Kirsten Jahn on Design & Life » The Bad

Why You Should Never Ever Use Vistaprint

admin — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 21:58:49 +0000

On Tuesday, November 9th of 2010 I placed a small order for some personal checks from vistaprint.com. The reason for my order was both obvious and not so obvious. Obviously I had run out of checks but I also really really needed new ones due to my upcoming settlement on a home on November 30th. Since Vistaprint had given me a 50% off coupon upon changing my address via the Postal Service I thought that I would give them a shot.

Boy was that a mistake.

The first trouble occurred when I tried to explain to them that I needed my new checks delivered to my mother’s address. They explained that sending the checks to an address different then the one on the actual check would be some sort of security breach and was not possible. Apparently they didn’t get the whole part about me MOVING.

I finally settled on buying a small amount, 25, and getting my mom’s address on them. No biggie, right? I placed my order and chose a shipping rate that would get my checks to me by November 23rd.

November 23rd has come and now gone. Its November 24th and, having checked with my mother, have still not received my checks. What to do? House settlement in less than a week!

I just got off the phone with Vistaprint and, after a discouraging conversation with their telemarketing rep, have not had my issue resolved. The woman told me that their website calculates shipping rates based on calendar days but in the “checking world” their dates are based on business days. Are you freaking serious? You can’t build a website that can accurately tell me when my order is going to be coming? And the icing on the cake… they have absolutely no way to track my shipment because they have no tracking number for it! What kind of hodge podge business are they running?

Needless to say, I am discouraged. They offered to refund me my order as well as expediting an order to me that would arrive in 7-10 days (oooh, but is that calendar days or business days? They’re probably not even sure) which is NO HELP.

I will never ever be using Vistaprint again and no else should either!

Video on a PC

Kirsten — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:25:12 +0000

This is Blasephemy!

Kirsten — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:42:43 +0000

I just got this in my inbox:

You Are Approaching Your Free Listening Limit

We wanted to let you know that you are approaching your monthly free listening limit. Pandora gives you 40 hours of free listening per month.

Why is free monthly listening limited?

If you’d like to listen more, you have three options. We hope that one of these works for you:

1. Pay 99 cents. Once you reach Pandora’s free monthly listening limit, the music will stop and you will be presented with an option to pay just 99 cents to continue unlimited listening for the rest of September. This is a one-time fee which requires a credit card, and it does not recur automatically.

2. Pay $36 to upgrade to Pandora One. For unlimited monthly listening as well as other cool features, you can upgrade to Pandora One for $36 per year.
Learn more about Pandora One

3. Pay Nothing. If neither of the above options is right for you, simply come back in October to start listening to your stations again.

The Pandora Team

The Cruise Scam

Kirsten — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 14:17:58 +0000

So two Thursdays ago I was called around 9 am by a woman from Sundance Vacations out of King of Prussia, Pa. The woman claimed that I had won a cruise from a drawing the previous weekend at La Festa Italia in Scranton, Pa. Of course I was ecstatic because I thought since I knew where she had gotten my information it had to be legit, right? Not so much.

The woman from Sundance Vacations explained that I would have to come in for a one hour talk with her so they could pitch using their company for any of my future vacation plans. At first this sounded fine to me – I scratch their back for an hour and then they give me my cruise.

I was wrong, of course, to believe in such a stroke of luck. Upon doing a little internet research (What? They don’t think I can use the Internet?) I discovered that many other people had been in my position prior to me and that their hour of “about our company” was really an hour of pressure sales where they insult you and try to sell you a $15,000 multi-week vacation package. Are they serious? How much money does it look like I have? I’m 24 and a web designer – you do the math!

In conclusion, the old adage “if its too good to be true, it probably is” stands firm – unfortunately.

W-O-W

Kirsten — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:59:55 +0000

If this is how the folks running the SIIA think they’re going to reach out to today’s teenagers, boy do they have a rude awakening coming their way. Piracy isn’t something you can control!

And what’s with the random Klingons? Speaking of which, I love that on the YouTube page there is this comment:

To whom it may concern,
We ask you to cease and desist in the use of our copyrighted Klingon characters in your SIIA PSA video. We take our copyright very seriously and will take you to court for this violation if you do not remove the video immediately.
Legal Department
Paramount Entertainment

Hilarious.