You guys may want to stay away from DVDExotic. I placed an order with them on 12/1 for 4 movies that were all listed as in stock. To date, I have been charged the full amount of my order plus tax and shipping and I still have not received my entire order. It took them a week to ship the first movie out and I just cancelled the fourth Wednesday (12/19). I had to call them on 12/7 for them to ship out my order and they did not even notify (email) me that one title was missing until I received my package on 12/11. I called today (12/19) and spoke to Mike and all I got was attitude and I quote “what do you want me to do about it.” Now let me remind you, I’ve already been charged for all four titles plus tax and shipping. On top of that, I even had their site pulled up on my screen to check on the status of the last item and was looking at the title in question. While we were arguing about the title still being in stock, he has the audacity to change the stock status while on the phone with me and then claim that I’m lying and that the title says it is out of stock. I repeat “I AM SITTING IN FRONT OF MY COMPUTER SCREEN LOOKING AT THE TITLE AND SEE IT BEING CHANGED RIGHT BEFORE MY EYES” and he says “ I don’t know what you’re talking about, my screen says it is out of stock.”
Steph, you may want to rethink you affiliation with this company. I remember people being dissatisfied with them back when they appeared in DVDTalk (I didn’t know why back then), and you were still with DivaDee (I spoke to you a couple of times, you may not remember but that’s not important). I actually tried DVDExotic and defended them (while getting flamed) saying they were a new company and are working through some jitters. Now, maybe I was one of the few unlucky ones who did not “realize” how they run their business and that the other members were correct.
I am sorry that you have had problems with DVD Exotic; however, my experiences with them have not been bad. I've placed 8 orders with DVD Exotic over a 4-month period. Of those, 5 were shipped in full the next business day following my having placed the order via the shipping method I chose.
The remaining 3 orders all included backorder items, none of which showed up at the time of my order. Therefore, I assume that there is some bug in the real-time inventory system. C'est la vie. And, I find DVD Exotic's method of handling backorders a bit strange; however, they have followed through every time.
It seems that they generate a second order for the backordered items with a zero-dollar charge for both the item and the shipping. This shows up at the time of shipment on their site listed under my account. The original order minus the backorder items is shipped and charged as if everything is there but an insert notes that some items are missing and will follow.
In the 1st of my 3 backorder situations, DVD Exotic sent me an email saying that they had encountered an unusually high number of returns on that particular item and offered me a choice: accept the item at my own risk, await replacement stock, choose another item of equal value or get a refund for the value of the item. I chose the refund at that time. The refund was credited to my credit card the next business day. What's more, as I tend to use coupons in an attempt to cut prices to the bone, taking a refund reduced my order below the coupon threshold. DVD Exotic did not reduce my savings, meaning that they cut into their profit because of the loss of the value of the additional item.
In the 2nd of my 3 backorder situations, they shipped the 2 missing items 2 days after the initial shipment; however, they upgraded the shipping method (at no charge to me) to UPS overnight (I always choose the cheapest method which also tends to be the slowest method). Both packages arrived the same day!
The 3rd situation has just occurred and is not yet resolved; however, based on past experience, I do not expect there to be a problem. I trust DVD Exotic to fulfill their part of our bargain as they have in the past. If it is NOT resolved satisfactorily, you may be sure that I will amend this post to that effect.
Yes it is a bit disconcerting to have a credit card charged for merchandise not received; however, many non-Internet mail order retailers do the same thing. Based on my experiences with DVD Exotic thus far, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
~ GaySatyr
Two notes based on the terms of the Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA): 1) They have 30 days from the date the order was placed to fill the order unless some other time period is clearly agreed upon in a purchase agreement; and 2) They have 60 days (beginning at the end of the 30 days) to issue a "prompt" refund if a refund becomes warranted in the transaction. (The government considers 60 days to be a prompt refund.)
I haven't ordered anything from DVD Exotic, but I can tell you that charging your credit card prior to shipping an item is ILLEGAL (it doesn't matter what state either of you are in, it's federal law).
If thay are incapable of following this basic rule of mail order, I don't imagine that I will be ordering anything from this company in the future.
I will contact the owner of DVD Exotic and bring this situation to his attention.
I have to admit that I'm very surprised by beelzebub's experience. I'm very familiar with their site and order processing systems. (I used to work with their programmer at Divadee before they went under and he joined DVD Exotic.)
I think you are mistaken. It is perfectly legal to charge a credit card for the total order at the time of the order. The supplier then has 30 days to fill the order (unless another time period is clearly stated in the purchase agreement) or to make special arrangements if the order cannot be filled within that time. This is all covered under the Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA), which applies to Internet transactions as well as telephone and mail order purchases. There are several situations that supercede this rule; however, generally, it applies.
There are a number of other regulations that cover credit card billing, mail order and interstate trade; however, I can find no reference to any law that forbids credit card charges prior to shipment of goods applicable anywhere in the United States (I did not try to find any such rules or regulations applicable world-wide).
The 30 day rule does not apply to credit card purchases. When someone pays by means other than a credit card, and the item is backordered for more than 30 days, the retailer must either notify the customer with a message that pretty strongly recommends that the customer cancels their order, or they must refund the payment to the customer and then bill them when their item ships (the company that I work for does the latter).
With credit cards, it is OK to authorize the card for the full amount when you accept the order, but you absolutely can not charge the card until the order is at least in the shipment process (and only for the items being shipped).
I have worked for two different (very well known) companies who do mail order sales, and have designed and/or written many of the fulfillment programs to support the mail order business and I can tell you that in both places charging before shipment is/was a major no-no which came directly from the legal department for exactly the reason that I gave in my previous post.
I'm not sure if the billing requierment is defined by law or if it's part of the terms of the merchant banking services contract. (It could be both.) The merchant agreement is the big one for a retailer to be concerned about. An online/mail order business can't survive for very long if they lose their merchant account due to breach of contract.
We can argue this point indefinitely. Company policy can be dictated by the company and/or its legal department as long as it does not conflict with the law. However, based on the FCBA (which specifically covers all open-ended credit agreements) and other consumer protection law, it does not matter what payment method is used for a mail order purchase, be it check, bank transfer, credit card or barter, the 30-day rule applies unless some other arrangement is part of the purchase agreement. The policy of charging at time of shipment was made popular by a number of major mail order retailers in an attempt to boost consumer confidence. It does not conflict with the FCBA, therefore it is legal - however that does NOT make it law - only policy. The FCBA further defines a number of remedies should its provisions not be met. These remedies include specific rules which must be followed by credit card companies regarding billing disputes. Regardless, unless there is an agreement otherwise binding between the purchaser and the supplier, for the purposes of mail order purchases via telephone, facsimile, US Postal Service or the Internet, the 30-day rule applies.
GaySatyr - I have used this company before also. I even gave them a bit of "leeway" considering it was holiday season and "things" were probably a bit hectic. Which is why I did not call them until a week after I placed my order to inquire about its status. One of the biggest problem was that I did not even receive a notification that a DVD was not in stock until my package arrived 2 weeks later and a letter inside that said the title will be in stock within a week and shipped out. When I finally called back on the 19th, all I got was attitude from the guy. The other thing I did not like was having the screen being updated while I was on their site. I told him that I just checked the status of my order and am looking at the title in question and it still says in stock. I even made the comment, "if I placed the order right now, it would still process through." Couple minutes later, (when my screen refreshes) the stock status has been updated to a RED "out of stock".
I did not like the way they charged my credit card but I was not that upset until I spoke to Mike on the 19th (again 3 weeks later) about the situation and he brings up the subject of me accusing him of "stealing" (??!).
beelzebub666 - Did you contact the owner of DVD Exotic? I have been in contact with him regarding this thread. I informed him that I did not have any of your order-specific information and that I would forward his email address to you at the address used in your forum profile.
