For the last couple of months I have been in the process of purchasing a very, very nice digital SLR camera; a Canon EOS 40D to be exact. I spent a lot of time back in January getting pieces of the camera from different websites to save some money. A memory card here, a lens and filters there, a case somewhere else. And it was really panning out. I saved a fortune on my 16 gig memory card and I even swung a deal on my lens with the online dealer nearly throwing in three filters for free. Finally everything came in the mail except one thing: the camera body itself. I purchased the body from some obscure online camera retailer basically because it was dirt cheap. The camera body is the same no matter where you get it, so I figured I might as well pay bottom dollar for it right? Well, maybe not.

The retailer sent me an email stating that my item had been placed on backorder, but didn’t say for how long. Now I was getting one kick-a** deal so I didn’t really care how long it was going to be on backorder. When saving over $1000 you have some patients. I ended up calling the company however to get an estimate on when my item would be in stock (never mind the fact that the website said the item was already in stock). I was told 4 to 6 weeks. That was no problem. I could wait.

Well guess what? That time went by and then some. Then one day, Stupid Me forgot to get my check card out of the ATM one day so I had to cancel it. Now the retailer wasn’t going to charge my credit card until the item was shipped. However, since it had been over two months since I ordered my camera, I didn’t really care about updating that company with my new card information. They were done, despite the amazing price. So I conducted a new search to once again find the camera body at an inexpensive price avoiding any online camera retailers that had a webpage like the first company I encountered (which was ShopCartUSA.com in case you were thinking about buying from there) and believe me there was a number of them. Finally I decided to go with the retailer that supplied me my lens and filters. Re-enter 1WayPhoto.com. I called the company this time thinking maybe I could haggle them down in price again. They were having none of that and frankly didn’t even care I would go somewhere else to buy the camera. But they were the next cheapest so a few days later I placed my order online with them. I wasn’t totally shocked to get an email stating that item was on backorder (again despite the fact their website said it was in stock). However they did give me a 3-4 week backorder time frame. Again I figured I’d wait it out.

Well, today, five weeks later, I still have no camera body. I decided enough was enough. I called up 1WayPhoto and canceled my order. Not a single question asked. All I said was I wanted to cancel an order, gave them my order number, and they were more than happy to do it without question. Not a second later I received an email confirming my cancellation and apologizing, stating that item was just too darn popular (or something like that). That is crap straight from Hillary Clinton’s butt!

So with my ego defeated I started searching online once again. This time however I had enough of these silly waiting games. I hit up the websites I knew would deliver: Newegg.com, Amazon.com and the major electronics retailers! After a few minutes of searching and comparing prices, Amazon.com had won. With my income tax rebate check nearly spent, I am now one happy camper. I even ordered next day delivery so with any luck tomorrow I will be the proud owner of a fully functional Canon EOS 40D SLR camera!

Moral of the story is sometimes it’s just better to stick with the people you know will deliver and pay a little extra for it. It’s what my dad has been telling me for years and why there will be service people out to our house today to fix our microwave that broke last night. Second moral of the story is sometimes Dad can be right. As long as he’s not hassling me about getting LASIK!