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Sup' guys.
Having a bit of a sh*t time with Maelstrom games (www.maelstromgames.co.uk), back in January I ordered an Empire Battalion which didn't seem to be getting shipped for a week and a bit (I chose free second class shipping so fair enough). I contacted then asking what was happening and they said that they now had it in stock and would ship it immediately; seeing as they had not already shipped it I asked them to change the order to a Chaos Battle Force and if they could refund the difference or shove it into my moneyback, I also asked for first class shipping (Maelstrom provide a money back service). Basically it's been three weeks since I asked for the order, I sent them an email asking what was going down which they replied to by saying they would ship it as soon as they had it in stock off GW.
From what I gather, for the fantastic saving of £5 you get an uncertain order pretty late; I could have picked it up in GW for no bother in a third of the time.
Don't know what I should do: ask for a refund and cancel the order? Money off my next purchase? Just leave it? I feel like I’m either getting ripped off or it's all just accidental. Just wondering what you guys would do.

I think its more of a case of they are getting rather well known. Normally that isn't an issue, but I have noted the last couple of their 'sales' where they add an extra percentage off, they have really slow dispatch times for a few weeks after.

So I think its a case of more and more people grabbing orders when the extra discount is in force.

Although to be fair its the only negative for the price, and the points system.

Its the same for pretty much all of the online discount stores; they often don't carry everything in stock and have to order from GW. Furthermore, GW's own draconian measures mean online retailers can only order once per week.

So as with everything, the trade off is money versus speed. Yes, you get a good discount but you need to be prepared to wait and with some items, there can be a bit of embuggerance getting them in (I had similar problems with some scenery once).

Alternatively, you can pay full price from GW but be fairly sure you will get your item quickly if ordering online, or immediately should they have it in store.

The choice, as they say, is yours...

(I have had experience with Maelstrom before and they are generally pretty good. Either be patient or ask for a refund)

filbert wrote:So as with everything, the trade off is money versus speed. Yes, you get a good discount but you need to be prepared to wait and with some items, there can be a bit of embuggerance getting them in (I had similar problems with some scenery once).

Embuggerace? Pratchett?
Yeah I think I’ll just bide my time, just wanted to check I wasn't getting ripped off or something.

Maelstrom are pretty well known and have a solid track record.

The delays that have occurred in your case are no doubt caused by the factors that people have mentioned above.

I've had to wait several weeks on occasion for popular items.

I don't think you should worry, just be patient for a while.

Maelstrom have really good pricing & many people have great experiences with them.

They are in my experience however, very slow to dispatch anything, taking a minimum of 2 weeks on everything I've ordered. I finally gave up ordering from them when they sent me the same wrong item 3 times.

Hopefully you're luck will be better than mine but I came to the conclusion that the low price is just not worth the hassle.

I use maelstrom almost exclusively at the moment as I've had no problems with them and I like their ranges of figures and other bits and pieces, but as has been said, they aren't the fastest to ship, especially on GW specific items which they don't tend to hold much of in stock for reasons specified.

I m surprised you have problem with MS Games. They have one of the best service, and offers competitive pricing and free shipping Worldwide!!!

There was once I ordered 3 boxes of the same items, received only 2. I wrote them an email, and 2 days later they sent a reply saying they will ship the other box to me , WITHOUT question. True enough, the last box arrived later on.
Excellent service I would say.

I have had somthing similar to the OP but had the opposite experience [infact I think they credted too much to my credit but Shuuush! ].

The only differance I can see is that being a luddite I called them rather than emailed them. I can imagne they like most people have allot of email traffic, so there is always the chance that it gets lost in amonst everything.

I confident that MG will resolve this for you.

Agree with whats been said already, they are a solid company (I have put in two major orders with them with no problems) albeit they can be slow for the above mentioned reasons. Both the orders took over a month to arrive but customer service was good and helpful.
Price vs speed/convenience is the choice here.

MG are pretty awesome, I've only ever had one delay in getting my order. Was a beast09 for warmachine and was when it was released. Did chase them a few times, eventualy got it when they got it back in stock as they were very very popular.

Other than that my orders have been with me in days let it be a £5 order or £50+

With the change of your order I dare say you might of made it even more of a wait. I would sit tight for now as they will get it to you, as said above it took sevral weeks for them to get my beast09 back in stock let alone get it in to fufil the back orders.

And speaking of orders shipping, my copy of Deathwatch: Rites of Battle just shipped. Yay!

Colour me very happy with everything that Maelstrom Games does.

If you want something done, CALL THEM

Nice H.B.M.C, seems a good week for that, my Hellpit and Ikit order finally got dispatched yesterday, so looking forward to looking at them this week.

Thats probably the longest I've waited for an order I'd reckon, I ordered them during the extra discount period in Jan. Not bothered mind, the saving is certainly worth it in my mind, plus I've had plenty to do anyways.

Morathi's Darkest Sin wrote:Nice H.B.M.C, seems a good week for that, my Hellpit and Ikit order finally got dispatched yesterday, so looking forward to looking at them this week.

Thats probably the longest I've waited for an order I'd reckon, I ordered them during the extra discount period in Jan. Not bothered mind, the saving is certainly worth it in my mind, plus I've had plenty to do anyways.

A friend of mine ordered 3 boxes of Gargoyles before the end of last year and they haven't arrived yet, and I've told the story of the two Honoured Imperium boxes that took months to arrive thanks to GW's indecision about whether to make them Direct Only or not. In all of these cases GW is often to blame, although the situation is created by Maelstrom (they have sales, get popular, have upwards of 5000 orders come in a week, and then can't fill them because GW is so tight with restocking).

And you changed your avatar.

I also have only good experience with Maelstrom. I've used them several times in the past years and just one time had to contact them about a order. The delay was caused by Privateer's inability to meet demand when Mk2 came out.

The Maelstrom savings mainly count when you are buying from overseas... Eg. AUS where our RRp is DOUBLE yours...

However, Maelstrom's Customer Service has been terribl and getting increasingly worse...

They shipped an incomplete set of paints to me and split my order in halves... more shipping for them, but a hassle for me as I was unable to field the Circle of Orboros miniatures that I had ordered in a local comp.

I suspect most of this is GW specific. I order a fair amount of flames of war stuff from maelstrom and the longest I've had to wait was 5 working days for something that was not listed as being in stock on their site. Everything else usually arrives in 2-3 days by first class UK post.