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Which is the best site to pre-order from?

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Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Nemesis Reformatted » Sat May 15, 2021 12:04 am

I've been using Bigbadtoystore. But lately I've been seeing a lot of comments saying "BBTS never ships" & they keep delaying their pre-orders. I called them the other day about one of my pre-orders & the guy said they are getting them in but Hasbro is sending them only a couple at a time, nowhere near enough to put a dent in the pre-order list. He told me that if I can find it elsewhere for a decent price, I should order it & cancel the pre-order with them.

So now I'm getting a little worried, especially over my Scorponok pre-order. I'm thinking about placing a couple more pre-orders for the titans with other sites & see who gets them first. I'm sick of always missing out & being left in the dust.

So who's the best? Does one site get their pre-orders faster than others? I also saw some comments saying Hasbro Pulse gets their stuff a lot later than other sites. Pulse pushed back my Quintesson Pit Of Judgement set by 3 months. I should've had that damned thing a long time ago! :evil:

I'm really tired of being so far behind. I can't believe I'm having so much trouble getting old figures from last year. Most collectors are already bored with them but I haven't even gotten them yet.

This is really starting to feel like a game of Whack-A-Mole & I keep hitting the wrong places.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby -Kanrabat- » Sat May 15, 2021 12:17 am

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It doesn't depend on the store's themselves. Whenever you deal with late shipments and such, the distribution is always the same. Hasbro seems to work like an erratic zombie lately. Not only that, but it can be even worse for third party companies.

You may try amazon.jp to preorder some things. Takara distribution with the price to match but at least, some things may be speedier or ironically cheaper. Especially for the Japanese exclusives.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby alekese » Sat May 15, 2021 1:00 am

I don't have much firsthand experience with most sites because I primarily use pulse, having to rely on anecdotes from others for comparison, but it depends on what metric you're using to define "best".

If You're asking 'who gets first production runs in first', Retail like target and walmart get their stock first, but it doesn't necessarily go towards preorder fulfilment, then the big e-tailers like amazon, bbts, and entertainment earth soon after, then hobby sites and pulse. Restocks like the scorponok and PoJ you're waiting on don't necessarily follow these rough guidelines, however. Those are up in the air.

If you're asking who has the best prices, Amazon and retailers sometimes have sales or price match that lets you get things for less than msrp, pulse and EE are msrp and rarely have sales, bbts has a small markup, and hobby sites have a larger markup because they get theirs from one of the bigger stores. If supplies start running low, though, amazon, hobby shops and to a lesser extent bbts will raise prices on in demand items, whereas pulse will always stay at msrp.

If you're asking about reliability/customer service, I have been using pulse since it launched, and have NEVER had an order cancelled. Delayed, sure. But never cancelled, and the handful of customer service issues I've had were slow to resolve but resolved satisfactorily. BBTS has good service, but i've had things cancelled once or twice, I've seen many reports of order cancellation from amazon, with underwhelming customer service, hobby sites can vary from reliable to horror story depending on site. Target and walmart have no scalperbot protections, so resellers clear out the preorder allotment frequently, fulfilment of the remaining orders is spotty with frequent cancellations from what I've heard, idk about target's customer service but walmart does not give a **** about it's customers before or after money changes hands.

All in all, if you're impatient for first releases, bbts and EE have the best release date to cancellation ratio, followed by amazon, restocks will get there when they get there and not a moment sooner no matter who you order from, but if you're patient enough to wait 1-2 months after they hit brick and mortar shelves so long as it's guaranteed to get there in the end, Pulse is #1.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Nemesis Reformatted » Sat May 15, 2021 2:27 am

So it's up in the air as to who will get it first?

I just want to get Scorponok out of the way ASAP. Before The Ark hits in August. BBTS says June, EE says July.

My pre-order schedule has been completely screwed up. We're 5 months into 2021 & so far only 1 of my pre-orders actually shipped, the Hasbro Pulse action figure stands 3-pack. Everything else has been canceled or delayed.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Roadbuster » Sat May 15, 2021 3:40 am

For me, BBTS and Pulse have given me no problem. BBTS just successfully FedEx'd me my SIEGE Omega Supreme that arrived jsut yesterday. They'd never given me an issue once.

The Seibertron store I purchased a few items, and they all arrived successfully. I never would have gotten a Quintesson Judge if they didn't have it in stock.

Pulse I got Punch/Coounterpunch, and Shuttle Blastoff with no problems. So in my experiences, those three are pretty reliable.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby alekese » Sat May 15, 2021 9:13 am

I can understand not wanting to get hit with 2 titan class payments in the same month, but every primary market store, no matter where you look, has to wait for the same container ship to cross the pacific. If you are at the point of 'I need the payment to hit now even if I have to pay more, just so I don't have to pay at the worst possible time', you might have to bite the bullet and go to ebay and hope for a reasonably priced reseller.

In the future, Pulse's only real downsides are they are usually last of the big e-tailers to ship out, and it can take about a month of back and forth to resolve customer service issues like defective figures, partly because they actually loop in their quality control team. They have cutoff points for preorders so they don't overcommit and have to cancel *coughamazoncough*, and they always send an email whenever the expected arrival date changes, giving about a weeks notice before billing if things arrive more than a week early, and a couple month's notice before even the original estimate for any delays. I said in another thread somewhere that pulse is best summed up as "never first, but never cancelled". I've heard complaints about there shipping prices, but i've found premium to be worth it, especially now that small amounts of other store's exclusives are being offered on a first come first serve basis, with premiums at the front of the line. If you balk at the price of premium, I don't approve of the method myself, but if you put enough unwanted items in your cart to reach the free shipping on $50+ order threshhold, you can proceed to checkout, remove the unwanted items from your cart while checking out, and still have the free shipping.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Nemesis Reformatted » Wed May 19, 2021 1:51 pm

Well, I ordered a G2 Sandstorm off ebay for a decent price. He should be here Friday or Saturday. So much for my BBTS pre-order :roll:

Since Ratchet/Lifeline last year, pre-orders have been pretty much useless for me. They either get canceled or delayed & I end up buying the stuff from somewhere else. Just find somebody who actually has it in hand for a decent price & then cancel the pointless pre-order.

Which brings me to my next question. I want a Sparkless Seeker. What is going on with this guy? My Walmart just got a new case of the wave 3 deluxes. Why aren't they getting the voyagers in stores? Should I bother pre-ordering from Walmart.com? I saw a lot of people had trouble with their wave 1 & 2 pre-orders. Walmart either canceled them or sent the wrong item. Do you think I should bother pre-ordering or just wait & see what happens? I don't like Walmart because they'll charge me as soon as I order.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Overcracker » Wed May 19, 2021 2:07 pm

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Have not had any issues with BBTS. I Pre-ordered SS86 Hot Rod and Dinobot, Kingdom Cyclonus, Primal, Cheetor and Megs, and all were shipped hone they said they would ship.

I haven't had any pre-orders get cancelled by them, and I've been using them for many years now.

Currently have Rodimus Prime, Tracks and Rhinox pre-ordered from them.

Amazon also shipped Dinobot fine and on time, so I pre-ordered Tigatron and SS Bee + Sam from them now.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Nemesis Reformatted » Wed May 19, 2021 2:42 pm

I have a bunch of open pre-orders with BBTS. Next up is Scorponok in June. We'll see how it goes. But if somebody else has it in stock I'll go with them & cancel the pre-order. I no longer have any faith or trust in pre-orders.

Right now I'm just trying to figure out what to do about that Sparkless Seeker.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Spider5800 » Wed May 19, 2021 5:26 pm

I've never had an issue with Amazon. No delays or cancels. Only problem with them is they seem to get stuff way later than other stores, for some reason. I've heard of others having tons of issues with them, though.

BBTS i've been mostly successful with, but had one order that kept getting pushed back for months, until I finally cancelled it and got the item somewhere else.

Only placed one order with Hasbro Pulse so far, and it went fine. One item came immediately and the other is a pre-order set to go out in August. Only issue I had was the tracking number they gave me was worthless, it never updated even after the item had been recieved. Just showed the order was pending for a week.

Avoid Wal-Mart like the plague. 50/50 shot your pre-order will be cancelled, in my experience. Garbage online ordering system.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby TF-fan kev777 » Wed May 19, 2021 5:50 pm

Nemesis Reformatted wrote:I have a bunch of open pre-orders with BBTS. Next up is Scorponok in June. We'll see how it goes. But if somebody else has it in stock I'll go with them & cancel the pre-order. I no longer have any faith or trust in pre-orders.

Right now I'm just trying to figure out what to do about that Sparkless Seeker.


If you are in the US, you really only have 3 options at this point since only Walmart and Pulse are carrying them at retail price.
1 - Get ready to try and hunt it down once it finally hits retail, which should be relatively soon-ish.
2 - Pre-order from Walmart and cross your fingers.
3 - Hope that Pulse gets more in that don't immediately sell out for premium members before regular members have access.

I pre-ordered from Walmart, but fully expect to find it in store before they even ship, just like for waves 1 and 2.
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Re: Which is the best site to pre-order from?

Postby Nemesis Reformatted » Wed May 19, 2021 5:53 pm

Spider5800 wrote:
Avoid Wal-Mart like the plague. 50/50 shot your pre-order will be cancelled, in my experience. Garbage online ordering system.



Yeah, that's what I thought.

So what is everybody doing about the Sparkless Seeker? Do we have a plan?
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