[X] My Assistant

[dvandorn]

Anyone else here having any problems with Spacecraft Films lately?

I had ordered the Apollo 15 set last summer, and I got it in five days. I was very happy with it. I got the 15 set first, I think, because 15 was the flight I didn't audio-tape at the time of the flight, and I wanted to be able to re-live the EVAs as I hadn't been able to do with the other J missions.

So, on January 15, I decided to order what I've been wanting all along -- the Apollo 16 set. I had little extra cash after Xmas from bonuses and such, and decided I could afford the set for 16, which was my favorite of all of the Apollo flights.

Two weeks after I ordered, no DVDs had arrived. I wrote to Spacecraft Films, asked what was going on, and was told that the set was out of stock (even though there was no mention of this on the website). I was told it would be another four weeks, and the note suggested I might want to take a refund.

I didn't want a refund, I wanted the set, so I said no, four weeks is OK, please send me the set.

Now, four more weeks have passed. I checked the website just about a week or so ago, it said nothing about out-of-stock, so I figured it had to be ready soon. But when the four weeks (plus) had passed, I wrote them again.

They said it would be *another* four weeks, and again more strongly suggested I take a refund.

I wrote back saying I REALLY wanted the set, and was at a loss to understand what the problem was. I also suggested they note this on the website, since for nearly two months, they were out of stock on something and there was no mention of that on the website. I told them I was irritated, but that I really wanted the set.

The reply from that, this morning, was "Why don't I just apply a refund -- we don't want you to be irritated."

These people just don't seem to want to sell me the set.

I am still irritated. I feel that if the item was going to be out of stock significantly longer than what they told me, they had a certain responsibility to let me know that, and not just add another four weeks to the supposed delivery date every time I asked about it.

Now I'm doing the LAST thing I wanted to do, here -- taking a refund and NOT getting my Apollo 16 set.

Now I'm more irritated than ever, and I want to know if I should bother even trying to order from Spacecraft Films ever again? Or if any of y'all should, either?

-the other Doug

[dvandorn]

Yeah -- I had looked through Amazon and Ebay and found several places where I could not only order the set, I could order "used, unopened, like new" copies of the set for significantly less money.

But I wanted to deal directly with SCF because I wanted to encourage them to continue doing what they're doing, making these materials available to the public. I wanted *them* to get the full profit, to encourage them and such.

I don't want them to stop doing what they're doing -- but I'm truly irritated and disillusioned with them, now. So it's quite likely I *will* order any further SCF products from third parties -- preferably third parties who take a nice big cut of the profit and leave SCF with less. Because if SCF is going to be this irresponsible with their direct customers, they deserve to only get the smaller cut they receieve when someone buys their products through third parties.

I might have had a different attitude had I been offered something -- ANYTHING -- beyond a refund. Like, a refund AND the set, or another set for free, or something like that. But they've blown it, as far as I'm concerned.

*heavy sigh*

-the other Doug