More on DHL + Disney

January 6th, 2006 by Potato

I CC’ed my DHL letter to Disney as well, seeing as how those are the guys that I ordered the houses from in the first place, the ones who didn’t warn me about this tax issue, and the ones who at the end of the day stand to lose a customer.

I thought that there was an outside chance that they would cover these additional and unforseen charges, or perhaps at least the service charge on the tax, and that I might get a half-hearted apology. They might even consider giving customers options in shipping like many other mail/internet order businesses do. I figured it was more likely I’d get no response at all.

I did get a response today, actually, and here it is:

Dear Disney Guest,

We like to inform you that all International orders are shipped via DHL.

We apologize about any inconvience that you may have experienced.

Your local customs office will charge you for duties and/or taxes. This information is referenced on DisneyShopping.com, Guest Services, and Shipping Information under “Who pays for duties and taxes?”

Our catalog prices do not include duties or value-added taxes. If assessed, these charges are the responsibility of the package recipient, who will be billed for them by the local Customs office. Please keep this in mind when shipping a gift item to a destination outside the US.

We do apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Sincerely,

Larry
DisneyShopping.com

So there is a half-hearted “sorry for the invonvenience” apology in there, but I’m not impressed that they tried to say that I should have known: first off, I stated clearly in my letter that I ordered using the phone system, since their website is slow as hell. Secondly, I went and checked their website before I sent it, just to make sure I hadn’t missed it, and again now after being told specifically where to look — and it’s not there. “Shipping Information” brings up a pop-up window that says “Shipping Information” “Print” and “Back to Main Menu” and nothing else. That is to say, no content. This malbehaviour is evident in both Mozilla and Internet Exploder.

I’m getting into a bit of a habit of writing complaint letters, so stay tuned for a new section of the website to appear tracking their progress!

Posted in Insanity | 2 Comments »

2 Responses to “More on DHL + Disney”

  1. Potato Says:
    January 6th, 2006 at 5:35 pm

    Here’s my response to Disney:

    Thank you for your reply. As I said initially, my main issue is with DHL and not necessarily Disney, but since it was Disney merchandise that was shipped, I wanted to keep you appraised of the situation.

    I’d like to make two clarifications:

    First, while I understand that I may be charged Canadian taxes on goods shipped to Canada, I’m not sure it’s proper for DHL to charge a processing fee for the tax on top of the courier fee paid at the time of order. (i.e.: $35 USD at the time of order then $5 CDN processing fee + $8.80 CDN tax)

    Secondly, there is no Shipping Information on the Disney website. I’m not sure if it is a bug or an unfinished section, but after checking over several days in both Mozilla and Internet Explorer, Shipping Information simply opens a popup window with “Shipping Information” at the top, a white space, and then “back to main menu” and “print” links at the bottom. Every other link from “Guest Services” works fine.

  2. Potato Says:
    January 9th, 2006 at 1:40 am

    Disney responds… err… well, they sent me a reply, but clearly didn’t read what I said:

    “Thank you for your recent correspondence.

    We apologize for any inconvenience that we may have caused.
    International shipping is based on dollar amount & is calculated when
    your items are in the shopping cart.

    If you should have any further questions, please feel free to contact
    us.

    Sincerely,

    Melissa
    DisneyShopping.com”