Friday, July 14, 2006

A Quick Gripe About Amazon's Cronies

I purchased Salman Rushdie's, The Satanic Verses, about 3 weeks ago. I just received it today.

For the last week or so, I've been dreading the prospect of calling Amazon to bitch about it. A 1/2 hour wait time, being put on hold 8 times and a bitchy, underpaid customer service whore to boot - this was way out of the question.

When the book arrived, I discovered the reason for the lag time: Media Mail.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of media mail. I used it - illegally - to move all of my belongings across the country just a few months ago ("What do these 40 boxes contain, mam?" "Umm... books, manuscripts, literary publications without advertisements..."). The rate can't be beat and if you're not in a hurry to receive your goods, this is the way to fly.

However, the San Diego-based seller on Amazon charged me $6.00 for shipping. Let me rephrase: $6.00. 1 book. Rip. Off.

Especially because the stamp on the envelope (which is actually no more than a plastic polybag - $0.03 - so packaging can't factor into the price), is in the amount of $2.55.

I hate when supposedly grass root assholes (which is the category that all privately-owned San Diego bookstores fall into), make money off of my S&H fees.

On the other hand, when a bargain-hunting bitch like me saves a buck or two using media mail, well, that's totally legit.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

no wonder you were walking funny yesterday...

Nicoel said...

Ugh, I hate it when people do that.

On another note - I love your new banner, but it links back to photobucket and not your homepage...

Gigi said...

You are too good to me, team G.

I went in and took care of it. Thanks!

Ben said...

They charge you the maximum possible rate they will be charged. My former business partner and I started charging that for shipping once we discovered we were getting burned--especially the guy that needed us to ship to puerto rico.

Gigi said...

Ben - You're one of them!