Terrible Experience w/ Topspin...Any Good Ones?

I'm not normally one to go out of my way to post a negative review (everyone has an off day, right?), but from comparing my experience with Topspin with others in the Music Corner forum I think this warrants sharing, and asking for any possible ways through to the crapstorm that is Topspin.

Background

As I've posted in Music Corner in the past, I'm perpetually on the lookout for '00 "instant" live shows from the likes of Bauhaus, Primus, Dead Can Dance, Joseph Arthur, Peter Gabriel, and Pixies. While doing a deeper search about two months ago I gave the simplest option a test, googl'ing 'pixies live downloads'. Wouldn't you know it, the first link returned was the older official Pixies site that was active during their earlier reunion tours and appeared to be still active, backed by Topspin. Score! And most importantly, every show in lossless for $3.99. Big score!

Before I went crazy and bought every show that I don't yet have in the archives, I thought I would test a few first. I was looking at ~50 shows, and even at $3.99 that's some serious change and I wasn't really into dropping it all at once. So I tried a handful...and so glad I did. The ordering process went through without an issue and I received my email to download each show right away (individual links for each show, all in the same email). First show download worked no problem but then...

Preparing...For Nothing

Every other show would bounce me to a page that said "Preparing your download..." with a spinning icon, then sit there stuck forever. I learned that if I refreshed more than, say, three times (or tried the same link in different browsers, over diff networks), eventually "Preparing" would turn to a page that stated I'd exceeded my download limit for that show and I was blocked forever. All in all I was able to grab 2 shows successfully, the rest of the downloads in my order failed.

So I reached out to the Topspin support team first via their help ticket system. A week later and crickets, so I submitted another ticket, this time specifically about the "too many downloads" error. Another week later, still nothing. This began a long process of me finding any email contact into Topspin I could find and emailing them directly. Nothing. About a month of this and I started the same with Bandmerch (their now parent company) as well as reaching out to both directly through Twitter. Silence. That was 6 weeks ago, no response from anyone at either company or from Topspin support.

WTF is going on with this company? This level of non-customer support is painful, and from searching it's obviously the norm for these guys. The forums here (and the internet) are full of the same Topspin story, over and over, and for physical items as well. So frustrating...

In my case they just lost a $200 order from me on the shows that I would have bought (Xmas cash needs go to somewhere...). I'm sure that's not a huge order to them but still, they lost it and now they've created the need for me to post my horrendously negative experience to a public forum.

Anyone have any good experiences with Topspin, and/or have any suggestions on how to actually get through to them?

 

Have you tried Facebook ...?

 

No, not a FB user, but not a bad idea. I have to think, though, that if they've ignored direct email and twitter call-outs then would FB be any different?

 

Perhaps, but since you have few options...
I think some companies might be more aware of the spotlight glare from certain Social Media sites.

At the very least, you’re bringing attention to other potential customers... who may think twice before ordering, paying, and ending up in the same situation as you.

 

So true. I've FB Messaged them directly so we'll see. Their last FB post was from 2016, same as their website copyright, so I'm wondering if Topspin as a company is just completely gone. Maybe I should be thinking about this differently and be amazed that their systems are still up and in place enough to deliver two shows from my order.

It's preaching to the choir on these forums, but the worst part is that those amazing Pixies shows are no longer available and just lost for the time being. Would love, LOVE to enjoy those.