Telling a Lulu
Oct. 10th, 2008 10:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shannon_aLast week I finally got around to ordering the first issue of Hearts in Glorantha from Lulu.com. I'd never ordered from them before, and so I didn't have much impression of their business before, other than the fact that they sold overpriced instant print books.
I was slightly flabbergasted and offended when I got to the checkout. Lulu lists as their default shipping method, UPS, and if you try to change to the cheaper USPS mail, it offers a dire warning that says something like, "Warning! We can not track USPS mail, and if your package does not arrive, this will be you responsibility."
To which I say, bullshit. The folks who run Lulu.com appear to be either utterly ignorant of their business, or else they're purposeful liars and intimidators, and I don't appreciate either answer.
First of all, pretty much any credit card company would reverse the charges if you reported to them that a company had not delivered. For Lulu to try to social engineer their customers to shift that burden toward the consumer sounds to me like a bit of immorality on their part.
Second, pretty much any reasonable online seller would replace a shipment that was reported lost if they were unable to track it. Yeah, they'd stop selling to someone if it was a repeated problem, but giving your customers the benefit of the doubt (in the absence of evidence to the contrary) is pretty much a definition of customer service.
Lulu.com is pretty damned lucky that they have an effective monopoly on the individual products that they sell. If not, I certainly wouldn't use them again, and irrespective of that, I certainly wouldn't use them for selling my own products.
I was slightly flabbergasted and offended when I got to the checkout. Lulu lists as their default shipping method, UPS, and if you try to change to the cheaper USPS mail, it offers a dire warning that says something like, "Warning! We can not track USPS mail, and if your package does not arrive, this will be you responsibility."
To which I say, bullshit. The folks who run Lulu.com appear to be either utterly ignorant of their business, or else they're purposeful liars and intimidators, and I don't appreciate either answer.
First of all, pretty much any credit card company would reverse the charges if you reported to them that a company had not delivered. For Lulu to try to social engineer their customers to shift that burden toward the consumer sounds to me like a bit of immorality on their part.
Second, pretty much any reasonable online seller would replace a shipment that was reported lost if they were unable to track it. Yeah, they'd stop selling to someone if it was a repeated problem, but giving your customers the benefit of the doubt (in the absence of evidence to the contrary) is pretty much a definition of customer service.
Lulu.com is pretty damned lucky that they have an effective monopoly on the individual products that they sell. If not, I certainly wouldn't use them again, and irrespective of that, I certainly wouldn't use them for selling my own products.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-10-10 08:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-10 10:26 pm (UTC)They're also semi-wrong about USPS. You can get delivery confirmation on any type of package (even Media Mail) as long as it is over something like 3/4 or 1" thick (and most books are). Tracking shouldn't be the issue with them. They just need, as a business, to have proof that something was delivered by the carrier.