Wow, busy week...

codemonkey

Shared on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 15:23
First, I want to say sorry to anyone that hasn't heard back to my e-mails about writing for gamestooge.com. This week, at my job in RL (read: real life to non-wow players) has been a bit busy.

So, with real life getting in the way, I've not had a chance to post a lot of news on either site. Special thanks to those that have submitted diggs on our stuff (even JollyRoger though he got pwnt by doodi for being a PS3 hater :) ). Thanks to doodi for keeping up on the news in my stressed out absence as well.

Update on our company website. Last I said my wifes business was picking up, which is nice. Mainly wii games and wii controllers but its still something. Well, we had our first credit card fraud. It sucked, we lost $490.00 to a frauder. And guess what? We have to foot the bill because that's how credit card companies "protect you" the consumer. Excellent. They make stuff easy to hack and we, the retailer, has to pay for it.

So, for those in Canada, if you buy from us and get a credit card denial please call us or send me a PM. The frauder has attempted to buy 10 xbox 360's, 5 DVD players, 5 copies of selected games and a bunch of other stuff. We had to put our credit card system on a very restrictive setting go avoid him selling out our inventory every 10 minutes.

So, you know how it goes... every bad experience is a learning experience. We've learned a lot from it but at the cost of 500 bucks. Which means every sale we make this month with our "picked up" traffic will result in trying to recover a bit of that lots cash.

Oh well. This is why fees and restrictions are so high on retailers today as is insurance. People cannot just be nice and use the system as it was designed, they have to work the system and cost the little guys money (and the big guys too).

Derrick

Comments

Falelorn's picture
Submitted by Falelorn on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 15:25
Damn Canadians... WE ARE EVIL.. it sucks losing money to a frauder...
codemonkey's picture
Submitted by codemonkey on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 15:33
I'm fine with Canadians if they'd get their banks to do address checks on credit card owners. In the US, I can validate the "billing address" is registered with a credit card. However, in Canada they just say "fuck you" if you ask to validate the billing address of the card holder - so you have to disable it or enable it. Disabling means CA folks can buy, enabling it means ya can't buy easily in most cases.
CapnHun's picture
Submitted by CapnHun on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 15:40
What sucks is that neither the consumer or retailer should get charged for that. The credit card companies gets away with charging the consumer exorbitant interest, and then they stick it to you as well. But they continue to issue credit cards to any one who asks because it is 'no skin off their back'.
UnwashedMass's picture
Submitted by UnwashedMass on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 18:16
Did you ship the product? Is it in transit? Can you put the whammy on the shipment? Maybe that's the 3-4 week lead time- ensuring no frauder on the other end. Sorry 'bout the bad turn. Hope it works out for ya!
GroovyElm's picture
Submitted by GroovyElm on Thu, 02/22/2007 - 20:45
It sucks that you are offered no protection. For a big box store it is a cost of doing business, for you guys it's nearly traumatic. Sucks.
Dawnfades's picture
Submitted by Dawnfades on Fri, 02/23/2007 - 13:16
Code, Sorry to hear you got burnt by a credit card fraud. Credit Cards are the biggest hassle for an independent business and in your buisness a necessity. The banks will nail you with tons of fees just to accept CC and then give all of the protection to the consumer and none to the merchant. Make sure you keep good records of your sales because sooner or later you'll get a customer who said they didn't buy something and you'll need the records to fight the charge back. Hang in there and I hop it's a long time till this happens again.

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