CigarBid

[dave]

They attempted a major IT upgrade that went south quickly. This was immensely exasperated by the fact that a good percentage of their customer service staff was out at the time.

IMO, cbid has been successful because of their customer service and despite their inventory validity, packing, shipping, etc. When things go wrong and they don't have their CS staff to buffer...well, there's nothing much positive that can result.

I've been in the supply and warehousing business for a very long time and I know how difficult it will be for them to recover since they didn't seem to pause or even limit new orders. They handled this poorly every which way and they deserve to lose your business...but they will no doubt recover and be thriving within a couple months.

[RUNYYFan]

Originally Posted by dave

They attempted a major IT upgrade that went south quickly. This was immensely exasperated by the fact that a good percentage of their customer service staff was out at the time.

IMO, cbid has been successful because of their customer service and despite their inventory validity, packing, shipping, etc. When things go wrong and they don't have their CS staff to buffer...well, there's nothing much positive that can result.

I've been in the supply and warehousing business for a very long time and I know how difficult it will be for them to recover since they didn't seem to pause or even limit new orders. They handled this poorly every which way and they deserve to lose your business...but they will no doubt recover and be thriving within a couple months.

I agree. I have dealt with this type of upgrade process on the IT side within a variety of systems. One of the most critical processes is the load testing before it goes live. The way this was done, it seems like they did a live swap out without checking to make sure anything worked. Or they may have just had a cluster**** of a rollout.

Anyway, I'm even more ticked off now because my credit card company just informed me I was billed twice from them for the exact same amount. The card company actually caught it because the charges both hit on Monday, but were pre-dated back to 2/18 and 3/3 which the card staff thought was sketchy. So now there is a dispute on both charges.

It might just be easier to build my own humidor after this.

[oldforge]

fwiw I had a CI small and simple order from 2/23 that still hasn't shipped.
I am letting it stay in limbo because from what I hear if you try to cancel the order the software starts spewing out random commands.

My advice would be to stay away from CI, Cbid, Cigar.com, Pipes and cigars (all common ownership and warehouse--presumably all affected by the software "upgrade") until the green light is given. My order arriving at my door would probably be a positive indicator. :-)

Originally Posted by dave

They attempted a major IT upgrade that went south quickly. This was immensely exasperated by the fact that a good percentage of their customer service staff was out at the time.

IMO, cbid has been successful because of their customer service and despite their inventory validity, packing, shipping, etc. When things go wrong and they don't have their CS staff to buffer...well, there's nothing much positive that can result.

I've been in the supply and warehousing business for a very long time and I know how difficult it will be for them to recover since they didn't seem to pause or even limit new orders. They handled this poorly every which way and they deserve to lose your business...but they will no doubt recover and be thriving within a couple months.