Hate to make my first post a negative one, but I'm so frustrated at this point that I need to vent a little bit and hopefully save someone else the frustration of dealing with these two companies.
I'm newly "serious" to the e-cig thing, after having tried a few a couple of years ago and finding them basically useless. On the way to visit family for Christmas we stopped at a truck stop and they had the Mistic e-cigs on display pretty darn cheap, so on a whim I grabbed one. Initially a was just thinking it might be a good way to get my nic fix while visiting family who don't allow smoking inside and avoiding having to go stand out in the cold. What I ended up thinking, much to my surprise, was that this might actually be good enough to get me off the cigs for real. Given that I've been a 2-pack a day Marlboro Red smoker for somewhere around 27 years, that's not too bad for a little cheapy gas station e-cig.
But the cartos for them are ridiculously expensive, so I got online and found out how to refill them. Picked up a bottle of juice from the Tececig kiosk at the mall. 10ml for 10 bucks. Not as ridiculous a lot of mall vendors I've heard about, but by that point I'd already looked around online and knew it was still high. But, they have the advantage of being local, so I could get it right away. What the heck, right? Found that the cartos refill easily, and all seemed well. Not totally off the analogs yet, but one pack has lasted me 6 days. Pretty darn good for a 2 pack a day guy.
Now, on to my frustration...
On Wednesday, I decided I'd better get some more juice on the way. Being a sucker for free shipping, I ordered 3 30ml bottles from LeCig, and based on a good review of it I spotted somewhere here on the forum I also ordered a little 10ml bottle of Black & Mild from Crystal Clear.
Here I sit 48 hours later and I just now received a phone call for age verification from LeCig, and just received an email reply from Crystal Clear crying about being busy from Christmas orders. Given the mailing times from where these two companies are located, I was half expecting at least one order or the other to show up in the mail today, tomorrow at the latest. Instead, neither order has even been packed, much less mailed.
Now, I know that most vendors in this industry are little mom n' pop outfits, and a sudden flood of orders could take a little time to catch up with, but come on...
How hard would it be to let customers know? All they'd have to do is put a little note on the website that they're overwhelmed with holiday orders and are experiencing delays in shipping.
Had these two companies done that, I would have probably still placed my orders with them anyway, and would be a happy customer.
In the electronic world we live in, it's a well established expectation that online orders get shipped either same day, or on the next business day. If you're a small outfit that can't meet that expectation, that's fine, but you have to let your customers know.
I'm newly "serious" to the e-cig thing, after having tried a few a couple of years ago and finding them basically useless. On the way to visit family for Christmas we stopped at a truck stop and they had the Mistic e-cigs on display pretty darn cheap, so on a whim I grabbed one. Initially a was just thinking it might be a good way to get my nic fix while visiting family who don't allow smoking inside and avoiding having to go stand out in the cold. What I ended up thinking, much to my surprise, was that this might actually be good enough to get me off the cigs for real. Given that I've been a 2-pack a day Marlboro Red smoker for somewhere around 27 years, that's not too bad for a little cheapy gas station e-cig.
But the cartos for them are ridiculously expensive, so I got online and found out how to refill them. Picked up a bottle of juice from the Tececig kiosk at the mall. 10ml for 10 bucks. Not as ridiculous a lot of mall vendors I've heard about, but by that point I'd already looked around online and knew it was still high. But, they have the advantage of being local, so I could get it right away. What the heck, right? Found that the cartos refill easily, and all seemed well. Not totally off the analogs yet, but one pack has lasted me 6 days. Pretty darn good for a 2 pack a day guy.
Now, on to my frustration...
On Wednesday, I decided I'd better get some more juice on the way. Being a sucker for free shipping, I ordered 3 30ml bottles from LeCig, and based on a good review of it I spotted somewhere here on the forum I also ordered a little 10ml bottle of Black & Mild from Crystal Clear.
Here I sit 48 hours later and I just now received a phone call for age verification from LeCig, and just received an email reply from Crystal Clear crying about being busy from Christmas orders. Given the mailing times from where these two companies are located, I was half expecting at least one order or the other to show up in the mail today, tomorrow at the latest. Instead, neither order has even been packed, much less mailed.
Now, I know that most vendors in this industry are little mom n' pop outfits, and a sudden flood of orders could take a little time to catch up with, but come on...
How hard would it be to let customers know? All they'd have to do is put a little note on the website that they're overwhelmed with holiday orders and are experiencing delays in shipping.
Had these two companies done that, I would have probably still placed my orders with them anyway, and would be a happy customer.
In the electronic world we live in, it's a well established expectation that online orders get shipped either same day, or on the next business day. If you're a small outfit that can't meet that expectation, that's fine, but you have to let your customers know.
