May 11, 2006

I have alot of experience with DVD Italia -

In a nutshell:

DVD.it - one of the few Italian online stores with a mirror site in English. Unfortunately no one in their office can or wants to speak English, which makes it a bit difficult when you call after waiting sometimes 2 months for your order to turn up, and after having given up emailing every department on their web platform without ever receiving a single reply or any sign of life from them. You cannot reply to them via straight email as it's all ''no-reply''. They do not part ship, so if even one DVD is not available, they will hold the entire order forever, until you call them and, if you're lucky and actually manage to get through to them, tell them to cancel in your best Italian. Seems they are permanently having either a religious or national holiday - and like many stores in Southern Europe, they only seem to be open for a few hours in the late morning and later part of the afternoon. And then you have to call endlessly as their single phone line is forever engaged...! The first time I said ''non capisco Italiano'', they hung up on me. Now when I call I have pre-translated everything into Italian and just read it all off to them. Although they answer in Italian at a rate of 200 words per minute, and I understand just about zero at that speed, they do get the idea that I want to cancel, and that I'm fairly unhappy. Unfortunately I am not having much luck cancelling my last order. After waiting just a month (that's nothing!) I emailed them in Italian and received a reply, but after waiting several weeks, have still not received a refund. Oh well, once again, it's on to Visa for a chargeback....buying DVDs CAN'T be this difficult?! They are more trouble than it's worth. What's ''lousy customer service'' in Italian? Maybe I'll use that in my next phone call!