Opentip

Full review
On 12/3 I ordered an item I intended to give as a Christmas present from Atafa.com and almost immediately received several emails containing my new account information, my order details, and a printable invoice. That was the last time they ever contacted me about my order. Within a couple of days my order status at their web site was listed as "processed," and their FAQ said the usual delivery time was 3-8 business days, but by 12/8 I still had no shipping confirmation and my card had not been charged. I emailed them twice asking for an updated status on my order, once on 12/8 and again on 12/11, and received no reply to either inquiry. On 12/13 - 10 days after placing my order and at least a week after their site showed it had been "processed" - my credit card still had not been charged, so I tried to contact them by phone to find out when the item would be shipped out. I called the toll free number several times but all I got was a recording saying that all their service reps were busy and asking me to leave a message. Since they hadn't bothered to respond to my emails, I didn't find the idea of leaving a message on an answering machine very appealing either - especially now that Christmas was fast approaching and if the item I'd ordered from Atafa wasn't going to get here I'd have to get on line pronto and find a suitable replacement for it. Finally I placed a long distance call to the other contact number listed on their site. This was answered by a fairly pleasant man who took my order number and asked me to wait while he checked on it for me. After a few minutes of me listening to him huff and puff and mumble and shuffle papers around on the other end of the line, he got back on the phone and told me that the order had been shipped a week previously, on 12/6, and that I should have it by 12/14 at the latest. I started to ask if he could tell me what shipper was used and give me a tracking number but he continued on to say that he would have to check with their "shipping department" for more details and get back to me. To his credit, he did call back later that day - but then he told me that the item I'd selected was out of stock and on back order and so had never been shipped at all. Since I wanted the item for a Christmas present I had no choice but to cancel the order. The man agreed to do so and was reasonably apologetic about the situation, however I still think it's deceptive and/or negligent and just bad business when a retailer lists an item for what looks like immediate sale on their web site even though it's not immediately available. A simple "temporarily out of stock" would have been enough for me not to have placed the order to begin with, since I needed the item for a Christmas present and couldn't wait an indefinite period of time to receive it. Failing an accurate representation of the item's availability prior to an order being placed for it, they should have made the effort to contact me afterwards if there was going to be any delay beyond their advertised "3-8 business days." Then I could have found something else on line to give as a replacement gift and not had to worry so much about delivery times or pay extra for rush delivery to make sure I'd get it in time. But no - even when I emailed them - twice! - asking for the status of my order, still not a word from them about it being out of stock. And to be told that the item was shipped - after having to call them long distance at my own expense to get any information at all - when it was never available for shipment in the first place is, in my opinion, inexcusable. Given how things have gone so far, I will not be surprised if they charge my credit card anyway and I have to deal with that, because clearly they either don't keep very accurate records or they just don't care about good customer service. I definitely will NOT be shopping at Atafa.com again.