I just got another rude awakening from PayPal. A fellow in UK ordered some plans and paid by Paypal.  The plans, CD, DVD and specs were sent to him by airmail. It seems that he was of the opinion that airmail from the US doesn’t take more than 10 days. (airmail overseas now always takes a month to a month and a half) Despite my giving him the postal tracking code, he filed a claim with Paypal, and they took my entire fee back.  (I see the tube took 8 days just to leave the US)

I have to remind everyone that KHSD is a design office, not a retail store.  I do know that some people expect my office to be like Amazon with hordes of low paid workers ready to Fedex your order out the same day.  I cannot hire more staff to meet the orders as the products do not bring in enough  to pay for that.  If I had people to do the retail, the costs would have to double at least.  I don’t think most people want that.

When I am here, printing can only be done once a week to meet the printshop minimum order size.  Printing costs have doubled about yearly now. If I have a serious deadline on design work, the retail products might have to wait.  Again a design office not….

Finally when I am out of town, as happens often and usually with little warning, the retail has to wait until I get back.

Not Amazon here, but trying to keep up.  Maybe the products all need to be only sold on Amazon, but its not there yet.

A few people have used this feature of Paypal to both get the product, and also get all their money back.  I guess I need to get a waiver back from every Paypal order now making sure they understand how it is, or I refund on the spot.  Just what I need, one more layer of tasks.

I am surprised that IBEX has never been interested in doing a seminar on legal intricacies of international design sales.  I’ve stopped suggesting it by now.