www.bookdepository.co.uk

Sephiroth_dude

Hi,
Has anyone ordered off these guys before?are they fast?

Bod1

I've only had fantastic experiences using them. Order directly and there is free shipping.

Manach

They are usually excellent value, esp. if there is discount coupon going, but they are not as fast as amazon to deliver and poor customer service.

Sl!mCharles

great service, fast delivery, great value. bought about 15 books off them over the last year, all lovely condition too.

Sephiroth_dude

Manach wrote: »

but they are not as fast as amazon to deliver and poor customer service.

Well thats a pity,thanks for the replys

Plowman

This post has been deleted.

Grievous

I bought ton of books from them. Cheap, reliable and fast. Go with them.

ynul31f47k6b59

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

Hi,
Has anyone ordered off these guys before?are they fast?

Yes they're brilliant, never had any trouble with them, order away! Awesome Books are also fantastic.

Sephiroth_dude

Ah well I'm slightly more optimistic now having seen the last few replys I preorded a book that isn't out till the 11th nov so hopefully it wont take that long to come

Eliot Rosewater

I think Book Depository is great - though I preferred it when it was independent of global monstrosity Amazon. Their delivery speeds are, in my experience, slow enough. If I needed a book asap, for college or something, I'd just go with Amazon.

Their customer service is notorious enough, and my girlfriend experienced it first hand. Still, my attitude is that if for some reason I lose a book sometime as it fails to deliver and they refuse to co-operate, I'll still in the long run have saved a lot of money using them.

HugoBradyBrown

Hassan Fresh Bun wrote: »

Yes they're brilliant, never had any trouble with them, order away! Awesome Books are also fantastic.

If that is Awesome Books in Berkshire, I can tell you that they are to be watched and are anything but fantastic. (I would hesitate to call any vendor a charlatan, a fraud, or dishonest in a forum of this kind, but only for strictly legal reasons.)

I have full knowledge of an on-going case where Abebooks management are pursuing them, where they had misrepresented on the site a cheap paperback book as being a new hardback. The buyer drew this to their attention when it was delivered. They said, in effect, 'you're wrong, mate'. They later agreed to accept the paperback copy back for refund MINUS the postage it had cost them to send it, contrary to the Sale of Goods regulations. They then went quiet and stopped responding at all.

Abebooks management got involved, looked back at previous states of the database, saw that the buyer was correct and truthful and that Awesome Books were wrong, are to refund the buyer in full, and are to investigate Awesome Books to assess whether they are an appropriate vendor to allow to use a reputable service like Abebooks. Abebooks are clearly highly responsible and honest, and they value both their customer's opinion of them, and the reputation of the vast majority of honest vendors on Abe.

Book Depository, in contrast, are exemplary, both, in the vast majority of cases where everything goes well, and, even more so, if something goes wrong. The latter is rare, but even then good customer service is good customer service and Book Depository is a first class vendor. It's a pity, though, that they have been absorbed into the Amazon empire, as their distinct identity could be erased over time.


Hugo Brady Brown

ynul31f47k6b59

HugoBradyBrown wrote: »

If that is Awesome Books in Berkshire, I can tell you that they are to be watched and are anything but fantastic. (I would hesitate to call any vendor a charlatan, a fraud, or dishonest in a forum of this kind, but only for strictly legal reasons.)

I have full knowledge of an on-going case where Abebooks management are pursuing them, where they had misrepresented on the site a cheap paperback book as being a new hardback. The buyer drew this to their attention when it was delivered. They said, in effect, 'you're wrong, mate'. They later agreed to accept the paperback copy back for refund MINUS the postage it had cost them to send it, contrary to the Sale of Goods regulations. They then went quiet and stopped responding at all.

Abebooks management got involved, looked back at previous states of the database, saw that the buyer was correct and truthful and that Awesome Books were wrong, are to refund the buyer in full, and are to investigate Awesome Books to assess whether they are an appropriate vendor to allow to use a reputable service like Abebooks. Abebooks are clearly highly responsible and honest, and they value both their customer's opinion of them, and the reputation of the vast majority of honest vendors on Abe.

Book Depository, in contrast, are exemplary, both, in the vast majority of cases where everything goes well, and, even more so, if something goes wrong. The latter is rare, but even then good customer service is good customer service and Book Depository is a first class vendor. It's a pity, though, that they have been absorbed into the Amazon empire, as their distinct identity could be erased over time.


Hugo Brady Brown

Really? Have never experienced poor service from Awesome Books - I was sent the wrong book once, e-mailed them, they sent me the right book and told me to keep the wrong one as well, they also refunded my money, so basically got 2 books for free because they messed up - I'd be wary of buying anything online, I suppose it's hit and miss with some places. Book Depository ARE good though. Also agree that it's a shame they're now linked with Amazon, as I try to avoid Amazon to be honest.

HugoBradyBrown

Hassan Fresh Bun wrote: »

Really? Have never experienced poor service from Awesome Books - I was sent the wrong book once, e-mailed them, they sent me the right book and told me to keep the wrong one as well, they also refunded my money, so basically got 2 books for free because they messed up - I'd be wary of buying anything online, I suppose it's hit and miss with some places. Book Depository ARE good though. Also agree that it's a shame they're now linked with Amazon, as I try to avoid Amazon to be honest.

Yes, Hassan Fresh Bun, I have mostly good experiences buying books through Amazon, Book Depository, Abebooks and others, and have also had some initially bad experiences. With the single exception of the atrocious behaviour of Awesome Books, every error by every other vendor has been rectified swiftly and without question.

In the case of Awesome Books, though, not only did they refuse to send me anything more than their initial email, they also ignored communications to them from Abebooks management, when they began to investigate the case.

It was their refusal to accept that they had listed a paperback as a hardback, and their clear implication that I was a liar that rather eroded my confidence in them as reliable vendors. It's the little things that matter, I suppose.

What have they gained? They unfairly pocketed about 20 euros of my money on their plus side; a lot of word-of-mouth publicity of their shady dealings has already come their way on their negative side. How much bad publicity can a mere 20 euros buy, I wonder? How long might it go on? The gift that will keep on giving, I suspect!

Now Book Depository are a different operation: professional, quick to deliver in my own experience, and giving buyers in Ireland the same delivery rate as anywhere else.

Hugo Brady Brown

Belle E. Flops

Bookdepository is fantastic. Have ordered 60+ books from them over the last year or 2. Cheapest prices I've seen and free delivery. I've never had a problem with them. Can take between 1 and 2 weeks for books to arrive but worth the wait as far as I'm concerned!

Toby Take a Bow

I find the delivery of the books quite slow, but overall good value for money.

HugoBradyBrown

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

I find the delivery of the books quite slow, but overall good value for money.

Yes, I suppose there can be different experiences in relation to delivery times, though Book Depository are prisoners of the various postal services they use. I find that they actually stock or obtain what they say they do or will, so that an order is always definite. With other vendors, a certain proportion are always cancelled by the vendor, especially in the secondhand / marketplace sector, and sometimes for reasons that do no credit to the vendor, notably when they realise that they have underpriced a book and then withdraw it from sale. When this happens after a delay, it means yet more delay as one searches for another vendor.

But, to give an example of Book Depository's good work, they will 'source' books from outside the mainstream GB / US market. Last week, after only one week, I received from them a hard-to-find title:

Hüttel, Richard (Ed) Michael Triegel: Metamorphosis of the Gods, Leipzig: Hurmer, 2011.

This is the catalogue of the exhibition in the Leipzig Art Museum of the work of a contemporary German painter. This would have been more difficult to get directly from Germany, and would certainly have taken longer than Book Depository took.

Their pricing is also entirely transparent; no small increments of cost, and no requests for extra charges.

Hugo Brady Brown

coffee_cake

Bad customer service?
I ordered 2 books from them at one point, and they sent a duplicate copy of the first book and no sign of the second. Complained and they sent out the 2nd book and that was that

Eliot Rosewater

bluewolf wrote: »

Bad customer service?

Insufficient sample size?

coffee_cake

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

Insufficient sample size?

Well if we're all going to post up anecdotes...

Eliot Rosewater

Personal anecdotes don't count as evidence unless they agree with my position.

Kinski

Fun fact: If you type "book suppository" into Google, thebookdepository.co.uk comes up, and the search does not display any "showing results for...search instead for" option. I shudder to think what some people must be doing with books from there.

brian807

yea i can give these guys the thumbs up - ordered alot of books for college - fast and efficient

Havermeyer

I've ordered from these a few times. While the prices are generally pretty good, delivery hasn't always been the swiftest.

They seem to ship products reasonably quick, but the delivery services they use tend to take their time.

johnayo

Book Depository have been reliable for me. Used them plenty of times and the free shipping is a nice one. Delivery can be quite slow by comparison to Amazon.

1966

Haver ordered quite a few books from them & have never had a problem.

sce88

every so often they have 10% discount codes, this page sometimes has one and also you can find codes in the Bargain alerts section of boards

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/fccbookclub?a_aid=offers

sxt

Bookdepository are defintiely > amazon. Except for delivery, with amazon if you ordered 4 books, you would get them in one delivery- With Bookdepository you would get them in 4 seperate deliveries:(

strobe

Plowman wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

I wasn't aware of this. How unfortunate...

Travel is good

sce88 wrote: »

every so often they have 10% discount codes, this page sometimes has one and also you can find codes in the Bargain alerts section of boards

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/fccbookclub?a_aid=offers

I'd love to hear if anyone has a discount code. I couldn't find this one.

I think TBD are great. I've ordered about 50-60 books over the last year or so with no problems. It is a bit annoying though, that the books are posted separately. But overall, that is not a major problem. I haven't had a problem with delivery times, but I appreciate that people in other parts of the country may have had different delivery times.

I have found the cost to be a huge factor - they are way cheaper. I have a few more books that I want to order off them, and I've been comparing the prices. TBD are still coming out cheaper, and free delivery too.

OP, go for it!

flyaway.

I bought two books from there on Monday for half the price I would have paid in my local bookshop so I was pleased. Hoping they'll arrive soon!

Chinafoot

I bought all of my college books through TBD and never had any problems. It was a lot of books too; English and History are pretty heavy going on the reading