Lost in Time

Posted on November 12, 2004 by Gene

Recently, when I’ve ordered things from Amazon.com, I find that they’ve been using a bait-and-switch tactic.
For example, yesterday I ordered two items (for the curious, they were a DVD set of “Are You Being Served? Again” and “Dr. Who Lost in Time Collection”) which both indicated “ships within 24 hours.”
When I ordered them, I got a confirmation e-mail which says that they will ship on November 17. That’s hardly within 24 hours, it’s within 120 hours.
I placed an order on October 18 for a RAM upgrade for a friend’s computer. I could have just gone down to the Apple store and picked one up, but I was lazy. Again, it indicated 2-5 days for shipment.
On November 9, I received an email telling me that (duh) there was a delay. I went to cancel the order, and couldn’t because it said it was “prepping for shipment.” Why, then, didn’t they send the email sooner?
Finally, it shipped November 10. For those of you keeping track, that was 23 days to ship an item that I should have just bought down the street.
Is this a new Amazon business tactic? Having burned out from shipping things the same day, they’re now taking their sweet time but still claiming fast shipping?