CLAMP Campus Adventures

The expectation was starting to get to me. Tension filled my body as I hopelessly attempted to check the status. When will my Apple OS 10.4 (also known as Tiger) arrive?

When Tiger was announced on April 12th, I was ecstatic. It looked so pretty and the widgets? So cool! No longer would I need to run a completely separate weather program (for example). By ordering it on the 14th of April (well before the deadline of April 26th), I would receive my software on the release date of April 29. Although I graduated in January, I was eligible for the student discount until June, so it would only cost me $69. It was too good a deal to pass up, so I ordered my shiny, new Tiger OS.

Then the waiting began. The anticipation was building. I planned my Friday evening around the fact I was receiving my pretty new OS (and Carl was working that night). There was one snag. My Tiger ship notice never arrived. Friday morning, at 6:30 am, like many other Apple users I received the following email:

I was not only concerned, but a little put out. After all, I had ordered by April 14 which was plenty early. It was only two days after the release notice! I waited until I got to work and placed a call to Apple. I spoke to a woman there who assured me the system was merely behind in updating. The shipments had gone out, but the notice was automatically generated. She reassured me I would get my Tiger today. I asked for the tracking number, but she was unable to tell me, so she took my phone number and promised to call me back with it. Thus, reassured, I continued on with my day, anticipating the daily UPS and FedEx deliveries at 10:30 am and at 4 pm.

At around 10:45 am, I received a call from the mail room. A package had arrived! My excitment built. I put down what I was working on and went upstairs to retrieve it. Never mind I wouldn’t be able to install it before I got home around 6:30 pm. I wanted my shiny, new Tiger OS, and I wanted it NOW! I was bound for disappointment. I was never so upset to receive a Lush order in my life. Subdued, but not defeated, I went back down to my office to check to make sure Lush packaged everything correctly (they’re apt not to) and then went on with my day.

4:30 pm came with no other packages arriving for me nor any phone calls bearing my tracking number as promised. Upset with Apple’s inability to, at the very least, call me back as they promised, I called again. This time I spoke to a gentleman and told him my woeful story. Still, I am promised my Tiger OS will arrive this very day! How is this possible, I ask the phone representative, my business closes at 5:30 pm, and in my order, I clearly marked it as a business address. I am told if they will make a failed attempted that day and I would be able to call and pick it up at the FedEx location on Saturday.

Then the story became convoluted. I asked, once again, for a tracking number, which they were, once again, unable to provide me. I asked if they were certain it was coming FedEx. It was then I was told they were using UPS, FedEx, and DHL and they were unable to confirm which was used to send my software. I became rather upset. After all, they spoke as if it were FedEx making the delivery without being absolutely sure. I found this tatamount to lying and told them so. They escalated me to a supervisor, who wasn’t able to tell me anything different and who just gave me the same song and dance. I let them know I was highly doubtful and quickly losing faith in Apple’s procurement and logistics managment. There was no excuse of an abundance of orders. Apple has known for over 6 months the Tiger release date was going to occur. They knew there would be many, many orders. They also knew they were going to strain the system. They should have planned for it and made sure the support structure was in place so the system could update properly. There was no blaming FedEx for this problem. FedEx has the most advance logistics system in the world. This was all Apple’s fault and their unwillingness to admit they made a mistake pissed me off. I told these things calmly to the supervisor, who continued to give me the company song and dance number. Much disappointment filled me as I hung up with them.

My workday ended and I went home without my new, shiny Tiger OS. I watches soulfully on IRC as my peers talked about the new features they were now enjoying. My heart broke as I heard about the pretty, new widgets and the h.264 Quicktime encoding. Even if Apple delivered as promised, it would fail, and I would not see my Tiger OS before Monday.

Then, at 9:47 pm, I received a shipment notification email from Apple. It contained a FedEx tracking number, the first positive confirmation it had actually shipped via FedEx. I quickly log into FedEx and put in the number where I find, my package had only left Newark, NJ at 3:50 pm that day. The package had also shipped FedEx 2-day and had only left the Apple distribution center on the 28th of April. It was scheduled for on time delivery on Monday, May 2 by 4:30 pm. That’s right, FedEx claimed May 2 was on time. I was furious. I spent the entire day being reassured by Apple delivery was scheduled as promised for April 29. What was this May 2 business?

It was too late to call Apple again to give them a piece of my mind, which was probably just was well. I wanted to call them with a clear mind. I had to wait until 10 am the next morning to do so. I find this procurement process unforgivable. Apple made promises it obviously had no intention of keeping. How early you ordered had nothing to do with when you received your order. I was jealous of all the people who went to the Apple Store in Cambridge and who waited on a very long line (apparently stretching around the entire mall floor) to get their OS. Even the fact I was going to that very mall the next day didn’t soothe me. The shipment had been made and chances are, they’d be sold out of Tiger when I arrived. Apple was going to receive a call at my earliest convienence for this one.

This morning I woke up and headed to my computer. After checking out how poorly Quicktime 7 ran on my G4 Powerbook using the h.264 encoding (all choppy, not nice), I checked out FedEx again to see if they’d updated my package status. At 7:44 am today, April 30th, my package arrived in Franklin, MA, the destination sort facility. This indicates it shipped up from Newark on a truck, not through Logan. This sucks, because the Logan sort facility is only a couple of miles from my house. Not that it matters. You can’t pick up a package until a failed delivery attempt is made, and it won’t be made before Monday, May 2. That’s the date FedEx clearly lists for delivery in their tracking information.

This isn’t about receiving a package late anymore. It’s about unfulfilled promises. Apple made a promise to me and to their other customers, and by breaking it, they’ve broken a trust. This is very poor business practice.

At 10 am, I called. I spoke to a gentleman who confirmed my other two calls had been logged. I explained my displeasure very politely and explained I didn’t appreciate Apple lying to me and to its other customers. I comiserated with him. I knew he’d be told to tell us the ‘party line’. He’d been lied to as well. I understood this and empathized with him. He let me know they weren’t even told people wouldn’t get their packages until 9 pm central time last night (10 pm my time). That lines up with when my tracking number appeared. He let me know they will be compensating people who did not receive their OS as promised with free software. However, I needed to wait until my OS arrived (on Monday) before calling back and getting it. When I asked what sort of free software, he told me iLife (which I have), iWorks (which I’m not terribly interested in since I have MS Office on this machine), or discounts up to $30. He didn’t seem terribly sure. Apple is probably still working out how they’re going to compensate the people they’ve broken their promises to. I can’t wait until Monday to find out.