Tracking lateness

[Boulder]

I got an email on Thursday stating that issue 208 will be sent out normally to subscribers. No info when 206-7 will be sent though.

[Weblaus]

I got an email on Thursday stating that issue 208 will be sent out normally to subscribers. No info when 206-7 will be sent though.

I know two fellow German subscrivers who also got that email (and who had no idea 206 and 207 weren't sent out), while I did not so far - I wonder whiy it is apparently so difficult to send such a trather important peice of information to everyone? Especially since I usually find an annoying "save money with our great offers"-ad from Future in my inbox every one or two days, but clearly these are more important...

206/207 supposedly will be sent "as soon as we can do so safely" - I would think when it's possible for 208 to go out in a few weeks, that should qualify as safe then? Then again, 205 took just 6 weeks from the UK to Germany in my case, so I'm not putting much faith in all of that.

On a related note, I received a snail mail paper letter from Future just yesterday with the standard "your subscription is in danger of running out in 3 months, renew it NOW!!" nag (for Edge in that case) dated from May 8th, posted via Royal Mail. Funny how that works just as usual, but delivering stuff already paid for can't be arranged for months...

[Boulder]

On a related note, I received a snail mail paper letter from Future just yesterday with the standard "your subscription is in danger of running out in 3 months, renew it NOW!!" nag (for Edge in that case) dated from May 8th, posted via Royal Mail. Funny how that works just as usual, but delivering stuff already paid for can't be arranged for months...

Maybe those are actually sent directly from the UK while the magazines are shipped to who knows where and shipped to subscribers from there.

[Weblaus]

Maybe those are actually sent directly from the UK while the magazines are shipped to who knows where and shipped to subscribers from there.

I am aware of that and yes, the letter was sent from the UK (that's why I mentioned Royal Mail). And I get that subs are sent differently, but I'd still expect a somewhat decent service instead of getting the "just wait until it's comfortable enough for us to do something about it" treatment.

Ever since Future decided to screw around with international delivery (basically right when they acquired Retro Gamer), I've kept track on the various ways issues and letters arrive here:

- stupid re-neweal mails and similar ad stuff: always from the UK, always at worst taking one week or so.
- single issue orders: can take a while to be dispatched (had everything from next day to 3 weeks later), usually were sent from the UK, but since March or April they seem to get routed through France (French Post) - arrival time sp far still mostly between 5-9 days after dispatch.
- subcriptions: routing has changed numerous times over the years, I've seen amongst others Austria, Czech Republic and Hungary mail notices. But for a good while now, delivery in Germany actually is routed through a German redistribution service - and STILL it more often than not takes between 3-6 (!) weeks to show up and seems to vary widely within the country for some reason.

So to sum up: The thing customers need least (especially if they have their emails in the system anyway) gets most priority and the one thing that should have at least a decent level of service attached (after all, subscribers have spent a decent amount of money upfront) Future basically doesn't give a poop about, at least for international customers these days. They used to be much better aboout this, but that has changed years ago.

[NorthWay]

Oh, and my "Re-sub EDGE now!" letter was dated 8th May and came here the 19th. Sent by air mail and everything (yeah, they have their priorities worked out).
Apart from not being on sale in my newsagent for years, the over-the-counter price is 2-3x the cost of a sub.

[Weblaus]

Issue #207 arrived today, routed through France - obviously not the "we'll send it to you later, promise!" subs copy, but a single issue ordered last Thursday and shipped on Frida, I believe.

Seems like for once being an international buyers has its advantages, as UK readers seem to wait two weeks or longer for some strange reason.

Anyway, I wish my regular subs would arrive even remotely this fast...

[rinzwind]

Maybe for Asia they got them out in plane passenger suitcases... no idea why they cant be delivered at this time. It would explain why it normally takes a month or so to arrive.

[Mauricio]

Before I contact customer service... any recent word on issues #206 (Half-Life) and #207 (Pac-Man) for international subscribers?

... and I thought I heard that we get digital copies of those for free in the meantime. How do we get those, and are they available for offline reading? (PDF)

Thanks!

[flugle]

I was only thinking the same thing Maurico, I too have never seen anything about these so called free digital copies to tide us over. Given previous attempts to get missing magazines replaced I have little confidence I'll ever see these issues (206 onwards) in Australia. And I got another card about re-subbing too, they have got to be joking.

[antsbull]

So, after not ever receiving #205 as a subscriber in New Zealand, three separate copies of it showed up this week, with one of them being the original that was sent months ago, that must've been stuck in the global mail system somewhere all that time.

I'm itching to get my hands on the next three issues, have been holding off reading the digital versions, as I just don't enjoy reading that way as much as I do with the physical mag.

[NorthWay]

#208 battled through the Corona zombie hordes and took refuge in my mailbox just now.
No sight of 206+207, and not a word about any digital editions being available.

[Rory Milne]

#208 battled through the Corona zombie hordes and took refuge in my mailbox just now.
No sight of 206+207, and not a word about any digital editions being available.

Have you tried contacting Future's customer service at www.twitter.com/myfavemags?

They should be able to get you links to the digital editions and give you an update on when your printed issues of 206 + 207 will be arriving.

[Weblaus]

Have you tried contacting Future's customer service at www.twitter.com/myfavemags?

They should be able to get you links to the digital editions and give you an update on when your printed issues of 206 + 207 will be arriving.

My experience with that Twitter account is complete silence, despite the Edge editor tagging them in herself.

But I'm happy for NorthWay, so maybe copies to Germany will also arrive before the next issue is out, after all.

[Rory Milne]

Have you tried contacting Future's customer service at www.twitter.com/myfavemags?

They should be able to get you links to the digital editions and give you an update on when your printed issues of 206 + 207 will be arriving.

My experience with that Twitter account is complete silence, despite the Edge editor tagging them in herself.

But I'm happy for NorthWay, so maybe copies to Germany will also arrive before the next issue is out, after all.

That's really sad to hear. I've seen other people from the forum getting things sorted out for them on that Twitter page, I wouldn't have suggested it otherwise. I can only guess that they must have more control over UK subscriptions, but there's no excuse for them not replying to your tweets.

[Weblaus]

That's really sad to hear. I've seen other people from the forum getting things sorted out for them on that Twitter page, I wouldn't have suggested it otherwise. I can only guess that they must have more control over UK subscriptions, but there's no excuse for them not replying to your tweets.

Well, the problem was about when a order of an in-stock item (the then-current issue of Edge) would finally dispatch because it's hadn't yet a week after I ordered it. And somehow, it did in the night after I posted about the situation on Twitter.

You could theorize that they knew that and felt that was answer enough, but I think that's probably pretty far-fetched. Especially as they would at least have cross-checked my name with their ystem (I didn't post a order number publically) to know that. Andf if they put that much effort in it, sending a single confirmation tweet or something should have been easy to do.

So the much more likely thing seems to be that the dispatch happening was pure coincidence and they couldn't be arsed to do something. Maybe exactly because they don't care much about non-UK customers once they got our money anyway.