Customs takes no Pride in repackaging!!

Sigh, I get myself a gorgeous chandelier, it's a partylite retired in 2001, so irreplaceable. The fixture is wrought iron, it comes with 4 hand blown glass votive holders with 24 k gold lace and had some pretty colours and a glass ball for the center piece.

I have to pick the package up at the Post Office, have to pay almost 19 bucks for duty charges, then I hear rattling as I carry it away..

#@$@%@#%#@$%@!

That seriously made my day. I was like, wtf?

I open it at home to find a sorry excuse for packaging, one sheet of bubble wrap was on the bottom, the glass was with the iron and half of it was smashed really well. and the candles I was told I'd receive were nowhere in the box.

I notified the seller, no response yet, but it seems the package is insured.. on their side of the border.

I just called Canadian customs, it says 'opened' as a message on the customs slip. She says if they received it broken, it would have said 'damaged goods' well it didn't. I told her, these items came unbroken all the way from North Carolina, and after they shipped from Mississauga to London they get smashed? She said they were placed on conveyer belts, I told her the glass was just thrown in with the iron.. so she directs me to a refund lady who isn't in yet..


like, some idiot at customs thought the wrought iron needed to be bubble wrapped with the glass.. crap! what an idiot!!!

Anyways, waiting to hear back from the lady to get a refund for the duties I spent, but I think I may have to ship back the items to the seller.. >< gah!

maybe I can just force paypal to give me my money back..


anyways. haven't blogged for a while. this is the first time I got something damaged through the mail. I think I'm fortunate, but these items were expensive. I hate customs.

 

well, it was really the customs people, but the guy could have packaged the glass better, with tons of tissue paper, boxes, etc.

I didn't get a call back from the refund center, so I called back. The lady was like 'call the company up, and when they ship you a new one, we won't charge you the 18 dollars' then I said to her, 'the seller only had one, it was one of a kind!' and she says 'cna you call back on Monday? my supervisor isn't in' .. give me a break.. they can't refund me? lol

 

thanks guys lol. After a wait, I could contact the supervisor, on the back of the customs form, there is a refund form, that would need to be filled out and mailed to them.. it was inbetween the carbon paper (you know the black sheet that allows transfers onto another sheet of paper) so at least there's hope to get the 18.74 back.

Even though it is Customs fault that all that glass got broken, the global priority package slip says it's insured.. 0_o have to wait back for a reply from Canada Post on that issue.

Some guy named Jose emailed me back from US Postal Services, I had given a detailed message stating what the package number was, and towards the end said there was an insurance number. He emails back telling me he can't track the package number &quot;the insurance number I gave with an added US on the end &quot; because it isn't a real number. Then he types in all this other info about how the sender on the US side has to do these certain things.

I email him back saying of course he couldn't track the number, because it was the insurance number, and that I could track the package number through Gobla Priority online as well as Canada Post online.

A day later I get word for word, the same response from Jose. Maybe he's a robot..

anywho. keep you posted..