Friday, February 18, 2011

How ChannelFireball.com lost me as a customer

So I wanted to share my recent experiences with ChannelFireball.com in the hopes that others will have the sense to go buy stuff from another dealer.

In business, customer service is what separates the men from the boys, and man did Channel Fireball drop the ball on this one.

So to start lets lay some history down.. With most set releases I pre-order a playset of the commons and uncommons.  I have done this in the past from about 4 different vendors.   Now it has been my experience over the last 10 years doing these kinds of transactions that a pre-order ships usally the day of release, and/or within a couple of days of release.

So flash forward to the present day.  Mirrodin Besiged is poised to release on February 4th so I went ahead and place my pre-order in early January for it.  At the same time I also place orders for a Fat Pack and boosters from my local hook-up :)

February 4th comes... Thanks to an Ice storm our Fat Packs and boosters arrived late, so we got them around February 8th.  Oddly enough I still had not received my playset from Channel Fireball...  I kept checking the website for a tracking number and such... Checking the mailbox.... No order... 

Well on February 10th I get the following email:


Yes... That's right.. My order had just shipped... After I had received and opened my Fat Packs and Boosters.... Wow...  

So I sent the following email to Channel Fireball in response...



I tried to keep it formal... I just wanted an explanation on the delay, and was seeking some sort of compensation.  After all this site looks like it has grown tremendously, maybe they had gotten too many pre-orders... I didn't know.  Anyway... about 4-5 hours later I received the following from them.





Well I did get a tracking number... And an email about the fact that it would take a week to arrive (No priority on shipping it), but the reason didn't fly very well with me.  I know that they receive their product before the release date. They expect me to believe that it took them 6 days to go through it all and ship my order?  What exactly is a pre-order to them? 
Absent from Channel Fireball is a pre-order policy or information on what they consider a pre-order.  So I replied.



This time I get right to the point... I am unhappy and I feel that I deserve something.  I'm not asking for anything extraordinary.  I would just like to get some money back.  Cause basically my pre-order was treated essentially the same as if I had ordered it day of release.

To this day I have gotten no reply from Channel Fireball.... I am honestly not surprised.... I am pretty sure they don't care. I am one unhappy customer... I've haven't ordered tons of stuff from them in the last year... They can stand to lose me... But I still am quite unhappy with them.   I am torn because I like the professional players who are associated with that site, I like their videos and articles, but their store is crap.

I have placed a lot of orders over the last 10 years... Pre-orders and regular.  they don't always go as planned....

When I had problems with a StarCity order in the past they called me on the phone.... That was enough to make me a returning customer.
When I had problems with CardShark, an email cleared it up fast.  

Customer service makes people come back.  So guess what... I'm no longer a fan of Channel Fireball.  I advise my friends and readers to order from other retailers online, or better yet, visit your local store :)

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