Thursday, January 15, 2015

A whole house of Pain! - Wayland Games - Store Review


I don’t normal post about my experiences with shops, though I think I might start after this but today is the exception. I am at the moment right royally miffed with Wayland Games! I think this might end up being the first in a new set of reviews for stores and products.I usually have a bit of tolerance for stores and the delays faced but today took the biscuit and I can confirm that after my first order with them I will never hand them another penny, but why all this animosity I hear you cry, well let me tell you.

 

This saga starts way back in October 2014, I decided as a treat after the summer of hassle to buy myself some of the Secret Weapon Bases and the new Secret Weapon Tablescapes, as I’m sure you can tell I love the Secret Weapon products. So I duly placed the order for the 24 tile damaged urban streets, some bases, some glue and some terrain. So the order goes in and I get the cursory email to confirm. First issue was one of personal annoyance and not necessarily an issue, when completing the order I try to use the free shipping code on orders over £40 but find that for some reason I can’t use this, most likely down to the Tablescapes being on pre-order. Annoying but not too much that it puts me off.

 

So I sit and I wait as I know the tiles were on pre-order for November. November comes, the date passes and nothing arrives or moves. I give it another week and I call Wayland to be told the dates have being pushed back so will be another couple of weeks. Apparently I should have received an email, checked all my folders and nothing.

 

So I sit and I wait as I know the tiles were on pre-order for another few weeks. The date passes and nothing arrives or moves. I give it another day or two and again I call Wayland to be told the dates have being pushed back so will be another couple of weeks, early December. Apparently I should have received an email, checked all my folders and nothing.

 

So I sit and I wait as I know the tiles were on pre-order for another few weeks. Early December arrives and the date passes and nothing arrives or moves. I again call Wayland to be told the dates have being pushed back so will be another couple of weeks but I should have them by the end of the month. Apparently I should have received an email, checked all my folders and nothing.

 

So I sit and I wait as I know the tiles were on pre-order for another few weeks. January arrives and the date passes and nothing arrives or moves. I again call Wayland to be told the dates have being pushed back but they are on their way so should be with me soon. Apparently I should have received an email, checked all my folders and nothing. In the mean time they finally decide they can ship me some of the items I’ve ordered as they are finally available, this wasn’t offered before (don’t know why) but I gladly take it just so I have something for my £185 I’ve thrown at them.

 

So I sit and I wait as I know the tiles were on pre-order for another few weeks. Amazingly some of the bases and terrain arrives (did I mention I love the Secret Weapon stuff, it’s great) It comes to the 10th and I find myself in Leigh, just a stone’s throw away so I think ok so I will pop in and ask at the store and see if I can get some more information, while I’m there I might also pick up some other bits.

 

So in to the shop I go, not visited before and must say gaming hall is great, selection on the shelves very poor, very little stock out, but this isn’t why I’m here. So I head up to the desk and am met by someone who seems more interested in his PC than me. Speak to him and ask for what I’m after to which he finally drags himself off to get it, 15 mins later I finally get the items I ask for (only a couple of packs of bases, the terrain was out of stock -  I can see a pattern here) and he speaks to the team upstairs about the tablescapes who advise him they are on their way and could be at the docks as they speak so should be in at some point this next week. I question this and rely my story to which there is no understanding and a case of “well they should be in soon, it’s not our fault we don’t have the stock” so I’m left again with no tables.

 

So jump to today, guess what finally hits my inbox! An email advising me of a modified release date for the tablescapes, so I duly click the link and am met with a release date of 22 September 2015 – suffice to say when I read it the swear words must have been audible in the wayland shop!

 

I ring wayland, get met with the same blank lack of understanding and ask them to confirm the date, the girl who answered was so disinterested I considered hanging up and calling back. So she finally goes off and checks the date and confirms that those are the right dates and that there is no movement on it. I ask if she thinks waiting for that long after all this time is right and I’m met with more disinterest. Again it goes on, she doesn’t seem to get that a year from date of order for something I could have ordered direct is slightly taking the mick! We dance round in circles like this for a good ten minutes and finally get it through to her that I want my money back and I will go elsewhere. Again more disinterest and an advisement that I will have to wait up to 5 days because the payment was over 60 days ago, the argument that they are the ones causing that delay falls on deaf ears. I did get the refund this evening but only after much gnashing of teeth.

 

I finally get a refund actioned and decide to explain my disappointment and frustration, yet more disinterest is evident, it’s almost like she hears this daily. All I can finish by saying to her is that this is the worst service I’ve had in a long time and I would rather pay full price in future (and in the case of Secret Weapon support Justin) than put a single penny in to their coffers. There was little in the way of apology and all they did was continually blame Secret Weapon, there was no offer of anything to compensate for my wasted time and the hassle this all caused and I reiterate there was no sense of shame or culpability that has left me feeling as if Wayland as a company couldn’t care less about who places orders and if they even get them as long as they are paid.

 

Since this conversation I have contacted Justin and have discuss not only release dates but that no uk seller has stock of these nor have they had stock of these! So it worries me that the initial release dates from wayland were just random and have meant orders have been placed that realistically will never be fulfilled.

 

For me I found this one of the single most frustrating orders to place ever, some people might read this and think I’m whinging, some might think I’m being too critical but the fact of the matter is I handed over £185 and had to do all the hard work myself. This was my first order with this company, something you would think would be flagged to ensure it all goes smoothly, and unfortunately it will be my last.

 
my overall view is one of distinct failings and as a result I would like to give Wayland 1 star out of 10 because at least they gave me my refund, it would be harsh to give them 0 but the temptation is there. I will say now I will never recommend them again and can see now why there are threads complaining. I’m sorry for the whinge but I feel their poor service needs flagging up as I cannot believe the hassles this order has faced and the lack of ownership the vendor has shown.






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Please Note:

Secret Weapon are in my mind not at fault here and this should not reflect on them, this is purely down to Wayland not handling customer expectations. Once again I can only recommend Justin and his products as an exemplary party to deal with, I need to contact Justin about this and to query one of the products received from Wayland but again if you want Secret Weapon Products please go direct and support Justin J

9 comments:

greggles said...

Though it's a bit late now...something to keep in mind with misterjustin's great company...

They routinely have coupon sales. So it can sometimes be cheaper to order from them, then to order direct from a local store!

Sorry you had so much trouble. I am highly looking forward to everyone painting up those tablescapes!

Millest said...

hi greg, always gone to Justin direct before but thought with the potential cost savings on the tablesacpes this would be the way forward but it hasn't worked out :( still im sure ill pick one up eventually but for now this has put me off any big expenditure on anything other than models at the mo unfortunately.

Knight of Infinite Resignation said...

I have had the exact same experience with Wayland twice, once over a load of Star Trek Attack Wing stuff I ordered and another time over some GW stuff. No communication, no willingness to send the stuff they DID have in stock. In the end the second time (STAW stuff) I cancelled the order after waiting about three months, ordered the stuff off an Ebay seller and got it for the same price about three days later.

Hard to believe that random ebay seller offered better service than the countries biggest online wargames retailer (or so they call themselves) but its true.

Perhaps they are going bust and having to wait for money to come in before they can order stock to fulfil orders. I'll never order from them again. I suspect Totalwargamer operate this way too as they have similar slow despatch and dodgy customer service.


Triplehelix (slowish but cheap and good comms) or Dark Sphere (fast and a great physical shop in London) for me.

Anonymous said...

Yeah not going to bother again with Wayland games, took my money no problem, dispite paying for express delivery my invoice stated standard (but with express amount), waited weeks and nothing.

Opened a support ticket and got a response that they were waiting on an item (misunderstanding detailed later), but it has magically come into stock now so I am priority packing, unfortunately if it does come next day I am going to be out, been making sure I have been around to recieve this for the last week or so. They never seem to accept fault and just seem to say "sorted now"

* Warning - Items marked as 'Available to order' are not in fact 'Available to order' they are 'out of stock' and wayland will order them and send them on. This is misleading in itself as I would have just gone elsewhere. No delivery estimates at all.

I realise other people have waited longer but in future I'll use amazon or my LHS. Lesson learnt

Millest said...

knight and anony thanks for the comments, I wonder if they would ever read this and think their business model needs somework - given they have just opened a second store I some how doubt it.
thanks for sharing and I hope you have better luck with the sellers you now use

Chris said...

I have had similar issues with the X wing stuff. I ordered the coloured stands from them, only when I did my homework did a realise that the announcement had only just gone up from FFG about them at the time, and there wasn't even a release date!! needless to say I cancelled part of the order as they would have waited to ship everything at once at an unspecified date, months in the future.

I also been waiting a month for a Saga rule book that was on discount. Im not holding out much hope, and had no communication about dates.

Millest said...

Jeez Chris worries me how things like this are still happening with them and how they are still in business. Good luck getting the rule book though

Unknown said...

I know this is an old post, but i feel the need to describe my experiences and there doesn't seem to be anywhere to leave a review. My first attempt at buying from wayland was just after i moved into my new house a couple of years ago, i registered with the website, confirmed my address upon registration, then proceeded to buy some 40k stuff. so i waited, and waited, nothing arrived, so i phoned up, cue a 40 min argument with the guy on the end of the phone, who was a little rude to be honest, i inquired as to where my order was and he said it hadn't been shipped yet, but gave my old address, and the rude man saying that my order had to be dispatched to my paypal billing address, (which i had not got round to changing) and i was trying to make him understand how stupid it was to have a registered address on THEIR website, but it isn't used, after all every website in existance uses a dispatch on their own website to confirm address. i wasn't offered anything like a reorder, or anyway to expidite the matter. with it being delayed, i cancelled my order and got a full refund. jump to 2016, decided to give them a second chance, big mistake, ordered some board games as they were on offer on their website, saving me £10 on each game, great, placed the order after xmas, their was a bank holiday, and i knew they had to order from supplier, so i expected a longer wait, the weeks went by, and let me tell you, you not getting an email wasn't that bad, i received the email, same one each week, copy and paste job, and the way in witch is was worded did nothing to soften the disappointment, i hate emails that end with sorry for any inconvenience or similar phrases, i had been waiting for over a month, by this point it was an inconvenience, and i was running out of patience, i ended up getting a full refund again, which was done in a timely manner. so if their supplier is the problem, then they need a new one, why have them on the website if i can't order them, i doubt they had any intention of honoring their prices, and probably never placed the order in the first place. they have done nothing but mess me about and i will never buy from them again. i will also tell anyone else to avoid them also, i don't care if they blacklist me, they clearly don't want the business as i ended up getting the £200 odd refunded, what a waste of my time.

Millest said...

Dean - thats shocking, its terrible to see that after almost 2 years its not changed! so glad ive swapped to element games and snm stuff.
sorry to hear the problems and hope that they do eventually learn from these mistakes

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