Anime Limited 12 Days of Christmas 2018

Lambadelta said:
Emails that you only get by chasing them up is imo poor. Why aren't we getting more open communication that is put in places people will see. It's all fine, and dandy that you yourself have a private email of details, and feel free to share stuff here about what you've learned.

But why as customers must we HAVE to chase them up to get any information. Why can't AL go pull the data of all shipped orders, and update our order confirmations instead of us having to chase them up for such information.

offering to cancel the order, and 1 email about the situation is honestly pretty **** communication overall to a situation thats been nearly going on for a month now.
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There's lots of orders in different stages though, I'm waiting on 3 orders & have had 1 arrive, in the meantime I've had 2 fairly comprehensive emails that were presumably sent to everyone which explained and updated the situation and a rapid response to my individual query regarding my order statuses.
I don't expect them to have checked the status of every individual order & update everyone over Christmas, these are human beings too who deserve to spend time with family and I doubt the distributor would have been open anyway. Anyone who cares enough has a chance to email individually and get a more personalised answer.

People making out it's all AL's fault is confusing to me, they chose a distributor based on (presumably) false promises and that distributor cocked up making AL look bad. This kind of thing always happens around xmas when there's a much higher demand and distributors lie through their teeth to secure large orders. I've been on both ends of this plenty of times in the past, it's really not that unusual.
 
I think the majority of people are understanding that Anime Limited are doing the best they can to resolve the actual circumstances - even my £5 The Empire of Corpses order arrived via courier, which is hella excessive considering the actual cost of goods! It's also reasonable to assume that perhaps communication wasn't as great as it should have been due to limited man hours being dedicated to the actual issue during an already busy period. So while less than ideal, the current level is kinda understandable, even if I still think the messaging should have been more open.

However, Anime Limited made no acknowledgement - public or private - of three Collector's Edition products being delayed outside of their w/c 17th December 2018 release without first being asked and have yet to do so. I only caught wind of it because someone else emailed them, told me, and then I contacted Anime Limited to confirm. Even an "Unfortunately, these are delayed" tweet around that time would have sufficed, or even customers being emailed specifically about them. I shouldn't have to chase this 2 weeks after release, and 5 weeks after I ordered.

I'm fortunate that I've now received all of my orders barring the delayed pre-orders for Snow White with the Red Hair, and the late-Jan slated Maquia, but some people are still waiting.
 
I see the discontent is growing, then~ I for one am shocked that the situation continues ever onward towards its ignoble end.

I'm still waiting on Mystery Box #2 (which seems destined to only include 4/5 items) and everything else ordered outside of bundles, including Gankutusuou, KlK box sets 2&3 and various other things. No order info/updates received. Emailed them yesterday for an update and will probably cancel most of what's outstanding if I don't like what I read. Yet to receive anything from MVM, either. Just a shitshow in general at this point. Not a good look to offer what many probably got as gifts and end up generating negativity instead of goodwill.

I sent my own, still sealed copy of Ganku to a friend to evade xmas AL delay fuckery I typically expect from them. Turns out I didn't see it had a scratch on the steelbook since it was sealed, ofc, so I'm left without my own copy and not an ideal gift given. Had I actually got what I ordered from AL, I'd still have my apparently scratched copy and would've sent other one to my friend, but noooooooooo. Now I'll end up forewarding copy AL send me when/if it arrives and ask for my old copy to be returned to me. Bollox to it all, in summary.

My opinion hasn't changed regarding AL because of this: they are run by good-natured anime fans that are cock-ups as far as business goes. They license things that won't sell (which is a good thing, yet...), make annoying CE releases of things like Gankutsuou/Harmony that are steelbooks without spines (although nowadays they have improved: chipboard sets without ugly labels on spines) and I just can't see them doing well with the delays they are known for.

FYI, they are still the only people I get my anime from aside from Discotek: things like Gundam Thunderbolt, Re:Zero, and soon Maquia, etc.
 
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I’ve moved on to importing most AL stuff especially Gundams. But the lack of communication is painful they used to always be here (As in on the site) nope not at this crisis, I can’t use the discord so can’t communicate there and I used two email accounts for my orders due to someone ordering one for me, so i can’t get the details for that one so even emailing isn’t practical for me.Also they added a schedule feature and never update it Bebop is wrong, Maquia still uses its old placeholder page so I can’t see the product details and half of the 17th Dec releases aren’t even listed on it for me to even say they haven’t updated them.
 
I do feel it's unreasonable to expect them to be around on the site or otherwise given this all happened during the Christmas break. As others have said, the team have families of their own and I'm sure this was the worst possible time to have an issue like this. I still think communication could have been better, but I do think some of the demands being made in this thread are unreasonable given the time of year and lack of people on-hand.

Fwiw only one of my orders has turned up with two having not been dispatched yet and a third I'm unsure about as it was ordered for me as a surprise Christmas gift by someone else. I chased up my orders yesterday and team AL were very helpful and got back to me promptly on the situation. I'm honestly perfectly happy with their service in that regard.
 
They have a longer Christmas break than nearly everyone I know, and if they weren't answering emails I would accept the business closed stuff but why are they answering emails then.
 
thedoctor2016 said:
They have a longer Christmas break than nearly everyone I know, and if they weren't answering emails I would accept the business closed stuff but why are they answering emails then.
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Because everything has gone so badly wrong? Even when we consider they are answering emails about the Christmas deals, it does seem to be only two of them rather than the whole team and they're almost certainly eating into their time off by doing it.

Also I don't really think it's for us to dictate how long a holiday they get. We don't have to work their jobs so we have nothing to moan about if they take off for a couple of weeks at Christmas. This is just unfortunate timing.
 
Sent an email there to AL wrt my mystery box 2. They have updated their automated response to state that they should have a timeframe for all unfulfilled sale orders some time this afternoon. They say they won't be able to give a time for specific orders, but we should at least get an update of when they should be shipped by.
 
Badej said:
1. It might not change anything, however not speaking about their ****-ups doesn't give them the necessary feedback that can prevent a similar situation from happening in the future. Also I'm from the Netherlands so I order pretty much everything from abroad and still get updates regulary even when it's not shipped. So stop defending bad business practices with bad arguments.
2. Except the problem is that the stuff hasn't even been shipped yet. So your pricey tracking stuff isn't even an argument at this point.
3. Well you pretty much said it yourself. Communicate more. As a customer I should NOT have to mail them about the order status. THEY should contact customers first if there's any relevant change such as a delay. It's called customer service. Heck even though MVM doesn't mail individual customers they still use their social media to let their customers know if there's a delay or if something arrived earlier. AL could have done this too considering it doesn't take 5 ******* minutes to write about it on twitter.
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1. It wasn't really their **** up, it was the distributors who didn't deliver on their end & AL doesn't have a time travelling microwave to warn them how things will turn out (missed UE opportunity Andrew).

2. Some has been dispatched, some hasn't, the point still stands. I'd have liked to see all of them have tracking but I can understand why they don't/can't, I have plenty to watch in the meantime.

3. I got 3 (if I remember rightly) blanket emails that were sent to everyone affected which apologised, explained the situation and listed time frames. They also shared their opinion on the matter which is something a big company wouldn't have done.
I believe emailing all of us was the best way to handle it as I avoid all that social media website rubbish and messages from them on forums such as this can easily get buried.

If it offends you & upsets you that much then maybe you should just get a refund and maybe even boycott AL as you may find their lengthy release delays unbearable.
 
They claim they have send everyone that was affected an e-mail. I never got one in fact I only got one when I asked about it.
 
I did get one email whose content wasn't specifically addressed to me. (And I also hadn't mailed them about the deliveries.) So I assume that was that blanket email. (Through I did not get 3.)
 
Badej said:
They claim they have send everyone that was affected an e-mail. I never got one in fact I only got one when I asked about it.
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The kunts; the nerve of them. They still haven't emailed me back about my orders, either.

I suggest we start a protest and refuse to buy from AL again until they give m... us some form of compensation. My suggestion would be the CE of Kill la Kill pt1. I'd be willing to accept a copy from the personal collections of the staff being as it's OOP, for I am reasonable.

Lambadelta said:
How dare people be upset over one of the worst logistics cock-ups anime wise in years.
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Tbf, it could be worse: you could be one of those that went for a bundle named after Andrew himself, wanting Eureka Seven UE, and ended up with the movie no-one seems to want even for free. There's some irony in that specific bundle going so awry.
 
I'm honestly fine with waiting myself, I'm very patient. I would certainly be upset if I didn't know the situation however hence my previous comment.
 
serpantino said:
People making out it's all AL's fault is confusing to me, they chose a distributor based on (presumably) false promises and that distributor cocked up making AL look bad.
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Most people here are moaning at not getting things... these comments are directed a DADC

Other comments are towards communication, this is AL fault in my opinion as I don't understand why a blanket email couldn't have been sent week 1 of delays, then followed up maybe once a week... This would have prevented a build up of emails that caused...

Demelza said:
it does seem to be only two of them rather than the whole team and they're almost certainly eating into their time off by doing it.
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From what I've seen, it really is eating into their own personal time. Its the reason why I haven't emailed them and tried to stay out of threads here. I like the team over at Anime Limited so would rather just wait it out tbh..

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What I'm saying is most people here are more pi%%ed off at DADC, not anime limited...

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I also hope this was a joke. I'm guessing it was

AironicallyHuman said:
The kunts; the nerve of them. They still haven't emailed me back about my orders, either.

I suggest we start a protest and refuse to buy from AL again until they give m... us some form of compensation. My suggestion would be the CE of Kill la Kill pt1. I'd be willing to accept a copy from the personal collections of the staff being as it's OOP, for I am reasonable.
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The wait matters little. I barely watch anime anymore, so in a rush I am most certainly not. What matters is frustration over AL cocking up with delays, even when they're only at fault indirectly, and seemingly having ran away for Christmas in the midst of all this unless you chase them up. Unlucky, bad timing, only so many staff, etcetc: it was AL that picked the distributor, the amount of copies offered, the dates of the offers and everything else. Incompetence via proxy is still incompetence, to put it bluntly.

As for protesting, whether or not it was said in jest depends entirely on if Andrew is willing to give me his own copy of KlK CE1. 'Tis a joke until compensation is actually offered. I'm more than willing to join Badger in protest over the injustice of the situation if the needs arises~
 
AironicallyHuman said:
The wait matters little. I barely watch anime anymore, so in a rush I am most certainly not. What matters is frustration over AL cocking up with delays, even when they're only at fault indirectly, and seemingly having ran away for Christmas in the midst of all this unless you chase them up. Unlucky, bad timing, only so many staff, etcetc: it was AL that picked the distributor, the amount of copies offered, the dates of the offers and everything else. Incompetence via proxy is still incompetence, to put it bluntly.

As for protesting, whether or not it was said in jest depends entirely on if Andrew is willing to give me his own copy of KlK CE1. 'Tis a joke until compensation is actually offered. I'm more than willing to join Badger in protest over the injustice of the situation if the needs arises~
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If you really want the KlK 1 CE, CEX have a dvd copy for £20. Apart from the discs it is identical to the bd version.

Much better than asking unreasonable demands for AL staff to fork over personal copies they probably had to pay for themselves.
 
Lambadelta said:
How dare people be upset over one of the worst logistics cock-ups anime wise in years.
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That was a joke about how people overreact and this current & immature "I'm going to boycott" culture. It was also a dig at AL's propensity for release delays.

Of course if you're one of those prone to outbursts & disproportionate levels of upset then feel free to be offended as that seems to be another popular movement at the moment.

AL usually puts a lot of effort into resolving things and they've done so many disk replacement schemes at their cost for tiny things when compared to others. Manga uk for instance has released & ignored some shockingly broken ones, so I think we're in safe hands should there be any issues (damage, missing items etc.)

It does feel to me like a lot of anger is still seem to be aimed at AL and not the responsible party (that people are naming as Sony DADC).
 
AL has some responsibility my contract when I purchased is with them not DADC. And omg shipping going wrong at Christmas most popular time of the year surprise. For me it’s they went on holiday early, yes it’s a shame they sacrificed some of their time but they didn’t respond en masse till the 21st Dec... 9 days after the whole event ended. MVM pre empted the delays and tweeted straight away as soon as they didn’t feel it would reach Christmas, for me it seems AL waited till the last possible moment. And the email only seemed to focus on bundles fat lot of good that was for me.
 
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