The Columnist Manifesto

On February 5, 2006, I ordered several "items" from Amazon.com. I refer to the "items" generically, because they are in fact gifts for certain "people" who read this blog. I liked the "items" so much that I also ordered a set for me.

Because February 5 was a couple of weeks before the "birthday" of a certain "person," I felt a high degree of confidence that the "items" would be delivered in a timely fashion.

Then I started getting these:

Hello from Amazon.com.

We wanted to let you know that there is a delay with some items in the order you placed on February 05 2006 15:36 PST (Order# 123456).

Please visit the Order Update page in Your Account at the address below to approve the delay for the unavailable items

I've gotten one or more of these messages every week for the past six weeks. The "items" were not shipped in time for the "birthday," and for the most part still have not been shipped. Amazon.com kept pushing back the estimated shipping dates: from end of Feburary to early March to mid March and now to the end of March.

When one of the "items" became available, to whom do you think Amazon decided to ship first? To the recipient of the item that included the gift card? Or to me. That's right, they shipped it to me, without ever giving me a choice of reminding them -- "no, please send the gift one first."

The "items" are either books or book like in nature. They are available from a "publisher" and probably in stores. They are not an exotic butterfly that must be captured live from a distant continent.

I would think that Amazon.com would tell the truth when they say the "items" are "in stock." I assume that means the "items" exist in a warehouse for which Amazon.com has the key to the padlock and maybe a couple of delivery trucks.

Instead, it seems that Amazon.com is waiting for these "items" to fall off a truck. Or perhaps to acquire pirated copies of them on the black market. Or maybe they just call up the publisher and ask to have some copies made up -- which perhaps I could have done myself.

Whatever your excuse, Amazon.com, consider yourself mooned.