My Funny Story (A Shutterfly Experience)

I use Shutterfly a lot. I take advantage of their "free unlimited pages" just about every time they have the sale. They had two in the first three months of the year already, and I had coupons exceeding 50% each time.

I use their service to create photo books, and a couple of times, art books. They don't seem to care what you're printing as long as it's not obscene. Now, I have to buy the books and find a way to sell them on my own, but still it's a good deal.

So last Saturday they offered a two-day sale. Not free unlimited pages, but free unlimited 6x6, 20-page books. Just pay shipping for each new book.

Supposedly.

I went to work, picking out twenty of the best images for the sets that I had, popped a few in my shopping cart, started with 12 of each book. Yeah, the shipping fee showed up, $7.99, plus tax. But not for every different book. My entire order. I ordered at least a dozen of each of several different books. Total cost, $7.99 plus tax.

A glitch in their programming? Maybe. I thought once I tried to check out, there would be some kind of flag, the order wouldn't go through. Nope, went right through.

Could lightning strike twice?

Next day I created more books, added them to my cart. Same thing happened. 16 copies of 8 different books. $7.99 plus tax. So all totaled, 194 books, 6x6 inches, 20 pages each, glossy hard cover. $17.10. About $0.09 per book. I expected to get an email from Shutterfly saying, "Dear sir, we apologize..."

Didn't happen. Next day got shipping notification. So at this point I'm looking forward to two or three big orange boxes.

Shipment one arrived yesterday: 12 different corrugated envelopes with four books each. About 14" x 10" by 2". Good thing I met the carrier at the mailbox. She loaned me one of their plastic baskets to get them to the house. And that was just the first 48 (with apologies to the tv show).

Now everything shows shipping. Some of them just ONE in an envelope. Hoping these are small envelopes, because I've got 91 tracking numbers. Yup, 91.

I contacted Shutterfly support via chat, got someone in about 30 seconds (Ah, Lulu... if only...). Odane was the rep's name. I suggested this might have been handled better, seemed like a lot of effort and waste, plus extra time and work for the postal service. I received and accepted both an apology and a $10 credit to my account for the inconvenience.

So that's my week folks! Have a Happy Easter or a remarkable weekend, or both, whatever fits your life!