Opinions on Discogs as a source for CD's?

Or less; a couple of weeks ago, DHL delivered a package to me that left Japan 4 days before. It wasn't on Discogs, but in December, I got a 48 hour delivery from Britain; 48 hours from the time it left the seller's hands, that is.

 

I ordered (I'm in Pennsylvania) from a seller in Canada 3 years ago and it took 30 days to arrive.
It was a NM original Canadian pressing of LZIII. Stellar. 30 days didn't bother me.
BUT...I'm about 200 miles from the origin of mailing. So you never know.

 

Important to note that Discogs is a record store like Uber is a cab company. That said I have had a couple of orders go south because the stock on offer was ultimately not available (and generated an immediate refund) but everything that has shipped has shown up. Never had to give anyone a bad review. When someone has sent the wrong item (which happens maybe 1% of the time) they've let me keep it AND sent the correct item.

 

That is good for people to remember. It's just individuals, mostly, who participate in 'on-your-honor' transactions over LPs. It works well mostly.
Once I ordered an LP from a different country. It was only the same as the description in name only.
The record was destroyed and the sleeve was stepped-on and bent a few ways. Not the seller's fault entirely (though it was sold as a sealed, mint item).
My point was just that 'you never know' but I will amend it by saying that Discogs works great 99% of the time.

 

I always hear good news about DHL!

 

I don't have so much experience, nor do I have any major complaints about any other delivery service for the most part. Sometimes, (infrequently for me), the USPS can have issues, but as the origins are political in nature, and relate to shipping, I'll leave it at that and just say that I like our current mail carrier. UPS made the 48 hour delivery from the UK, but as I believe that there were also probably vaccine related shipments enroute to Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids, I suspect that there's some causal relationship there.

 

I use dealers on discog all the time. Never had an issue with a seller including overseas sellers (of course I do check their feedback first), but I will say in COVID times, USPS delivery of package has been glacially slow.

I know they're working with reduced staff in sorting facilities to limit the number of people in one workplace together, and I know they have an increased volume. But honestly, it recently took 5 weeks for a CD a bought from one seller to travel from Fort Greene, Brooklyn, NY, to my suburban NYC home about 25 miles away, a postal route that in normal times takes no more than two or three days.

I don't know about postal service in Canada, if it's experiencing the same problems we are here, but this has become routine for the shipping of packages vis USPS during COVID. It improved briefly at mid summer when the COVID numbers were down, but this fall turned even worse. Pretty much everything I've bought from a dealer on Discogs in the last 12 months that was delivered via USPS has had this problem to some degree or another. And USPS tracking is also unreliable and often not informative.

It's actually gotten to the point where I'm thinking twice about making purchases. It's just too frustrating.

I've not experienced the same astronomical delays with other carriers. I've had shipments during COVID times via UPS, regular parcel shipments, not overnight shipments, arrive in 48 hours from New Hampshire to NY. But USPS? 5 weeks from Brooklyn to the NYC suburbs.

 

No it’s good like it is. Reference first. Sale a long way behind. The market stuff is well dealt with by other sites. This is a resource we don’t want in the great wide open. Standards will fall.

I have had one issue on discogs. Bought an item by mistake (fumble fingers). Immediately messaged seller and explained. Said there was no way I would pay the (exorbitant) shipping charge. Would not pay. Stand off. Seller refused to release me from the sale and left negative feedback. Seller lost nothing because of my mistake ( 1 minute off market). So I disputed the feedback. All was fixed by discogs. A good platform.

 

Tracking that shows something has sat at the same location for a week (as has happened several times in the past year) leaves me uncertain about what exactly is happening with the package; is it really sitting there, or is the tracking hopelessly behind on the actual movement of the package?

 

I’ve been ordering from Discogs for years, and only had one CD not show up. The seller refunded my money quickly, so it wasn’t an issue. It’s a shame that you’re having this problem with your first order, but I’m sure Discogs have a system in place for this kind of thing. Check with them how long you have to wait before ‘escalating’ your issue - there’s probably something on their T&Cs. Good luck! I hope it doesn’t put you off using the site again, because it’s a good one from my experience.

 

I've seen tracking not updated for week (I think the package really is sitting there). I've seen it marked as having arrived locally, then being somewhere else not local. I've had issues where I've inquired about a package and suddenly the funky tracking data disappears to be replaced by a generic and totally non informative "your packages will be arriving late but it is still on its way," and I've also just seen that latter message pop up when the target deliver date comes and goes with no delivery.

My package that took more than a month to get from Brooklyn to Westchester was showing "label created" for more than 3 weeks, though the seller assured me he had dropped off the package with others on that date. I believe him. It was taking three weeks for them to do the initial processing of a package in Brooklyn. I presume it was just sitting there the whole time.

 

Somehow, I'm reminded of being at a record show and asking a dealer if he took checks. While I expected that he would, his response did surprise me "I've been doing this for 20 years and haven't gotten a bad one yet!" Some friends at a local store haven't been so lucky; they used to post the bad ones on the wall...

 

I have 118 purchases completed on Discogs. And about 2 of them were annoying. It's fine. Just don't necessarily expect delivery times you'd get from a large multinational. It's mostly small sellers.

 

Pre-C-19, I once had a package of music make it to Michigan, then get shipped to Iowa before being shipped back to Michigan and then to EL where I am. 3 or 4 years ago maybe.

 

Small sellers who do sometimes provide 'service that's competitive or better than you get from some multi-nationals.'

 

I've also seen that "label created" message a number of times in recent months, followed by days of no activity, and then, finally, movement. I've figured all along that it was an issue with the USPS, not the sender, but, of course, all of that is speculative.

 

We're all struggling to cope with new and difficult, safe working conditions during COVID, but honestly, 5 weeks to ship something from a post office in Brooklyn to a post office in the nearby suburbs (I live seven miles form the northern city like of NYC) is really outrageous and unacceptable. We've all had a year now in each of our businesses and industries to find new processes and ways of doing things. This shouldn't still be going on with the USPS, but it's not just still going on, it seems to have gotten worse. And its not just me and its not just metro NYC, I've heard similar complaints from others across the US.

 

There are some larger sellers who do not have in stock the items they are selling. A label is no doubt comforting for them even if it does not mean much.

 

Send a message and if there's no response from the seller in 4 days, contact Discogs for mediation is my understanding; I've never had to go there.

 

I recently made (and quickly received from Japan) just such an order, which I didn't know beforehand, but it appears to have only added 4-5 days to the arrival time, and as only 400 boxes were made like 5-6 years ago, I was fine with that; I'd only found out that it (B.B.King box) even existed last month, here at SHF.

 

I've mentioned it elsewhere, but in December, UPS delivered a package from London to me in c. 48 hours, left there Tuesday afternoon GMT, was here in EL Thursday afternoon EDT. That's faster than if I'd mailed a letter to myself via UPS, as anything I send is sent to Grand Rapids before being sent back to East Lansing. And that was also true "before."

 

If it's media mail, that usually means it's sitting in a warehouse or in a truck at a USPS hub waiting on the other types of mail with higher priority to process through.

If you ever ship anything media and it gets to Oxford, MS or Memphis, TN it's a good bet it will be there a week or more right now before it goes to the next location.

 

Yeah, as I said it's all about the type of shipping the seller uses or the buyer pays for. I've got one that left Germany on December 15th and still isn't here. I Had one that took from November 15th until February 16th to arrive from the same location.

DHL from Japan is super fast. I'm always amazed as to how quickly it gets here.

 

It was my first order from a company in Japan (I've bought a couple in the past from individuals there).
I'm also curious about comparisons between the 'various best sellers' there (Japan), as I've seen a few names here, with comparative comments by others that I didn't know enough about to put in perspective.

 

Yep- a lot easier to find specific pressings.