₦airaland Forum

crestweon:
After loosing my item and then accusing me not writing my unit number which was clearly on the package and pictures sent proves so I still continue to recieve mails from shoptomydoor saying that my item has been put back in my warehouse et al.

I have categorically told them that they can keep the item or better still sell it and share as staff bonus. The item only cost 35 dollars. I have not had this much trouble in shipping since I left them 2yrs ago and like an abusive relationship I am tired.

I will be glad if you can desist from sending me emails from all manner of customer service people. I will be glad if you guys can advice me on the proper way to shut down my account from your website. I have searched I can't find.

Like the prodigal son, i am going back to my shippers thanks and for the rest of you I wish you happy shipping to your door.

NB: still expect my honest review.

Please @crestweon, kindly furnish me with the name of the shipping firm you are using now. I need to make some purchases with this year's Labor Day Sales.

Thanks

shoptomydoor:
Hello,

Sorry about your experience, which unfortunately occurred as you made changes the last minute after you had requested that your goods be shipped with our free ocean promo. However, as you had earlier requested for our ocean promo, your purchases were moved to the sea section, based on your request.
Our container for July moved from the warehouse around July 18th and all shipment in the ocean section was moved as well. Unfortunately, you logged into your account after we had moved it based on your preference to be moved via ocean and then you changed to ship via air and paid whereas your package had already shipped via ocean.

Your refund has long been made on the difference in cost since the 18th of August, 2015. Kindly revert to your email as we believe all your issues have been adequately addressed.
We take out our time to ensure each customer is satisfied but we can not stop a ship or empty a container that is about to sail with several other goods.
We also can confidently say we have no record of missing shipment as most shipment even when they come without a proper address such as: the unit number are kept in safe in a secured location of our warehouse until we are able to identify the customer through the measures we have put in place on that, and such items are shipped as soon as we get the required details from the customer.

We appreciate your doing business with us.Thank you.

Seriously, it would have been better if you had simply ignored my post since it wasn't directed at you because if you had read my review and actually checked with the other customer care reps that worked on this issue before you replied, you would have realized that there is no way you will come out looking good. Where do I start from? The missing records that couldn't be found when my items where assigned a very wrong chargeable weight? Trying to get me to pay to have my items re-weighed? Finally getting the weight right by a customer care rep in Nigeria calling the US office, something that a customer care rep in US wanted me to pay $5 for? And above all these, finally getting me to pay for air freight for the shipment despite the fact that the shipment has been shipped out long ago via ocean freight. Yes, you did refund me after you found out the mistake. But the fact remains that the deed was done and heck, the mere fact that, for several weeks, you couldn't account for the whereabouts of my shipment is enough to make anyone lose confidence in you guys. Now, you are adding new charges instead of working towards getting your services right first.

I have read what Mr. Nduka said about comparing the services you offer for free that others don't. Let me ask this, are you the only ones in the industry that offer this same service for free? Shippyme did before they went belly up, MyUS does too, and a host of others do as well. So, I really don't get why you have to come off sounding like you are doing us a huge favour here. If I were you, with all these negative reps, I will put on hold any further planned increase and work towards improving your service delivery first. After that, you can stand justified if you still want to go ahead and increase your rates.

crestweon:
order #69704

The last time I posted here about my terrible experience with shop to my door alot of probably sponsored folks here countered my allegations by posting pictures of their Goods received from Shop to my door.

The chairman of the company went further to debunk my allegations about my experience. He went further to ask me to reveal my identity and also to provide an evidence of my order number which I did.
Guess what? I did not hear again from him.....lol. I am sure he saw the terrible treatment I got and had no response except to keep quiet and say nothing hoping it will die a natural death.

I intentionally kept quiet and placed an order through them last week to debunk all their lies about improvement. I ensured I paid through PayPal and I beat their time cut off on Friday.

I got this message after payment "Booked to depart USA on next cargo flight on the 22nd August-2015. Estimated to arrive Lagos Sorting Center after customs clearance on the 29th-August-2015 and will be available for pick up at your selected pick up center or delivered to your door on or before 03rd-September-2015.

Ladies and gentlemen of Nairaland I have not heard from them all week only to get an email today with this message
"Booked to depart USA on next cargo flight on the 29th August-2015. Estimated to arrive Lagos Sorting Center after customs clearance on the 05th-September-2015 and will be available for pick up at your selected pick up center or delivered to your door on or before 10th-September-2015"

I don't mind that I was charged a ridiculous 60 dollars meanwhile I just received the same weight package from another shipper here for 40 dollars. I shipped both on the 21st.

Most of the reviews you see here pls do a simple research on the faces behind them and you will be amazed.

After leaving them for 2years I just spent my money to prove that the lies that this is the cheapest and most efficient shipping company is still true.

Nduka over to you. Nairaland be the judge.

@Crestwagon. I myself have had quite a terrible experience lately and decided to jump ship. I wrote a review of Shoptomydoor based on my personal experience with them here https://www.nairaland.com/2467817/personal-review-shoptomydoor. Frankly, I am well and truly done with them. The last one that broke the camel's back was that even after the entire process and brouhaha I went thru in the last shipment, I only got to find out that all those times, they have even shipped out my goods via their ocean shipment and still went ahead to make me pay for air freight. That is assuming that they didn't say that to hide the fact that they might have actually lost the shipment. I will wait for the time given to elapse and when I don't, I will then take up action against them. By the way, what is the other shipping firm you now use. I want to try out one a friend recommended called Skybox. Their website is Skybox.net. They seem pricy and all so I'm still on the look out for alternatives.

Dear Nduka Udeh,

My fear about the downward trend of your company is fast coming to reality. After my last review of your firm, I finally paid and had the two shipments sent to my via air freight. The shipments have the following order numbers 67313 and 67663. Order 67313 ended up being delivered to the wrong address but lucky for me, I was able to track down the address and retrieve my package via the tracking number that was provided. Now, I don't blame your company for this error, rather I blame Red Star Express cos my address and phone number was clearly printed on the shipping label and the delivery guy failed to give me a call like they normally used to in the past. But this next one, I think is solely your company's fault. After paying for the shipping, I was getting updates about the status of the two shipments via email. But suddenly, I stopped getting updates for the shipment with order number 67663. I assumed it was due to the same issue that I was having of not getting updates from u guys. But unfortunately, it isn't because I kept getting updates for order 67313 but not for 67663. Currently, it is past the due date I was supposed to receive my items and I'm yet to get it. I have emailed your staff as regards this issue and so far, nothing has been done except wait for 48hrs to tell me that it will be forwarded to the appropriate unit and they will get in touch.

I only hope that my shipment hasn't been lost, misplaced nor damaged cos that will really be a terrible thing to happen. Kindly look into this matter please.

Thanks

Dear Nduka Udeh,

My fear about the downward trend of your company is fast coming to reality. After my last review of your firm, I finally paid and had the two shipments sent to my via air freight. The shipments have the following order numbers 67313 and 67663. Order 67313 ended up being delivered to the wrong address but lucky for me, I was able to track down the address and retrieve my package via the tracking number that was provided. Now, I don't blame your company for this error, rather I blame Red Star Express cos my address and phone number was clearly printed on the shipping label and the delivery guy failed to give me a call like they normally used to in the past. But this next one, I think is solely your company's fault. After paying for the shipping, I was getting updates about the status of the two shipments via email. But suddenly, I stopped getting updates for the shipment with order number 67663. I assumed it was due to the same issue that I was having of not getting updates from u guys. But unfortunately, it isn't because I kept getting updates for order 67313 but not for 67663. Currently, it is past the due date I was supposed to receive my items and I'm yet to get it. I have emailed your staff as regards this issue and so far, nothing has been done except wait for 48hrs to tell me that it will be forwarded to the appropriate unit and they will get in touch.

I only hope that my shipment hasn't been lost, misplaced nor damaged cos that will really be a terrible thing to happen. Kindly look into this matter please.

Thanks

It's very funny to see when some of silly and foolish Igbo brethren call their fellow Igbos Ewu Awusa and Yoloba simply because they don't agree with their stupidity. It's ppl like these that give us a bad name. People that reason from their.........

onagoodday1:
hapu Onye homo ahun, mmadu no'ro nooh ona 'ako mpeteri

Okwu okenye na adi ka nkwuyeri na nti onye nzuzu.

deadie:
Come on mechie onu dia. Kedu maka "We cannot in honesty expect those that gave me 5% of the vote to be treated as those that gave me 97%". What does that mean? The statement you quoted, when put in context with the "5 and 97%" part of the statement essentially confirms that any actions he takes in the SS and SE will be for the sake of satisfying constitutional requirements. See ur mouth and "average Igbo man". What/who is an "average Igbo man"? Do u imply that they are not intelligent enough to decipher the meaning of comments? Ewu Awusa.

As the olodo one of umuolodoland in whatever state isi daputa, did he say that before or after he said this one "But, by the constitution, no state can be excluded from government, so there is no way, even if I want to show gratitude to those constituencies that heavily voted for me against those that even vote for me, they have the protection of the government. And I have made an undertaking that I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody. If I come clearly and show and marginalize a certain group of people because they didn't vote for me, then I have already contradicted myself. And I'm sure, people will be too quick to pick that against me."? A si gi nwe ako na uche, iju i nwe. Mscheeeew.

Mynd44:
To answer these questions, the OP needs to put in the post above what led to the Naira depreciating from 154/156 in November2014 to 196 in December 2014 first.

When you do that, we can then start to track the primary factors and how we can tackle the strength of the Naira viz-a-viz the price of goods in the market.

To take this issue from the events of May 2015 is just you attempting to put squares pegs in round holes.

Too much making of sense.

kraftykc:
I'm Igbo. I voted PMB. I rep PMB. but if PMB will wait for only the constitutionally mandated appointments to have Igbos in his cabinet then I do not see any reason to thank him. I don't even see the reason to thank him if he chooses an Igbo man simply because the man is Igbo. I will thank PMB if he takes special interests in the peculiar problems of the SE.

It doesn't matter one way or another if he does or doesn't appoint Igbos. We will survive. Truth still remains that he was the best choice to make in the last election.

Spoken like a real and wise Igbo man. Hapu umu nwanne anyi isi gbarigo na acho agha ha ga anu.

deadie:
I am an Igbo man and I supported Buhari over Jonathan because I sincerely believed that the Jonathan government was doing more harm than good to this country. However, I cringed when I watched the interview where Buhari essentially stated that he will not be fair to a region that that gave him 5% of the vote. My respect for him instantly evaporated and he validated the ethnocentric labels that were placed on him before the elections with that singular comment. I no longer wish him success. In fact, I hope he fails. He is less intelligent than I thought.

As usual, you went the same way the average Igbo man did. So, I choro igwa m na I gero nti na ihe ndi ozo okwuru mgbe o na aza ajuju ahu. Ngwa, ka mu nye gi ya ebe a. O siri na "But, by the constitution, no state can be excluded from government, so there is no way, even if I want to show gratitude to those constituencies that heavily voted for me against those that even vote for me, they have the protection of the government. And I have made an undertaking that I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody. If I come clearly and show and marginalize a certain group of people because they didn't vote for me, then I have already contradicted myself. And I'm sure, people will be too quick to pick that against me.". Ngwa, I ka na acringe acringe?

Xtopherprince:
Bringing up issues of campaigning and voting only solidifies the victimization ish. This is a democracy for Christ's sake.
And about the 'choicy appointments'..... Federal character should come into play...what is good for the goose is also good for the gander. The resources that is been used to run our great country doesn't come from one section of the country alone.

So in essence, you are saying that we should sacrifice ability on the alter of federal character. That is if Mr. A from SE is better equipped to handle a situation than Mr. B from NE, we should give it to Mr. B because we want to keep the federal character? Nigerians and myopic views.

Dubem13:
Biafra is the only solution.

Then go find am where you lose am ni.

Xtopherprince:
What other appointments are you talking about? Or are you reffering to the ''Special adviser to the Special adviser'' appointments? After handing out the choicy positions who does he want to take up the crumbs?

So, na only Igbos deserve the "choicy" appointments ba? Based on how much you campaigned and voted for him in the past elections abi? Puleeese. Get a grip on urself mate.

Sanchez01:
You're not one to make us have a rethink into joining Biafra. What impact has Biafra had on its own soil that is worthy of note and mention? Biafra is promising, yet desperate Igbo youths are either sentenced to death in China, Singapore or Malaysia over drug peddling offences. Is it not rather ironic?

Last I checked, Biafra is a dream specially crafted for the Igbos and those who buy into the dream. A son of the SS hanged on to power for 6 years yet could not transform the region. It is not the FG's problem. A son of the land misrepresented us even at the Federal level and then we blame Nigeria as a whole? Heads of militant groups enrich themselves with the people's supposed compensation and we blame the government? Hell no! We're responsible for our mishaps. This is a problem of mismanagement and not even Biafra can fix this!

Bros Sanchez, I don't drink, nor do drugs nor womanize and don't condone such. But wherever you are and if I happen to meet you and you do these three things. I will happily supply you with a trailer of Orijin, a farmland of opium and weed, and enough babes to make the suicide bombers in "paradise" look jealously at you. In fact, you are not just making sense, YOU, MY FRIEND, IS SENSE ITSELF.

Sanchez01:
Enough of this bull crap, abeg! I'm from the SS and I can categorically state that Igbo tribes in the SS has been and is still denying that they're not one and the same as Igbos in the SE.

Problem with you guys is that you cannot fight your battles yourself and your unholy alliance with the SS is largely because of its oil. I reiterate for the umpteenth time, THE SS is NOT THE SAME AS THE SE! We're not the same and we'll never be. The bitterness of the Igbos recently is because of the huge miscalculation at the recent elections. If the Igbos want Biafra let them push for it without attaching themselves to the SS.

Just like Etcetera wrote sometimes ago, the Igbo leadership is confused and lost. One minute you want Biafra, the next minute you decry being ignored. One instance you say Nigeria is a zoo, the next you travel all over the zoo, refusing to return to your Utopia to develop it.

Please stop playing victim. You marginalized yourselves. The Arewa Forum, as big and as powerful as it is never threw its weight behind Buhari prior to the elections, at least they did not announce it publicly even if they supported him.

Just yesterday, a stray bullet killed an innocent trader and some annoying folks came here wailing that Buhari is planning on killing Igbos on their turf, to the extent that the coward albino broadcasted that Igbos react.

Question is, how many people has policemen 'mistakenly' killed in the South West since Jan? Enough of this Barcelona injury-feigning act of cowardice.

SS know themselves, biko.

STANDING OVATION MY BROTHER. This is just the gospel truth and they can read it and weep if they want to. I am from Anambra and I'm just filled with disgust the level the SE has degenerated themselves to simply because their candidate lost out in the election. Instead of being wise like we always claimed to be and start mending broken fences, we now choose to be a bunch of sore losers, always looking for errors in whatever the President does. As for me, thank God say my house dey badagry, the day una carry una Biafra for head take up arms, I go jejely carry my small load cross border enter Cotonou until una finish una craze. I refuse to allow a single strand of my hair be hurt on the account of the folly of some people drunk on nkwobi and isi ewu and palm wine.

Ujulabelle:
U must be funny bcs if u hv been to d Eastern Nigeria, u'd know that even its villages are developed. The development comes from their hardwork and not from Federal Govt.

If we can develop our villages ourselves, why are we now making so much noise about what ever rubbish that we think we are not getting? I mean, even with the little we, look how far we went with it. I think the reality of it is that this our current generation of ndi igbo has gone lazy and no longer value hard work. Watching Davido/Whizkid etal sing about easy money all day does that to an impressionable kid.

I have been using Original Samsung Memory cards. Class 10 UHS 1. And I buy them from Amazon. I do have a couple spare cards lying around and can sell em to you if you wish. But they don't come cheap o. It's going for 5k. Please don't ask me to reduce the price and no, it isn't the same ones they sell here either. They don't even have the same color schemes sef.

Airtel to Etisalat.

Nduka193:
Hi Henry,

Our Online tool "Get Shipping Cost" actually allows you to know the shipping cost direct to your door anywhere in Nigeria. So just select your warehouse location as the From, and your town where you reside as the final destination and you will get an accurate shipping cost.

Also starting August 2015, we will be opening up locations in about 10 cities where people can go pick up their shipment, talk to an agent there and have any questions they may have fully answered. These locations will be in Warri, Port Harcourt, Onitsha, Awka, Kaduna, Uyo, Ibadan, Benin. THis is our first phase of rool out and we expect to expand to more cities before the year runs out.

Best Regards,
Nduka Udeh
President/CEO - Shoptomydoor.com

Hi Nduka,

Yeah, I.ve used that before. But why I was asking was to get the extra cost for home delivery that is being added to the shipping cost. That info used to be on the website, but I can't seem to find it anymore.

About the rollout, that is great news especially for those who would like to further reduce their shipping costs by picking up the package themselves. Keep it up.

DayoAle:
@Henry, good luck in your search.

@DayoAle, thanks.

Nduka193:
Hi Henry,

Please use our quote tool to get this. So you will be looking at shipping cost from Houston to you in Nigeria. Basically for delivery to our Lagos office, its a flat charge of $3 plus $3.59/pound. So if you have 10 pounds from Houston to our Lagos office, it will be $3 + $35.9 = $38.9. If its 100 pounds its $3 + $359 = $362. So basically the flat $3 charge has a bigger effect on smaller weights. Unfortunately this has to be there and compared to other companies, their typical minimum charge is $20 to $100.

We may increase this minimum to $10 in the near future as we put in more measures to improve our service way above the levels you are requesting, and as you know good service tends to be reasonably priced. In all, you will see that l always use the word "reasonably" priced as l believe our price irrespective of how good the service is must be affordable to the masses.

Let me know if you have any further questions.

If its not too much to ask, on my next trip to Nigeria, l would love to invite you to our office or meet you somewhere for a chat and a drink. I am really impressed with how you took the time to explain the issues you had and proffer some good suggestions. These are the things that help us to improve our service the more and l highly appreciate it.

Best Regards,
Nduka Udeh.
President/CEO - Shoptomydoor.com

Hi Nduka,

Ok. Quite fair. But what about home delivery? I expect an extra charge is added for that extra service. Well, taking it up to $10 from $3 might seem a bit much, especially to those shipping smaller weights like you mentioned. All the same, I do hope you will do a thorough review before the increase and settle on one that is reasonable to all parties involved (business and consumer).

About the meet and chat, that's no problem. I can make out time as long as I get a heads-up before then.

Nduka193:
Hello Henry,

Thanks for this. See my answers to this:

Point 1 - That has been implemented and customers get updates when shipment arrives. If they dont, then the warehouse personnel may have forgotten to activate the alert. Thanks for all your information on IT and web programming. Unfortunately, the same shoes do not fit all legs, and different companies have different approach.

Point 2 - There is no fluctuation in billing. You are billed based on your actual vs chargable weight and what you get as a quote is the same as you get when billed with the same weight and dimensions. The same quote system runs the amounts that you get on your invoice.
Humans beings key in weights and dimensions and its possible for them to have made an error. When you notice this, the solution is simply send a mail or call and it will be handled within 24/48 hours. Resolution time will typically depend on the work load of a finite staff system but we typically strive to resolve issues within 24 hours.

Point 3 - The solution to this is what we have implemented and it so far works for 99% of our customers. When an invoice is uploaded, the right values are always entered 99.9% of the time. Is there a probability of an error occuring a second time, Yes. But definitely, we dont go around entering wrong values as we have nothing to gain from it. As insurance is based on actual declared value and purchase value, you will know if you have ever dealt with an insurance company that any deviation from declared and invoice values validates the insurance claim. So please understand that no one deliberately enteres wrong values.

On item names, you may know what you ordered. but when you have staffs dealing with over 10,000 different items on a weekly basis, do you think there is a probability for them to mistakenly call one thing another. Anyway, we receive so many different items and without invoice, its difficult at times to know what one ordered. These are just simple issues that are easily dealt with, best by chatting with us and pointing out the mistake right there for it to be easily corrected.

Point 4 - I beg to differ here. The system is designed to add the weights as items come in and we have run tests on it many times and seen it to be 100% accurate in summing weights. The only time an error like this will occur is again if there is a human error in the dimensions of one of the deliveries. We don't release a system without thorough tests. There is no need beating on the same issue over and over again. The main thing is that the error made initially was discovered when it was repackaged, and since it became smaller when repackaged, l think it shows that there was an initial error and obviously was not an attempt to inflate charges. Since this has been dealt with to your satisfaction, lets leave this and move on please.

Point 5 - I see you are one who is technologically savy and dont expect you to suggest for automation to make way for manual process. The system works automated as it allows us to handle over 3,000 packages that may contain over 50,000 items weekly. it remains like that as we have received well over 200 emails from other customers praising the speed of invoice generation using the automated system. While you have one view, we have views of 50,000 plus customers and will always go with what suits the majority.

All other suggestions have been noted and those we see fit will be implemented. Again, l stand on the point that you will return as a customer. Not because l am bragging but because of the statistics at our disposal. The key thing for now is that you had issues, they were dealt with, your initially wrong weights were corrected when it was manually packaged. At this stage we will close this chapter and wish you the best in your shopping and shipping endeavors.

As someone who has used us, you will notice that we always make changes and improvements on a regular basis. That has been our succes.. Listening to the voice of the customer and implementing the suggestions supported by "the many". While you may have your suggestions, others do have their too and we stand as judge to implement what majority prefer.

Again, Yes. I said go and try other companies, and l am even willing to recommend others that are in the same field should you need my recommendation. My view on service is that when you have done your best to be the best, you believe in your self and leave the rest to God. I am still confident that we will see you soon and back to Shoptomydoor.com

Best Regards,
Nduka Udeh.
President/CEO - Shoptomydoor.com

Hello Nduka.

As much as I am IT savy, it pains me to see when technology is being poorly implemented. And in such scenario, it's either the implementation is fixed/improved or it is totally scrapped. There are cases whereby automation is actually worse than manual operations. Before I go any further on this, I'd like to know how much you charge for shipping per pound presently, ie shipping rates. That is, excluding the import duties and taxes. Been trying to find where you listed the cost per pound for shipping but I couldn't find it. Can you help me out with it please?

Thanks.

lordkay10:
Wow! I'm glad the lingering issue has been put to bed. I've been following closely to see how all these would pan out but I must commend them for giving u a fair hearing.
By the way I've been trying to reach their customer service on 07008008000 but it doesn't link me up to any customer care representative, I just get a few advert and would be finally told to record a voice message. Pls is their any other way to call them? Thanks

Yeah, I was glad that it was resolved too. As for that number, I never had any luck connecting to them all the times I tried to. In fact, their US number connects far more easily than the 9ja one. This is something else that they will also need to be look into. But in the meantime, you can try this. Send a mail to their email, then go their page on facebook or twitter and drop a comment telling them about the mail you sent and a summary of your issue. That seems to get their attention and if your query can be dealt with easily, they will reply you there.

SEQUEL TO UPDATE NO 4

I will like to commend Shoptomydoor for the fact that they made a mistake, admitted and also corrected it. Even though it took a lot more back and forth between us than it used to in the past. All the same, still commendable. Again, I will also like to commend Bisola that took it upon herself to work out an issue that wasn't even her prerogative in the first place. I will advice that Mr. Nduka should employ more people like her. I know that you expanded recently and possibly recruited a lot of new hands, but you need to maintain a certain level of quality among your employees. They are the ones that reflect what your company stands for, much more than even you the President. They are your foot soldiers, and you the General. And we all know a General is nothing without his/her foot soldiers. So, I will implore you to always train and retrain your soldiers. Make sure that they are the best and meet a certain level that is required of them, weed out those that do not and reward those that do go that extra mile to make the company be what it is today.

Also, kindly look into the points that I have raised here. These are real issues that need to be addressed. Fix that automatic invoice or even better, get rid of it entirely or overhaul it completely. You can see the error margin was just too much here. It isn't something that you would want to turn to a regular occurrence. Fixing this issue and the others that I mentioned will surely go a long way in boosting customer's confidence in your business.

Once again, I'm glad that we resolved this issue amicably and will continue doing business with you guys once I see that the issues raised has been addressed sufficiently.

Thanks to everyone that contributed.

DayoAle:
@Henry, I have been using shoptomydoor for the past 3 years and I can tell you that they have scored 85%. Even humans are not perfect, hence you cannot find a perfect company as there may be ups and down but what is important is how they get it resolved. Looking for shipafrika and the likes may land you in more deeper shit than you expect. To find a company who tries to resolve customer's need is one key thing you should look for and shoptomydoor has that better than any of the shipping companies I have used. You can go ahead to try others and I will like to hear from you what your experience is. For me, they got their customers back.

@DayoAle, I know no business is going to be 100% perfect. I will be a hypocrite asking that of others knowing fully well that I am not perfect either. But like you pointed out, it all comes down to how the issue is resolved. In the past, the few issues I had then were always resolved promptly and to my satisfaction. So, let’s see how they resolve this one in the end. As for getting into bigger poo by trying others, I think that could swing either way. Besides, haven’t you heard the saying that one doesn’t know what he might be missing because you didn’t try? I do believe the good ones are out there, albeit in small numbers. And, if need be, I will find them the same way I found Shoptomydoor. And I pray I find many good alternatives because monopoly is not always a good thing and when you know your competition is as good as you are, you tend to be focused and very serious with what you do.

Nduka193:
Hello Henry ... I hope that is your name ... Wow... I am blown away by your review. By the way, this is Nduka Udeh, President here at Shoptomydoor.

Its good to see people who are actual customers and who take their time to give constructive reviews and not other shipping companies masquerading as customers just to spoil our image because they cant beat our service. Thanks for the very constructive review.

Anyway, thanks for the review. Your issues have been noted and while you may not know, we have solutions for all this. Let me list your main points one by one and deal with the solutions that already exist besides each.

1) Not Been Notified When Items Arrive Your Warehouse - This was a bug in our site software and its been worked on now by our IT team. Its a simple fix that should be fixed in the next few days. Not a big issue. But even if you are not notified, our standard update time is 24 hours. So 24 hours after you get an email from Amazon or any company that your items have been delivered, when you log into your warehouse you should see the item. Once in a while, especially when we do promos, we get over whelmed with lots of orders and you may experience update delays. But typically in 24 hours your warehouse is updated.

2) Fluctuations in Billing Due to Naira - This is unfortunately something we can t do much about as we pay airlines and service providers in dollars. So we have to peg our service charge against the dollar, and update the exchange rate as it fluctuates. You will always get the same dollar amount, but the naira may vary as it fluctuates. My advise is to stock up on dollars for now, and pay in dollars which is always consistent. The best bet for a heavy shopper is to use your card to pay (either a naira or dollar card) as you will be billed against Visa/Master Card rates. This can save you a lot in the long run.

3) Wrong Declared Values - Not all shipments come with an invoice from the store when its delivered to us. So your warehouse personnel will typically estimate a value for customs purpose. Our platform allows you to easily change this. When you log into your warehouse, there is a link beside each shipment that says "If the values of any item is wrong, please upload invoices". I have attached an image of this for you to see. Once you upload your invoice, any wrong value is corrected within 24 hours.

You may ask why we do this. (1) For insurance - We have a 100% delivery guarantee that your items will be delivered intact or your money is refunded (item cost and full shippiing cost). Based on this, we have insurance on every single item shipped and the insurance company will insure only based on the declared value. So it makes sens e to ensure that at all times you have the correct item value declared. In the past, we allowed customers to enter the value themselves without invoice verification. We had customers with items worth $2000 entering $20. When an issue occured, and insurance requests to refund just $20, you can imagine what comes up. (2) Customs Purposes - We have had instances in the past where customs held some high value items and on contacting the customer to pay the extra requested duty, it became a problem cos they had declared wrong values.

So to be on the safe side and to avoid back and forth, we always enter what we feel is a reasonable estimate based on general web search. When you now feel the value is wrong, follow the procedure to have it corrected.

3) Actual Versus Chargable Weight - This is programmed into the system and its based on the same formular used by all shipping companies. Chargable Weight = L x W x H /139 and its the same with DHL and UPS and Fedex. You can google dimensional weight to see this. When packaging your items, note that boxes are used and items are not thrown like that into the plane. So the final packaged weight may differ slightly from weights you see online. To combat this and to be sure customers know they actual shipping cost even before shopping, we have the "Item Quote Tool" online that enable you to enter the actual item and a shipping cost is displayed. For these, if there is any difference, we guarantee not to charge you more than the quote shows.

4) $3.29/Pound Advertised Rate - This is a special rate been advertised strictly and for just US residents, and not for every one. We have typically restricted our business to shoppers from Nigeria but have decided as of June to open up to US residents with the special discounted rate. Please read the page well. This rate applies only to customers living in the US sending their items to us direct from their house or coming into our US warehouse to drop it off. For those shopping online from a store and sending direct to us, the rate can be seen open and clear for various weights by going to our "Get a quote tool". Our base rate for all others can be seen from the get a quote tool and is automated into the warehouse. It is still better than any rate you will get from any shipping company serving Nigeria that offers the quality of service we strive to offer. Yes, you may get a few cheaper that our rate for shoppers, but be sure there is no money back guarantee, no online view of your items, no online payment, may be no customer service at all. You really get what you pay for and to offer quality service, our cost has to be reasonable (but not expensive).

I hope this answers your pressing questions.

Go ahead, try other companies but l am 100% certain that you will return. We continue to look at comments from customers like you and constantly implement solutions to solve these and other issues you may encounter.

Let me know if you have any further questions.

Best Regards,
Nduka Udeh.
President/CEO - Shoptomydoor.com

UPDATE NO 3 OCCURRED WHILE I WAS COMPOSING THIS REPLY

Hello Mr. Nduka,

I'm glad this got your attention and that you came here to address some of my concerns. Like you can see from my review, I repeated time and again how your service was topnotch and transparent in times past. In your post, you tried to address some of the issues I raised here, but unfortunately, you were only repeating the same thing your customer care staff were telling me and it's something I myself already know fully well. You also failed to address the other issues that made me call your US office and talk for over an hour without getting any meaningful solution. But before I delve into all that, let me address the points you made so far.

1. About the notifications issue, this like you pointed out, is a simple fix. I am not a webmaster but from my little experience in web development, I can tell you that it is indeed a very simple issue that can be fixed within a day. Since it was working before, that means it has already being implemented and hence, It is just a matter of going thru the code for that and finding the bugs. This should actually take not more than 2 days for a single web dev to fix. But as it stands now, this issue has been there for as far back as May 17th of this year and up until 3 days ago, it still hasn't been fixed. I said 2 days ago because that was when the warehouse was updated with the last item that was received for me and I still got no notification regarding that. If you check your records, you will see among my emails one in which I told you guys to do something about your website. I even went out on a limb and offered to recommend some solid web devs that I know of that will do a great job in giving your website the much needed overhaul. We both know the outcome of that today. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I will suggest you to take a look at website of similar firms and you will see a mix bag of features that wouldn't hurt you to incorporate in your own site. Granted a lot of them have terrible sites that make you cringe just visiting it. But others have well-thought-out designs that even if their services may not be great in the end, it encourages first time users to give them a trial. Case in point ShipAfrika. Compared to your own site, there is no comparison at all. Most of the links that a first time user will need to visit for information are buried and hidden away with no links to it existing on the home page, except for the FAQ page that was even displayed with a bit misleading heading. And note, I'm not saying you should go copy other sites verbatim, all I'm saying is that you should take a look at them, look at the features that they implemented well that is user/customer friendly, then implement it in your own unique way.

2. Fluctuations in Billing Due to Naira - This point is void because like I pointed out before, I always deal with you guys and pay my bills in USD and not in NGN. So, the fluctuations have never been an issue to me per se.


3. Wrong Declared Values - Truly, not all shipments come with an invoice from the store. That was why, in your old website, you implemented a feature that enables one to input the figures themselves. Granted, a lot of issues will arise from this and I see the point of you removing this feature. But what I don't get is that even when I uploaded the invoices, your staff still went ahead and put in different wrong values in multiple occasions. Is it that they can't read a bunch of figures from a pdf file? And what about the wrong names assigned to items too? Sometime ago, I shipped a phone through you and that phone was mislabeled as a tablet and even though I didn't bother back then due to your awesome rates, I wouldn't be surprised if I check and see that the cost I paid for that would be that for a tablet. But that's past. Presently, as it stands, it says a lot about your staff if they keep making these type of errors.

4. Actual Versus Chargable Weight - Yeah, I understand perfectly the deal with the difference between the two and how packages are being charged based on them. But like you said just now and same thing your customer care rep said on the phone, it is programmed into the system and done automatically. And therein lies the problem. From what your customer rep said and what you are confirming here as well, it appears that an estimate is generated automatically based on the individual items before they are actually consolidated. When I requested for an invoice to be generated for the $20 Ocean Shipping, it was manually packaged and the final actual weight, chargeable weight and box size were all within reasonable estimates for a package that started off at 14lbs. This is a far cry from what I got from the automatic estimate that has been programmed. And even when I took the manually generated weights and dimensions and input into the shipping calculator, I got the same exact charges that was to be paid if I went with the ocean shipping.

So, you can see that there is an issue somewhere, and anyone will tell you it lies with your automatic invoice generation. If it can make such a massive error, imagine the kind impression it creates. This is why it needs to be investigated properly and fixed immediately if it is found to have errors now. I haven’t complained of this issue with any of my past shipments so it’s quite obvious that it probably broke around the same time some other features on the site got broken e.g. Notification System.

5. $3.29/Pound Advertised Rate – Yeah, you are right and I was wrong. It says clearly on the site that it is ONLY for US residents. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to also include the rates for non-US residents alongside that so that others won’t make similar mistake like I did.

One issue I would like you to kindly address is, the huge discrepancy that occurred between the figures generated manually and that of the automatic. I wasn’t the one that put in those figures on the site and for it to suddenly vanish and you chalk it up to errors being encountered makes me think that something fishy is going on. Then again, your customer rep in the US also claims that he doesn’t have the details of my shipment that was manually generate anymore. According to him, the system flushes the records automatically when one makes any changes after the invoice was first generated. That explanation seems unbelievable based on these reasons.

1. Cost-Effectiveness - If you configured your database to flush/delete such crucial information simply because the customer made changes. It will not be cost-effective in the long run because, the change could be a temporary one. Like for instance, the person might want to see what the charge will be if he/she uses a different freight without having to go back to the “Get a Quote Tool” and start inputting the figures manually in it. In fact, it will be a good idea to have it incorporated in your site that one can use the final manual consolidated package dimensions and automatically compare the charges for shipping. In that way, the customer will always pay the right amount and both parties will be happy. Besides, you can even scrap the automatic generated invoice thingy and only generate manually once the customer is ready to ship. Generate the invoice latest in 24hrs and have it update on the site. Once generated, any further changes (like adding more items to the consolidated package) should then attract the $5 service charge. This manual generation will be better because, you normally ship out on a particular day of the week, say Monday, and if someone decides to ship on say Tuesday, he/she will have to wait until Monday to have their items shipped. So, there really is no need to rush and prepare an estimate and bill the person when at the end of the day, you will still need to get those info manually since you need it as well for your own payments that you make to the air/ship courier as well as records.

2. Customer Errors – cases where the customer mistakenly clicks on link that causes a change, e.g. changing an item from the ship by ocean option to ship by air, does it mean that because of this, the customer will have to wait another 48hrs for another invoice to be generated for the person? There are other reasons I can think of but let’s leave it at those two for now.

Back to the customer rep in the US, when he said that he has no records because they have been deleted due to changes I made, I asked him to give a call to those in charge at warehouse and request for a copy of their own records that they have about mine. And he answered that doing that, the people at the warehouse will have to re-weigh and re-measure the package and that will attract a fee of $5 or so. I told him over and over that I wasn’t asking my package to be re-weighed, rather he should simply request for their own records since his own has been deleted. He still insisted that it will require the $5 charge before they will grant the request cos they will still have to re-measure it. Well, I don’t think there is more to say about this than what has been said already.

Finally you said and I quote “Go ahead, try other companies but l am 100% certain that you will return.”. That smacks highly of arrogance. I mean, I know your services are good and topnotch in the past like I mentioned here, but it clearly isn’t so at the moment. Also, there are others out there that could offer the same level of service, if not better, that you currently do and at similar rates too. Before you get carried away by your level of success, do remember that Nokia was the King of smartphones before and Blackberry was the lovechild of business users, now look at where they are today.

No business is perfect but no matter how successful it is, it needs to always be on its toes and maintain a constant level when it comes to products and services it renders to its customers. It needs to always strive to stay ahead of the competition to remain the King of the Hill. The competition will not remain 2nd best forever, they also are striving each day to beat you and improve their services. Same also, an entrant into your niche can take away your clientele in a few months despite the fact that you’ve been market leader for years. That being said, I’d advice that you work on these issues I have pointed out.

@Op, From your question, I think you are a bit confused. You are kinda mixing things up. When you talk about FHD, HD, QHD,etc you are actually talking about display resolution size here. FHD = 1080p, HD = 720p, QHD = 1440p etc. But when you talk of IPS, AMOLED, LCD etc. You are talking about display technologies. Hence, you can get IPS screens in various resolutions and same goes for AMOLED too. So, now I have explained it, can you re-phrase your question?

@Dauchman, you say you've tried a lot of them, do you know of ShipAfrika and if you have tried them, how good is their service? I kinda came across them last night and couldn't find much reviews online.