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Scrapbooking, part 2

I wrote recently about my experience creating a photo book with Shutterfly and MyPublisher. I chose MyPublisher to create the books but the process failed miserably when I tried to actually order the books. I wanted 5 copies of the same book. The checkout process wasn’t unusual but at the end the application tries to upload all of the images and the book layout to MyPublisher’s server. Well, it didn’t work. At first it said it couldn’t connect to the server. I clicked retry several times with no change so I stopped and restarted the application. When the application restarted it asked if I wanted to continue uploading. I’d click yes and watch as nothing happened. So, I attempted to contact their technical support.

Here’s something I should have checked beforehand. There is no way to contact anyone in MyPublisher customer service by phone. There are no phone numbers on their site. All contact with support is via email. Shutterfly tries to do all of their support by email too but they at least publish a toll number if you prefer. So, I explained my problem in an email and waited.

The next day I received what was obviously a form letter with some appalling suggestions. They were: turn off anti-virus software; disconnect the cable modem from the router and connect directly to the internet; try turning off spyware; and add MyPublisher to Trusted Sites in Internet Explorer. These are all terrible suggestions for two reasons: 1) Each one reduces my security, particularly the router and anti-virus suggestions and 2) They have nothing to do with the actual problem. The anti-virus suggestion would only be an issue if their software is doing something virus-like in which case my virus software would have told me about it; the router suggestion would only apply if the software was using bizarre ports or hosting a server; the trusted sites suggestion implies that MyPublisher.com needs to do things to my computer that I may not approve of; and the spyware suggestion is just plain ridiculous – MyPublisher must have a different definition of what spyware is than the rest of the world.

Against my better judgement I tried them just so that I could write back to their tech support and honestly say they didn’t work. So I did. In that second email I also asked a couple of very simple, direct questions: Has my credit card been charged? How do I cancel my order in progress? Can I just try again with a whole new order without worrying about being billed for my first order which failed to upload?

And they replied with another form letter! This time they suggested that I must have at least 512MB of memory (I do); that I should logoff and back onto my internet service; that I shouldn’t use dial-up (I’m not); that I should use lower quality images (what?!). And they did not answer a single one of my questions. They didn’t even attempt to!

I wrote them back to tell them to cancel my order and never heard from them again. It’s the worst customer service experience I’ve had in years. Maybe your luck with them will be better. Perhaps if I tried again the upload process would work. But, on principle, I’m refusing to use their service because of how abysmal the support was.

So I turned to Shutterfly. As I mentioned before, this involved uploading all of my photos to their service and using their online book designer. The only real drawback to Shutterfly’s designer is the limited layout choices. But the designer itself is very easy to use. It only took me a couple of hours to recreate my book at Shutterfly. More importantly, ordering worked flawlessly. The 32 page book came to about $33 + tax and shipping. I had Shutterfly send copies directly to relatives and a copy to myself, five in total. I received an email the next day saying the books were printed and shipping!

When the book arrives, I’ll post some pictures of it and a my thoughts on the quality of the printing and binding of the book itself.

Update: Part 3, the final post in this series

Comments

  1. marius on 2005-03-14 18:18:13 wrote: *Contact information of mypublisher from their domain name: MyPublisher Inc. Jason Rosoff 400 Columbus Avenue Valhalla, NY 10595 US Phone: 914-773-4312 Fax..: 914-773-4305 Email: [email protected] *

  2. s dunne on 2005-05-13 20:20:02 wrote: *Press zero and ask for that Jason guy. Apparently he’s a disgruntled IT guy there who is prone to (if pushed) giving away free coupons for books. The stuff is SHIITE and I wouldn’t touch it but I’ll take anything that is free and this Jason guy knows how to give it to me. *

  3. photoboo on 2005-09-14 12:10:29 wrote: i found this guy’s info also: MyPublisher 400 Columbus Avenue Valhalla, NY, 10595 Contact: Randy Barron, VP Phone: 914 773 4312 ext. 22 Fax: 914 773 4305 Email: [email protected] www.mypublisher.com

  4. Susie on 2005-12-24 09:58:27 wrote: Wow, I wish I had seen this web site before I spent weeks putting my book together!!!! The customer service was horrible. They sent my parents christmas present to my billing address and not my shipping address and would not accept responsibility. So no presents for the folks and pure aggravation.

  5. CAT on 2006-01-09 09:15:55 wrote: I had issues with one of the books produced by My Publisher as a Christmas Gift. The cameo cutout in the front cover of the album was extremely crooked. I admit that it was a real inconvenience dealing with the company via email. I received the book about a week before Christmas (which was as expected when I made my purchase) so there was little time for correction. Instead of producing a replacement (which was my preference), the company could only refund the purchase price INCLUDING shipping. I was then instructed to re-upload my book as a completely separate transaction (in other words, buy another one). Overall I have been very pleased with My Publisher and all of the books I have produced thus far. It is inconvenient to deal with the company via email, but I have found them to be pretty prompt in replying and they do indeed stand by their satisfaction guarenteed policy. I recommended the service to dozens of individuals that were impressed with the Christmas gift.

  6. Nancy on 2006-06-05 12:16:31 wrote: Photoboo, Thanks for doing your homework photoboo! I printed a book and after reviewing it deleted a few pages. Their dumb sofware flips the order of pages when it moves a layout from the right to left side of page, so all the captions that I had written in teh one caption box on each page were aligned with the wrong photos! I go t 1 response from customer service that asked me to send more info. I’ve been sending and resending my response for weeks and have not gotten any response. I finally sent it again and CC ed Randy Barron. I’ll let you know if I hear anything. Nancy

  7. Paul on 2006-06-13 08:23:20 wrote: I’ve just received 4 mypublisher.com books, (when I only expected 2) and the last page of all of them is missing. Has anyone else had problems with pages not printing? I’ve order this book twice before (with modifications) and the last pages printed just fine. I also had some additional order problems that I’ve written about here: http://www.critiquewall.com/node/106 I sure would like for their service to work.

  8. Le on 2006-07-20 11:32:31 wrote: I too have had terrible problems with MyPublisher. First, the cover photo on the album I ordered was (very!) crooked, which made the album look absolutely ridiculous. Since they do not provide a phone number for customer service, I have exchanged numerous e-mails with customer service reps. I even sent them a digital picture of the album cover so they could see for themselves how bad it was. Each rep has told me that they are terribly sorry, but they were unable to do anything to help. Save your money, use a different company to make your albums online instead!

  9. Wendy on 2006-09-11 07:46:25 wrote: I had the exact same experience as the original poster had. I’ve spent over 50 hours putting together a book from my recent Africa trip and after multiple attempts to follow their e-mail instructions all I wound up with was FOUR charges to my credit card for orders they say they never received! When I e-mailed about having the charges removed, I was told not to worry - they’ll drop off of my account in a few days. Great way to do business. I’ve asked several times for them to give me a phone number to talk to a person and gotten nowhere. I’ve now called the numbers listed above and left messages with return phone #s. We’ll see what that does - if anything.

  10. Photodoto » Blog Archive » Has anyone had a good experience with MyPublisher.com? on 2006-09-12 10:31:05 wrote: […] Back in December 2004, I wrote about my experience creating a coffee table photo book with MyPublisher.com and Shutterfly.com. I preferred Shutterfly because MyPublisher simply didn’t work: At first it said it couldn’t connect to the server. I clicked retry several times with no change so I stopped and restarted the application. When the application restarted it asked if I wanted to continue uploading. I’d click yes and watch as nothing happened. So, I attempted to contact their technical support. […]

  11. Kristina on 2006-09-29 14:50:18 wrote: This was all super helpful. I need to get a hold of the company and like all y’all was very frustrated that I couldn’t find a flipping phone number! So thanks. Wondering if anyone has had issues with promotional/coupon codes. I was sent a coupon code and wanted to use it but when I went through, it said “not valid.” I read all of the terms/conditions and the problem didn’t seem to be there. I emailed the help desk and got a lovely form letter. Followed the instructions, but of course that didn’t help either. Thoughts?

  12. elvis on 2006-11-08 07:38:46 wrote: MyPublisher’s head guys are : Carl Navarre [email protected] CEO, MyPublisher 400 Columbus Avenue Valhalla, NY 10595 voice = 914-347-0253 fax = 203 661 1331 and Bill Avery [email protected]

  13. kixtastik on 2006-11-10 08:59:03 wrote: I’m currently not impressed with them. My order is stuck at Canada Customs.. they declared it as $1500!!! I paid $300. NOT GOOD.

  14. jeepchick on 2006-11-10 13:53:27 wrote: I am having sever problems with My Publisher. They have changed their phone number. The correct number is now 212-935-5215. You can reach all of the above mentioned people at this number. I too am experiencing great difficulties with My Publisher. I can seem to get my book. Been over 1 month now. I will keep you posted to any good/bad outcomes.

  15. taking care of customers on 2006-11-16 15:13:50 wrote: Hello Jeepchick and Kixtastik - I read your comments and I am sorry you are having trouble receiving your books. I would be happy to help both of you figure out what the problem might be with delivery and ensure you receive your MyPublisher photobooks. Please feel free to contact me at [email protected]. MyPublisher is committed to making you happy with our quality and service.

  16. John on 2006-11-17 01:09:50 wrote: rolls eyes

  17. Rumplestiltskin on 2006-11-17 13:16:18 wrote: I have spent hours preparing my adopted daughter’s life book and I cannot connect to the server. I have done absolutely everything they say in their help pages including altering the RAM on my PC. As you all stated, an email to their alleged support system resulted in a standard message which only repeated their help pages which I had followed. As an adopter I am a member of several web rings which have hundreds of people subscribing. I will be posting my experience to warn people. I will try one of these alternates - thanks for the tips but I cannot really be bothered telephoning a company who do not have customer service as a priority.

  18. joe marquez on 2007-02-03 12:24:46 wrote: I am really surprised to hear of all the problems that every one is having with MyPublisher.com. My wife and I have ordered 3 completely different books of our wedding and we only had 1 problem and that was a few photos were rotated 90 degrees from how we had it setup in the software. One email to inform customer service and the next day, we received an email with a coupon for a free book to try it again. We set up the book and sent it and all was well. Word of advice, check the website for updated software before attempting to send your book, especially if you have spent more then a day setting it up with your photos. I would like to see them send me an email when there’s a software upgrade out there, but thats minor compared to what others have gone through. Guess we’ll find out if there really is a problem as we continue to order new books.

  19. flagrantdisregard » Blog Archive » Scrapbooking, part 3 on 2007-08-21 16:49:34 wrote: […] written two previous entries (Part 1, Part 2) about my experience creating a photo book with Shutterfly and MyPublisher. I chose Shutterfly for […]

  20. Gaida on 2007-09-03 19:49:48 wrote: Thanks for the information regarding MyPublisher…(who it sounds I would never want to use or recommend. There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to talk to a ’live’ person. How do they really expect to do business these days with so much competition around if they can’t keep their customers happy. One disgruntled customer tells 10 others and the ball keeps rolling… Pick up your Free Scrapbooking ebook and learn tips and tricks to bring your precious memories alive.