posted on October 2, 2000 04:50:22 PM
I've been using Stamps.com with no problems at all for about a year now. Tonight I've got my first problem. I can't even sign into my Stamps.com account. I get an error message. When I call their toll-free customer service number, they no longer have 24-hour help and I can only call between 7am and 4pm. They also no longer have 24-hour online help.
Anyone else having problems getting into the stamps.com servers?
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The only place you'll find success before work is in the dictionary.
posted on October 2, 2000 05:03:30 PM
Same problem here, I have to try and log on 10 or 20 times just to get into my account. Real tired of their crap personally. Heather
posted on October 2, 2000 05:20:14 PM
I spoke with them at length and with force today. I have had problems connecting on and off for 3 weeks, I am also a long term customer.
In the end (I logged over an HOUR on the phone with them in two phone calls) they acknowledged that they are having problems and said that they are working on them. The agreed to credit me this month's fees because they had to agree that I am paying to print postage at my convenience and have not been able to for weeks. I explained that it they thought proper to charge me for such dismal service that they were welcome to, however it would be the last dime. I explained that I was in my thirties and had no intention of going to the PO again, so we are talking 40 yrs of business on the block here, so do whatever you want.
For people just encountering this problem, it generally clears within a hour, but that does not mean it stays that way. Print when you can and cross your fingers it gets repaired quickly. I went on at length about the holiday season upon us and I think they know what is at risk. I also saw shades of the OLD stamps.com where customers were treated well. On that note, I am optimistic.
[ edited by VeryModern on Oct 2, 2000 05:22 PM ]
posted on October 2, 2000 06:01:12 PM
Stamps.com, like many of the other internet services with exponential growth has evidently outgrown it's service capacity and ability to offer good support. I get errors connecting all the time and last night it took 4 hours for them to approve a postage purchase.
The thing that bothers me is that I do all my order processing very late at night. I can only imagine how bad it is in the daytime/evening when most people must be using the service.
I hope they get thier act together and get some additional capacity online before the busy holiday shipping season. If not, they'll lose business to estamp or other new services which do not require you to be connected to the internet to print postage.
The best way to get tech support, I have found, is to go to their live chat tech support page. You can talk to someone very quickly there, but their tech support has been of little use. When their servers are down, they are just down I guess. Try again in a half-hour and things are fine again. It's a very on again - off again service. Very unreliable when you'll get connected or not.
posted on October 2, 2000 06:13:37 PM
Aha! The network community strikes again. I was about to sign up. Sure glad I haven't yet. If they DO ever get their act together, ya'll come back and let us know, okay?
posted on October 2, 2000 06:14:42 PM
good tip in there gamecock - I had the same delay getting a purchase approved.
Be a good idea to keep some postage credit in your account these days. That is what set me off today. 1.5 hours to connect and then I did not have the credit I needed and when I tried to buy it would not approve th purchase for another hour. I got the package out and an hour later needed to print again and found it down again. At this point I went ballistic.
They really do seem to know that their %%% is on the line though. No more cocky attitude like a month ago. I take some comfort.
posted on October 3, 2000 12:05:24 AM
Well, it's 2:44am EST and all I can get out of stamps.com is this error:
"A connection to the Stamps.com Internet Postage Servers could not be made at this time. (8004140A)"
So, I pop over to the stamps.com website and connect to the live java chat tech support. (Yes valerie47: they do still have 24 hour live tech support on thier website.) The tech support person tells me this: "We are currently having troubles with the ISP that handles our Intenet Postage Servers. While I'm not sure if this is related to your particular inability to connect, troubleshooting at this time would be a futile effort."
I have about 100 orders to get processed tonight and this is really ticking me off. I guess I'm going to have to start keeping a lot of stamps around the house again for nights like this when I can't connect.
I will be calling in the morning to point out to them that I am paying to print postage at MY convenience. (as VeryModern did.) Hopefully they will refund my fees for the month. I don't really care about that though. I just want the darn thing to work, so I don't have to spend the morning tying up a line for 2 hours at the post office. I'd really make their day if I busted up in there with 100 packages in the morning. lol.
I Don't know how I ever operated before stamps.com. When it works, I have nothing but glowing praise for the service. But, it is NOT working more and more frequently...
posted on October 3, 2000 02:25:16 AM
5:19am Still unable to connect. I'm starting to get really frustrated now. Someone at stamps.com is going to get an earful in a few hours!
Oh, well... Time to start manually addressing all these packages...
posted on October 4, 2000 09:02:54 PM
Stamps.com kept charging me for an account I closed because they suck so much. I ended up looseing almost $100 bucks in a snowball effect from them erroniously charging an old bank account for a very closed account.
I loathe stamps.com
