The wait. The BRUTAL BRUTAL wait. *support group*

[MashiMaron]

So… it’s “normal” when you order a doll it takes hell of a time until delivery? My track and trace on UPS still nothing changed UGh!!!!

[mibdul]

Heya, MM.

Yeah, that seems to be pretty normal. If your doll is shipping via UPS out of China, maybe try (t.17track.net). For me, that provided a lot more updates on the China side of things than the UPS app.

[Primus_Sucks]

Welp I’ve already learned one of the things that sucks about ownership and I don’t own a doll yet

I feel like Charlie Sheen in Platoon when he just got there, and the guy tells him he needs to count up instead of down so he doesn’t get bummed out

[mibdul]

Well, color me stunned.

After my girl's release from being trapped in Taiwan for several days, UPS re-quoted her pre-trapped delivery date: today (Wednesday). Given that she wasn't released until very late Monday/early Tuesday, I had serious doubts.

However, after bouncing from Taiwan to Alaska to Kentucky to Connecticut in very rapid succession, she arrived on my doorstep around 12:40pm my time today. Apparently UPS can really move when they want to. I just wish they wanted to slightly more often.

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I have a lot to do today, but I'll be back. I hereby bequeath my relatively excellent luck with manufacturing and shipping times onto the rest of you who are waiting, for whatever that's worth.

[Birdcaller]

Well I understand why you call the wait BRUTAL, that’s an understatement.
I ordered my first doll day before thanksgiving, what was supposed to be a ready to ship ZELEX SLE ZXE217 on a ZX160J, being shipped from California. She was supposed to be at my door within 3-7 days. Seems Silicone Wives is laughing their ass off at me, because I paid for her, of course, only to find out they are giving me some bullshit line saying she’s so new that they didn’t have any in the warehouse in California so she’s coming from their warehouse in Hong Kong. Except she’s been stuck in Hong Kong for four days now, which more than likely means they are building her then shipping her. She has all the options I’d have wanted except the implanted hair. But, I hate to be made a fool of with the ready to ship from the US and now it’s China. I placed the order with a human at silicone wives and confirmed it’s coming from the US.
The wait is excruciating! I’ve name her already, ordered cleaning supplies and pumps form Coeros. My wife has ordered her clothes from Victoria Secrets and we’re all ready to have a new family member, now this. I’d never have thought I’d have this level of frustration with the wait and Silicone Wives!
My wife will be out of town for the holidays and I’m hoping she arrives before she leaves. She’s also significantly different from my wife in appearance. Isabel, (our new addition), has long dark hair and is thicker, my wife has an athletic build and is blonde. So of course I’m looking forward to that and my wife is perfectly fine with it. It’s actually rather hot the way my wife is also excited about her.
But the wait is definitely brutal. Here’s some site pictures from Silicone Wives if you haven’t seen her. Any advise or ideas are always appreciated.

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[MashiMaron]

Heya, MM.

Yeah, that seems to be pretty normal. If your doll is shipping via UPS out of China, maybe try (t.17track.net). For me, that provided a lot more updates on the China side of things than the UPS app.

Yeah I did look on that site but it’s still stuck on nov. 9th pfffff

[mibdul]

Heya, MM.

Yeah, that seems to be pretty normal. If your doll is shipping via UPS out of China, maybe try (t.17track.net). For me, that provided a lot more updates on the China side of things than the UPS app.

Yeah I did look on that site but it’s still stuck on nov. 9th pfffff

I'll be thinking good thoughts your way.

[Vampire_Jesus]

Got a mail from MRD today that my replacement WM175D is airborne from New Delhi Airport India and lands in Belgium tomorrow. If no delays then they will bring it to me this Sunday.

The end of an era Happy to hear man! Hope there aren't any further delays, you've already been through the ringer

Sounds like some good news after all bs you've had to put up with.

I was told factory photos this week, I really hope so, I want to email but I guess it's only Wednesday, emailing and asking will only be redundant

Fingers crossed they don't miss their estimation like mine did, it really makes the wait so much harder for a short period. I'd definitely hit 'em up next Monday-Tuesday though

[Vampire_Jesus]

Well, color me stunned.

I have a lot to do today, but I'll be back. I hereby bequeath my relatively excellent luck with manufacturing and shipping times onto the rest of you who are waiting, for whatever that's worth.

Yooo! Enjoy dude, nothing like the learning experience of the first one!

[Nackers]

@Peter_Holland: Nice to here your doll is moving, and by air no less. Fingers crossed it arrives soon.

@Mibdul: Awesome! One more person who can say the brutal wait is over. I really don't understand logistics at times, maybe sometimes the wait is because they don't have a connecting vehicle, or they have a backlog of packages to ship before yours. Who knows, shipping is still a black box even with track and trace.

@Dr3amBOx: I always try to be patient, I know what it's like trying to do regular work and at the same time getting bombarded with emails about progress updates. Like you, I always figure if someone says "this week" it's only fair to wait till "next week" before trying to get a progress update. No matter how eager I am. I am however mashing the update button on the tracking website for my doll every couple hours

[Nackers]

@Birdcaller: In the case of the new Zelex SLE dolls I'd give them a little leeway since they're so new and from all indications they have been selling like hotcakes. I think once the initial rush settles down they (and other vendors) will actually have them in stock for real. It's definitely disappointing that you tried to buy an "in stock" doll and it wasn't actually in stock though. I feel like they really should have updated their site with a warning message along the lines of "These dolls are popular and while we try to keep them in stock, they sell out quickly and we may need to ship from the factory". At least that way you'd be armed with that knowledge before you placed the order.

In an ideal world they should have contacted you the moment they didn't have one in stock for your order and asked if you wanted to cancel or were willing to wait on a factory one. Heck, in an ideal world, their inventory tracking would be hooked to their sales page so you wouldn't even be able to buy the doll without knowing if it was genuinely in stock or not.

[MechaTortilla]

I always try to be patient, I know what it's like trying to do regular work and at the same time getting bombarded with emails about progress updates.

The professions a person has worked in can change a lot about how they approach different situations.

Like after working retail or food service, you have an awareness of certain hassles that you would never think about otherwise.

Working manufacturing at various times definitely gives some insight into the problems that can arise when making and shipping complicated equipment, and a doll is pretty complicated equipment.

I'm currently waiting on some emails/videos to verify that some features were actually included in my order, and it's been a few days since they've last contacted me.

But I figure they are probably slammed with Black Friday orders and a much higher volume of customer service requests, so as impatient as I want to be, I can't fault them too much for being a little slow to fulfill a request that is time consuming and not helping to move any of their production forward.

So I'm sitting here, doll completed, waiting to be shipped, and it's being held up because I wanted to see a video of the shoulders shrugging and the hands being manipulated to make sure I got an EVO skeleton and articulated hands before it's shipped out and there's no way to solve it if I got a standard skeleton and wire fingers.

I feel bad giving them extra work to do, and I'm sure they have a lot on their plates, and will feel really bad if something is wrong with the doll's specs.

So yeah, being patient is nearly impossible right now, but Rosemary Doll has been incredibly helpful and AngelKiss got the doll completed very quickly and it looks absolutely perfect from what I can see so far.

I just really want to make sure the mobility is correct. I'm not even 100% sure AK does the old school skeletons or wire fingers, so I might be asking them to verify something for no reason. It doesn't look like an option on some sites, but Rosemary had EVO and Articulated as upgrades, so we'll see.

I wish the 3.0 hands had been an option, but I honestly don't think I'll miss that slight amount of side-to-side movement of the wrist. I have heard the fingers articulate a little more accurately when making a fist, but I don't think I'll be too upset about it either way.

Ok this ended up being a lot of tangents and thinking out loud.

Like I said, it's really hard to contain my enthusiasm at this point. The last 5 weeks have been difficult, but this is more so.

[Nackers]

@Mechatortilla: I absolutely get that. My previous doll I had the same sort of questions about the gel breasts, because on a still photo there's no way to verify whether they're gel or not. I felt bad for hassling them about proving they were gel but I'd have been pissed if they'd arrived and they were standard solid boobs after paying extra for gel. It's too late to ask once it's in the box and the courier has picked it up, so I'd rather be annoying before it's sent than after

I do find some of the ordering options confusing too. I think because of the way some sites have been designed you see options for some dolls that they can't possibly have - like boltless standing feet on a TPE doll. And sometimes options overlap, like movable jaw means the doll head is soft, but you can also pick soft head as an option. Should you pick both? Will you get billed extra for both when you really only needed to pick movable jaw? Or the doll has a choice of wired/articulated fingers but the manufacturer no longer makes wired fingers. It'd be nice if we could trust that the vendor sites were 100% accurate and up to date on options, and they worked in a logical way.

[Birdcaller]

Nackers

I do try to be patient, albeit every profession I’ve worked in absolutely no one has any for our tasks, it’s literally minutes or even seconds as ridiculous as that sounds.

What drives me nuts, and I have zero tolerance for, is the obvious and intentional lies. Now I may be completely wrong but from reading on here it seems like so many of these manufacturers, and venders specifically, got your money and, oh well so sad, wait, what else are you going to do we’ve got you and your money.

Doesn’t do any good to bitch anymore anyways. I’ll just learn more from everyone on here. One thing I do feel very good about is the maker and model of doll I did order. She’s beautiful, different, for me, by all accounts very good quality, options filled, with good LHP. Besides she already belongs to me I just want her home.

[Nackers]

I understand what you're saying. And it wouldn't surprise me if at least a few shops are that way. But at least some of them aren't I know a couple literally have the dolls available if you walk in and want to pick one up. So they're definitely not all bad.

As I mentioned I think it's worse on the SLE dolls because they're in such huge demand. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the shopping systems aren't updated in real time, so at the start of the day the doll you wanted might have been in stock but by the time you ordered it they'd actually sold the last few they had in stock, they just hadn't updated the website stock levels yet. I'd generally view this is poor inventory management rather than outright deceit. Of course if it continues to happen that opinion would change.

Annoyingly there are very few shopping sites that manage inventory really well. Mostly because it needs linking between online sales and physical sales.