What's with the late shipments from ImportCDs lately?

They may have changed things up since they added a warehouse. It's been a little bit since I placed an order there. They used to only ship from Irvine, CA.

 

When I ordered earlier this year, I half expected tracking to show my packaged rounded the African Horn on its trip between Irvine and New Orleans.

 

DHL Global - for when snail mail is just too fast.

 

You may care to read my post at: http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/importcds-com-and-bad-customer-service.370761/

Things don't look good from importcds

 

Tell me about it! I pre-ordered the George Harrison Apple Years box set from them. It supposedly shipped on Saturday, September 20, but the package showed zero progress until the following Tuesday with an estimated delivery data of today. In the meantime, the package has slowly made its way from Kentucky to Cincinnati to Des Moines and finally to Dallas. And now I find out that delivery has been delayed until tomorrow, as if 9 days wasn't a long enough time to get from Kentucky to Dallas.

For just a couple of extra bucks, I could have ordered from Bull Moose and gotten it delivered in just 2 or 3 days. Well, now I've learned my lesson.

 

That's what you'll get from shipping consolidators like DHL Global Mail, UPS Mail Innovations, and Fedex SmartPost. They build up bulk containers at each point, and then ship the bulk container to the next "stop" on the way to you. At each stop it might take a day, or two, or three, or more to fill the container before it's loaded onto a truck or plane or passed along to USPS for final delivery. It's meant to save money for the shipper and seller. It's fine for business-to-business deliveries, but is bad for consumers like us (especially when the savings are sometimes pocketed entirely by the seller - but not saying that Importcds is guilty of that).

It's frequently slower than even Media Mail.

 

I've been buying from them for around six or seven years. In the beginning, I'd get my stuff in one to three days. Now it's closer to two weeks.

 

Two weeks is too long and to be honest, thanks to "Import CD's" slow mailing, I've probably slowed my own buying anything anymore, from anyone, by about 75%. I should also add in the fact that Amazon keeps pushing the shipping prices up and I just can't go for $3.99 per disc!

 

Thanks for that explanation. I always wondered how that worked - what you said makes sense and explains some of what I've seen happen with my orders.

 

I used to buy a lot from them, but after some painfully slow shipping times and terrible customer service I avoid them.

I don't know if they've fixed this, but they used to proudly state all their stock was in a warehouse in California but shipments were actually originating in Kentucky. When I asked them about this (after several attempts) they finally owned up to it. They just lie to people and don't seem to care.

 

I have found them slower as well - but still reliable.

 

For years, everything was fulfilled out of their California warehouses. Their corporate owner went and bought another media distributor in Kentucky. Packages from California were taking forever to arrive on the East coast.

 

Then they should have updated their Amazon seller page to reflect this rather than lying to people.

 

I suspect they're somehow affiliated with Blowitoutahere (I-deals) now, who is based in Kentucky. Everything I've ordered lately from Import CDs has shipped from KY. Delivery time has been averaging about 6-7 days.

Oops, just saw PhantomStranger's post.

 

Today I asked forum member gottafeelin if Import CDs has a physical presence in Illinois, since he is charged state sales tax on his purchases from Import CDs, he said " yes."
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...ete-basementtapes.377804/page-9#post-11189230

They must be opening warehouses / offices all over the country ?

 

Deep Discount is in Illinois. Both owned by Super D. Guilt by association?

 

Ah...there's the sales tax connection for sure.

 

Dear Import CD's,
Stay away from Michigan

Thanks in advance.

 

None of that will matter soon. As more states look for increased revenue, they'll all pull the same thing they did with Amazon. "Internet presence" will be considered physical presence across the board.

 

As long as it is less than 13% tax it will still be cheaper for Canucks to shop cross border.

 

Yeah? Even with the newly wacky international shipping costs?

 

Lucky me :

The five states with the highest average combined state-local sales tax rates are Tennessee (9.45 percent), Arkansas (9.19 percent), Louisiana (8.89 percent), Washington (8.88 percent), and Oklahoma (8.72 percent).

 

But you have a relatively low COL. It all evens out in the end. We all get equally screwed. YAY!

 

I should have clarified that shipping was to the USA, declaring at the border avoids the ridiculous handling charges as well.
The advantage of living 2 minutes from the border.

 

November 1st - DHL gets my shipment in Hebron, KY, 261 miles north of me.
November 2nd - Processed
November 3rd - Left Hebron, KY, 261 miles north of me.
November 4th - nothing
November 5th - nothing
November 6th - ?