No more ComGateway for me

I give up! I think all the hiccups with ComGateway were signs that I should stop my online shopping. I could feel another frustrating incident coming my way and it has materialised as predicted.

The order in question is my latest Old Navy order. I usually wait until the merchant notifies me my order has been shipped before I input my details onto the ComGateway website, so I know how many shipments to expect and save on base shipping costs by consolidating.

And so when this latest order had left the Old Navy warehouse and there were indications to expect 2 packages, I entered my details (Order 00016) onto the ComGateway site but for some reason could not indicate multiple shipments.

I contacted their customer service agent (CSA) via 'livechat' who asked me to try again and in the meantime would delete my first input. After the second attempt (Order 00017), my order was still not displaying on the multiple shipment page so I dropped them a mail to remind them to cancel my first input (00016) and take note of the multiple shipments for my re-entered order.

They only replied via email that they would cancel my order in 1 business day and I asked them what about my consolidation request, stating upfront that I should not be charged double base charges since it wasn't my fault I couldn't indicate multiple shipments, but their site simply didn't allow me to do so. They then replied one day later that because I had opted for their 'Fully Landed Cost' option, I am disallowed from using the multiple shipment option.

They should have told me that in the first place and make the information available on their FAQs instead of wasting my time re-entering my information over and over again. Their CSA should also have advised this when I first encountered trouble...who knew about this policy since it's not stated anywhere on their site?

I immediately asked them to cancel my 2nd entry (00017) and re-entered the order a 3rd time (00018), this time not selecting the fully landed cost option. Only after doing this, could I indicate my shipments were arriving in 2 packages but a few days had passed since my order left the warehouse and I had a feeling ComGateway would receive Part 1 and match it to the entry that had not been cancelled yet (00017).

True enough, they forwarded the package upon receipt and have sent me notice that Order 00017 has been shipped and that part 1 has been received for 00018. I have since written to them to say 00017 and 00018 are the same, and I just know that I will be charged 2 base charges of US$14 each. Essentially because of this hiccup, I can expect to pay about US$12 more in shipping costs overall. It's not much but still!

Anyways, they also recently wrote to say that they have lost part 2 of my last Old Navy order and would be issuing a refund. I don't know how long that would take! I am definitely cancelling my account after all outstanding shipments and refunds have been received...time to try the Citibank Globeshopper site!