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Post by coffeeaddict on Sept 5, 2016 17:04:14 GMT
I was just looking into a new 4th Doctor CD subscription: Fourth Doctor Adventures - Season 6 (CD) starting with release '6.01. The Beast of Kravenos' - $99.61 Shipping & Handling Fees - $59.94 Season 5 was $99.49 with postage fee of $11.37 If I do Season 6 as download it will be $65 total. I think I will have to stop getting the CDs of this range. Thankfully I am a download customer, but for kicks I took a look at what it would cost for a cd subscription to season six here in Canada. It works out to raising the per cd cost to $22.97 - the subscription total with the shipping would be $206.74. Before shipping the sub is $129.21, shipping fees are $77.53. I think BF is definitely not getting the best shipping rates, though they do look to be in line with what I've seen from other small companies shipping from Europe. Not knowing how many orders they send internationally and how many they would need in order to receive better rates from shippers it is hard to say whether they would be able to bring it down very much.
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Post by Ela on Sept 5, 2016 18:56:09 GMT
I don't want to upset any of non uk members, but you are a very tiny proportion of BF market in physical product. When I got upset about the reducing of the download price to a straight £ to $ etc. Dear old Paul spragg explained that the only way they could grow the oversea orders was to reduce the downloads price to encourage customers, as price, shipping, wait times, broken items, lost items & customs were prohibitive for most & BF. That was the reason the price change had come about. The biggest proportion of overseas went download with only a fraction wanting CD's unlike the UK market. So I can understand that getting a decent shipping price from the carrier is a problem if you are only sending a few hundred parcels a month. I think the wording of the shipping costs is confusing, but I do think they are being straight with us customers. It's a shame but brexit has thrown up all kinds of problems, for all the gains overseas make in the lower value of the pound a whole handful of other troubles are thrown up. Did it ever occur to you that you might have it backwards and that the reason overseas customers order more downloads than physical CDs is because the price of shipping has always been quite high, even before this new "per order" charge? Certainly, the high shipping price has always been a big factor in my decision to select downloads over CDs. The CD price plus shipping is so much more than getting a download. I'd much rather get more releases for my money, and skip the physical CDs.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 5, 2016 20:10:10 GMT
I don't want to upset any of non uk members, but you are a very tiny proportion of BF market in physical product. When I got upset about the reducing of the download price to a straight £ to $ etc. Dear old Paul spragg explained that the only way they could grow the oversea orders was to reduce the downloads price to encourage customers, as price, shipping, wait times, broken items, lost items & customs were prohibitive for most & BF. That was the reason the price change had come about. The biggest proportion of overseas went download with only a fraction wanting CD's unlike the UK market. So I can understand that getting a decent shipping price from the carrier is a problem if you are only sending a few hundred parcels a month. I think the wording of the shipping costs is confusing, but I do think they are being straight with us customers. It's a shame but brexit has thrown up all kinds of problems, for all the gains overseas make in the lower value of the pound a whole handful of other troubles are thrown up. To repeat what was made clear earlier, this change has nothing to do with Brexit and has been brewing for a long time.
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Post by muckypup on Sept 5, 2016 20:39:19 GMT
I don't want to upset any of non uk members, but you are a very tiny proportion of BF market in physical product. When I got upset about the reducing of the download price to a straight £ to $ etc. Dear old Paul spragg explained that the only way they could grow the oversea orders was to reduce the downloads price to encourage customers, as price, shipping, wait times, broken items, lost items & customs were prohibitive for most & BF. That was the reason the price change had come about. The biggest proportion of overseas went download with only a fraction wanting CD's unlike the UK market. So I can understand that getting a decent shipping price from the carrier is a problem if you are only sending a few hundred parcels a month. I think the wording of the shipping costs is confusing, but I do think they are being straight with us customers. It's a shame but brexit has thrown up all kinds of problems, for all the gains overseas make in the lower value of the pound a whole handful of other troubles are thrown up. Did it ever occur to you that you might have it backwards and that the reason overseas customers order more downloads than physical CDs is because the price of shipping has always been quite high, even before this new "per order" charge? Certainly, the high shipping price has always been a big factor in my decision to select downloads over CDs. The CD price plus shipping is so much more than getting a download. I'd much rather get more releases for my money, and skip the physical CDs. no.....he explained that new customers were ordering downloads over CD's & many existing customers changed to downloads. the shipping costs & £ to $ conversion made it a very expensive product overseas, and the best way to try and reduce the overall price was to sell more so overseas was a chance to grow so this was one of the reasons for the straight conversion. but he stressed that at the time, very few physical products were sold overseas compared to UK & growing was one of the ways to hold of any price increase on cd's. the point i was trying to make though was really that the market is not that large, so carriers are not that willing to offer better rates..... shipping overseas from UK using royal mail with no insurance is very expensive i wanted to send a calendar to Australia last Xmas to my friend, the calendar was a slimline size and weighed 210grms.....that cost me in excess of £7.....the calendar only cost £4!!!!
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Post by muckypup on Sept 5, 2016 20:48:56 GMT
I don't want to upset any of non uk members, but you are a very tiny proportion of BF market in physical product. When I got upset about the reducing of the download price to a straight £ to $ etc. Dear old Paul spragg explained that the only way they could grow the oversea orders was to reduce the downloads price to encourage customers, as price, shipping, wait times, broken items, lost items & customs were prohibitive for most & BF. That was the reason the price change had come about. The biggest proportion of overseas went download with only a fraction wanting CD's unlike the UK market. So I can understand that getting a decent shipping price from the carrier is a problem if you are only sending a few hundred parcels a month. I think the wording of the shipping costs is confusing, but I do think they are being straight with us customers. It's a shame but brexit has thrown up all kinds of problems, for all the gains overseas make in the lower value of the pound a whole handful of other troubles are thrown up. To repeat what was made clear earlier, this change has nothing to do with Brexit and has been brewing for a long time. the pounds value has gone down because of brexit....that's a fact! which has meant that BF are receiving more income from overseas orders and the cost to overseas buyers has gone down. that is all true.... it also means that base costs are looked at to keep being profitable, this would most likely happen with or without brexit. that's all i meant by quoting brexit
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Post by Deleted on Sept 5, 2016 20:50:37 GMT
Like I said, I think in the other thread that discussed this - the cost of me personally mailing things to the US has increased MASSIVELY in the past couple of years. I have a friend who would send me blurays from the US-based Criterion and Shout Factory and I'd send him UK-based Arrow, Masters Of Cinema and BFI releases. It worked well and I could send 4 or 5 discs over for about a tenner with some tracking info. The last time I did was closer to 20 quid for the cheapest, non-insured option. Now, I'm one guy but if BF were sending hundreds and thousands of packages over to the States at the prices some have said they were paying until this week...they must have lost a fair whack. Harold on the first page was good enough to post an example, that the Third Doctor Adventures would be $13ish for postage. That's a tenner. There is no way you'd get it cheaper than that these days. The fact it was, untill last week, $3.99 to ship it...well, that would barely cover it's postage in the UK never mind overseas. It's about £3 to post a BF boxset in the UK from personal experience. BF using a courier who they can negotiate with will get their costs well below mine as an individual but again, hard to imagine it could ever be anywhere near as low as $4.
I know it's not nice, I know it's a high price in comparison to what you've been paying but it's really true - the cost of posting to the US, Aus and elsewhere really is horrendous now. I've criticised BF's practices when I thought it appropriate but in this case..they surely couldn't keep on losing cash. It's a tight spot and I'd hate to be making the calls at BF on it.
I don't think any of us grudge them breaking even on postage but, of course, everyone has only so much cash. This will make some go DL only, it'll make some buy more from Amazon and ebay, it'll make some wait untill they've got a stack of things to buy before doing so. The cost of pre-subbing to, say, the 4DAs would now be prohibitive for lots since you'd pay a fair whack for each and every individual release. It would be much more cost effective to wait till the run is over and then buy...but then you're behind on releases which again will lead some to buy elsewhere.. I've nothing but sympathy for those affected. It's not nice to have this out of the blue but if they'd given notice, people would have filled their boots at cheaper costs and compounded the issue. I would suggest they should to start to offer people the chance to sub to a range and then have the copies sent at the end of the run, giving you the downloads at least until then. Not ideal (if you're an international hard copy buyer, you may not like downloads) but it's something and would at least give another option.
The real question - and it's purely internal for BF and not for us to worry about - is why this was allowed to go on for so long when they clearly knew the postage was too low for a very long while. As I say, it's years since the tariffs at the post office went up so it seems the policy has been too lax for too long and someones decided it has to end.
Again, NOTHING but sympathy for those affected. If BF weren't charging enough, it's no-ones fault but theirs that this has arisen. You can only pay for the prices you've been offered in the past, if those were too low..not your problem. Going forward....well, I hope this doesn't put anyone off doing things like trying new ranges and taking a chance on a release you're unsure on.
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Post by pawntake on Sept 5, 2016 21:08:28 GMT
There's nothing we can do If It don't get through Blame it on the pony express. There's nothing we can say If it goes astray Blame it on the pony express Change to Downloads today!! You know it makes sense and its cheaper!!
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Post by kimalysong on Sept 5, 2016 21:12:59 GMT
Just did a little experiment with Dorian S3. Let's say I ordered from Amazon
The Base Cost is £20.83 + shipping £6.98 a total of £27.81 which is $38.41
If I ordered directly from Big Finish it would be $33.30 base price + $2.00 shipping fee + $8.66 per order charge a total of $43.96
That's a difference of 5.28
A Main Range title came to $26.88 on Amazon $30.63 on BF a difference of only $3.75
While I certainly get that every dollar counts with the Big Finish version you also get the free DL version so I guess if you want a hard copy you can figure out if the DL version is worth that extra $3 -$5 (and in some cases getting it sooner). But comparing what Amazon is charging it doesn't seem like Big Finish is being unreasonable here
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Post by Ela on Sept 5, 2016 21:19:01 GMT
Did it ever occur to you that you might have it backwards and that the reason overseas customers order more downloads than physical CDs is because the price of shipping has always been quite high, even before this new "per order" charge? Certainly, the high shipping price has always been a big factor in my decision to select downloads over CDs. The CD price plus shipping is so much more than getting a download. I'd much rather get more releases for my money, and skip the physical CDs. no.....he explained that new customers were ordering downloads over CD's & many existing customers changed to downloads. the shipping costs & £ to $ conversion made it a very expensive product overseas, and the best way to try and reduce the overall price was to sell more so overseas was a chance to grow so this was one of the reasons for the straight conversion. but he stressed that at the time, very few physical products were sold overseas compared to UK & growing was one of the ways to hold of any price increase on cd's. the point i was trying to make though was really that the market is not that large, so carriers are not that willing to offer better rates..... shipping overseas from UK using royal mail with no insurance is very expensive i wanted to send a calendar to Australia last Xmas to my friend, the calendar was a slimline size and weighed 210grms.....that cost me in excess of £7.....the calendar only cost £4!!!! You are focusing on what was said in the old forum about why the prices are what they are (or were what they were when the information was posted at the old forum). You are not responding at all to what I said about why people from overseas may be ordering less physical product, which was the main point of my post (and which has nothing to do with what anyone from Big Finish may or may not have said): Perhaps few physical products are sold overseas because the price of shipping plus the price of the CD makes it prohibitive for many of those ordering from overseas. If you do not live in the UK, the download option is much, much cheaper. That was true even before the per order fee was added. Hope that's clear, now.
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Post by Ela on Sept 5, 2016 21:22:38 GMT
And to be honest, I don't really know if it's still true that much less physical product is sold outside the UK. It makes sense, based on the price differential, but I don't have access to sales figures, and neither do most of us here.
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Post by Digi on Sept 5, 2016 23:20:08 GMT
Even assuming it is true that sales outside the UK are smaller--by any margin, large or small--the new policy makes no sense. If you want to grow your market, you don't jack up prices 50+%.
If the market is as small as some here have suggested, this move will only strangle the abroad-market in its cradle.
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Post by barnabaslives on Sept 5, 2016 23:51:13 GMT
I would suggest they should to start to offer people the chance to sub to a range and then have the copies sent at the end of the run, giving you the downloads at least until then. Not ideal (if you're an international hard copy buyer, you may not like downloads) but it's something and would at least give another option. Yes, if only they could consolidate shipping costs on subscriptions, if things are as described in this thread, it might take the hardship out of it (not to mention leaving customers more money to spend on Big Finish rather than carriers). Trying to think if there's really some way from them to do this without reinventing their shopping cart... How to make this most convenient at BF exactly - "Overseas subscriptions will automatically ship when all items become available, unless otherwise requested"? If hard copy prices have already been putting off overseas customers, would anyone really want to pay that much extra to have the physical product immediately? Perhaps a relatively few exceptions would be easy enough to accommodate? I think shipping time must have encouraged many people towards download already to hear things in a timely manner - and do I remember correctly that the sub bonuses are download-only so that subscribers are already encouraged to participate as downloaders to claim them? - so hopefully that part wouldn't force any radical changes on listeners. The real question - and it's purely internal for BF and not for us to worry about - is why this was allowed to go on for so long when they clearly knew the postage was too low for a very long while. As I say, it's years since the tariffs at the post office went up so it seems the policy has been too lax for too long and someones decided it has to end. I imagine they were simply trying to avoid it for as long as possible, bless 'em, and might have been barely managing to get away with it until the B-thing? Again, NOTHING but sympathy for those affected. Same here. I'm enough of a completist myself that if someone already has the first four or five seasons of something on CD, I really don't want to tell them they should just switch to download-only even if that's my own customer category. (Completists should be catered to if possible, by the way - they make valuable customers since they often insist on buying the entire catalog).
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Post by Ela on Sept 6, 2016 0:16:20 GMT
Well, the sub bonuses are download only, but you get then whether your sub is a CD sub or a download sub. So not sure why that would be a factor.
And your suggestion to send a sub as one package when everything is released makes sense, if that would help BF with its shipping costs. The subscriber would still have access to the download while waiting for the physical product.
I've seen many companies offer cheaper shipping if you agree to have it sent all at once, as opposed to when each item is ready.
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Post by Whovitt on Sept 6, 2016 0:40:08 GMT
Hi everyone - a bit of a discovery... (I've made a separate thread for this on the Doctor Who board, but I thought it was also relevant to this discussion ) The Main Range has a new subscription system! You can now make "Retrospective" or "Pre-Order" CD subscriptions, the difference being (from the website): " The PRE-ORDER subscriptions enable you to buy stories not yet released, which will be sent as soon as they are released. The RETROSPECTIVE subscriptions enable you to bulk-buy a number of stories which have already been released. These will be sent in a postage-saving single package as soon as possible after purchase." Basically this means that Retro subs are equivalent to bundles, with decreased shipping costs due to the single package being sent; the Pre-Order subs include the new individual CD shipping costs and are thus now considerably more expensive (at the moment, Retro subs are AUS$259.30 and Pre-Order subs are AUS$332.88) Additionally, there are now new limits to subscriptions: at present, a 12 story Retro sub can only be made with stories 204. Criss Cross and earlier, while Pre-Order subs can only choose 215. Maker of Demons and later. Any stories in the middle can only be accessed via 6 story Retro subs, as you can no longer make subscriptions that include both already available titles AND titles yet to be released... I've also found that this sort of thing applies to the Fourth Doctor Adventures - bundles or earlier series are much cheaper than pre-ordering Series 6, postage-wise. For international customers, I'd say it's now a much more viable option (money-wise) to wait for the stories/series you want to be released, then get the bundle at the end of that time. I know that with some series (such as the Main Range/Fourth Doctor Adventures/Torchwood/etc.) it would be much nicer to get them as the come out for discussion purposes, but I thought it was worth suggesting this idea anyway
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Post by nottenst on Sept 6, 2016 2:25:33 GMT
Hi everyone - a bit of a discovery... (I've made a separate thread for this on the Doctor Who board, but I thought it was also relevant to this discussion ) The Main Range has a new subscription system! You can now make "Retrospective" or "Pre-Order" CD subscriptions, the difference being (from the website): " The PRE-ORDER subscriptions enable you to buy stories not yet released, which will be sent as soon as they are released. The RETROSPECTIVE subscriptions enable you to bulk-buy a number of stories which have already been released. These will be sent in a postage-saving single package as soon as possible after purchase." .... I've also found that this sort of thing applies to the Fourth Doctor Adventures - bundles or earlier series are much cheaper than pre-ordering Series 6, postage-wise. For international customers, I'd say it's now a much more viable option (money-wise) to wait for the stories/series you want to be released, then get the bundle at the end of that time. I know that with some series (such as the Main Range/Fourth Doctor Adventures/Torchwood/etc.) it would be much nicer to get them as the come out for discussion purposes, but I thought it was worth suggesting this idea anyway Interesting. At the present time the main range and the Fourth Doctor Adventures were the only titles of which I was still getting physical copies (besides the occasional special deluxe limited edition). I had transitioned to download for just about everything else I was interested in. I'll have to weigh the option of waiting for the 4DAs to be retro. As far as any special deluxe limited edition packages - those will be an even harder decision now. I think most of the last series of 4DA CDs arrived in the same envelope as the main range, but there was an occasional time I received 2 envelopes the same day or really close and I was wondering why they didn't just combine them.
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Post by redsharkJason on Sept 6, 2016 5:58:22 GMT
I suspect this new shipping rate way of doing things hasn't been *fully* implemented and could be still evolving. Hopefully postage relief incentives will be applied to configuration plans such as: long term pre-orders, subscriptions and bundles. Loyalty program - anyone? I'm not sure that I fully comprehend (without example) this Big Finish statement: "International subscription and bundle postage charges are calculated based on the specific content included and the postage timeline for the items." With the assistance of Whovitt's reconnaissance, I now unfortunately understand the above Big Finish statement that I previously wondered about regarding bundling and subscriptions. I thought the £6.50 "per order charge" was harsh, until later viewing what pre-order subscription shipping will cost at Big Finish! £5 for every single 1-2CD to be sent to Canada. Example: FDA: Series 5 CD retro subscription (8 titles) £10 for shipping - amicably reasonable. FDA: Series 6 CD pre-order subscription (9 titles) £45 for shipping - not very customer friendly. I'm presuming that the monthly pre-order releases will be sent via Royal Mail ECONOMY, as I believe they have been doing in the past, which in all probability Big Finish would have some kind of business rate discount. Big Finish seems to forward my mail orders out of Germany, so I can't tell if their paying a standard rate or economy mailing rate. The cost for a regular (non business) UK citizen to send a 250g economy small parcel to Canada is £3.85 + the cost of a padded mailer. It's theoretically possible that Big Finish is actually making a tiny profit on charging £5. It seems odd to me that Big Finish is willing to lose money more frequently by capping UK resident orders at £4 shipping for an unlimited item quantity size, but is NOT willing to subsidize 1 penny for a less common international order. ** Please don't get me wrong, I have no qualms with UK Big Finish CD customers receiving a good deal! ** It just seems that Big Finish is overly protecting themselves on international orders by charging more than is necessary. It's actually cheaper for a Canadian resident to pay for a FDA: Series 6 download subscription and then buy its matching CDs from the Book Depository (all together about $40 CAD less). Than it is to pre-order purchase its CD subscription directly from Big Finish.
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Post by barnabaslives on Sept 6, 2016 6:12:59 GMT
Yes, that's what has me worried - after all the efforts to encourage both subscriptions and purchases of items as they are released, they now seem to have a pricing system that encourages the opposite for CD customers abroad.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 6, 2016 15:03:15 GMT
Yes, that's what has me worried - after all the efforts to encourage both subscriptions and purchases of items as they are released, they now seem to have a pricing system that encourages the opposite for CD customers abroad. Yeah, on the face of it the subscription situation does seem a bit odd. As it will now make more sense for international CD subscribers to wait until the titles are released and then buy them in one go, incurring only one per order charge, as opposed to paying six or twelve per order charges as every title is released and sent out. However it does seems like this per order charge really was beyond the control of Big Finish and they either passed on the cost to us, or lost money.
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Post by frobisherthepenguin1 on Sept 6, 2016 19:31:23 GMT
Yes, that's what has me worried - after all the efforts to encourage both subscriptions and purchases of items as they are released, they now seem to have a pricing system that encourages the opposite for CD customers abroad. Yeah, on the face of it the subscription situation does seem a bit odd. As it will now make more sense for international CD subscribers to wait until the titles are released and then buy them in one go, incurring only one per order charge, as opposed to paying six or twelve per order charges as every title is released and sent out. However it does seems like this per order charge really was beyond the control of Big Finish and they either passed on the cost to us, or lost money. Let me repost (and tweak) what I posted on OG as it's further grist for the mill.... (I'm in the USA) Here's the Bundle for the All-Released Season 5 of 4DA, compared to the Subscription for upcoming Season 6 if I were to put them in my cart today. Fourth Doctor Adventures Series 5 (CD) - US $106.57 US $106.57 Shipping & Handling Fees US $13.32 Total US $119.89 Fourth Doctor Adventures - Season 6 (CD) starting with release '6.01. The Beast of Kravenos' US $99.91 Shipping & Handling Fees US $59.94 Total US $159.85 I appreciate where BF are coming from, but there is zero incentive to pre-order anything any more if it's going to cost this much to ship each one as it's released. If I want to keep getting the CDs (and I'm starting to wonder whether there really is) I'll WILL need to wait until everything is released. So for that reason, I WOULD be happy to continue to pre-order, but ONLY if there's a checkbox for "hold until all CDs released" option, as that will allow me to listen sooner via the App/Download, and still receive any subscriber bonuses. As a further point of comparison, this is my existing pre-order for Season 6. Even with the order including UNIT4, the "Postage Contribition" was $18.88: Fourth Doctor Adventures - Season 6 (CD) starting with release '6.01. The Beast of Kravenos: US $108.94 = US $108.94 UNIT - The New Series - 4 - UNIT - 4: US $29.05 = US $29.05 POSTAGE CONTRIBUTION: US $18.88 TOTAL: US $156.87 This shows that last year, even pre-Brexit, I was able to get a whole season of 4DA + UNIT4 for LESS than what a new subscription to the same 4DA series would be.
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Post by agentten on Sept 6, 2016 20:23:48 GMT
I think the "hold until all CDs are released" option is worth talking about. I would be bummed to not have the discs right away when they come out, but I could deal with it if it brings the price down.
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