OK, OK - Now I'm completely confused... [SOLVED]

[DavidMcCrossan]

This morn I received LXF 183.

This is at least 12 days sooner than normal over the 10 years I have been in Spain.

What is occurring?

Best

David

[ChriThor]

I was on holiday so I thought I'd pop it in your letter box since I was passing through...

We don't actually have control of distribution, unfortunately. I will see who deals with this kind of thing and find out what I can.

[dandnsmith]

Perhaps the guy who delivers it has changed, and the new one doesn't read it (just being paranoid).

Several years back, an American mag was persistently going missing at certain times of year, which roused my suspicions.
They re-sent whenever they still had copies, but we never found the cause. In the end I stopped subscribing to the paper copy, and got it on Kindle not so good if you want the DVDs and so on)

[Fat_Tuesday]

I was on holiday so I thought I'd pop it in your letter box since I was passing through...

Genius

[ChriThor]

David,

Can you tell me when you get your magazine roughly, please?

I can check with the person that deals with it and see if it tallies with the average distribution time for Spain through our third party.

Cheers,

[ChriThor]

Just a quick update to say that I can't progress with your query unless I get some dates for when your magazines are arriving.

Even if I can't solve the problem I should be able to get an adequate explanation.

Thanks!

[DavidMcCrossan]

Chris, I responded on reading your post, but my reply has got lorst....

I expect delivery from the 18th - 20th normally.

These past few years I have given up hope of getting anything before Xmas.

Much obliged for your kind efforts.

Best

David

[ChriThor]

Thanks, should have an answer for you very soon.

[ChriThor]

David,

Just to give you an idea of the situation, here's the route for LXF183:

Linux 183 was collected from Gibbons [printers] on the 20th March and would have been processed/lodged with the postal provider within 24hrs. Typical delivery times into Europe should be 5-10 working days for a standard service. (The majority of titles denote that all EUR items are sent via a standard service, and ROW items via a priority service).

We do see a slight variance in delivery speeds depending on the optimum route/postal supplier being utilised for any given magazine issue (which can vary on a day-to-day basis dependant on Qtys/weights etc of the magazine), though we would only expect to see a fluctuation of a day or so at most and whichever route is utilised should still fall within the 5-10 delivery guideline. On that basis the usual delivery times for this subscriber specified below do seem slightly outside of what we would anticipate.

Final delivery would always be made by the local post in Spain, however we’re doing a little more in-depth analysis of routes utilised for Spain over the last few weeks to see whether there have been any notable changes/pattern etc. We’ve not been advised of any local delays or issues either with Spain or postal routes into Spain and would therefore presume this is most likely a local delivery issue, however we’ll revert with any further details as soon as we have finished our analysis.

I will mention to them that this was something that's been occurring for a very long time, as it appears I didn't mention it.

As you can see that 'early' issue has roughly the delay we'd expect from when it leaves our printers and should arrive at your door, which means your 'normal' delivery time is very, very late for some reason we've yet to nail down.

This could be down to local post and that depends on where you are in Spain. If you're in a main city then this a concern, but a rural location may be a major contributory factor to the delay. Doesn't explain why your issue can suddenly turn up earlier though...

[DavidMcCrossan]

Thanx Chris, for your reply. You have certainly done your homework!

I live on the Costa Blanca in a tourist area called Orihuela Costa, about 25 miles South of Alicante. About 30,000 heads here, and 100,000 in Torrevieja, a few miles away. Both on the N332 main drag (and it is when the tourists are here...).

Mail is delivered to the Correos, which is some 50m from the Mail Room.

We are familiar with the fast burro/slow burro conundrum...

New Scientist normally takes 5-6 working days - generally once per week.

Hope this gives you the info you need.

Many kind regards

David

[ChriThor]

David,

Can you PM me your contact info (address and email) or email me at chris Dot thornett AT futurenet.com, please.

Thanks!

[DavidMcCrossan]

Thanx, Chris - email is in the post.

Best

David

[DavidMcCrossan]

Out of a clear blue sky came LXF184 with mint deb 64 bit edition - just wot I have been waiting for!

It was sent vas PPI Mag Service, for which I thank them - and Chris Thornett.

Best regards

Davi

[ChriThor]

That's better and I'd say that's about the expected delay for European deliveries (7 to 10 days).

We're still uncovering the reason for the long delays in the past as a general concern and should know soon.

[ChriThor]

Just to close this up. You've been put on priority mail service for your copies of LXF, which should speed up your future deliveries to Spain. Unfortunately, we can't do anything about the local post but that's as close as we can get to resolving the situation for you. Fingers crossed.

Again, sorry for the past problems but hopefully you'll see an improvement from now on.