Data Sphere

I ordered some of Gale Force 9's out of print terrain from Wayland games on December 2nd, as they were the only non-australian(i.e. ridiculous shipping) guys who had it listed, and were a pretty big name from what I'd learned. Well, they informed me that though it was "Available," this means it can take up to 3-9 business days for it to ship. Though I think that's a rather big window to just ship something, I accepted it.

Nearly two weeks later, I continue to check my order only to find it still 'awaiting stock.' I contacted them, they apologized, saying it should come in soon. Fast forward, its been three weeks and the best I've gotten is an apology and that it MIGHT show up on today's shipment. I'm a pretty understanding guy, but making your customer wait three weeks without any update and nothing more than a "sorry" is outrageous to me.

I will never be buying from Wayland Games again.

*EDIT: I must have been tired, edited for more proper english

I've had bad experiences with Wayland Games as well, and so have several of my group. The main issue we've had is that the stock level on the website is usually very different from the reality. Combine that with the policy that Wayland seem to have of not splitting the shipment of an order means that one element you thought was in stock can end up delaying your order by weeks and you get no update to inform you of this.

For me it is that lack of any communication that is the really irksome part. I understand that keeping things in stock can be an issue but not keeping your customers informed is a sure way to annoy them.

I quickly learned with Wayland that 'available' is a very different concept from 'in stock'
It only means that they can place an order for it with the distributor. If they don't have any, then you have to wait for more to be manufactured and shipped to the distributor etc etc.
Unfortunately there is no point in getting all knicker-twisted about 'poor service'; it's a direct consequence of cheap prices/postage.
It is a pity they are not more upfront about this on their site, as it would help their image a lot, judging by the large number of very similar complaints to yours on many different websites (and personal experience)

Yep, other shops have a "ready to ship" different from "quick back order, 3-4 days". Having one or two issues is fine, when people start to complain about constant delays, they should change the policy.

Wayland Games have, in my experience, been terrible. I've ordered a couple of times from them, neither were what i would class as "satisfactory". Last time, i ordered some Bolt Action minis and, seeing as i was making the order anyway, added in a few Monsterpocalypse comics which were on sale. They took payment from my account straight away (via Paypal) but then ignored my mails for nearly three weeks. Finally i received an automated mail telling me my package was on it's way. A few days later, a package containing nothing but the Monpoc comics arrived. Next day, i received a notification from Paypal that i had been issued a refund for the stuff that hadn't shipped.

So in summary: Slow, unreliable service with ZERO communication from Wayland themselves (even when chased). Avoid like the plague!

ork56 wrote:Unfortunately there is no point in getting all knicker-twisted about 'poor service'; it's a direct consequence of cheap prices/postage.

I vehemently disagree; waiting THREE WEEKS without any communication is a pretty good reason to be frustrated with a company. Like I said, I can somewhat understand 3-9 Days(though they are the only retailer I know who can't move product faster than that), but Three Weeks(and counting)? With the only response to my emails being "sorry, check later!" Nah mate, that's Poor Service, no quotations.

ork56 wrote:I quickly learned with Wayland that 'available' is a very different concept from 'in stock'
It only means that they can place an order for it with the distributor. If they don't have any, then you have to wait for more to be manufactured and shipped to the distributor etc etc.
Unfortunately there is no point in getting all knicker-twisted about 'poor service'; it's a direct consequence of cheap prices/postage.
It is a pity they are not more upfront about this on their site, as it would help their image a lot, judging by the large number of very similar complaints to yours on many different websites (and personal experience)

In the US, that's bordering on mail fraud, to claim something is available when it would have to be back-ordered from the distributor/manufacturer.

It's utterly inexcusable for a company the size of Wayland to not have active stock management, though I suppose the European refusal to use bar codes would complicate things.

It's not that hard to have your Point of Sale system maintain a computer inventory. My FLGS does that.

There's even a way for the POS to generate weekly orders for each company/distributor, and that's running a Microsoft point of sale system. Commercial, off the shelf software, not custom bullcrap. My FLGS does that, too,

Neal over at the War Store has figured out how to get his POS system to talk to the webstore, and if his website says "Supply Chain Managed" and "In Stock", that is as close to an ironclad guarantee that it is in Neal's possession to ship to you as you can get without physically going to the War Store brick&mortar location and pulling it off the shelves yourself.