Volks Japan webstore maintenance and update

I can't order anything for a while anyway (holidays killed my wallet) but I certainly won't be ordering until they do the card option, as I personally refuse to pay the Paypal fee. Beyond that, I echo everyone else's woes.

I can't order anything for a while anyway (holidays killed my wallet) but I certainly won't be ordering until they do the card option, as I personally refuse to pay the Paypal fee. Beyond that, I echo everyone else's woes.

 

I don't think they're allowed to ask you to cover paypal fees. It's against Paypal's ToS.

I can't order anything for a while anyway (holidays killed my wallet) but I certainly won't be ordering until they do the card option, as I personally refuse to pay the Paypal fee. Beyond that, I echo everyone else's woes.

 

I don't think they're allowed to ask you to cover paypal fees. It's against Paypal's ToS.

Nope, they totally did. They added it on as a "handling charge" that wasn't there if you paid directly via a card. Other sites do this as well, along with many individual sellers. Paypal may have that in their ToS, but they don't really care, so long as they get their money (PP basically told me "don't buy from them if you don't like it").

 

If someone does order from the site soon, can they confirm if there's an additional 3-4% tacked on the invoice somewhere?

I don't know if the new site does it, but the old site has always done that. There was an extra handling charge if you picked PayPal instead of credit card. It was around 5% I think.

 

"4.6 No Surcharges. You agree that you will not impose a surcharge or any other fee for accepting PayPal as a payment method. You may charge a handling fee in connection with the sale of goods or services, as long as the handling fee does not operate as a surcharge and is not higher than the handling fee you charge for non-PayPal transactions"

 

You want to be the one to report them?

 

It's not all that uncommon. All credit card associations have similar terms. But occasionally you see small stores with signs say an extra 3% charge for using credit cards, or 5% discount for using cash.

Hmm. I never knew that. Then again I always paid using a card and not paypal. Are the FGO orders (for those who paid using paypal) also subject to that "handling fee"?

If someone does order from the site soon, can they confirm if there's an additional 3-4% tacked on the invoice somewhere?

 

one thing to keep note of is also comparing the prices from the japanese side and english side, since for instance at amiami there is segregated pricing between the two sides of the site (actually the discount % to be accurate) based on sales tax or not.

 

so if the english side prices of volks int is now lower it returns to business as usual, even with the added paypal fee's.

 

But still not what it should be for actual international purchases. ie. Tax free.

 

edit: Quick check netted same prices on both sides.. unless the possible paypal fees are included in the classic handling fee's that were taken even with the old system.

Edited December 29, 2018 by Guest

Jungle does this too. Well, it used to be a Paypal fee since they only took that as payment. After they started also accepting credit cards they still charge it and it's a generic "handling fee" or something.

 

I haven't seen the following in years, probably since back in the 1980s and before the internet, but it wasn't uncommon for mail-order places to charge a percentage for credit cards to cover the fee the card holders charge. This especially happened if you used American Express, who charged the businesses more than Visa and MasterCard did; I don't know if that's still the case. Actually this type of extra fee is still quite common if you use your credit card to pay fees such as property taxes, court costs, etc.

 

finnleo: Volks charges international customers the Japanese consumption tax (8%?) so I think the prices are the same on both sides. Amiami charges it too and claims the discount percentage off the total + tax so those numbers are actually bogus. That tax isn't required to be charged for sales outside of Japan AFAIK and as such I do not know if it's actually paid as tax or just kept by the sellers. CDJapan, Amazon Japan and others do not charge the tax though the prices listed on the site tend to include it, and it gets removed during the checkout process. It's the same for me if I order items from the UK normally I do not pay VAT.

 

Edit: I'm speaking from a US perspective; I don't know how it works ordering from other countries since I have no experience.

 

finnleo: Volks charges international customers the Japanese consumption tax (8%?) so I think the prices are the same on both sides. Amiami charges it too and claims the discount percentage off the total + tax so those numbers are actually bogus. That tax isn't required to be charged for sales outside of Japan AFAIK and as such I do not know if it's actually paid as tax or just kept by the sellers. CDJapan, Amazon Japan and others do not charge the tax though the prices listed on the site tend to include it, and it gets removed during the checkout process. It's the same for me if I order items from the UK normally I do not pay VAT.

 

Edit: I'm speaking from a US perspective; I don't know how it works ordering from other countries since I have no experience.

 

Volks charging the japanese sales tax (or VAT, or GST) has been discussed elsewhere on the forum, There the consensus was that international tax free sales would probably have to be reported differently than domestic taxed one's (at least here its that way) so they most likely oped for the easy way out, hence everybody is treated the same.

 

Amiami's prices/discount percentage used to be quite different between the two language versions when they started the english side and it went along with the sales tax % at the time, but now they seem to have unified the treatment there also upon closer inspection - so thats no longer a comparison.

 

But the general rule goes that if you are selling stuff outside of the economic trade zone your in, sales tax should not be applied. For instance inside the EU sales tax is applied in the country of origin. if someone sells from the EU to the States, its the USA's IRS's headache to get the sales tax from you one way or the other, but as far as I know they don't bother for individual people -- unlike vice versa, where either you pay the sales tax here along with the customs charges - or your stuff gets shipped back to the sender.

 

 

EDIT: Apparently others have inquired directly and there this in the How-To page:

 

Payment can only be made through PayPal.

*We are currently in the process of setting up direct credit card payment. In the meantime, we ask that customers who wish to pay with their credit card make their payment via PayPal.

*Credit cards are also available for PayPal.

 

 

 

So give them time, and the wonders if Nicos should return.

I am not sure if this is related to Underwhelming Site Improvements, but: I did go in but I had to 'forgot password'and change it anyway because I had forgotten what it was, and changed my password successfully.

But I then got a -completely blank email- from them titled パスワード変更完了のお知らせ (notice of password change). It being blank is weird but I imagine it would be even more confusing to people who couldnt read the title. It is -really- bizarre to me that they made such a big thing of separating the international/japanese customer databases (I think thats what it was anyway?) and yet theres still so much Japanese text.

 

this is honestly just extremely bad all around. I actually can not figure out how things are being grouped - it cant possibly be by popularity or none of the 20cm Dollfie stuff would be coming up first.

 

I didn't actually know about the paypal fee thing because I was positive I had always had to pay a fee with amiami and just assumed that's how paypal works, because its not something I've paid a lot of attention to. I do like using paypal and tend to prefer it, but I would prefer having the choice.

 

But the real test will come with the after event, I guess. If the whole thing crashes anyway despite these 'improvements' - which I can only hope are mostly structual and not aesthetic- then I'm going to be pretty irritated. Remember, there's gonna be a lot more people checking out at once now that you cant let things sit in your cart anymore.

 

EDIT: I looked at it again just now and now you can search by size and the 20cm dollfie stuff arent the first things that come up under outfits. I dont know when this was changed but I'm very glad for it.

Why change something when there's no improvement, and actually it's worse? Maybe it's somehow better on their end but I sort of doubt that given everything else.

 

This absolutely reeks of the renewal quote from their vendor for their storefront was higher than they liked, so they searched for a lower quote at the last minute. Their existing product database from the old site has been crudely dumped into a new database, and the new vendor is still working on the conversion.

 

I'd guess that's also the reason for the Paypal change earlier in the year, and was probably when the search for a new webstore vendor started.

This absolutely reeks of the renewal quote from their vendor for their storefront was higher than they liked, so they searched for a lower quote at the last minute. Their existing product database from the old site has been crudely dumped into a new database, and the new vendor is still working on the conversion.

 

I'd guess that's also the reason for the Paypal change earlier in the year, and was probably when the search for a new webstore vendor started.

Now that you point this out I agree.

Found something else crappy about the new website. On the old site, if they had less than 10 of an item you could tell this because the drop down box for selecting a quantity to order would only show the number they have. The Volks USA site doesn't do this but it will still not let you buy more than they have; if you select more than their stock it gives you a warning and only puts what they have in your cart.

 

Because of the looming/eventual discontinuance of old body parts I had looked at the previous Volks Japan webstore and noted various parts that they had less than 10 of by checking those drop down boxes. As I remembered some of the items they had few of I checked them now, and they all show 10. Worse, unlike the USA store, it will let you put those 10 in your cart with no warning.

 

In other words, for the time being at least, the webstore has no knowledge of actual stock. I'd also bet that thus when something sells out it doesn't go to showing sold out automatically either but they have to manually enter that. Given the current ordering proces where you have to wait for an order confirmation and Paypal invoice, it's going to be extra annoying.

 

Especially if I'm right about that and it's still working this way when the coming After Event clickwar takes place!

I think I ordered a DDS f3 body. I'm not sure what happened and I feel icky about it. Half the checkout page was in Japanese and in the end they sent me an email saying they'll ask for PayPal details later. This website feels half baked (unfortunately that's the norm for new software nowadays...) but at least it has filtering options and useful search? It seemed decent, I was sure I wasn't able to find something I wanted.

 

It'll be really interesting to see how this holds up to an event (after party or outfit collection). They had a certain amount of security built into their website to prevent people from buying items when they shouldn't be able to, such as before the event starts. I have feeling it's going to be a smurf-show now (for lack of a censored word).

 

This absolutely reeks of the renewal quote from their vendor for their storefront was higher than they liked, so they searched for a lower quote at the last minute.

Yeah, having to do a rewrite for new features seems to be what's happened. The old site was so ancient (I can't remember the Volks store website ever looking different), the code had probably gotten so old that a rewrite may have been the only option. I was thinking recently how much cruft they had to work around in that that they were still using fixed size images for their product shots, and using white padding around the images to make them fit on the website. Every single product image was 570x570 pixels. Thats like, so last century.

 

I'm sure this will go woosh over most peoples' heads but they must have been emitting HTML markup directly from JavaServer Pages. It gives me shivers just thinking about it.

I have not made a purchase on the new site yet so cannot say anything about that, but they way it is organized now is so much better to me. I can actually find things now. Instead of searching by "name brand" I can search by "what fits" properly (before the results were. . . . eh). I also like the limited stuff can be found with the general clothing too, now I know The Daughter/Servant of Evil sets can still be bought at retail value! I also think the site is much cleaner visually. Pictures when scrolling are a good size and a lot of the background is plain so it is not distracting. So far I definitely prefer the feel of the new site, whether or not the code is truly put together on the back-end and how the payment process goes is a different story.

Okay, I decided to register for the new website since I would like to order something from the February collection.

 

Has anyone tried to fill in their shipping address? Mine are blank and when I try to fill it in, it gives me a form that heavily implies that I live in Japan. With prefecture, I'm able to choose "other" but it does not give me the option to choose which country I live in.

Okay, I decided to register for the new website since I would like to order something from the February collection.

 

Has anyone tried to fill in their shipping address? Mine are blank and when I try to fill it in, it gives me a form that heavily implies that I live in Japan. With prefecture, I'm able to choose "other" but it does not give me the option to choose which country I live in.

 

Is that when making an order or some account info setup? I think your shipping address only matters when they give you the PayPal invoice. When you select payment method on checkout, all the payment methods are Japan only except "Other payment method" which overseas customers are supposed to pick. It says they'll calculate the shipping charges when they make the invoice.

 

The checkout screen just has postal code, address 2 and address 3, and I guess you can put whatever you want in there. Actually looking at my account info my country is set to Canada but I can't modify it (・・')

Okay, I decided to register for the new website since I would like to order something from the February collection.

 

Has anyone tried to fill in their shipping address? Mine are blank and when I try to fill it in, it gives me a form that heavily implies that I live in Japan. With prefecture, I'm able to choose "other" but it does not give me the option to choose which country I live in.

International people need to go through this link to fill out the application for registering, there's a box for 'country' in this one!

https://ec.volks.co.jp/apply.html?id=REGISTRATION1&bu=

Since I had mine before the change over I noticed that they did have it correct on some account info page, but it was all blank in the shipping section. I filled it in as best I could, but I'm not too worried about it as they do have my address from my old account, and PayPal will send them the correct address when I pay that way.

 

But I do admit that it's going to be a big enough pain that I'm just going back to waiting for the Volks USA lotteries for things. I know not everyone has that option.

I actually just signed in to the new site since the update, and there is something that worries me a bit.

 

No order History.

 

my Nier 9S pre-order is not showing up. I can live with my Len order, and other goodies going AWOL, as those are in the past. But I am currently out more than $120CAD, and there is no evidence of my order...

 

For those who contacted Volks’ customer support, did they provide any reassurances?

That part at least is addressed in the information pages where it states:

 

Purchase history display

 

Regarding the purchase history ordered and reserved at the old site, it is currently under preparation.

We are planning to reflect it sequentially in future updates.

 

Your purchase history has been carefully kept at our company. We apologize for any inconvenience but please wait for a while.

So hopefully everything is ok with that, and hopefully all this will be fixed long before 2B and 9S are ready to ship.

I actually just signed in to the new site since the update, and there is something that worries me a bit.

 

No order History.

 

my Nier 9S pre-order is not showing up. I can live with my Len order, and other goodies going AWOL, as those are in the past. But I am currently out more than $120CAD, and there is no evidence of my order...

 

For those who contacted Volks’ customer support, did they provide any reassurances?

 

This has happend to me too,but I still haven’t contacted them about it.

With the lottery/after event madness I figured it’ll be better to wait a bit...

I'm sure they'll fix it, but this sort of thing is why I keep all my confirmation emails until I actually receive my orders. Just in case my history gets "lost", I have proof I ordered 9S...

Can anyone tell me what the collective fees are for using Paypal with Volks, including Volks' fees? I have money set aside for my lottery items (about 200$ more than the price before fees) but I'm guessing I should set aside a little more for those fees and shipping.

 

If my guessing is correct it's like 8% plus another 3% in paypal conversion fees but that might be off.

I'm sure they'll fix it, but this sort of thing is why I keep all my confirmation emails until I actually receive my orders. Just in case my history gets "lost", I have proof I ordered 9S...

 

Oooh. Good point. I still have my confirmation email. That’s gonna stick around. Thanks for reminding me of what I shoulda remembered.

International people need to go through this link to fill out the application for registering, there's a box for 'country' in this one!

https://ec.volks.co.jp/apply.html?id=REGISTRATION1&bu=

 

That's for new registrations. I had an account on the old website so in that case, you just needed to change your password. My address/country is mentioned in "User Information" but my address wasn't mentioned in the Address Book.