Amazon - pre-order not arrived on release day

poet123

The last game I ordered for day of release never turned up at all. It is obvious what they are when they are going through the system in bulk, all too easy for someone in the PO to "mislay"!!

bluenoseam

goater78 wrote: »

I think amazon are too big to be scared by them. Not supplying to amazon would be a crazy business decision.

Not a hope, 1 retailer not having access to their products barely makes a dent in Vivendi's business, especially when a majority of their business will be made elsewhere. However if Amazon, who claim to be the worlds leading retailer didn't have access to products like Lady Gaga's new album it would severely damage them. The product would sell regardless as to if Amazon had it or not as people would simply acquire it elsewhere.

There's precious few items which hold that sort of gravity of "don't break street date" - used to be Star Wars stuff used to be similarly scary for date breakers. The indies who generally broke dates in recent years have been hit with situations where they get their stock on release date - or don't get it at all. (Which with some indies doesn't hold water as they often are cheaper getting things through supermarkets given their lack of purchasing power.) With CoD being probably the fourth biggest gaming event this year behind the obvious console launches & GTA the focus was on companies to ensure they didn't go early.

I'm lead to believe the boxes containing said product were boldly marked "DO NOT SELL BEFORE 5th NOVEMBER" as well, y'know just so Doris doesn't stick 'em on Asda/Tesco's shelves prior to then.

System

bluenoseam wrote: »

Not a hope, 1 retailer not having access to their products barely makes a dent in Vivendi's business, especially when a majority of their business will be made elsewhere. However if Amazon, who claim to be the worlds leading retailer didn't have access to products like Lady Gaga's new album it would severely damage them. The product would sell regardless as to if Amazon had it or not as people would simply acquire it elsewhere.

There's precious few items which hold that sort of gravity of "don't break street date" - used to be Star Wars stuff used to be similarly scary for date breakers. The indies who generally broke dates in recent years have been hit with situations where they get their stock on release date - or don't get it at all. (Which with some indies doesn't hold water as they often are cheaper getting things through supermarkets given their lack of purchasing power.) With CoD being probably the fourth biggest gaming event this year behind the obvious console launches & GTA the focus was on companies to ensure they didn't go early.

I'm lead to believe the boxes containing said product were boldly marked "DO NOT SELL BEFORE 5th NOVEMBER" as well, y'know just so Doris doesn't stick 'em on Asda/Tesco's shelves prior to then.

Yes but you're talking about indies being refused stock. They can do that to them as they have no power but they wouldn't do that to amazon as they're probably the biggest mail order game seller in the world.

It's incredibly short sighted as a business to refuse to provide stock to the biggest retailer which is why it would never happen.

Nilrem

goater78 wrote: »

Yes but you're talking about indies being refused stock. They can do that to them as they have no power but they wouldn't do that to amazon as they're probably the biggest mail order game seller in the world.

It's incredibly short sighted as a business to refuse to provide stock to the biggest retailer which is why it would never happen.

They may not refuse to supply them.
But what they can and have done in the past with all sorts of retailers is to simply not have them delivered to the retailer until the day of release, or day before release.

For example if Amazon have consistently been sending stuff out a couple of days early, the supplier can simply hold the delivery to Amazon until the day before release.
That means Amazon could just about get it out in time (if the delivery arrives early enough, they are able to do it as a priority and nothing goes wrong/they don't have too many orders), but it's much harder for them.

I know going back years that certain HMV stores for example would from time to time be put on notice by suppliers for breaking street date, and thus when new releases were due, if they had broken it again (or even just once or twice for big releases), they'd suddenly find the next big release wouldn't turn up until the morning of the release day (so they wouldn't have it on the shelves in the morning).

Having said that, given that the game in question this time round may well be the big, expensive version, it could well be that in some cases at least it's not arrived with the post because it's with a courier who delivers later in the day (and even next day couriers aren't always, especially if they've got more packages than usual due to things like a big game being released).

bluenoseam

goater78 wrote: »

Yes but you're talking about indies being refused stock. They can do that to them as they have no power but they wouldn't do that to amazon as they're probably the biggest mail order game seller in the world.

It's incredibly short sighted as a business to refuse to provide stock to the biggest retailer which is why it would never happen.

There was also a significant part at the end of that paragraph - "the focus was on companies to ensure they didn't go early". All the reputable retailers (that's your supermarkets, Amazon etc) made doubly sure that the game wouldn't be in customers hands on the Monday morning.

It's not as "short sighted" as you'd think, it's also not always a case of wholesale refusing to provide stock. It can be as simplistic as favouring certain retailers with regards to "exclusives", it can be as involved as refusing to stock them certain products. With a company like Vivendi you can be sure that if you as a retailer broke that street date there would be consequences. Those consequences may have been as simple as a "fine" but it's somewhat silly to play chicken with a company who can cause you problems by not stocking you with something this close to Christmas. Ultimately as I'm sure I've said, doesn't matter to Vivendi if Amazon don't have the new Lady Gaga CD in stock because they know that those who don't get it on Amazon will get it elsewhere. That's not "short sighted", that's the business equivalent of a nuclear deterrent, after all, slap Amazon with a £100k fine and they're going to pay that out without blinking, slap them with no copies of a major new release, that'll sting.

For what it's worth I'm 100% in the corner of legitimate retailers who made sure that no customer had the game on Monday - I've had weeks where my company suffered because of that stuff. (well, it was HMV, but it was "my" company at the time) Amazon being responsible heeded the warnings, as did every major retailer on the high street - which is a refreshing change for things like this.

Becles

Day 3 and still no Ghosts

Postman has just been with a big Amazon box and I was all excited. Opened it and it's just the advent calendar I ordered last week! That was dispatched on the 3rd, so if Ghosts was dispatched on the 4th hopefully it might arrive tomorrow *fingers crossed*

SuperHan

At 16 the OPs son should be well enough equipped to deal with a couple of days delay.. Life only gets more disappointing there on in

Antnshell

I have only just seen this post.....the exact same thing happened to me with Fifa 14 got home on the Friday it was released after preordering with Amazon and no game!!!

I contacted them they said the same it was sent royal mail and would be with me by the following wednesday at the latest....I then kicked off as why garantee delivery and then use a standard Royal Mail Service refusing to give in and asking them what they are going to do about it...they gave in and sent me another Fifa 14 via courier to be delviered the next day (Saturday) before 1pm and I was suprosed when it actually arrived.

On my account the first one had shown as lost it did eventually arrive so I kept it for the incovenience

Maybe worth you trying to get them to send another if you still havent got it...I didnt pay extra for delivery I was on the prime account free trial which they also extended by 12 months as a good will gesture.

custardy

Antnshell wrote: »

I have only just seen this post.....the exact same thing happened to me with Fifa 14 got home on the Friday it was released after preordering with Amazon and no game!!!

I contacted them they said the same it was sent royal mail and would be with me by the following wednesday at the latest....I then kicked off as why garantee delivery and then use a standard Royal Mail Service refusing to give in and asking them what they are going to do about it...they gave in and sent me another Fifa 14 via courier to be delviered the next day (Saturday) before 1pm and I was suprosed when it actually arrived.

On my account the first one had shown as lost it did eventually arrive so I kept it for the incovenience

Maybe worth you trying to get them to send another if you still havent got it...I didnt pay extra for delivery I was on the prime account free trial which they also extended by 12 months as a good will gesture.

and people wonder why companies no longer give good service.....

Hermione_Granger

Edited for correctness.

Antnshell wrote: »

On my account the first one had shown as lost it did eventually arrive so I stole it for the incovenience