Registered: Nov 1999
Location: Davis, CA USA
Posts: 10

As the 6 week deadline set by Handspring reached its terminus I emailed the CS department at Handspring to confirm the orders were still being processed within the established guidelines. I received an immediate and kind response - but the message was sickening. Here it is verbatim "While we are doing
everything we can to ship product as intended we are shipping product closer
to 8-9 weeks. I cannot provide you an exact date as to when your unit will
ship and I don't want to set expectations that we are unable to meet. I
assure you we are all working very hard to rectify the problems and will
ship your unit as soon as possible." Ouch. So much for 6 weeks on the web orders!

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Dallas, TX, USA
Posts: 70

And this actually came from Ms. Dubinsky's staff at headquarters? Okay, I'm officially upset now! All we've been hearing for a month now is 4-6 weeks, don't get upset, you'll get your Visor in 4-6 weeks and now that the 6 weeks are up, they're now saying 8-9 ?!? UNBELIEVABLE!

Can you tell us if you emailed the CS department using the online response forms, or if you emailed someone directly at HQ?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: richmond, va, usa
Posts: 46

(Must keep head from spinning!!!!)

I am not happy. I guess this means that some of the pre-10/6 orders will not be out the door for a couple more weeks either, since they were going to start the FIFO as soon as they cleared those out. We will see what happens this week. If this is true, there will probably be another change to the shipping/receiving page. Let's hope the E-mail was cautiously pessimistic.

Geoff (10/6 - Online)

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Streamwood, IL USA
Posts: 118

October 31st....

4-6 Weeks....

8-9 Weeks....

When exactaly are they going to stop setting expectations that they can't keep? This is getting horrificaly ridculas <sp?> I can't believe this!

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Lakewood, Ohio USA
Posts: 40

I'm on the 9th week and still don't think I'll be seeing anything even though all my order information is showing as correct. I wish they would at least notify me if there is a problem this is getting beyond their updated shipping promise.

Registered: Nov 1999
Location: MA
Posts: 19

O.K. now I am really starting to boil. It seems that anyone that ordered on the *fabulous* web site is being punished. They told us to be patient for the Oct 31 deadline, which we were. Then be patient for the 4-6 week deadline - which we have tried to be. NOW 8-9 weeks?!?!?
I really don't know what to do! We better get something extra for all of our time and patience (and not cancelling!)

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Dallas, TX, USA
Posts: 70

At this point, the "extra" I'd personally like is my Visor sometime before CHRISTMAS!

I have NEVER experienced such crappy customer service from ANY company in my entire life! And I used to be a purchasing agent, and thought I'd seen the worst!

I only have one credit card I use for online orders and as a backup to my checking account card, and it only has a $300 credit limit. So that card is "on hold" until I get my Visor, because I don't want to risk having my order rejected because I got something on it, and didn't get the payment in before HS tried to ping it. And they can't even get thier collective feces together enough to tell me WHEN they're going to bill and ship it!

Like everyone else who ordered on the web, I did so to try to avoid some of the issues that were coming up with the phone orders. And since that was SUPPOSED to be thier primary order method, you'd THINK they'd be committed to making sure that it delivers as promised. Oh, well, that's what we all get for thinking, right?

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Streamwood, IL USA
Posts: 118

Ok the excuse for not shipping the original phone orders was a data conversion problem from the CSR company to HS's database.

The excuse for delaying the web orders was to sort out the September orders.

If we ordered on the web, didn't the data go DIRECTLY to HS's database? What could the excuse POSSIBLY be?

This is extremely frustrating. If I don't see it by Wednesday (10/6 order + 6 weeks + 1 day for overnight delivery as promised), I am going to start *****ing directly at Donna. I have been patient and I have not bugged anyone, but I have had enough.

Registered: Nov 1999
Location: Davis, CA USA
Posts: 10

In response:

MeghannMac - Don't bother with the inept CS staff. My message is straight from Handspring - so it looks like we are in for a long wait.

Meisty - Good luck, I'm sure your patience will be rewarded

Remely - No dice, only the overcharged customers receive the free 5 pack. The web orders just get to wait.

On the plus side I have it on good authority that we will have our Visors before the millenium. If Handspring's database can't handle something as simple as orders, can you imagine what Y2K will do to them?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location:
Posts: 86

Although I've been one of the most vocal "Come on folks, let's all just be patient" kind of guys on this board, I'm really starting to get upset.

Every other on-line company on the web strives for an "order today we'll ship it tomorrow" time frame. It's what makes on-line business work. If HandSpring wasn't capable of handling of shipping 1000 orders a day then they shouldn't have started taking orders. I mean, why not just go pay buy.com to set up your e-commerce for you? They can handle tens of thousands of orders a day.

Whatever company HandSpring has doing their order taking needs to be fired A.S.A.P.

Regardless of whatever problems they've had in the past, the ONLY excuse for shipping in an 8 to 10 week period is lack of product. I mean come on! Jeff Hawkins invented the Palm Pilot. Of all people he should know how popular they are. How could they NOT know how popular the Visor would be.

So, exactly how popular is the Visor? I was originallly hearing rumours that there were 50,000 orders in the first month. From the traffic on this board and the serial number information that's been posted I'd expect that the real number is somewhere between 5000 to 10,000 orders total over 2 months. That's NOTHING! How can I believe that in the 20 business days between Oct 15th and November 12th HandSpring could not ship 500 packages a day? If you have a staff of only 5 people in your shipping department that's nearly 5 minutes per package to pull the stock, box up the order and address it properly.

I'm sorry but the numbers just don't add up. The only solution I can come up with is that the Visors simply don't exist. Their manufacturing hasn't caught up with even the lowest estimate of orders. And THAT'S an appaling lack of customer service that IS HandSpring's fault.

Registered: Sep 1999
Location:
Posts: 106

And if I here another person says "Hey cut them slack. It's not Handspring, it's their contractors that are messing up", I'm going to scream! The case is not put together correctly...blame it on the Malaysia assembly plant. Shippment didn't get to the U.S., blame it on the freight lines. Blame it, blame it, blame it. Blame it on everybody but Donna and her good intentions. I have made ONE overture to Handspring to correct CC info. I have left them alone. Their promises are turning into lies. Donna step aside and let someone else steer.

[This message has been edited by RJT (edited 11-15-1999).]

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: richmond, va, usa
Posts: 46

Just thought I would quote HS on the Web Order stuff before they change the page. Most of you saw this on the "Shipping Details" page on their site, but here is a refresher...

"Web orders: Some individuals placed orders on the Handspring web site during this period. These orders are fine, and will be shipped within the 4-6 week guideline we established. You do not need to reconfirm these orders. "

I think I'm gonna be sick...

Geoff

Registered: Oct 1999
Location:
Posts: 18

I wouldn't be surprised if they don't update the shipping info at all.

It's a shame that such a (supposedly) magnificent product is being managed so poorly. If Handspring hasn't gotten its act together by now, I wonder if it ever will.

My order status on the HS web site still says 4-6 weeks. If my Visor is still vaporware by Wednesday, I'll introduce myself to Donna.

Gavin

[This message has been edited by ssugavin (edited 11-15-1999).]

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Troy,MI
Posts: 12

I'm upset but not surprised. The 4-6 weeks for web orders stated on their site kept my hope up. But the "visor received log" doesn't have any real number of October orders received at all.

If my 10/6 order isn't here by Wednesday then I'm cancelling and waiting for it to show up at buy.com whenever that happens.

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Dallas, TX, USA
Posts: 70

I'm with you. I just sent off a scathing email to Ms. Torres. What the CSR just told me when I tried to verify the change to my shipping information was that no one at the 888 number can get to that information, and the new *expected* **SHIP** date is 8-9 weeks. And shipping will take another week on top of that. So.... my order now isn't late until after 12/8???

For all of this, I can have a IIIx in my hands come Wednesday with 4MB RAM, get a cool replacement cover from palmcolors.com, and get a new PDA from one of Handspring's competitors once they catch up with the RAM and springboard technology. Which I'm fairly certain they will.

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: richmond, va, usa
Posts: 46

Here's a little salt in the wound:

Check out the Visor Received Log at: http://www.visorcentral.com/visor/d...L/000016-4.html

There are two posts from members who received Visors today and ordered in mid-October. As happy as I am for them, I can't understand the logic at HS. They even came Fed-Ex after a mere 4 weeks of waiting!

Geoff

[This message has been edited by wgharper (edited 11-15-1999).]

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: richmond, va, usa
Posts: 46

In the spirit of my earlier post, here is the text from the Donna D. Shipping Update page describing the shipping order:

"Our process will be to continue to validate the data, and then reinstate our sequential shipping process, shipping the oldest orders first."

If I am reading this correctly, they had planned to clean up the early orders, and _then_ start shipping FIFO. Clearly this is not the case.


------------------
**********
Geoff H.
"For a nation which has an almost evil reputation for bustle, bustle, bustle, and rush, rush, rush, we spend an enormous amount of time standing around in line in front of windows, just waiting."
-Robert Benchley

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Blacksburg, VA, USA
Posts: 26

Same here, if I don't get mine by the end of this week handspring will have lost yet another customer. I doubt they care...

Registered: Oct 1999
Location:
Posts: 21

There is a good side to all of this. Since I (and I'm sure others) will be traveling over Thanksgiving, I had nightmares that my visor would ship late this week (10/6 online order) and make it here next week while I was away. At least I don't have to worry about that now!!

Seriously though, I just have to say WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT! I know my info is correct in their DB. Yet, they are shipping orders that are a week after mine. As far as the September orders go, I have no idea how you folks have been able to handle all this. The whole thing is quite insane really. What in the world has Handspring done with their millions of dollars of venture capital money????

What's the best price you've seen for a Vx?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Alexandria, Va, USA
Posts: 19

Anybody have a email address of a high up in Handspring so I can get some service maybe.

Thanks