Merry Christmas all!!!!
...and here is my Christmas rant.
The wife and I are not big on gift-giving anymore. We are at the point where we normally buy what we want, when we want it, given our budgets for such things, but we do like to have something for each other to open Christmas day. I have my RCs, 3D printing, and Lego building, and she has her knitting, painting, and such. Neither of us are well enough versed in the other's hobbies to really buy anything useful. But, we of course keep an ear out for things we might get each other. For my last birthday she bought me the Lego Ecto-1 Creator Expert set (this thing is big), but as a gag gift before I opened the Ecto-1, she got me a Lego Friends set. She was amazed when I was excited about it, I am not terribly excited about the Friends Lego line, but that series has a color pallet you just can't get in the other sets. So, the long and the short of it, giving gifts isn't that big of a deal, but there are times when it is...
Recently the wife has had a big career shift. It be honest, she actually now has a career. For years she has worked just as a general office worker, not really a secretary, she is very tech-savvy, heavy in spreadsheets and databases. But, hopping from job to job as I got transferred from command to command. I am not complaining about this, our lack of locational stability throughout the years has necessitated this. She has always worked, no matter where we have been, and I am very happy about that.
After I retired from the World's Greatest Navy, we settled in one spot, I shifted to my second career, and she decided that she was done being a general office worker. As a result, last month she passed her APC exam for medical coding, and she landed a job in that field.
//rant_start/
So, I wanted to get her something for Christmas that would commemorate her accomplishments, would be something she'd use, and something she'd get a giggle out of. On Amazon I found the perfect gift, a coffee mug. On it are the medical codes for caffeine abuse, and self harm; she is the self-proclaimed 'caffeine queen', and she has an unusual knack for hurting herself (accidentally, of course). On Amazon the seller said the mug was in stock, and that the expected arrival date was December 5th (about a week from the date I was looking at it). PERFECT!!! ... and ordered!!! The perfect gift, getting her well before Christmas.... WINNING...!
So, here we are, Christmas Day... Guess what.... There is no cup sitting under the tree (technically speaking, we don't have a tree, but you get the idea).
I started getting the uneasy feeling about this when I looked at the tracking information and it was for a service that was not in the U.S. Worse, there are multiple updates for status and location, but the only data they give is "null". I contact the merchant, and they say they have had some issues, but the item should be shipped in the coming week; this was three weeks ago. I asked about their tracking information, and they say that the local shipper hasn't picked up the package yet. ***sigh** I check status again around the 18th, and they have no record of my purchase. I refer them to the Amazon information and suddenly they found my transaction. They say they should be shipping it out some time in the next two weeks, and that I should have ordered it sooner that the 18th of December if I wanted it by Christmas...
Never minding crappy customer service by this company, I am annoyed at Amazon. There are certain assumptions that are to be made when ordering something, especially in today's environment when we have container ships waiting six weeks to offload at US ports. The biggest thing, if the expect arrival date is within two weeks, that should mean the item being ordered is on the same continent of the delivery address. If it is not, then there REALLY NEEDS TO BE A FRIGGIN' DISCLAIMER... Something like, "This item's expected delivery date may be delayed due to the item being shipped from overseas". I would have likely ordered the mug anyways, and found something else for Christmas day. But no....
I got a message from Amazon yesterday, it asked if I was enjoying the items and if I wanted to order another one...
//endith rant/