Ordering an “In Stock” item from UK shop but shipped from outside UK

[johninderby]

Now I’m not going to name the UK dealer as I don’t want this thread to be closed (and no it’s not FLO of course) but ordered something the other day hoping it would be here for the weekend only to find out it’s being shipped from outside the UK.As it was showing as in stock and they are a UK based shop I expected it to be shipped fairly quickly. If they had have made it clear that it would be shipped from outside the UK I would have ordered from someone else. Now I know it will arrive next week so no worries about it not arriving but just irritated.

Has anyone else found this happening lately? Please don’t name names as I don’t want this turning into dealer bashing but just interested in hearing if this practice is becoming more common. 

 

Edited May 24, 2019 by johninderby

[Carbon Brush]

I know of one astro retailer (with a shop) who talks about items in HIS warehouse. When he actually means drop shipping from Optical Vision.

 

 

[Davey-T]

Had it happen to me, actually went to the shop to buy it as they advertised it as in stock, turned out they meant in stock at the suppliers and then it turned out it was even out of stock there with no idea when it might show up, first and last time I tried to buy from them 

Dave

[johninderby]

We’ve been spoiled by FLO. 🙂

[Cosmic Geoff]

I ordered an item which was supposed to be in stock. When it didn't arrive, I chased it up to find that it was actually being dispatched from another company who had managed to mislay the order till pursued.

[heliumstar]

In stock doesn't mean anything on astro shops. Always better to check first but it can be annoying. Sometimes there comes Thursday or Friday that I want something and it says in stock but when I check it's actually not and the wait time is anywhere from a few days to couple of weeks. I understand it's hard for small shops like astro to have this nailed down but on the other hand a little transparency would go a long way.

[RiponJas]

Yup, twice from the same shop as well. No longer use them for anything of value. 

Is certainly a frustrating situation when it arises. 

Jas 😀

[upahill]

Unfortunately very common as smaller retails who have to compete on price a lot more reduce capital outlay/risk by dropshipping or using just in time fulfilment from suppliers. 😞

Thinking about it, its actually a part of many businesses now by design, like companies who use Amazon for their warehousing and fulfilment but do own the stock. It's still technically coming from a 3rd party. Have bought parts on website before and had Amazon drivers turn up with it.

[Davey-T]

I ordered something from a site calling itself telescopes uk or some such, the invoice was in dollars and delivery from Europe 

Dave

[Ben the Ignorant]

The Celestron 100 ED was a bargain almost too god to be true. It's been discontinued for years but it was an f/9, aspherical apo doublet, probably a clone of the Sky-Watcher f/9 doublet but maybe not. Anyway, it got this excellent review:

http://www.telescopedoctor.com/main.asp?cod=test/rifrattori/celestron-Omni102ED

If you don't read italian, spherical was extremely reduced, no fringing in focus, only a little color spread outside of focus, no light scatter, extreme sharpness, 300x and no image breakdown. The best part was it retailed for not much over 700€. 746€ in a certain shop when I hadn't saved up, and then only 716€ when I had, mount and tripod included. But it was labeled as "available in may" when I had decided to buy in february of that year.

So I waited and waited and waited, checking regularly the status of the thing. When it finally showed up as "in stock", I sent an email asking to confirm it was actually so, cause I knew actual stock is not always updated immediately. Yes, it's available for order, and you'll soon enjoy that fine instrument, was the answer. An hour or two later I'm back at the shop's site to place the order but it's labeled as unavailable. Imagine how shocked I was after a three months wait!

One more email, they answered their provider has suddenly discontinued the thing and not warned them. So it had never been in stock anywhere, but only probalby available, and the probability turned out Schrödinger's cat was dead. Or it was materially present somewhere and was sold to someone else, which would not be better.

Today you'd pay more than 716€ for the Sky-Watcher tube alone but back then the price inluded a CG-4 mount, Celestron's supposedly upgraded version of Sky-Watcher's EQ-3 mount. Manual controls, no dual-speed focuser but still a wonderful bargain. In theory.

That was my worst disappointment ever in astro shopping. I must say I avoided that shop for a long time but ordered from them on a few occasions when I felt more at peace with them. As some sort of twist of fate they got me an 80mm semi-apo at 1/3 of the regular price because it had fungus on the lens but it was never used, happened in a wharehouse, the mounting rail and the focuser drawtube were pristine, never been used for real.

So, be prepared to an occasional letdown, but don't boycott any shop, they might have what you need later and it might be an even better bargain.

Lastly, since the mount alone costed around 300€ at that time, it means an 100mm apo doublet could be marketed by a brand usually more expensive than Sky-Watcher for about 400€. Food for thoughts, uh?

[Ben the Ignorant]

1 minute ago, Davey-T said:

I ordered something from a site calling itself telescopes uk or some such, the invoice was in dollars and delivery from Europe 

Dave

My TS 80 triplet arrived in a Geoptik box.