Caveat Emptor: Subway Stamp

I agree Dale.

An update on Subway Stamp shop. I just talked to a nice lady there (Nanette?). It turns out their customer service email account was broken (the person owning it has left) and their attempt to forward it didn't work. Meanwhile, the email address jen@subwaystamp.com does work. They are definitely in business. I'd ordered a set of Vintage Reproduction pages from them and those are basically print on demand. They're doing a run this weekend.

The person that owned the CS email left and it was broken. That is just pathetic. Sorry.

You are right, rogdcam! It is sooo pathetic, in fact, that I choose to not believe it. Do you really mean to tell me that in this world of on-line activity, that a company that probably does 75-90% of it's business online, that their main contact with their customers has been 'broken' for that long???? FWIW, I had an order that I e-mailed a status request to their 'jen@...' address in August and never received any response. This was the address on my order confirmation in May. Call me a cynic, but I think they simply didn't want to be bothered, or they didn't know everybody was e-mailing to a 'dead' address. But they should have known. If ***I*** knew I was getting e-mails for my business at a 'dead' address, I would hire whomever I had to, and paid him WHATEVER, in order to resolve the problem THAT WEEK! Would anyone here do it any differently???

Roger wrote on September 16: "I just read a slew of negative Google reviews......"

Reminds me that I met the couple who run Coast Philatelics (Costa Mesa, CA) at the SESCAL stamp show last October in Ontario, CA. I needed some Showguard mounts, which they didn't bring to the show. I contacted them afterwards and asked for a price. Sent them a check and had my mounts within about 10 days. Excellent service.

I had planned to go to WESTPEX back in April; even had my plane fare booked; but COVID..... Hope to see them again in 2021. I recommend them.

I'd blow a valve and a couple of gaskets.

I placed orders this week two days apart with IHobb for a Scott album and some Hawid mounts. One order shipped within 10 hours and the other within 2 hours. No drama just as it should be.

Less than three weeks ago on September 30th, I ordered ten (10) packages (of 40 pages each) of Subway's own version of blank Scott Specialty pages. They're just as good but less expensive than Scott and have the same border. I didn't need them right away, so I was prepared to wait awhile. They arrived early this week less than two weeks after I ordered them. So something at Subway still works.

I hope they resolve whatever problems they're going through. As I said in a previous comment, one of their main people passed away recently which must have created problems. Over the years, they've been inconsistent at responding to emails (but so is Scott/Amos which takes weeks to reply to my emails). And they were shut down because of the pandemic which may have created unknown problems (maybe laying off people?), as well.

So clearly it's still an old-fashioned operation they need to overhaul and are taking forever to do so. I hope they figure it out because they're a good alternative source of supplies with good discounts from Scott/Amos prices even if shipping takes longer. I guess we'll see. I've never had any trouble talking to people at Subway once I get them on the phone. They've generally been very responsive to me. I do still have one outstanding page replacement problem (water damage), however, which seems to have fallen through the cracks somehow at Subway. In the past, I've cancelled a few orders that just took way too long to fill and then ordered from Amos/Scott instead at a higher price.

Reopening this thread... I ordered some of the vintage brown reproduction pages the other week from Subway and not a peep from them since.

Has anyone had success (or not) ordering from them recently? Maybe they're just being slow?

For a few years, I regularly ordered from Subway to build up my albums and pages for collections I was planning to create. I pretty much have what I need now, so I haven't needed to buy much in the way of stamp supplies lately -- just stamps. But I was in contact with them a lot either ordering from them or phoning to ask questions or check on an order.

When I did order from Subway (largely because their small discount from regular prices did make a difference to me) their shipments took about the same time as shipments from other companies -- except when they didn't. After this happened a few times, I took to calling them with every order or to ask whatever questions I had about an order. For something like printed album pages, my impression was that instead of having them in stock, they ordered them for their customer from the manufacturer only after they received an order. I believe this was the case with all the many Scott album pages I ordered.

Using this system, shipping was obviously going to be slower. They may also do this with many other products they list. Their list of products then is what they believe they can supply to customers, not products they have in stock. This can result in disappointments when their supplier is out of a product. It's a discount website. Subway was always a discount seller. So for saving a little money, at times you pay the price of some inconvenience.

In one call, I was told that often their products were out of stock and that if I needed something reliably or quickly it might be best to order from another seller. Interesting way to do business, but honest. Everyone I talked to there was very nice and as helpful as they could manage to be. For whatever reason, presumably to offer discounts and keep their own costs down, it's just not set up for the most reliable service.

I suggest always calling them before ordering to check on whether items are in stock -- or if you have ordered, follow up a week or two later to see if the item(s) have shipped. You are free to cancel orders. Although you may get your order from Subway quickly, I'd only order things from them that I didn't need right away.

Drew, appreciate the advice, and just circling back to share my experience, which was overall positive - I did get the album pages yesterday.

Shipping was slow, but that's fine. They seem to be the only game in town for the Brown Internationals reproduction pages, so I'm just glad that I can still order them.

Side note - I don't know if it's a more recent development, but the source quality of the images is pretty bad. Has that appearance reminiscent of a 'photocopy of a photocopy'. But since the old Scott Annual albums are scarcer than hen's teeth, I guess it's the best we'll get!