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Post by barnabaslives on Mar 22, 2019 3:07:18 GMT
Should overseas customers be paying more than the 1:1 - yes, probably. However, is there a price point on audio downloads where a market like America won't on average be willing to pay? Could this be one of the factors why Big Finish previously went with the 1:1? Should international pricing be set at an increased fixed price instead of relying on a daily and sometimes harsh exchange rate? If I understand this, I can kind of see myself tempted to procrastinate on future purchases hoping for best rate of exchange. Funny thing though, I actually thought my purchases were already being converted from pounds to dollars via the current exchange rate though PayPal? I'm probably a lot confused now.
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Post by Whovitt on Mar 22, 2019 3:10:30 GMT
The shipping costs to Australia can be a little bit situational, but the price of shipping subscriptions is shocking. Here's an example: Main Range CD standard shipping = $2.76 + $11.98 (per order charge) Main Range CD standard shipping for 12 releases therefore = $45.10 Main Range 12-story sub shipping ( retrospective) = $33.17 (which is approximately equal to $2.76 x 12, give or take 5 cents) Main Range 12-story sub shipping (pre-order) = $110.57!!! (which is equal to $9.21 per CD!)
There's simply no reason for why there should be such an enormous difference in prices! Where does the additional $77.45 come from for pre-ordering? Wait, I'm a little confused - did they actually ever implement an option of having a sub dispatched as one shipment only when all of the titles in it have been released? I thought I kept hearing that was an unfavorable option because it involved CDs taking up valuable warehouse space or something. I'm assuming if a sub goes out as 12 dispatches (instead of as one like a retro-sub), that each individual CD might accrue a per-order charge. Could that be where the $9.21 per CD charge comes from here? Maybe there's a lot of money to be saved by being six months behind on non-boxset items? Dunno - like I said, I'm a little confused. Personally, I think it's unfair to charge people per item in a sub. The whole point of subs and bundles is to try to circumnavigate the per order charge in the first place! And there's definitely no 'hold all the CDs until the end' option, that's just something everyone was asking for and they don't want to offer.
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Post by Ela on Mar 22, 2019 3:15:02 GMT
Should overseas customers be paying more than the 1:1 - yes, probably. However, is there a price point on audio downloads where a market like America won't on average be willing to pay? Could this be one of the factors why Big Finish previously went with the 1:1? Should international pricing be set at an increased fixed price instead of relying on a daily and sometimes harsh exchange rate? If I understand this, I can kind of see myself tempted to procrastinate on future purchases hoping for best rate of exchange. Funny thing though, I actually thought my purchases were already being converted from pounds to dollars via the current exchange rate though PayPal? I'm probably a lot confused now. Your purchases are actually being converted from dollars to pounds via the current exchange rate. For downloads (until the change on April 1), if a release cost £20 someone in the US would pay $20 US. They weren't converting £20 into the equivalent amount in dollars. They were converting $20 to the equivalent amount in pounds, and that's the amount BF was receiving for your purchase.
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Post by tardybox on Mar 22, 2019 5:12:24 GMT
Oh dear. I can see how this would make business sense and I respect that, but it's definitely going to be slashing this particular American's purchases rather severely. It's going to take a little while to 'mentally' adjust to the new prices - I'm just not used to, say, boxsets going for ~$27 versus $20 on preorder, and I'm not sure it's personally worth that on my salary unless it's a significant release. I'll do my best to keep up with the core releases, or ones with fewer upcoming sets (you can't make me give up Blake's 7 if you tried! ) but I'm afraid ranges like UNIT and Jago and Litefoot, as wonderful as they are, just aren't affordable at the moment. :/
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Post by bohnny on Mar 22, 2019 6:19:40 GMT
Oh dear. I can see how this would make business sense and I respect that, but it's definitely going to be slashing this particular American's purchases rather severely. It's going to take a little while to 'mentally' adjust to the new prices - I'm just not used to, say, boxsets going for ~$27 versus $20 on preorder, .... up from $20 -> $37 in australia on todays rates
BF is the one big thing that I 'waste' money on every month; to have it cut in half virtually overnight makes me very sad
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Post by glutamodo on Mar 22, 2019 6:44:06 GMT
After a chunk of time where I held of on orders from BF, I did a big one recently. After their last multi-year Monthly Range special from a few years ago, I had occasionally looked to see if anything had been offered beyond that point. Now, a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that I could go and add another year onto that. So I did, and at that same time preordered everything else I'd set off as "on hold". At this point I'm not sure if there is much I can go and order.
So am I like dancing in the street celebrating my Monthly Range preorder before this announcement? No... not really. As others have said, I've rather expected that BF would "close the gap" as per exchange rates at some point... and thought it would happen before now. Yes, I'm currently caught up, and I did it before this announcement. But, the change won't make me not order in the future.
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Post by axelotl38 on Mar 22, 2019 6:47:31 GMT
Oh dear. I can see how this would make business sense and I respect that, but it's definitely going to be slashing this particular American's purchases rather severely. It's going to take a little while to 'mentally' adjust to the new prices - I'm just not used to, say, boxsets going for ~$27 versus $20 on preorder, .... up from $20 -> $37 in australia on todays rates
BF is the one big thing that I 'waste' money on every month; to have it cut in half virtually overnight makes me very sad
I agree. Certainly I won't stop, I've bought so much Big Finish I'm not stopping now! But certainly it'll slow down progress and pre-orders may take longer to save up for. Fortunately I've been able to catch up at least so I won't be behind. But for me at least it's manageable. It's a shame others will have to stop (or at least heavily slow down).
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Post by shallacatop on Mar 22, 2019 7:31:27 GMT
I must be a sad individual because I’ve woken up and come to make a cup of tea and have been thinking about the price change at Big Finish!
For those outside of the UK, did you know the prices we pay for downloads? Do you think they’re reasonably priced or rather expensive for no physical product in return?
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Post by tuigirl on Mar 22, 2019 8:32:10 GMT
I should have taken a screenshot earlier, as it honestly didn't render with the notice. Here's what I'm seeing now. I guess it was a good run while it lasted.
That is exactly the way it looks on my PC via Firefox and my iPad. Well, it was like this for me both on my ipad and Firefox but then they changed it and now it is red... that is the reason I was a bit miffed about them "hiding" the information.
The whole thing is a PR mess. The blurb should have been written by someone who knows what he was doing and the message should have been put up by someone other than the web design intern. This was a very clumsy and borderline insulting move. No wonder people are upset.
On the other hand, as I said before, this change should have been made much earlier because the 1:1 conversion made no economic sense whatsoever, but I assume the same intern was also in charge of finances until yesterday...
This is the only reason I can think of, honestly.
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Post by tuigirl on Mar 22, 2019 8:41:55 GMT
I must be a sad individual because I’ve woken up and come to make a cup of tea and have been thinking about the price change at Big Finish! For those outside of the UK, did you know the prices we pay for downloads? Do you think they’re reasonably priced or rather expensive for no physical product in return? Well, I was aware from the very beginning that a 1:1 conversion rate made no sense- first I was paying 1:1 in NZ dollars when I lived in NZ which is a 50% save and now I pay 1:1 in Euroes which is also a bit of a save. So yes, I was aware and at first I was wondering how this was going to work until I stopped thinking about it and just took it at face value.
As for the general pricing of the downloads- yes, the ARE pricey. No way around it. Although, right now, they are lower than what I would pay for a comparable product from Black Library (however, Black Library is always cheaper from iTunes, I never buy direct), however, if BF go through with the change, prices will be roughly equal. Compared to the prices of my favorite German audio dramas- I did a quick mental calculation yesterday and as the prices are now, they are the same. As soon as the prices change come April, Big Finish will indeed be more expensive. Production values of all of these are, I assume, roughly equal.
But I am already used to the fact that German books in Germany are cheaper as physical books and the downloads are more expensive, and of my favorite German audio dramas, by now, the CDs are cheaper than the downloads on Amazon. Anyone willing to explain that? I cannot. Good that I read most books in the English original then (where ebooks are significantly cheaper).
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Post by dalektimecontroller on Mar 22, 2019 8:42:46 GMT
This has left a very bitter taste in my mouth. Regional pricing has always been a hotly contested topic and I can tell you as an Aussie we're usually on the wrong end of it. I think the 1:1 policy was always simplistic. A regional pricing scheme would have made more sense if they wanted to charge different amounts in different markets and the price differences would be more justifiable then. But whatever your opinions on the fairness of the policy, it does hurt to be told that, as a loyal Big Finish listener of more than 10 years, prices are going to double next week. Unfortunately, whether fair or not, the reality is my Big Finish purchases will likely drop by more than half. The extra cost means I will only be able to buy half as much, but when sales come around, those impulse buys I wouldn't have otherwise bought that were previously $5 are now $10 and suddenly not worth it anymore.
But personal whinging aside, my biggest problems with the new policy is that everyone loses and Big Finish have not really been open about it. The only winner is the company - every listener is now either paying the same as before or significantly more than before for the same product. This, and the fact that it has been very poorly advertised, leads me to believe that this is being done as a sly money-making exercise and not in the interests of fairness at all. If BF were sincere about making it fair for everyone and cutting off avenues to game the system rather than about driving their profits up, we all could have met in the middle. Let's say that 30% of Big Finish purchases are overseas customers who pay half as much as our fellow listeners from the UK. Make the prices equal for everyone but drop them by 15%. Same profit for BF just distributed across all the listeners equally. Without meaning to sound too negative because I still love the work Big Finish do and will remain a loyal customer, this and a number of other decisions that the company has made recently have at least given the impression that the company is more about turning a bigger profit than supporting the fans, which is a far cry from its humble beginnings.
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Post by tuigirl on Mar 22, 2019 8:48:02 GMT
This has left a very bitter taste in my mouth. Regional pricing has always been a hotly contested topic and I can tell you as an Aussie we're usually on the wrong end of it. I think the 1:1 policy was always simplistic. A regional pricing scheme would have made more sense if they wanted to charge different amounts in different markets and the price differences would be more justifiable then. But whatever your opinions on the fairness of the policy, it does hurt to be told that, as a loyal Big Finish listener of more than 10 years, prices are going to double next week. Unfortunately, whether fair or not, the reality is my Big Finish purchases will likely drop by more than half. The extra cost means I will only be able to buy half as much, but when sales come around, those impulse buys I wouldn't have otherwise bought that were previously $5 are now $10 and suddenly not worth it anymore. But personal whinging aside, my biggest problems with the new policy is that everyone loses and Big Finish have not really been open about it. The only winner is the company - every listener is now either paying the same as before or significantly more than before for the same product. This, and the fact that it has been very poorly advertised, leads me to believe that this is being done as a sly money-making exercise and not in the interests of fairness at all. If BF were sincere about making it fair for everyone and cutting off avenues to game the system rather than about driving their profits up, we all could have met in the middle. Let's say that 30% of Big Finish purchases are overseas customers who pay half as much as our fellow listeners from the UK. Make the prices equal for everyone but drop them by 15%. Same profit for BF just distributed across all the listeners equally. Without meaning to sound too negative because I still love the work Big Finish do and will remain a loyal customer, this and a number of other decisions that the company has made recently have at least given the impression that the company is more about turning a bigger profit than supporting the fans, which is a far cry from its humble beginnings. You know what? I think they had a financial advicer come in recently and throwing his weight around and made changes to policy. I find this worrying- I was following the same changes with Games Workshop a while back and the change in policy nearly destroyed the company and drove us old fans away (from humble company listening to their followers to a bunch of mindless money grabbers).
They even fired RICK PRIESTLEY for god's sake! I drew a line. I am happy that they have improved again recently, but am still inclined to follow the company Rick Priestley is working for now (mainly because they make the Who miniatures... )
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Post by Deleted on Mar 22, 2019 9:48:28 GMT
I must be a sad individual because I’ve woken up and come to make a cup of tea and have been thinking about the price change at Big Finish! For those outside of the UK, did you know the prices we pay for downloads? Do you think they’re reasonably priced or rather expensive for no physical product in return? I can't remember how long it took before I noticed the 1:1 exchange, but I think I must've caught on fairly early on. I recall my tiny maniacal mind deciding that I'd subsidise the costs of my purchases by buying an amount of Big Finish content that equalled a UK release or so. One of those kind of schemes that kids hatch... I think the introduction of things like Patreon for online platforms made us very aware of the concept of patronage to content creators. As I got older, I found that it made sense on an international basis. As has been pointed out, it correlated neatly with the Australian wages, taxes, goods and services. I don't live in the British economy, so I'm not paid the kind of money that would work in exchange rates. Things aren't cheap here regardless. Public transport alone can gouge $40 out of you (back and forth) in a 5-day working week if you're not too careful and that's only travel to and from the inner city (it can go up to $20.00 for a single, one-way trip for some travellers). Physical products were always for a special occasion. A particularly good story, a celebratory one or a boxset whose content justified the added expenditure. The Tara King Avengers release, for instance, would've qualified. We were on the lower end of the financial bracket, so there was an acute awareness of money and the lack thereof. The box for The Light at the End was a very special thing to have at the time. What makes me wary is the uncertainty surrounding download prices because it's that or nothing. Anything else will be prohibitively expensive. *winces* And as a customer, I honestly don't want to be playing stocks with my BF purchases, I really don't...
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shutupbanks
Castellan
There’s a horror movie called Alien? That’s really offensive. No wonder everyone keeps invading you.
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Post by shutupbanks on Mar 22, 2019 9:55:12 GMT
As an Australian customer I've been a download-only customer for everything I've wanted except for a couple of things that I REALLY HAD to have a physical connection with. I've been baffled by the exchange rate since Day 1. But I've enjoyed it. Oh, how I've enjoyed it.
However, something that I haven't seen anyone comment on yet (or may have missed) is that BF are moving steadily towards a "mostly-download" platform. The CDs will only be available for up to 12 months after release, or until they sell out so this kind of cracking down on the prices of what looks to be becoming their main source of income isn't that big a surprise to me.
The only thing that bothers me - as with most others - is the suddenness of it. Announcing it less than 10 days before it comes into effect is a bit mean-spirited.
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Post by mark687 on Mar 22, 2019 10:18:48 GMT
Question: Does the UK 10% discount on orders over £50 apply only on physical media or to downloads as well? Being from the USA, I have never paid much attention to this and did not readily see the answer on the BF website. Applies to Both
Regards
mark687
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lidar2
Castellan
You know, now that you mention it, I actually do rather like Attack of the Cybermen ...
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Post by lidar2 on Mar 22, 2019 10:34:57 GMT
Question: Does the UK 10% discount on orders over £50 apply only on physical media or to downloads as well? Being from the USA, I have never paid much attention to this and did not readily see the answer on the BF website. Applies to Both
Regards
mark687
Apologies if this has already been mentioned upthread, but ...
BF's announcement mentions UK customers setting up fake foreign accounts to buy downloads cheaper. If they give UK customers a 10% discount on downloads but not foreign customers, then haven't they created an incentive for foreign customers to set up fake UK accounts to get a 10% discount? Or am I missing something?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 22, 2019 10:40:06 GMT
I'm probably leaving myself open to a charge of naivety here, but I genuinely had no idea about the 1:1 policy for overseas customers until I started reading this thread last night and I didn't have a clue that overseas customers didn't benefit from the 10% discount if spending over £50 on the site. Why would I? It plays no part in my buying decisions. I buy audiobooks from Big Finish (and now Amazon..) on the basis of what I can comfortably afford to be prised from my wallet and what I derive the most pleasure from. I certainly don't consider purchasing on the basis of "hmmm.. I wonder what customer X in Canada, customer Y in the United States or customer Z in Australia pay for their audiobooks?". And I certainly don't have the time, patience nor an overwhelming sense of entitlement to look into exploiting any loopholes.
I'd like to think that I'm not in the minority in that way of thinking..
As for the new pricing scheme, while I understand why it is necessary from a business point of view with the pound being as weak as it is, it is also safe to say that from a customer point of view Big Finish have fumbled the ball with this, their trousers have dropped to their ankles at the same time and they've tripped over their own two feet as a result. I played around on XE.com this morning and the variations with the new pricing structure are eye watering. Surely there should have been advance notice of such a massive change in pricing and not (if I am reading comments correctly) having it quietly dropped onto the website? Surely retaining customers overseas should be of paramount importance to Big Finish, especially with all the uncertainty for UK customers over the financial impact of Brexit? Surely alarm bells must now be ringing over a poorly thought out customer experience?
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Post by axelotl38 on Mar 22, 2019 10:49:16 GMT
If it helps, the banner is far far clearer now. So at least they sorted that error.
I get the situation, I understand it, and honestly it's one of those things that I'm annoyed about, but ultimately I can't exactly bring myself to blame Big Finish in this situation or get mad at them specifically. As it stands, to me it makes all logical sense, and in an upcoming troubling financial crisis, it makes sense that BF are trying to cover all their bases. I think the biggest problem is that there's only 10 days left. I think This should've been established at the beginning of the year as a possibility, so people are given time in advance to look after themselves.
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Post by Digi on Mar 22, 2019 10:51:25 GMT
If it helps, the banner is far far clearer now. So at least they sorted that error. Yep, it's now white text on a red banner for me rather than the poor-visibility look it had yesterday. (Chrome, Windows 10, Canada)
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Post by mark687 on Mar 22, 2019 10:57:41 GMT
Applies to Both
Regards
mark687
Apologies if this has already been mentioned upthread, but ...
BF's announcement mentions UK customers setting up fake foreign accounts to buy downloads cheaper. If they give UK customers a 10% discount on downloads but not foreign customers, then haven't they created an incentive for foreign customers to set up fake UK accounts to get a 10% discount? Or am I missing something?
(Again I say this with respect to everybody) Depending on how cynical BF might think some of their Customer Base is you have a point, but if you remove it that leaves Subs and Pre-orders and maybe Sales as the only way of affordable /attractive way of purchase for everyone. Can BF risk loosing another source of regular income that comes through smaller purchase (eg Boxsets brought after release but before the base price goes up bought together to get the 10% off £50 or more?)
Regards
mark687
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