Bait and Switch by Apple?
 

Ok, I'm kind of torqued off at Apple right now. Even though I bought a 40GB IPOD less than a year ago, I succumbed to the new color 60GB model and ordered one on Sunday (March 27). The website said "estimated shipping same business day". Yesterday, I got a confirmation email saying "estimated shipping on or before March 31" and as of yet the item still hasn't shipped.

Granted, the website said ESTIMATED same business day, but now it's not even close! :mad:

ok, so I just had to vent............ :(

Well, maybe you can cancel and order it from somewhere else.

I haven't checked recently, but Buy.com was discounting the photo iPods, didn't collect tax for my state, and had free shipping. We got the previous 60gig with the accessories last month for $429.

Order it through Amazon.com :cool:

Not really bait and switch, just Apple and their crummy logistics. Dell is also really good at this.

Yeah. "Bait and Switch" would be for Apple to have said "Sorry, we're out of 60GB iPods. Would you like an XXGB model for $xxx?"

One thing you can be sure of with Apple is that you can never be sure of when you'll actually receive your product after ordering it. This problem has plagued them since at least 1990. You'd think 15 years would be long enough to figure out how to fix their logistics issues.

pricegrabber.com shows several places selling for less than $449 with current availability.

Keep in mind that Sunday was not a business day.

It's quite possible that the iPod is being prepared to ship or even has shipped by this point. Those quote confirmation emails are sent out far more often than they're needed, due to FTC regulations.

Another explanation for the wonky quotes: You happened to place your order the weekend that the quarter ended, which is a time of craziness and upheaval. The quarter ended Saturday. There was probably a lot of "closing the books out" on Sunday, which might've come into play. Not to mention the fact that it was Easter, and, for once, the Apple Store CS dept was given the day off.

The amount of iPods shipping each quarter, each month and each day is insane. Yes, the quote mechanisms have always been a work in progress, but from the other side of the curtain I can tell you that there have been some remarkable strides in both the logistics and the logic driving the commitments. This effort is always ongoing. But once you throw the iPod into that, it can seem like the whole system is back to square one.

Anyway, point being, it was an estimate, Sunday is not a business day, it was a holiday, and it was also the end of a quarter. Additionally, requotes are sent out more frequently than needed so as not to expose any others to the $10,000 fine (per order) the FTC applies to under-quoted online orders.

Feel free to PM your order # to me, and I'll take a look at it and see how it's going.

I understand that Sunday was not a business day. I did not expect it to ship Sunday, what I expected was for it to ship Monday. I just got the notification today (wednesday) that it shipped. That's three business days after the order was placed. :(

Did you do the free engraving? Sometimes that screws up the shipping, as things get backlogged over the weekend with new orders.

Timothy

Buy it a circuit city
 

Buy at circuit city they have the best warranty. Apple care is a joke. Circuity city will give you a brand new one instead of sending it out to get fixed ala apple. This includes the battery issues with the ipods.

oh yeah same price as apple care.

Most likely, it shipped Tues. The ship notification email messages are not sent instantly after something ships; there are lots of steps in between that occur first and several other factors.

Engraving will add some time to things as well.

Here's the official policy, accessible at the bottom of any page at the Apple Store web site...

Orders for in-stock items that are eligible for same-day shipping must be received before your local time of 2:00 p.m., pending payment processing. Orders placed on the weekend or on a holiday will begin payment processing the next business day. Unanticipated changes in supply can affect product availability. Please confirm the estimated shipping lead time at the "Review Your Order" page for the most current availability information.

also...

Order lead time is the length of time it will take us to validate your credit card, assemble the right products and package your order.* Shipping time is the length of time it will take for the package to travel from our warehouse to your shipping address.
Apple makes every effort to ship your product according to the estimated lead times provided by the Apple Store at checkout.* The estimated lead times are in business days (Monday through Friday) excluding Federal Reserve holidays.* Lead times will begin the following business day for orders placed and credit cleared after 2 p.m. PST.* Lead times quoted on the checkout page are for orders that are partially shipped - meaning items ship as soon as they are available. If you have requested a complete shipment, please add 3-4 additional days for transportation and order consolidation processing.

Although every effort is made to ship your order according to the lead time provided, shipping dates may change due to changes in supply. If the lead time changes, Apple will contact you via email and provide a revised shipping estimate.

We encourage you to contact Apple Store Sales Support at 1-800-676-2775 for order status information or visit http://www.apple.com/orderstatus or navigate to http://store.apple.com/ and click the "Your Account" button to view the status of your order.

What I think probably happened is that the leadtime given on the Web on Sunday had not been updated, due to the end-of-quarter maintenance going on. Once the new leadtime of "1-3 days" was available on Monday, you were alerted to the update by email. Later on Monday, your order was prepared for shipping. If personalized, this process takes a bit longer. Sometime Tues, your order status was updated to shipped. Sometime after that (putting us into Wed), you were sent an email notifying you of this. So, just because you got the email on Wed doesn't mean that that is when the order shipped. That's when you were informed that the order shipped. Throw lots of time zones into this mix, and things get really interesting. :)