We can feel your frustration (can you feel ours?) and we are so very, very sorry for these delays on PassPorter. Here's our latest news on the book shipment update. [Webmasters, if this post is inappropriate, please feel free to edit/delete it -- we just thought folks here should get an update.]
Book Delivery Update (2/14/2005) - Due to shipping delays, the new editions of PassPorter Walt Disney World 2005 are still not in our warehouse. We are hopeful that they will arrive within the next few days, perhaps even tomorrow (Tuesday, 2/15/05).
Wondering about all these delays? It's a pretty incredible story -- one that we hope will be behind us very shortly (though it may be a few years before we can laugh about it).
It started in early December, in Hong Kong. Our books were printed and ready to ship, right on schedule. Our printer, after a change of personnel, made the mistake of holding the shipment of the books until they could confirm a detail with us. Normally this would not have been a big issue, except the printer chose only to contact us via e-mail, and the message didn't reach us for several days. Once we got that straightened out, we learned that this delay of a few days would result in a further delay of a week and a half because the printer had missed a shipment window. Finally, the books were on the boat, and they reached California without incident.
As luck would have it, our timing couldn't be worse. California was hit by torrential rains in early January, causing major landslides which in turn caused a massive disruption of rail service in Southern California (
http://www.ble-t.org/pr/news/headline.asp?id=12414 ). And our books, which fill an entire 40-foot container, travel by rail from Los Angeles to
Detroit. At this point we inquired into having the container trucked to us, but we learned that it would take just as long (if not longer) than if we waited for the railroad delays to clear up.
Eventually the trains started getting through and our container was among them. We tracked its progress through the U.S., which while slow was still moving forward. The books arrived in Detroit on Feb. 4. At last! Now the container only had to be trucked from the rail yard in Detroit to our warehouse in Ypsilanti, just 30 miles away. This wouldn't take long, right? All the shipping company had to do was assign the delivery to a local trucking company.
Well, days passed and despite many phone calls, no action. In the past, this delivery had taken a day at most. We had no explanation for the delay, and we could not retrieve an entire container load of books ourselves. Finally, on Thursday February 10 the shipping company assigned the delivery to a local trucker. At last! But a Friday delivery was too much to hope for. Delivery was scheduled for today (Monday).
Nope, not to be. Here's the icing on the cake: Today (Feb. 14) the drivers went out on a work stoppage because the rail yard is releasing shipments too slowly (no surprise to us!), resulting in too much unpaid downtime for the drivers. Well, we and the truck drivers may both be plagued by the same problem, but the added delay sure doesn't solve *our* problem. These work stoppages, which have happened before (
http://www.detnews.com/2004/business/0407/28/b01-225031.htm ), have lasted from a couple of hours to a few days. A few days?! We just spoke to the trucking company again, and they're optimistic that the stoppage will be cleared up this evening or tomorrow morning. We'll know more tomorrow.
As you can imagine, this has been beyond frustrating for us, and we feel horrible that we're not able to deliver books to our readers. If there were something we could do to get those books out faster, we would do it.
Some folks have suggested that we should start printing our books domestically to avoid shipment delays like this. Unfortunately, a book with PassPorter's many unusual features requires a lot of labor. Domestic printers would have to charge us more than DOUBLE the price (even factoring-in the cost of shipping from halfway round the world). That would
make PassPorter far too expensive to be successful in the market, and it's already one of the most expensive travel books out there.
Usually, our international shipments arrive without delay, and when delays do occur, it's typically just one week -- not five. We just don't have control over things like personnel mistakes, natural disasters and work stoppages, but we will be doing everything we can to streamline those things we do have control over so we don't have a repeat of this year's chain of aggravations.
So, if all goes well we'll finally start shipping books to folks later this week (Feb. 16-18). For those wondering if other bookstores already have them or can get them to you faster, they don't and they can't. Before they can arrive in book stores they have to go from our warehouse to the book wholesalers, a process that typically takes two or three weeks.
If these delays mean you'll receive your book perilously close to your vacation date, please contact us by e-mail at
orders@passporter.com, or toll-free at 877-929-3273. We'll make sure your needs are addressed.
Thanks for your understanding and patience!
I emailed them about a week ago, but never got a response. I keep looking at the site, hoping for some updated information. Frustrating to say the least!! 
It seems like everything that could of gone wrong for you did! (I bet you guys are starting to feel like Eeyore!! 
). I really look forward to getting the new edition (and heck.........I actually had to buy this one as one of my "magical memories" was published in it! 
) Are you going to email everyone who preordered and let us know when the books are finally leaving your warehouse? 
As a business owner I understand your frustration - hopefully this will all be behind you soon. 
