Blusttoy
Arch-Supremacy Member
- Joined
- Sep 5, 2011
- Messages
- 14,257
- Reaction score
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I once rage typed out my grievances with P-Bandai. I find that local hobby shops don't stock the P-Bandai stuffs that I want. And the ones that do, was that overpriced La Tendo.
I almost have orders each month on P-Bandai and my issues are:
[1] For certain items, scalpers and their bot scripts will sold out within minutes of PO opening, especially Metal Builds and then seeing these items relisted at 30%+ markup at localized shopping sites; Carousell.
[2] For orders with delivery within the same month, you cannot combine orders, so you're paying multiple shipping fees. The reason there's several orders is because P Bandai list items on different days and months. To save yourself from an item selling out, you PO first.
Example: February 2021 releases RD Satan Gundam, listed in September. I preordered it in September and luckily too cause it is sold out now with $20-$50 markup. In October, another February 2021 item, the AOZ kits were listed. I preordered again. Both orders had separate shipping fees.
So in the future, in February 2021, these items will be delivered to my house at the same time and I had paid twice the shipping.
As a long term member, this somewhat leaves a bad taste when other online shops can and provide combined shipping.
[3] The website design sucks. The search option doesn't work properly. I search Satan and nothing comes up even though Satan Gundam is there. I search Gundam and sometimes Kamen Rider shows up in result. I search for delivery month and the results are inconsistent.
[4] Ineffective customer service and marketing. It is obvious that the P Bandai teams outside of Japan are incompetent. Their usual response to queries are "Sorry we can't do anything" unless it's payment related.
If you want to avoid missing out on hot items, you have to surf Bandai Hobby Net for future release since the FB page of localized P Bandai are slow to update.
[5] Pre-orders with limited quantities. In my opinion, if a pre-order is stated between start and end date, there should not be a limited quantity. That's the entire ****ing point about PRE-ORDERING. Manufacturer Bandai should be prepared for whatever quantity being the final order quantity.
Premium Bandai was intended for items they thought wouldn't sell high volume in the mass market. Stuff like variant kits and niche high price figures. None of P Bandai items have xxxx/1000 limited quantity designation or rarity branding. Not even the Gundarium alloy one.
Don't make scalpers profit and shame the P Bandai branding. Don't make items become exclusive and limited, when you're gonna do a ****ing 2nd and 3rd batch of release in the future. If Bandai is unable to fulfill the orders, then immediately put up 2nd and 3rd waves so we won't have scalpers profiting up to 50-200%.
[6] They should consider putting up expo-limited, Gundam Front limited and now upcoming Odaiba items since not everyone globally will have the chance to visit Japan.
In all, I like Bandai's products but I find that the P Bandai shopping experience to be somewhat lackluster and lagging behind online stores such as Hobby Search and Mandarake.
For sold out items, I prefer to purchase from Mandarake JP than pay for the scalper's price on Carousell.
