Experiences buying online thread

[Kyosuke Kagami]

Some weeks ago, I ordered 3 things from Play Asia:

-Guilty Gear Accent Core PLUS (PSP).
-Lucky Star Vol.2
-Radiata Stories (PS2).

I decided to order there, since my previous buys there were processed and sent in no time. But this time it was different, because one of the items (not sure which one, but I'm sure it's Radiata) wasn't restocked yet and, so far, they haven't received a new stock of that item. So far, I've been waiting for 2 weeks and I haven't received anything But oh, they were fast in charging the 110 USD for everything

Previously I've ordered stuff from Amazon (oh hi mr. EBA ), and while the service was nice, even with a nice shipment service they took 2 weeks to deliver. And worse: since it was a shipment from the US and the mexican customs offices like to be complete asses, if you're bad lucky you end up paying 10% more of the value of the stuff they're sending to you Also used other services like NCSX (no need to use it anymore, after discovering P-A) and other page called TheRage, which had a lot of awesome Dreamcast games but now they're closed


Any experiences? Or hints about what you must do while ordering online? Oh, and can someone suggest me what to do with P-A and my particular case?

[Shiny]

All of my experiences of buying online have been good; except for one transaction on eBay where I had to threaten action against a seller that was not sending my goods in the prompt manner that they advertised.

Bought something off of buy-rite when they were still doing business. And I got gouged pretty bad for an import copy of Capcom v. SNK 2 when it came out (92 dollars? ..but I had to have it. I didn't think it was going to see the light of day Stateside at the time). But it still made its way here, after the freeze on air traffic in the aftermath of 9/11. But..buy-rite had a history of gouging and bad business practices, and being new to the intratubes, I didn't learn that until later.

I've purchased DVDs, a jacket, and a host of other things from online merchandisers, and I have had no problems outside of the skirmish on eBay.

No real advice for you, however. Haw haw. /nelson muntz'd

DID YOU KNOW: That buy-rite was based here in NC? I had went to the store once, and bought an import copy of KoF '98 and '00 for the PSX. I figured they were expensive because they were imports. I did not know they were such a shoddy company until I did a little research online. Random bullshit fact.

[hebretto]

Um ... did you pay using your cc? If so they won't charge you till the order ships ... I made that mistake by paying with paypal for 2002UM and I had to pay upfront ... the dollar has gotten better so I've kinda lost out on money but I learnt that I should use cc for EVERYTHING! hahahaha ... also they stated that they only ship once everything is in stock ... if you don't like that you should be making two seperate orders.

If you want those games SOOOOOOOOOOOO badly just cancel your order and get the two games that are in stock now and place a separate order for the restock item.

[Kyosuke Kagami]

No hurries, to be honest. It's just that they made me wait too damned long

In fact, I didn't make the order. A friend (and his credit card) did... or maybe he used PayPal, iono.

[Apathy Wind]

TheRage is gone huh? Too bad - I bought from them once and was pleased with the results.

I bought an import controller from Toys N Joys once but the thing never seemed to work right. I had thought it was out of stock everywhere when I found it on TnJ and after getting it often wondered if it wasn't used (as it had the same issues an earlier version of the same controller adopted after moderate use). Moral is that I don't know that I'd recommend them.

As for SS's employer my first experience with them was very very bad. My stupid account wouldn't reflect a purchase and their CS people couldn't find record of it so instructed me to replace the order. I reordered and of course they sent (and charged me for) two copies of each item ordered. I contacted them and explained the situation - they instructed me to return one of the orders at their expense. I took the package to the post office and tried to buy tracking on it to confirm their receipt but was told that I couldn't add it since Amazon was paying for the return - I would have had to pay for the return mailing myself. So I decided to just send it back as instructed and of course they claimed that they never fucking received it. It took many annoying calls to finally get my money back from the stupid duplicate order.

After that I swore never to use Amazon again but eventually had to in order to get someone a Christmas present I couldn't find locally. That process went smoothly and I've used them again from time to time with no complaints. So go figure. I did learn however that free super shipping or whatever it's called takes forever - I guess you get what you pay for.

[Kyosuke Kagami]

Toys N Joys' Dreamcast prices are retarded Their anime section is more decent though

I guess Amazon is nice if you live in the US.

[Gunsmith]

In general I've found that delivery times are always exaggerated. When they say "Delivered in 24 hours!" they mean from the time they're ready, which could be... anytime.

I order a lot of stuff from play.com, have a look, great bargains!

On Ebay I refuse to buy things from Hong Kong or China... even though I still did because it's so damn cheap. And of course the items turned out to be crappy. But now I'm not eager to buy anything from ebay at all - My friend bought a 8gig memory stick from England and it turned out to be fake. As China can copy virtually anything these days not to mention billions of bootleg anime goods, buying from ebay's a real crapshoot.

[Branger]

I really haven't had too bad of a buying experience online. I bought an import PS2 and NTSC-J KOF XI from Play-Asia a few years ago. I think I might have paid too much, but otherwise, shipping was what I had expected it to be. I haven't purchased anything off of Ebay in years mainly because I don't think the site is what it used to be. Usually, I tend to buy a lot of my stuff from Amazon, and when I do it's (a) for stuff I can afford to wait for, or (b) for stuff I buy far in advance before I actually need it. Also, there's a pretty good game store by me that sells a lot of games (including SNK games) at very good prices (better than Gamestop/EB Games).

I think the only time I've been frustrated by online sellers was when I tried buying graphic novels from Amazon. I think I was buying one of the Invincible collections and they had said it was in stock. I go and place my order and it then said it would take weeks for them just to ship it. I got frustrated, cancelled my order, and ended up paying regular price at the local comic book store.

[Kyosuke Kagami]

Just posting to let you know that 2 of my 3 items were already shipped here, via Fedex (LS 2 and GGAC+). Apparently Radiata Stories was the game that delayed everything and they'll send it later (no additional cost, also via Fedex).

Finally.

So yeah, still gonna be buying in Play Asia.

[Foxhole]

I've bought from Cdjapan, Hobbylink Japan, Amazon, and a few other smaller establishments. I've never had anything but the best service, so I can't complain.

[hebretto]

I deal with shops from Japan ... nothing short of good shit ^_^b

Play-Asia is pretty good as well you just lucked out with one of your items KK ... but then again I don't think living in Mexico helps with all those border restrictions amirite?

[Kyosuke Kagami]

Customs aren't terrible (or they're unexistant) if the shipping don't come from the US. Play Asia isn't, so no problem there. Same thing for stuff from japanese stores.

There's some shit with chinese stuff, though (AKA products that say "Made in China"... and if they come directly from China, it's even worse). If borderline finds one of those and the guy that checked wants to be an ass (90% of the time), when you get your stuff you'll get 2 options:

-Play 300% over the value of that producto as importing taxes.
-Have one part of your product partially destroyed so you don't pay anything.

[Apathy Wind]

Some weeks ago, I ordered 3 things from Play Asia:

-Guilty Gear Accent Core PLUS (PSP).
-Lucky Star Vol.2
-Radiata Stories (PS2).

On a side note, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus has just been announced for North American release on the Wii, PS2, and PSP

[Kyosuke Kagami]

I know and I dun really care

Specially because my chances to find that version here are null