If I Die Suddenly - Blame Diamond

I almost had an aneurism this morning - all thanks to Diamond Distribution. Yes, I told Craig that if it happens again and I DO die suddenly he should sue them for millions.

Here's what happened... every Friday morning we go onto Diamond's web site to see what we've got coming in for the following week and how much it's going to cost us. Then we take the list, edit it for public consumption and post it onto our web site so our customers can see what's coming in. Well, we went on and looked at this week's invoice. Before any of the books coming in was a LONG list - probably around 150 items, all of which werer ordered by us in October, that were cancelled. Here's just a small sample of the many items on the list, so you can see how I nearly died:

STAR WARS DARK TIMES #3 (OF 5)
BATMAN YEAR ONE DELUXE SC
GREEN LANTERN #16
ULTIMATES 2 #13
ASTONISHING X-MEN #20
FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST VOL 11 TP
CIVIL WAR THE RETURN

It wasn't just junk stuff that might never show up. These are serious titles!

I thought maybe our check got lost in the mail or somehow we did something we weren't supposed to that we didn't even know about and they were cancelling our stuff, month by month. I almost threw up right there in the office!!

Craig called, but of course our rep wasn't in yet. It was just before 8 am when we saw this, and our rep doesn't get in until 9 am our time. He spoke with some other Diamond guy who said our October order looked fine and he had no idea why the stuff showed cancelled on our invoice. Well, Craig seemed to think that I should have been comforted by that. However, I know Diamond and how one person never seems to talk to another and how 3/4 of the people there don't seem to be able to see past the end of their nose. So, I was NOT comforted. I had to sit down and try to relax.

Once the room stopped spinning I took a shower and got ready for work. At 9 am Craig called our rep again, who of course didn't answer his phone. Craig left a message - but in the instructions had the rep call the store - where we weren't at that point. After he hung up he realized his error. We left the house and went to Starbucks to enjoy a venti chi and then Craig called our rep again. Turns out someone over there pressed some magic button and deleted the outstanding October orders of a bunch of Diamond accounts. Our rep said we were one of 30 messages he had to return on the incident when he arrived to work today.

Later we received the Diamond Daily email, and it said this:

Important Announcement Regarding Erroneous Products Appearing on Retailer Invoices
Lead Stories, Diamond Daily, 12/29/2006

Retailers are advised that, due to a computer error, some OCT06 items marked as "uncancelled" appear on the order status report for products shipping on January 4. These items should be disregarded.

In addition, some previously cancelled items may also appear on the invoice for products shipping on January 4, and may fill with that week's shipment. If you receive any previously cancelled items in error, please contact your Customer Service Representative.

Diamond regrets any inconvenience caused by this error. Retailers with further questions should contact their Diamond Customer Service Representative.

They ALWAYS regret the error. I hope they really regret it when retailers start jumping out of their apartment windows and having heart attacks. Thankfully it's all worked out, or so they claim, and things are all good. Keep your fingers crossed - I know I am.