Well, I wasn't in a big rush for the book, so I thought no big deal.

Well, the book finally arrived, and so did another $5 off coupon. Well, don't you know, I needed another book, and there was that $5 coupon... So I placed another order with them. I ordered a book on neurology that cost $70. It was close to the same price at Amazon, and I had that $5 coupon. The book was listed in stock, and I specified the standard shipping. I ordered the book Saturday morning, may-29-1999. Now there is a US holiday on Monday, but I thought that I the book would be shipped before Monday.

Now Borders claims to have a stated on "many pages on their site" that:

...all orders placed on Friday the 28th with US standard shipping would be sent out on Saturday, but due to the Holiday weekend any orders placed between Saturday and Monday would not be shipped until Tuesday.

I don't doubt that they had this on many pages on their site, but I sure didn't notice it. So I am not blameless. Well, on Wednesday, I got some more email from them, saying they had shipped the book. I was a bit miffed. Wednesday isn't Tuesday. And I needed the book. I was a fool, and I should have ordered from Amazon. I called up Borders. They said that perhaps the book was in stock when I ordered it, but perhaps between the time that I saw it was in stock, and the time I placed the order, someone else had bought it. Seemed unlikely to be, for a book on neurology, and a time span of 3 minutes or so.

They never explained why they shipped the book on Wednesday, but they were kind enough to refund my the shipping cost. So, from the time I ordered the book, to the time they shipped the book was 5 days. A carrier pigeon would have been faster. So I thought it would show up in a day or two... On Saturday Jun-05-1999, I sent them email asking where my book was, and when it would show up. They said that it takes 3 - 7 business days for shipping. On Monday Jun-07-1999 they said the book should arrive tomorrow, Jun-08-1999, and gave me an UPS tracking number. Well, guess what? No book. I called them, and told them that if the book didn't arrive by Wednesday, Jun-09-1999, that I didn't want it.

Well, sure enough on Wednesday, 12 days after I ordered the book, it arrived. It was 6 business days after they shipped the book. They sat on the book for 5 days, due to the holiday and their corporate policy not to ship until Tuesday after the holiday.

Now I live in a suburb of Los Angeles, California, which is not exactly the middle-of-nowhere. If Amazon can get me a book in 2 days, I find it hard to understand how Borders takes 6 days for a similar package. I have ordered lots of stuff from all over the country, and typical delivery times are 2 - 3 days via UPS. It is quite rare for it to take more than 4 days.

I am not impressed. The advantage to buying something over the internet, is that you don't have to wait until a store opens. Now I don't expect every mom-and-pop shop that has a web page to order stuff on to really be staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. However, if you want to play with the big boys, need as good service as they have. So Borders has lost one small customer, and I will stick with the serious player, Amazon.com. Better selection, similar prices, and no sissy excuses for taking two weeks to get a book.

Yellow Freight - shipping

Yellow Freight I needed to ship a used engine block to someone far away, and I decided to use Yellow Freight because they had the cheapest price. I had wanted to use UPS, but the box weighed over 150lbs, which is their max.

I called Yellow Freight, and told them I had a box that weighed about 190lbs. I told them where I was, and where I wanted it shipped. They told me it was $176.51. I drove down there to deliver the box to their depot. They were very professional. They put the box on a fork-lift, and got it inside their warehouse. I filled out all the paperwork, and told them I had weighed the package at 190lbs using my house scale. The forklift scale said it weighed 145lbs. They crossed out my weight, and filled in 145lbs. I told them I thought it was much heavier, as I can tell the difference of 45lbs, and if it was really 145lbs, then UPS would have shipped it.

A clerk there had to call and get a quote number, which she did. They took my credit card number, and I drove home. Yesterday, I got a call from Yellow Freight. They needed my credit card number, as they couldn't find it. I gave it to them again. I verified the charge was $176.51. They said it was roughly $25 more, because the package weighed 194 lbs. I told them that I was told that they charged in increments of 100 lbs, and when I questioned the weight of 145 lbs, I was told it didn't matter, 145 or 190 lbs. I told them that I had agreed to pay $176.51, not $200+.

Based on my limited law experience, I had a written contract (the bill of landing), and consideration (me giving them my credit card). And once there is a contract and consideration, you cannot just change the contract without mutual agreement.

I told them that they weighed it, and we had an agreed on price, and that I wouldn't pay any more money. They got upset and argued with me a bit, and finally they hung up the phone on me!

It is a good thing I paid by credit card. If they try to bill me more than the agreed amount, I will complain to my credit card folks who can then deal with it. I am shocked my the unprofessionalism of Yellow Freight, and I won't use them again. For stuff less than 150 lbs, I will deal with the professionals at UPS.

American Express (credit card)

American Express I decided I wanted to get an American Express blue credit card. They have no annual fee (because they charge the merchants so much), a very good price protection policy, and lots of nifty internet-enabled features. Well, the internet enabled features only work with Microsoft's Internet Explorer.

I tried to sign up for for the blue rewards (or something like that), which involves getting some kind of points when I use the credit card. So I clicked my browser over there, and their web pages were broken. I have dealt with broken web pages before, and so I enabled javascript, which usually solves the buggy web pages. (Note that good sites like Netscape and Quicken actually tell you that they want javascript to be on, and work in a less feature full manner when javascript is off. I happen to keep javascript off because I consider it to be a security problem, and I don't like pop up ads appearing everywhere.) Well, the American express web pages were still broken. Since I was running a real operation system (Mandrake Linux), I rebooted into a lesser operating system (Windows 2000), and fired up internet explorer. Surprise! The web pages worked!

So it was a simple case of some morons writing non-portable web pages. I understand when a really clueless company like United Airlines does that, as they are superb at canceling flights, losing luggage and the like, but I expected better from American Express. After all they have a credit card reader that attaches to the computer, and brag about all the on-line services that they offer. So I called them up, and got to a technical support person. They explained that they supported the latest Netscape browser. When I told then that I had 6.2 (which is much more standards compliant than older browsers), they told me they supported only 4.7x, and that 'Netscape had not told them how to program their web pages' or something like that. It was clear that I was dealing with morons, as their web pages should work with *all browsers*, not just Internet Explorer. Browsers like Opera, Lynx, and the silly ones built in to PDAs, and cell phones. It isn't rocket science to write portable web pages, but it seems to be beyond American Express's ability.

I told them I wanted to cancel my card until their web pages were usable with different browsers. Perhaps one day they will learn how to write portable pages...

American Express (credit card)

Well, things have changed from 2002. I recently signed up for an American Express card. There were no problems using Firefox 3.0. I guess they got the message about writing portable HTML code. They don't give out card readers for their cards anymore, but I have no problems logging into their site. Perhaps canceling in 2002 had a small impact in getting them to fix their web pages.

FreeChoice Communications

FreeChoice Communications offers phone service in the US. They said for $40 a month, you could make unlimited calls in the US (and perhaps Canada). I had service with a cable company, and FreeChoice said they couldn't switch my number from the cable company. So I switched to a normal phone company from the cable company (and kept my number). I then switched to FreeChoice.

Little did I suspect at the time that they were lying sacks of *!@#!

Everything was good. I could make calls as long as I wanted, and not worry about the billing. FreeChoice even set up automatic billing from my credit card. What could be easier? Then the first bill came. It was $40 or so, plus a bunch of charges they had told me about. I noticed that my caller id was being displayed when I called out. I called FreeChoice and was told that I would have to pay a monthly service charge to have my caller-id suppressed. I told them that was unreasonable. They said tough luck.

I called them around Jan 19 2005, and told them to remove the caller-id at no charge or cancel my service. They said they couldn't remove the caller-id at no charge. I told them to cancel my service. I guess even though they recorded I wanted to cancel my service they didn't take me seriously. I had assumed they canceled my service.

I was quite surprised when the next bill came. Not only did they not cancel my service, but there was a notice that they were raising rates by $10 due to increased costs on their end. I really didn't care, as I had canceled my service. But being billed for service was confusing to me. I called them, and they said that even though I told them to cancel my service, they didn't. I told them I wouldn't be paying them, as I had already canceled my service. I thought that was the end of FreeChoice and me. I was wrong.

I switched the phone back to the cable company. Now, when you switch phone companies, you go through what is called third party verification. When this happens, you go to a neural company which records that you are switching service from the old company to the new company. Everything is recorded. This is to prevent some bad person from switching some good persons phone service without the good person knowing about it. I suspect it is also due to the practice of 'slamming' where some bad long distance company with high rates would somehow get to be the long distance carrier for some good person, without the good person knowing about it.

Well, today I got in the mail a bill form Apr-28 through May-27 from FreeChoice. I called them. They had cleverly listed the wrong number on the bill under 'Customer Service'. They listed Micron Semiconductor's phone number. Fortunately, they also listed in another place on the bill the correct number. I called them. They admitted that I called them Jan 19 and told them I was canceling the service. But I guess they didn't take me seriously, and cleverly decided to keep on billing me. I told them to fix the problem and refund me all the money they automatically billed my credit card since then. They said I have not canceled my phone service, so they would continue to bill me. I said to fix it or I would call my credit card company and report the problem as fraud. They said to go ahead and do it.

So I called my credit card company. I told them the whole story. About FreeChoice knowing that I called Jan 19th, and not listening to me canceling. About the third party verification system which lets everyone know that I am really switching phone carriers. The credit card company said there was no way to deny charges from one merchant, and that I had to switch credit card numbers. I told them to do it. So now the fraud department is investigating FreeChoice.

When I signed up with FreeChoice, I was told if I got another 5 people to sign up, they would give me free phone service. When I called up today, they said they were not taking any new customers. I suspect they are in a very bad way. I suspect there are others, like me who canceled when they raised rates, and are still being billed. Needless to say, I do not recommend dealing with FreeChoice under any circumstances. Better to deal with *anyone* else.

But wait, there is more. Around May-12-2005, I got yet another bill from FreeChoice. It said Invoice 05/09/05. They charged me for 05/28/2005 - 06/27/2005. I called them again. After being on hold for about 10 minutes, I told them I canceled my service in January. I was told I had to call another number. I did. I spoke to 'Kim', who was very rude and told me a collection agency would get the unpaid bill amount from me. I called back, and spoke to 'Dontae'. He was much nicer. He admitted I no longer had service with FreeChoice. He didn't seem to know I canceled service Jan-19-2005. He did say he would try to straighten the bill out. He said I would have to pay an additional $25 'charge-back' (that is when they refused to explain why they were still billing me, and I had to have my credit card company talk to them and they eventually refunded me the bogus charges). Of course I should pay my bill through Jan-19-2005, but there isn't much I can do if they failed to disconnect the phone when I asked them to. As best I can tell, they owe me for about 15 days of service. I won't go after them for it, as they are clearly clueless and it would be a huge hassle. After all, if they had the smallest clue, they wouldn't have sent me a invoice dated May-09-2005.

I thought I had heard the last of these folks. I was wrong. On Nov-28-2005 I got an invoice dated Nov 7 2005 for $308.42, along with a threat unless I pay them before the due date, my credit card will be charged the amount, I would be subject to a $5 late fee, and other threats. I called them up and let them know they have been listed as weasel of the month, and that I wanted a written apology for all the $%#@ they had put me through. I was told the matter would be referred to a supervisor who would contact me.

vikyhwt and ebay

Everyone has heard of ebay. Most stuff you get there is sold by decent people, however there are always people who will take advantage of honest people. Ebay does try to some extent to weed them out, but as long as ebay is making money, I suspect they don't try too hard to weed out the crooks.

Recently, I was the high bidder for a watch on ebay. The auction ended. I paid within a few hours. Since the seller was local and they said local pickup was ok, I decided to not pay the shipping charge (as the ad stated). Here is what I wrote:

I drive by Alhambra twice a day, in the early morning, and the late
afternoon. If one of those times is good, I can pick up the watch. Otherwise,
I can stop by almost any time that is good for you this weekend, as I live in
******.  

Please let me know what time is good for you, 

Here is their reply:

I am sorry. Actually, I moved out from ALhambra almost a year ago. And this
item I didn't put local pick up was available. Therefore, please pay the
shipping so that I can ship you your item immediately. And if you still have
any concern please feel free to emial me. Thank you for your purchase again. 

Here is my reply:

The item *does* specify local pickup is available, check for yourself. 
Your paypal address is also listed in Alhambra. 

Where are you currently located? 

A few hours later I got this from paypal:

wan huang (vickyhwt@yahoo.com) has issued you a full or partial refund for
your payment.  

Message from merchant: 

Next I got the following:

I am sorry for the incorrect post, but I live in SAN JOSE now. The old address
is the the address I registed in ebay and paypal. Sorry for that mistake I
made. I just gave you full refun for the transaction. Sorry again.

Next I got the following from paypal (note the address):

wan huang has cancelled the shipping label for the reason below: 

Changed Mind

Your package will no longer be shipped using PayPal Shipping with U.S. Postal
Service.  

Ship From:

wan huang
316 W. Ramona rd
alhambra, CA 
91803
United States

I asked ebay for his contact info, and I was given the following:

User ID: vickyhwt 
Name: wan huang 
Company:  
City: alhambra 
State: CA 
Country: United States 
Phone: (626) 823-7839 
Registered Since: Saturday, Aug 02, 2003 10:40:10 PDT 

I really wanted the watch, and since the seller refused to let me pick it up, and claimed to live in San Jose, I decided to pay the shipping charge. I could have simply contacted ebay, but I fear they don't really care, as I will show below. I eventually got the watch, which was postmarked in Los Angeles CA. What is wrong with this picture?

• The seller offered local pickup in the ad, but then claimed that he didn't.
• The seller said he lived in Alhambra in the ad, but then claimed that he moved to San Jose a year ago, and forgot to update his info with ebay and paypal. He lied about that, as the watch was shipped from Los Angeles, and the return address on the package was in Alhambra.
• The seller was selling 8 other items, and in each one he listed his address as Alhambra, and said local pickup was ok and free.
• Even if he didn't want me to pick up the item, he should have offered me free shipping, because I agreed to bid on the watch knowing I would be picking it up as the ad stated (even though it would take longer to arrive that I would like). He didn't offer free shipping.
• According to ebay "When a seller lists an item and a buyer purchases it, the seller and buyer have entered into a contract that both members are expected to honor. For sellers, this contract includes both formal requirements, as well as informal, common-sense obligations to provide good service to their buyers." There was a contract, and the seller didn't honor it. 'Changed Mind', isn't a valid reason to cancel the contract.

I suspect the reason that he wanted the item shipped was it was a light watch which would likely cost about $5 to ship. Since he was charging $11.99, he was making about $7 profit, and ebay gets zero percentage of shipping costs. Just speculation on my part

I contacted ebay and told them everything. They said "I understand the frustration you're feeling. Please know that we are working to resolve this as quickly as possible.". That was 3 weeks ago. They told me that paypal had to deal with the issue. I conteacted paypal and after about 2 weeks, I finally got my money back, and I got a letter from paypal saying the issue was closed. So I presume that paypal pressured the seller to pay me back.

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