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Just a thank you to the mail order team,

my pre-order valkyrie came sans flying stand, bit of a shame but...

1 quick phone call later and an appology that they can't send out a flying stand on it's own, so they'll have to send another valkyrie with it, terribly sorry.

the prices going up makes me sad, the good service make me happy again.

course I'll be able to buy less to get good service with, but there you go...

Flying stand is reputedly coming out on it's own soon....£6 if memory serves. There is a thread knocking about Dakka on the subject.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Flying stand is reputedly coming out on it's own soon....£6 if memory serves. There is a thread knocking about Dakka on the subject.

Knocking about, and knocking it. The prices have reached the point of lunacy.

GW customer service rocks. Bash the prices and the silly rules all ya want, but at least they got 1 thing right

I was thinking about getting 9 valkyries to turn my guard army into a vet airborne army, decided to blow $400 on a PS3 instead

Yeah, I have to admit it, the customer service is pretty good. This year I have had a faulty cast and several boxes missing bases, but they quickly and happily fixed things for me. I think Jervis has a serious lack of grounding in reality, and whoever it is that decides the cost of things needs a kick in the nose, but these guys are actually quite good.

No argument that they make good on mistakes, often lavishly...

OTOH, the costs of those replacement parts have to go somewhere, and probably contribute (albeit in a tiny way) to raising prices.

I've found mini companies tend to be good at customer support like this if they're at all reachable. (I.E. if they're more than a guy who spins up some molds as a weekend job and is busy all week at his day job.)

I find the fact that there is a global recession happening and GW decides well we are going to increase prices to be a little bit ridiculous.

I also find that the customer service is alright (granted I go in to my local GW store to get my stuff fixed and all they do is replace the part so no free valkyrie for me) this however is completely taken down by the fact that I can no longer order Forgeworld product from my local store I have to order from GW direct which means I have to pay the shipping as well that the GW bitz orderign system just keeps gettign worse and worse all the time.

Gaznab wrote:I find the fact that there is a global recession happening and GW decides well we are going to increase prices to be a little bit ridiculous.

I also find that the customer service is alright (granted I go in to my local GW store to get my stuff fixed and all they do is replace the part so no free valkyrie for me) this however is completely taken down by the fact that I can no longer order Forgeworld product from my local store I have to order from GW direct which means I have to pay the shipping as well that the GW bitz orderign system just keeps gettign worse and worse all the time.

Forgeworld is a different part of the company- although ask about getting it sent to your local store- that can bag you free shipping in the UK. As for bitz ordering... erm how has it gotten worse and worse since the old "lets make the company go bust" approach of ordering anything was replaced with the ever-expanding bitz packs?

Ever-expanding? Yeah... and maybe one day the Bitz Pack service will be useful and/or useful. I've never met a person that needs 5 Terminator Psycannon arms. Ever.

But as far as GW's customer service goes, I'm not 100% sure on the UK side (I know it takes them 2 weeks to ship a tiny package to Australia, which is an eternity compared to the next-day-delivery of GWUS), but I know that GWUS is easily the best mail order service on the planet. Sure, I order from Maelstrom because the prices are fantastic, shipping is free, and they're (usually) quick, but GWUS is the best from a service perspective. Mistakes are rare, and those that do happen are fixed within a week, if not sooner. And their delivery service is the quickest I've ever seen (I once ordered on Monday evening, had the package by Wednesday morning).

GWUS is great.

I recently experienced the same thing, and received a complementary Land Raider Crusader box

karmaiko wrote:I recently experienced the same thing, and received a complementary Land Raider Crusader box

No wonder they're going to have to raise prices!!!

H.B.M.C. wrote:Ever-expanding? Yeah... and maybe one day the Bitz Pack service will be useful and/or useful. I've never met a person that needs 5 Terminator Psycannon arms. Ever.

Deathwatch kill team conversion pack... useful
Chaos mutation sprue... very useful and up until the change in bitz service...unavalible
Baneblade sponson upgrade... again very useful
Ork glyphs, various marine shoulder pads (with new ones too) packs of 5 plasma or melta guns...

Hell the new orky ones have the buzzsaw arm... i'll probably be ordering a ton of them- and I would have done if they were in the old bitz range...but wait they weren't

such a shame you can't get chao terminator 4's left trophy rack anymore

Bignutter wrote:As for bitz ordering... erm how has it gotten worse and worse since the old "lets make the company go bust" approach of ordering anything was replaced with the ever-expanding bitz packs?

I don't know if we can really say that bitz were a massive drain on GW's finances. I think that was part of the justification for ending the program, but I think it was mostly a logistical nightmare as they needed to actively maintain 10x as many parts in the inventory. I'm guessing they may still have 'codes' for a lot of these parts, but don't use them externally anymore.

It can also be potentially expensive to cast, say, a mold with a bunch of metal space marine parts for the guy that wants one weapon piece, but that's why a model cost more if ordered in pieces than ordered normally. GW can theoretically absorb a lot of the excesses due to volume: They sell much more than most other game companies, so many of the excesses would get evened out over time.

On the other hand, the service (like the good customer service) gets GW something they can use, which is goodwill. A lot of people liked being able to order oddball parts for conversions (I know I did!) and I think that access helped spawn many of the great looking armies people have made.

The company I do some work for can't justify a parts service due to the cost issue as most products are on a single mold. They do a selection of limited weapon and upgrade packs. There's a lot of requests for a few other components, but the items would need to be reorganized for more efficient casting and it would mean another item to store, advertise to retailers, etc.

(At least, that's my understanding. Visiting the caster would require an international border crossing.)

Had I been GW, I would have preferred a 'middle path' of announcing an intention to star phasing out older components: Maybe ceasing to sell that metal Skaven warrior from the early 80s would be a bit less likely to annoy people. Use the sales data and make 'bitz packs' people actually want.Take it slow, instead of cutting things off.

Of course, I do not run a game company, so I'm just running my mouth.

Im totally on board with how awesome their customer service is. I bought a box of boyz a few months ago, some of the bases were melted and like 2 shootas were melted. I also said hey just send me what I need, no big deal. Nope got a whole box to replace it lol. Made me happy

Bignutter wrote:such a shame you can't get chao terminator 4's left trophy rack anymore

Oh please. Don't give me that.

The bits packs have a very limited area of use. They don't sell Razorback sprues. They don't see Command Squad sprues. They don't sell Black Templar upgrade Sprues. They don't see separate Iron Hands Thunder Hammers. What if you don't want all the needless Deathwatch heads (1 in every 2 is a SCREAMING head... who needs more of those, in metal?)? What if you want a specific model from a specific kit? What if I want 5 Grey Knight Halberds and not 4 and a useless Sword? Who needs 5 Terminator GK Psycannons? Why can't I just get 1? Why would I want metal plasma guns when we have access to plastic ones off bits sites. That are cheaper. And there are now Necromunda models you can't actually get!! Awesome!!! What if I want a Servo-Arm? What if I just want regular Servitors and don't want to have to keep buying HW Servitors?

I understand GW's reasons for getting rid of the bits service, but their replacement is pathetic.

So you're saying I should go buy a Valkyrie and call and say it didn't come with a stand?

Well lying (and abuse) of the system will just get it shut down, which doesn't help anyone (obviously). But that's not to say you can't be... "economical" with the truth.

Example:

Dread Mob Apoc formation - came with 6 Kanz & 3 Dreadz. Good deal actually. Friend orders it, and gets 3 Kanz rather than 6. He tells GW, they send him the remaining 3 Kanz. What he didn't mention is that they sent him 6 Dreadz by accident. Net-result - 3 free Ork Dreadz.

Or one for me, I ordered two blisters of metal Spore Mines. They did not arrive. Instead I get two Psycannon GK Terminators (WTF???). I let them know that the Spore Mines did not arrive. They send replacement Spore Mines within a week (GWUS is awesome). I decided not to mention the GK Terminators, and gave them to a friend of mine.

So I never lied to them, I just didn't give them the whole truth.

dr vompire wrote:Just a thank you to the mail order team,

my pre-order valkyrie came sans flying stand, bit of a shame but...

1 quick phone call later and an appology that they can't send out a flying stand on it's own, so they'll have to send another valkyrie with it, terribly sorry.

the prices going up makes me sad, the good service make me happy again.

course I'll be able to buy less to get good service with, but there you go...

According to the logic of CT GAMER from another thread, what proof do we have that your telling the truth that GW followed through and sent another valkyrie?

H.B.M.C. wrote:Well lying (and abuse) of the system will just get it shut down, which doesn't help anyone (obviously). But that's not to say you can't be... "economical" with the truth.

Example:

Dread Mob Apoc formation - came with 6 Kanz & 3 Dreadz. Good deal actually. Friend orders it, and gets 3 Kanz rather than 6. He tells GW, they send him the remaining 3 Kanz. What he didn't mention is that they sent him 6 Dreadz by accident. Net-result - 3 free Ork Dreadz.

Or one for me, I ordered two blisters of metal Spore Mines. They did not arrive. Instead I get two Psycannon GK Terminators (WTF???). I let them know that the Spore Mines did not arrive. They send replacement Spore Mines within a week (GWUS is awesome). I decided not to mention the GK Terminators, and gave them to a friend of mine.

So I never lied to them, I just didn't give them the whole truth.

I was just kidding of course. There was a time where I got 6 blisters of Ork Escort ships for BFG that were packaged incorrectly. It took them 4 times to get it right

Hmm i wonder if anyone have purposely lied to gain from GW mail service.

And around how much is GW losing from that.

I also noticed ( in canada atleast ) they are very inefficient with the postal fees. I think once i received a mini with 2 same sided arm , so they mailed the other arm to me and the postage on it was $11?

Geez o_o after that i sort of felt bad for them and never complained about the defective products .

I havn't dealt with GW much, but i called the Oshawa store today looking for a Tau Battleforce ( I'm HORRIBLY in need of some more troop choices), and the guy gave me some tips on making my army Apoc-ready. apparantly the Hammerhead formation is a hell of a titan killer. Ironically i went to another store (not GW) that had that formation for $130 (CAN). almost bought it too, except i dont have any room in my FOC for 3 hammerheads and a skyray :-P. On a slightly off-topic note, you guys mentioned that US gets things delivered the next day or 2 days later usually. Is that true in canada? i still need that battleforce, and if i can avoid driving to another city for it i'd like to. I just don;t want to wait 2 weeks (I may be playing in a tournament then, and I need time to paint and assemble). I'm a half hour drive from the nearest GW store (yeah i know not far) but i dont usually have access to a vehicle.

Balance wrote:

Bignutter wrote:As for bitz ordering... erm how has it gotten worse and worse since the old "lets make the company go bust" approach of ordering anything was replaced with the ever-expanding bitz packs?

I don't know if we can really say that bitz were a massive drain on GW's finances. I think that was part of the justification for ending the program, but I think it was mostly a logistical nightmare as they needed to actively maintain 10x as many parts in the inventory. I'm guessing they may still have 'codes' for a lot of these parts, but don't use them externally anymore.

It can also be potentially expensive to cast, say, a mold with a bunch of metal space marine parts for the guy that wants one weapon piece, but that's why a model cost more if ordered in pieces than ordered normally. GW can theoretically absorb a lot of the excesses due to volume: They sell much more than most other game companies, so many of the excesses would get evened out over time.

On the other hand, the service (like the good customer service) gets GW something they can use, which is goodwill. A lot of people liked being able to order oddball parts for conversions (I know I did!) and I think that access helped spawn many of the great looking armies people have made.

The company I do some work for can't justify a parts service due to the cost issue as most products are on a single mold. They do a selection of limited weapon and upgrade packs. There's a lot of requests for a few other components, but the items would need to be reorganized for more efficient casting and it would mean another item to store, advertise to retailers, etc.

(At least, that's my understanding. Visiting the caster would require an international border crossing.)

Had I been GW, I would have preferred a 'middle path' of announcing an intention to star phasing out older components: Maybe ceasing to sell that metal Skaven warrior from the early 80s would be a bit less likely to annoy people. Use the sales data and make 'bitz packs' people actually want.Take it slow, instead of cutting things off.

Of course, I do not run a game company, so I'm just running my mouth.

Erm....thats kinda what they did- although they dropped it alot quicker due to business tax- all of those bitz lying around get taxed at their retail value- and that is a HUGE blow to the feasiblity of such an open scheme... and that has been replaced with the much more sensible bitz packs...



as for saying that the bitz packs are useless- you can give thousands of examples for why they are bad- but they wouldn't bother doing them if it wasn't worth them doing it- the grey knight force weapons is what you get straight out the mold- what do you want them to do with the spare sword? and what happens if you want the spare sword? The packs had been put together based on what people had been buying- so the most popular bitz are in the form of bitz packs.

Is the business tax thing verified? I assumed the whole idea for bitz was that they were cast on demand, which is part of the justification for the cost.

As for packs being useless, that is of course personal. Some, like the Deathwatch pack, is a great idea except for the identical heads. It's guaranteed waste. The basic Imperial Fists pack looks a lot smarter, as it's parts you'd actually need.

Anyway, they're pretty variable. Some are cool, others aren't. If nothing else, I wish they'd add more of the old smaller plastic weapon sprues.

Balance wrote:Is the business tax thing verified? I assumed the whole idea for bitz was that they were cast on demand, which is part of the justification for the cost.

As for packs being useless, that is of course personal. Some, like the Deathwatch pack, is a great idea except for the identical heads. It's guaranteed waste. The basic Imperial Fists pack looks a lot smarter, as it's parts you'd actually need.

Anyway, they're pretty variable. Some are cool, others aren't. If nothing else, I wish they'd add more of the old smaller plastic weapon sprues.

They weren't usually cast on demand- but even then- the molds have full models usually- so if someone wanted 10x abbaddon's sword, there would end up being 10x lightning claws, 10x heads, 10x bodies all lying around (and maybe being bought) and 10x of each trophy rack that just sit there and cost money because of their tax value, as well as the cost of storage and materials to make 'em

At tax time round up all leftover bits and remelt them into raw material. Metal is good that way. Also the solution for what to do with the left over bits of someone's order.

I don't think their old bitz service was running at a loss, probably just not enough of a profit to satisfy some accountant.

asmith wrote:I don't think their old bitz service was running at a loss, probably just not enough of a profit to satisfy some accountant.

To be honest I assumed it was no one wanting to have to deal with bitz for the online store when it was last updated. It's amazing that the store seems to go down in actual utility every time it's updated.

(I just went to check it before running my mouth: The new version is cool and AJAXy, but I'm not sure if it's really a great interface nonetheless. They do have nice big pictures of most products, thankfully, which is good considering for so long they had some horrible pictures up.)