Thoughts on an auction house screw up
 

Hey Guys, I recently won a card for $1,600 from a major auction house. They shipped my card to my billing address despite me providing them with a shipping address. The card was attempted for delivery at my billing address but no one was there so the card is being held at a FedEx office. It is a huge hassle for me to go down to the FedEx office to pick up the card that was shipped to my billing address. Is this a big deal? Should I request some type of compensation from the auction house? Like some type of voucher? I'm really annoyed that they would be so careless with my card.

I think a friendly reminder to the AH that you have a seperate shipping address should suffice.

If it were me, I'd just send note letting them know of the mistake and let it go this time. If it continues to happen on any future purchases, I'd take it farther.

Can you request FedEx forward the package to the address of your choosing? Or the auction house can request to forward the package to your alternative address?

When I worked at UPS we handled address changes all the time.

This is what I would do.

James

$1600
 

For $1600 I would pick that thing up myself, hassle or not, rather than taking a chance that between the Auction House and carrier they now get it to you at another address. Then send note to AH asking for refund on shipping. You may not get it, but better to have an expensive card's fate in your own hands at this point

That is why I arranged for pick up instead of re-delivery. I don't want to risk anything with such an expensive card. My billing address is an apartment building with many tenants, which is the exact reason I specified it be shipped elsewhere. It just really bothers me that they would be so careless. I checked my invoice it very clearly says Bill To and Ship To and they are two different addresses.

Their mistake; their duty to make it right. But good luck with that.

The other thing that really bugs me is that if the FedEx guy gave it to some random person at the building the AH would probably just say "it was delivered not our problem" even though it was sent to the wrong address. This has now become my problem when all I did was pay promptly and give easy to follow instructions on where to send the card.

I would do this also. This has happened to me before where a major AH shipped to my billing address instead of my shipping address. Basically, my billing address is my home where USPS/FedEx/UPS often just leave very expensive packages outside my door where anybody can get them or just toss them over my backyard fence, or of course, mis-deliver to my neighbors, all of which has happened. Therefore, I just ship to my office, where I haven't lost or had a single mis-delivered package.

For the auction house that this happened to me on, what happened was that they had updated the Shipping Address in their system, but hadn't updated the Shipping Address within their UPS system. Once they fixed that, all was good. The other thing that I've done is that now I use my work address for both my billing and shipping address. So, if I get invoices sent to my work address, it's no big deal, but then this way, there is only one address the AH has, so there *shouldn't* be any shipping errors.

The issue is that they require your debit card in order to register. My debit card has a different address associated with it even though I don't use to pay for winnings. I always send a check. So they wouldn't even have that address if they didn't require it to register.

I sent them a note asking for a refund on shipping since it was $16 I didn't need to spend.

That's happened to me a couple times over the years. I didn't really think about it too much, just went to the fedex and picked it up before they sent it back.

For a $1,600 card I would definitely go pick it up myself and avoid any other problems like it getting lost or delivery problems or getting stolen on your doorstep any variety of things as long as you know it's sitting at the FedEx office I would just avoid any problems and go get it myself. That's a lot of money to be letting float around and avoid any more problems. Then get ahold of the auction house and tell him the situation to see if they would do anything for you.

i too have had this happen to me...by the same auction house a few times...each time I told them to please send to the send to address...not the billing address.

So I sucked it up and picked up the items from the fed ex facility 20 miles away.

I don't deal with this house anymore...for a myriad or reasons.

I've had auction houses send it to my house 2 houses ago in a different state before. I've called them and told them what my address was and they called up UPS and corrected the problem. Not a big deal if it happens once, but it's happened numerous times. I always hold high end cards coming in at fedex anyways.

Sounds like a human mistake on shipping to the wrong place.

A note from an ex-auctioneer, if you move, make sure you change your shipping address in the auction systems. We had many, many people move and never say anything so we shipped to incorrect addresses. It happens...

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I think you should definitely get a refund on the shipping charges but I wouldn't hold out hope for more than that.

Haven't even received a response from the house. Real classy. Will never bid again. PM me if you want to know the AH. Human error or not, if one of the tenants at the apartment building they shipped to (despite my directions) would have claimed the package as their own and kept it, I have no doubt the AH would have hid behind the billing address and delivery and refused to refund me. So while this might be a small issue in reality, the truth is I could be out a $1,600 card due to no fault of my own.

+1 there, and make sure the auction house has the address straight in their records for the future.

Best always,

Larry

Name the house. Back up your position and walk away.

I agree with this too.....human mistake, we all make them, but do the right thing and help the customer out. :confused:

I'd forget it and not aggravate myself too badly about what could have happened . . . but you got to wonder. Pretty fundamental screw up for someone whose business it is to sell and mail things.

Reminder to check the website of the AHs you are registered with periodically and confirm that everything is hunky dory.

I agree it was a human mistake but like I said I have no doubts that if someone else were to have swiped my package the AH would cite the delivery confirmation and never refund me. That's where my issue lies, because that's the scenario I wanted to avoid when I provided a shipping address.

This happens to me every once in a while - I live in a walk up. You need a key to enter the foyer and there is a mail box inside. Generally, packages are left on the floor at the foot of the mailboxes. There are only four apartments, so I have never had an issue with theft, but I intentionally have all my eBay, PayPal and AH shipping addresses set to a different location.