's easy for the big three or four supermarkets to make price match promises - there are far more chandleries around and they can't afford the time to go exhaustively through each other's web sites checking prices every few days. I try to always deal with my local chandery - for most day-to-day items they are within a whisker of the "best price" I can find on the internet and I don't quibble over a few tens of pence difference on an item costing, say, £50. When I've wanted larger items such as expensive electronics, I know that they will probably not have it in stock. It's generally more convenient to let them order it in for me rather than purchase on-line and have to be pinned to the house to accept a delivery. I will usually go to them asking if they can get it for me and pointing to the "best price" I've found on the internet - in almost every case, they have been able to source the item within two or three days and match the internet price. The advantages of purchasing locally are considerable - if I have any problem with the item, I can simply return it to them and they will take responsibility for getting it replaced.
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I wasn't talking about mail order here.
In my area there are 2 chandleries - a large(ish) one and a smaller one.
They're less than 10 miles apart. Both have an internet outlet too.
Frequently the smaller of the two offers the best price, though occasionally the larger outfit will price match the smaller one (if prompted).
Why should I buy from the larger outfit? I'd rather buy from the smaller chandlery, who offers me a good price up front.
 
OR4751 said:
I wasn't talking about mail order here.
In my area there are 2 chandleries - a large(ish) one and a smaller one.
They're less than 10 miles apart. Both have an internet outlet too.
Frequently the smaller of the two offers the best price, though occasionally the larger outfit will price match the smaller one (if prompted).
Why should I buy from the larger outfit? I'd rather buy from the smaller chandlery, who offers me a good price up front.
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In that case, we are in agreement - I certainly prefer to support the small, independent and will pay a (small) price premium to do so.
 
OR4751 said:
1. They don't price match electronics
2. Not a fan of this price match bollox - I'd rather spend my money with the outfit selling an item at the best price off the bat.
Click to expand...

Me too. I will, in fact, drive past the <ahem> larger chandlery you mention to go to the <ahem> smaller one

Mind you, the <ahem> smaller one got a bit of an ear bashing this morning over delaying shipment of the bits for this weekends little project 'cos one poxy £1.68 component I can do without hadn't come in as promised! Unusual and abject apologies were tendered and accepted :)
 
OR4751 said:
Getting more than just a bit fed up with on-line chandleries.
Do these people stock anything they're offering for sale?

1. Ordered a replacement VHF battery from one on-line retailer. Did not come up with the goods at all, even though delivery time was specified as 5-7 days. Requested a refund after 7 weeks. Another marine electronics retailer finally came through with the battery after 2 weeks.

2. Re-doing the cabin lighting (going LED). Ordered some cabin lights from a large South Coast chandlery. After my order I was informed that they were currently out of stock, but they the expected to ship some time in March.

3. Other well known chandlery - ordered various items, ranging from webbing to fire extinguishers and blocks. Told it would take approx 3 weeks to deliver.

Yet all, and I do mean ALL, took the money from my card as soon as I placed my order.

How hard can it be to show on their website whether or not they have an item in stock? And if not, how long it will take to ship my stuff BEFORE I place my order.
And when the lead-in time is significant, at least have the common decency to take the money from my card when, and only when, you are ready to ship my order.

In a nutshell: why can't on-line chandleries be more like Amazon?
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As others have said, easy answer, use a real chandlery. I almost always use my local one. Then it's there when you want something little.
 
Interesting, as my card payment contract stipulates that I have to ship within 24hrs of taking payment, so if I don't have stock I wait until the day I ship to take payment.
 
Neil_Y said:
I don't, I wait and contact customer when we are ready to ship. No card details are stored on computers or paper these days.
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Haven't we had this conversation before? I can categorically state that they are - Merchant services systems such as Paypoint and Sagepay (and even Paypal!) hold the details - The retailer can't see the FULL details, but they can request a charge of the card at any time (obviously the contract requires the authorisation of the cardholder) but they ARE definitely stored on computer, just not the retailer's computer.

The place I work for's merchant system (for the internet orders) take the card details and the merchant processor store them..essentially a "shadow" is placed over the funds, but they are not physically taken from the bank (The shadow helps to prevent fraud, it informs the retailer in advance that the bank are likely to authorise the transaction and that funds are available) - only when the computer system invoices and releases the goods, does it communicate with the merchant processor system and actually physically take the funds.

So, that's how you can delay taking the payment until despatch.

Telephone orders or orders at counter are likely to be different and take payment at point of order (This is really no different to the high street - B&Q take your payment upfront to order a kitchen that might take anything up to 11 weeks to arrive, DFS the same for Sofas if you're not using their credit provider).
 
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FishyInverness said:
Haven't we had this conversation before? I can categorically state that they are - Merchant systems such as Paypoint and Sagepay (and even Paypal!) hold the details - The merchant can't see the FULL details, but they can request a charge of the card at any time (obviously the contract requires the authorisation of the cardholder) but they ARE definitely stored on computer, just not the retailer's computer.

....
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The theory is that card details should only be stored on computer systems that are certified as PCI (Payment Card Industry) compliant. These are highly secure systems that have been tested and are audited by the industry body. The forms that you key your card details into should be generated and published from the PCI compliant servers, not from the vendor's own web site and the security sensitive data should not pass through any non-PCI certified computer. The PCI system takes the payment and returns a unique reference number to the vendor's computer system which will allow the transaction to be accessed in the future in case any adjustment needs to be made.
 
FishyInverness said:
Ah I see, Sorry Neil, I thought when you said "<Paraphrased>card details aren't stored these days" you were referring to everyone...apologies!
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They are supposed to not be stored these days. I recently did my annual Data Protection and Information Security refresher courses and it was drilled into us that storing card details ad similar information in insecure systems (including making a note on paper when the secure system is off-line) is a big no-no which can get both the employee and the company into a whole lot of trouble.
 
Indeed, I think you might be misunderstanding me - The card details ARE stored, but they are stored by the Merchant Processor, who are permitted to do so, not the retailer, who may not be. - it allows the retailer to make a process using those card details for purposes of, say, a refund, or an authorised re-charge if the customer wants to add to a transaction without going through the whole card information a 2nd time, but the retailer can only see limited information about the card.
 
I've been surprised that in spite of offering a "contact us" email address, whenever I've raised a query about an item of stock, or measurement or pricing, none of the chandleries have bothered to reply.

I certainly wasn't being offensive or insincere - just asked a straightforward question which 15 seconds at their keyboard could have replied to. I've had no response.
 
<Renoved> Realised it wasn't about a specific query, just in general :p

However, would like to say that i'm in charge of the inbox here and we respond to anything received that we are able to answer within 24 hours, i've never just left a genuine query to disappear even if it's a "sorry, no idea"....but then again, don't underestimate the interfering nature of the Spam Filter! :(
 
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