Education order - waiting waiting waiting AAARRGGHH!!

[Dark Energy]

So here's my Macbook Air order story. Please forgive the small rant, I'm not a happy bunny right now. I ordered a 1.8/SSD model on Feb 1st through the education store. Stupidly asked for iWork to be preinstalled (yea I'm a noob I know ).

- Original ship date was mid Feb.

- Mid Feb, ship date got pushed back to Feb 26th

- Today, ship date got pushed back to March 11th.

So I call Apple and they say they have no clue what is going on, but they'll add on expedited shipping and put in a 'priority' on the order (I have no idea what that means). Even then, they couldn't guarantee it would ship on the 11th, and that further delays were 'possible'.

I feel like murdering kittens right now.

Should I just cancel? Or is it worth waiting a little longer? Anyone else have an experience like this? And does anyone know if a 'priority' has an effect on delivery times?

*sees kitten wander by and restrains himself with difficulty*

 

[TEG]

Could you not just go to an Apple Store and buy it in person with your discount?

TEG

 

[Federico]

Well I ordered a 1.6/80/spanish keyboard (for my friend in South America) on Feb 18, at that time they said 5-7 business days.... (2/28 7 business days)

Order Status:

Ships by: Feb 28 - Mar 4
Delivers by: Mar 3 - Mar 10

I got the discount because I'm a k-12 staff member, i need to get before March 7 (i'm leaving that day) , i could not order on the store, they don't have spanish keyboard. (they only have 1.6/80)

Edit: well i just received the tracking number

 

[Dark Energy]

Could you not just go to an Apple Store and buy it in person with your discount?

TEG

Well thats what I tried doing originally on Jan 31st but was told the wait time would be long and that it would be far better to order onlne and i would 'get it faster'.

so I did... sigh... must take deep breaths...

 

[kantonaxtwoo]

why dont you just cancel the order and go get your edu discount at the apple store?? that would be far easier and much faster

 

[queshy]

These things are all over the place now...no reason to wait.

I'm sick of waiting...for this thing to charge!!! (sorry to pollute the thread with my own problems)

 

[Dark Energy]

why dont you just cancel the order and go get your edu discount at the apple store?? that would be far easier and much faster

Because this is my first ever apple computer purchase

If they can't ship me a laptop within 6 weeks when the quoted lead time on the website is 1 week or less, then they aren't getting $3000 from me under any circumstances.

In essence, I want to see if they can get this right. If I have to cancel the order due to interminable delays and there's no explanation for those delays, AND other customers who ordered after me are getting their machines before me, then there's no way I'm doing business with them. I'll just stick to Linux.

 

[hotsauce]

Wirelessly posted (Apple Communication Device: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A93 Safari/419.3)

Well I ordered a 1.6/80/spanish keyboard (for my friend in South America) on Feb 18, at that time they said 5-7 business days.... (2/28 7 business days)

Order Status:

Ships by: Feb 28 - Mar 4
Delivers by: Mar 3 - Mar 10

I got the discount because I'm a k-12 staff member, i need to get before March 7 (i'm leaving that day) , i could not order on the store, they don't have spanish keyboard. (they only have 1.6/80)

Edit: well i just received the tracking number

Just out of curiosity, how different is the Spanish keyboard as opposed to the English version.

 

[JCT]

Because this is my first ever apple computer purchase

If they can't ship me a laptop within 6 weeks when the quoted lead time on the website is 1 week or less, then they aren't getting $3000 from me under any circumstances.

In essence, I want to see if they can get this right. If I have to cancel the order due to interminable delays and there's no explanation for those delays, AND other customers who ordered after me are getting their machines before me, then there's no way I'm doing business with them. I'll just stick to Linux.

Yup, been there, done that. Placed an order for a 1.8/SSD through my university on (are you ready) ... Jan 22nd. My EDU rep told me it would ship by Feb 12th and she had put an "expedite" on it. Sound familiar? Am I typing this on an MBA? No--- on Feb 13th the ship date flipped over to March 12th.

I called and asked my completely worthless EDU rep what had happened and she didn't seem to know-- when I asked what the chances were that it would actually ship-- she couldn't give me a straight answer. My lab has previously purchased tens of thousands of dollars worth of Apple gear.

So I cancelled the order and gave up. No excuse for being jerked around like this. While it might be painful I will probably just buy a small Sony or Lenovo for travel-- I would have it in my hands by the end of the week according to both reps, and unlike Madame Clueless at Apple, if there were issues they would make it right.

So you're not alone.

JT

 

[Federico]

Wirelessly posted (Apple Communication Device: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A93 Safari/419.3)



Just out of curiosity, how different is the Spanish keyboard as opposed to the English version.

ñ/Ñ key

 

[Dark Energy]

Yup, been there, done that. Placed an order for a 1.8/SSD through my university on (are you ready) ... Jan 22nd. My EDU rep told me it would ship by Feb 12th and she had put an "expedite" on it. Sound familiar? Am I typing this on an MBA? No--- on Feb 13th the ship date flipped over to March 12th.

I called and asked my completely worthless EDU rep what had happened and she didn't seem to know-- when I asked what the chances were that it would actually ship-- she couldn't give me a straight answer. My lab has previously purchased tens of thousands of dollars worth of Apple gear.

So I cancelled the order and gave up. No excuse for being jerked around like this. While it might be painful I will probably just buy a small Sony or Lenovo for travel-- I would have it in my hands by the end of the week according to both reps, and unlike Madame Clueless at Apple, if there were issues they would make it right.

So you're not alone.

JT

That makes me feeel a little better Sorry to hear about your woes though - maybe Apple just don't value education orders?

 

[JCT]

That makes me feeel a little better Sorry to hear about your woes though - maybe Apple just don't value education orders?

This is basically the question I put to my lousy rep. I asked why if I placed a regular EDU order on Feb 12th would I get my machine way before my institutional order placed on Jan 22nd. She had no answer. Really impressive.

JT

 

[Federico]

Well I ordered a 1.6/80/spanish keyboard (for my friend in South America) on Feb 18, at that time they said 5-7 business days.... (2/28 7 business days)

Order Status:

Ships by: Feb 28 - Mar 4
Delivers by: Mar 3 - Mar 10

I got the discount because I'm a k-12 staff member, i need to get before March 7 (i'm leaving that day) , i could not order on the store, they don't have spanish keyboard. (they only have 1.6/80)

Edit: well i just received the tracking number

Update, i just got the MBA this morning!!! i ordered trough Education Store on Apple.com on Feb 18, only took 2 days to arrive!!! (i didn't pay s/h)

 

[Dark Energy]

This is basically the question I put to my lousy rep. I asked why if I placed a regular EDU order on Feb 12th would I get my machine way before my institutional order placed on Jan 22nd. She had no answer. Really impressive.

JT

That's crazy. It seems like your and my orders have fallen into some rather small black hole - edu institutional purchases for the 1.8/SSD model maybe.

As this is my first purchase from apple, I'm prepared to give them one more chance. The optical drive is scheduled to ship by March 5th after 2 delays (original ship date was Feb 9th). If it slips again by so much as a day then I'm calling apple, and unless they make very VERY nice, I'll never do business with them again.

 

[JCT]

That's crazy. It seems like your and my orders have fallen into some rather small black hole - edu institutional purchases for the 1.8/SSD model maybe.

As this is my first purchase from apple, I'm prepared to give them one more chance. The optical drive is scheduled to ship by March 5th after 2 delays (original ship date was Feb 9th). If it slips again by so much as a day then I'm calling apple, and unless they make very VERY nice, I'll never do business with them again.

That's actually an interesting point regarding the 1.8/SSD version. I was calling around yesterday looking for a MBP in the config I wanted and one of the Apple store folks commented that the MBAs with the SSD seem to "trickle" into the stores.

I cancelled my MBA order -- but be sure to post back when your situation resolves. And be sure to give them hell if they screw around -- you're definitely not alone in this.

regards,

JT

 

[gregi]

MY EDU order also delayed

I too feel your pain about the slowness of filling education orders. I order the stock 1.6/80 Air, extra power adapter, and optical drive on Feb 2. My power adapter shipped 2/11. Everything else has been delayed at least once. My MacBook Air is now showing a shipping date of March 10-13. My optical drive was showing a ship date of March 6. However, on Friday, I got a notice that the optical drive has shipped. I'm hoping the Air will ship before 3/13. It wouldn't be quite so annoying if the on-line store did not show the MacBook Air shipping in 5 to 7 business days.

 

[Dark Energy]

Well, I got off a redeye this morning to discover that my Air has Shipped, and is allegedly in Alaska. So it seems that the 'priority' they put on the order after I rang them up and politely and calmly screamed blue murder at them did something useful - I thought I'd have to wait at least another 5 days.

If you're still waiting, then I suggest calling apple ad saying you have a business trip on date X, and that if it doesnt reach you by X-1 then you're not interested and you'll cancel the whole order. Oooh and that youve never shopped with apple before (in my case, all of the above is true). It seemed to work!

 

[Dark Energy]

That's actually an interesting point regarding the 1.8/SSD version. I was calling around yesterday looking for a MBP in the config I wanted and one of the Apple store folks commented that the MBAs with the SSD seem to "trickle" into the stores.

I cancelled my MBA order -- but be sure to post back when your situation resolves. And be sure to give them hell if they screw around -- you're definitely not alone in this.

regards,

JT

Interesting... sounds very plausible.

It also sounds like weordered Airs for similar reasons, so I'll post back with my impressions of it when it arrives, in case you change your mind

 

[Suncusser]

Educational orders- last in line

I ordered a 1.6/80 a few hours after it was announced on 1/15. Got a Feb 6 ship date like everyone else but when they started shipping early in January, mine never moved up. On Feb 5 my order went to "prepared for shipment" and on Feb 8 it slipped to ships March 6, arrives March 12. Went to my local Apple store and bought one with the edu discount on the afternoon of Feb 8. When I called to cancel, I found out I had a campus rep that had to approve a cancel without a restocking fee. He was reasonable but it turns out he only gets a commission on those ordered online or at the campus bookstore so he wasn't overjoyed that I went to the Apple store. Nevertheless, he took care of it and approved a return authorization. He mentioned that if I had known to call him, he might have been able to expedite the order so that it didn't slip back. The long awaited MBA then showed up on Feb 12 (the original arrival date) and was promptly shipped back.

 

[JCT]

Interesting... sounds very plausible.

It also sounds like weordered Airs for similar reasons, so I'll post back with my impressions of it when it arrives, in case you change your mind

That would be great -- and I will probably re-order later in the year when my travel load picks up again, being able to just toss the MBA in my regular carry-on bag is a huge draw.

And Suncusser-- your experience sounds nearly identical to my own except, of course, for the happy ending. We don't have the option of going to an Apple store (against my university's policies) -- otherwise I would have. Pretty funny about your Rep losing a commission -- mine just had a complaint filed on her with her superiors by my purchasing director. The comment about calling him sounds like serious B.S. -- I called mine immediately and she couldn't give me a clue as to what was going to happen. In any case, hope you are enjoying your MBA.

I think that the Institutional orders are simple at the bottom of the pile and at the slightest hint of a delay up the line they automatically get bumped down first. Pretty ridiculous.

JT

 

[gregi]

A happy ending

Right after my previous post, I decided to try a top down approach with Apple. I sent a very nice email to Mr. Jobs explaining my situation and my dissappointment with an additional 3-week wait when the web store only lists 5 to 7 days. I never expected to hear anything and was going to try contacting Apple from the bottom up if the lastest ship date (3/13) never materialized.

Well what do you know. Soon after my email to Mr. Jobs I received a phone call from a very helpful woman from Apple. She admitted a problem with some of the education orders and now has my MacBook Air on its way! She has called me several times to let me know of the order status.

People can say what they want about Apple, but in my 4 or 5 times of directly contacting Apple their customer service has been outstanding. If anyone else is thinking of contacting Mr. Jobs, I would suggest the nice and polite route. You can get your point across without threatening to cancel your order, etc.

 

[JCT]

Right after my previous post, I decided to try a top down approach with Apple. I sent a very nice email to Mr. Jobs explaining my situation and my dissappointment with an additional 3-week wait when the web store only lists 5 to 7 days. I never expected to hear anything and was going to try contacting Apple from the bottom up if the lastest ship date (3/13) never materialized.

Well what do you know. Soon after my email to Mr. Jobs I received a phone call from a very helpful woman from Apple. She admitted a problem with some of the education orders and now has my MacBook Air on its way! She has called me several times to let me know of the order status.

People can say what they want about Apple, but in my 4 or 5 times of directly contacting Apple their customer service has been outstanding. If anyone else is thinking of contacting Mr. Jobs, I would suggest the nice and polite route. You can get your point across without threatening to cancel your order, etc.

Actually -- I can make you laugh, I was probably the one who set this off. After I went through my nonsense with this I sent a detailed note to Jobs and got a response back from him-- the look on my Apple-loving teenager's face when she saw email from sjobs in my inbox was priceless. He suggested I try to buy local (not allowed by my school)--but it *was* nice to hear back from him. Your note sounds very similar to mine, pointing out the unfairness regarding EDU shipping and the long waits. So I guess he decided this was not just a single snafu and since it was persisting a month later, passed it along. Hey, look, maybe they will actually look at this problem....

regards,

JT