I guess many of you have had similar experiences with ordering stuff over the internet but this is the first problem I've run into in the World of Archery - and there's a clue there.
I live on the Ilse of Skye and internet shopping is extremely useful. In the majority of cases delivery charges are no different from the rest of Great Britain. Some companies however do have a lack of understanding of geography or they have their own interpretation of UK Mainland. I once had a company who said they would only deliver as far as the ferry, when in fact we have a piece of tarmac that allows me to get to Lands End or John o'Groats without getting my feet wet.
I decided to order a layered foam target boss and did some searching around to get the best price including delivery. The supplier that seemed to offer the best had no way of indicating delivery costs unless you went through the process of actually ordering i.e name, address, email etc - something I'm reluctant to do if the final price is then not acceptable. So I used a fictitious name and address but same post code and got an acceptable delivery charge. ?16.75 + vat. After which I then went in to correctly place the order.
The money was taken and then I got an email to say that the delivery cost would be another ?30 - making it over ?50 on an ?85 boss. I was told this was the cheapest option and it would be Fed-Ex. I decided to cancel rather than put up a fight and they did refund the money quickly - or so I thought. Because of the vagaries of the banking system it would appear that it may take over 30 days before it appears bank in my account. Leaving me with the problem of not having the money to re-order somewhere else.
As it happens it took only 4 days. So I emailed another company, Merlin, and asked for the delivery charge. The told me ?19.95 +vat; I ordered; its been shipped.
Quite a number of companies we use only take payment just prior to shipment, a practice I think others would be wise to put in place if they don't want to loose business, since I wont be going back to the original on-line shop. But then I guess the majority of orders they take go through without problem and they don't care about loosing me.
Buyer Beware
Colin
I live on the Ilse of Skye and internet shopping is extremely useful. In the majority of cases delivery charges are no different from the rest of Great Britain. Some companies however do have a lack of understanding of geography or they have their own interpretation of UK Mainland. I once had a company who said they would only deliver as far as the ferry, when in fact we have a piece of tarmac that allows me to get to Lands End or John o'Groats without getting my feet wet.
I decided to order a layered foam target boss and did some searching around to get the best price including delivery. The supplier that seemed to offer the best had no way of indicating delivery costs unless you went through the process of actually ordering i.e name, address, email etc - something I'm reluctant to do if the final price is then not acceptable. So I used a fictitious name and address but same post code and got an acceptable delivery charge. ?16.75 + vat. After which I then went in to correctly place the order.
The money was taken and then I got an email to say that the delivery cost would be another ?30 - making it over ?50 on an ?85 boss. I was told this was the cheapest option and it would be Fed-Ex. I decided to cancel rather than put up a fight and they did refund the money quickly - or so I thought. Because of the vagaries of the banking system it would appear that it may take over 30 days before it appears bank in my account. Leaving me with the problem of not having the money to re-order somewhere else.
As it happens it took only 4 days. So I emailed another company, Merlin, and asked for the delivery charge. The told me ?19.95 +vat; I ordered; its been shipped.
Quite a number of companies we use only take payment just prior to shipment, a practice I think others would be wise to put in place if they don't want to loose business, since I wont be going back to the original on-line shop. But then I guess the majority of orders they take go through without problem and they don't care about loosing me.
Buyer Beware
Colin