I've been waiting on a big order since December also. At first I was in good contact with them, always with promises of "next week ". 25 unanswered emails later I'm starting to get a little pissed. I thought PayPal extended the dispute time from 45 days to 180?That is correct.
They are taking a pounding on their Facebook page. Does show the extent of their poor business practice. I got my last order following a PayPal dispute but will not order again. The photos above of recent casting are shocking.
Here's one issue I can join in with too:
* Order placed in July 2017;
* Most of it arrives, but several packs missing;
* Compliment slip included in order for reference, promising a follow-up;
* Emailed to ask 'any news yet' just a few times; and,
* Just sent them another email reminder today (23/April/2019).
What do you think my chances are? Giddy with anticipation ;)
Meanwhile they are running their 3rd kickstarter of the year.
I also received a personal email committing to making good and throwing in some extras to make up for it. That was a couple of weeks ago. I will believe it when it arrives. In the meantime, I managed to find an eBay seller with some BTD and also did some surgery on the inaccurate figures. Not great, but they will do.
It will be my last BTD order.
Ordered a bit over a month ago and nothing has happened since.
I was sending emails and facebook mails, but no replies, so I gave up. Just made a paypal claim and no response to that either.
I needed the minis for a game at the end of this month, so I could not wait longer. So I order some alternatives to the ones I wanted, from Mirliton instead. They came right away.
I don't even need or want the models from BTD anymore.
Too bad, since they have a lot of great minis.
They've got form mate:
https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=112741.msg1410318#msg1410318 (https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=112741.msg1410318#msg1410318)
It's been going on for years, I'm not exaggerating. I remember reading stuff like this 15+ years ago on TMP. Which led to the hilarious charade of the 'Sock Puppet' incident. People like yourself were rightfully complaining, Harry, and then 'persons unknown' were coming on saying 'Why don't you just give them a call instead of whining here', 'I've had great service, stop bitching, bitch' etc.
Then brilliantly Bill exposed the fact that everyone slagging off 'the whiners' were all from the same IP address, the same one as Black Trees!! lol lol lol
They came clean, apologised, and were never seen on the TMP again.
And checking, I exaggerated earlier.. it was only four months for the incorrect order to arrive.
Four months is still a silly amount of time to wait for an order :-X
Carlos, it's not US or UK owned. It's three guys, and they moved from Cornwall to Texas. When they moved they kept an 'office' open in the UK, but it's just an address, there's no UK employees of BlackT. There's no US ones either, just these three guys, the Edwards Bros and John Olsen. All the casting is done by contractors.
Yep, from what i have observed, and been able to glean, essentially all their stuff is pretty much like a Kickstarter, so they run constant sales, and when they have a large enough volume of orders for a specific set of moulds - they order in the metal and outsource to casters, (and it's not clear to me even what involvement they have in fulfillment) then fulfill the orders, there is negligible to zero stock on hand, so no storage, no warehousing, no dead stock, just a set of moulds awaiting pre-orders. They also seem to wait to fulfill O/S orders until they have a critical mass to make the freight as cheap as possible.
So you may be lucky, so that you have ordered exactly the same large order as another 50 folk, so the money is there for them to get the casters working. Woe betide if you want one of something on another spin.
And my experience is they will just ship the order with some of the stuff you want, and hope you get bored asking for the correct stuff.
So that's my theory.
I’ve always been lucky & got everything within 2 to 4 weeks from them.
I’ve not ordered from them for a couple of years though.
It’s always made me laugh when they ‘find’ some Dr who stock in the warehouse! How big do they think we all think that bloody warehouse is?
Thinking about it, it must be f###### massive if they keep getting lost for months picking people’s orders lol lol lol lol
Sorry Katie, I be clearer. There wasn't a single Doctor Who casting left at Harlequin Miniatures.
They bankrupted Harlequin, moved all the moulds into new premises and started casting Doctor Who miniatures again, and when the BBC wrote to them they spun the tale they had bought the stock from Harlequin.
Tsk, I just placed an order - even having read this thread - having not noticed whom I was buying from. Which places me in the "fingers crossed" camp.
Hopefully PayPal's refund system is robust enough that I can look into that a month or so from now if it doesn't work out (and I really can't be waiting longer than that for the figures I ordered as they're due for a game in the New Year ...besides obviously most orders should have arrived by then anyway).
I don't really think they're competing with Warlord. I buy BTD Dr Who stuff because I already have a bunch (I bought a load yonks ago at a Fantizan in Newark in the 90s when they were, I think, still Harlequin) and don't want to switch scale: apart from anything else, all my terrain is 28mm too. (I'm just putting up with the 'adventurous' sculpting of some of the figures).
I don't think I'd be buying Warlords version because I just don't like the figure style. OTOH, I have just ordered loads of plastic sprues from Warlord in their sale to use for historical characters... so they're both winning out.
All the casting is done by contractors.
That might be the biggest problem. So I guess they are taking orders without checking if the molds still are ok, the casting quality is ok, stock is balanced and the shipping from their contractors to the customer is on time?
Doesn't sound like a good business model to me. If they don't want any hassle with casting & shipping, why not license their ranges out to well established manufacturers and get a small % for every model sold? Free money, no hassle, nothing...
I’m still chasing up a 100 quid plus order from
Xmas 2018. And they keep issuing new Kickstarters! So annoyed.
Good luck with that, I'm still waiting for them to correct an order from the same period.
It might be a stretch to say they have "continued" any ranges at all, given the continuous customer complaints...
https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=112741.0
Caveat emptor applies in this case, very much.
It's strange that over the years there have been constant complaints about BTD service and yet, the four times I have used them (over about a ten year period) I have had prompt service. They are clearly a bit hit and miss. Perhaps I just rolled 6's on the delivery dice lol
I'm about to contact them again. The only thing you can do is threaten their livelihood by telling people what to expect, though I am going to lodge a complaint with the Competition and Markets Authority in the UK.
We shall see. In my view they should either be shut down or compelled to recompense customers.
Looks indeed like they oop'd a.o. their Germans & Picts. Best if they sold their stuff ( molds masters and reproduction rights ) to someone who actually knows how to run a business...
They running some kickstarters now atm, depending on the critics if the deliver when funded it might be tempted to order again from them, but up to then, no way. Too risky after all insiders have told me.
For what it's worth, I always got my order although once it was 2 months or so waiting.
More productively, 2nd hand BTD seem to turn up often on Colonel Bills - so maybe keep an eye on their webstore?
I’m owed part of an order ( a regt of 20 romans) from a Xmas sale in 2017!
Sent the rest if the order over 2 deliveries, the second part only after a lot of emails and queries. Came with a note saying they would be delivered later, but never sent and every email after that just ignored.
1) Why do people even order from them?
You’ll be all glad to know that the Christmas Sale is now on ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
You’ll be all glad to know that the Christmas Sale is now on ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
Is it still the 2005 Christmas sale they never bothered to close? lol
Because they have some great mini's at an excellent price.Judging by what I had from them the one time I made the error of ordering.
It's a shame, I really want some of the Ancient Germanics. I have some Foundry ones which are great, but am put off by the high price of getting more and the BTD ones look like they'd fit in well style and scale-wise.I don't know if this is any use to you but Foundry do have a Christmas sale on.
Judging by what I had from them the one time I made the error of ordering.
No...not great minis at all lol
If they don't deliver and you can't get the figures then what is the point?
You may get the figures...or some figures. It's a game of chance. ;)
But reading your comments over the boards I wonder if there's anything in this hobby you actually do like?proves you've never read any of my comments lol
OK, so I decided to place another order after getting a previous order in days (rather than the normal weeks/months) at the end of Nov 2019. Here we are today (mid Jan) and nothing. I have sent 10+ emails to no affect.
Is there a reason I put myself through this? Sadly, these miniatures were for a game I was planning to put on at a convention in March. Guessing I'm not getting them for that:-(
Has anybody ordered/received anything in that time period (01 Dec to Today)???
OK, so I decided to place another order after getting a previous order in days (rather than the normal weeks/months) at the end of Nov 2019. Here we are today (mid Jan) and nothing. I have sent 10+ emails to no affect.
Is there a reason I put myself through this? Sadly, these miniatures were for a game I was planning to put on at a convention in March. Guessing I'm not getting them for that:-(
Has anybody ordered/received anything in that time period (01 Dec to Today)???
My last Black Friday order I placed (2018), arrived at the end of August 2019.
You’ll get them, it just takes a while.
My last Black Friday order I placed (2018), arrived at the end of August 2019.
You’ll get them, it just takes a while.
In good time, or 'at all'.
UK or US?...
Sorry, should have said, I'm in the UK.
UK or US?...
I made the rather foolish decision to start my Dalek army there, I was planning to get tons of stuff but I might just stick to my first order.
Its a pity because there are picture out there of people who have managed to get quite a few.
I've already sent them a kindly worded email yesterday, How long should I wait before spamming them with "Oi! Where me Daleks at!?!"
Thanks for the advice, it's a pity that they are the only place to get Classic Daleks from, I might make a force of the 2010 Daleks with Ebay.
UK or US?...
That’s something that it’s good to know… from which branch you order and from where you order… Looks like BTD US are “faster” on delivery, no?
As today is Trafalgar Day, perhaps we should re-dedicate the Royal Navy's famous toast:
"To the Immortal Memory - of the order we placed with Black Tree Design, some [insert number here] months ago!"
Hi Guys
It's unethical for me to speak bad of another miniature company, but they aren't a real company so maybe I should pile on lol
In all seriousness, they are not a positive force in the hobby. And if people stop ordering from them, they may actually sell the range on to someone who gives a hoot about you , the hobby and the community. Every order you give them keeps the zombie staggering on.
(I wouldn't buy the range BTW, I wouldn't give the Edwards and Olsen my money)
I don't think they do Atheling.
It's a business basic just to keep your Facebook page upto date. A glance down their posts shows you this isn't a group of people who are engaging with their public.
I went on there because they were using painted Crusader Miniatures as their header photo. They did change it when I pointed this out to be fair.
I'm afraid it's really hit or miss with them and you seem to have got a miss.
Are they still in business?The business of stealing and ripping people off?
No
Will I ever see my order shipped?
Yes
Should I consider to open a refund action?
The business of stealing and ripping people off?
Yes. They're still very much in that business
NoYes
I must admit I didn't see this thread before to buy months ago, my bad! >:(
A long thread.
Why? ???
There's thousands of figures to choose from in the world, why put yourself through the BlackT experience again? I'm genuinely baffled in an unfunny way.
I'll wait for clearer post-brexit-shipping-vat news and I will try another again.
To be fair they have some interesting figures in their different ranges. The static German MG set is particularly good. I also really like the looks of their HYW foot knights and the older fantasy dwarves figures (the ones with integral bases)...
Yep. I have picked up a few BTD figs second hand that have been very nice, and I'm still looking for a third m/c combo. But a slightly less nice figure in the hand is worth any number of prettier figures never received..
Some people enjoy the thrill of high stakes gambling. Many more enjoy endless, mind-numbing, soul deadening, hours spent pulling the lever of a fruit machine in the hope of beating long odds and winning some paltry pay out. To each their own.
Maybe their client base fancy their chances of beating the odds, even though they know the machines in this particular casino are fixed by crooked operators? The casino bosses occasionally allow a bet to beat the house in order to keep the punters flowing through the doors.
Maybe I missed something but I placed an order to Blacktree/Eoeorbis UK website nov 11th 2020 and it's still "unfulfilled".
I tried to contact with all the emails I found on their websites (US and UK) since december but I got no answer at all.
Are they still in business?
Will I ever see my order shipped?
Should I consider to open a refund action?
Cheers
Ordered some Saxon Cavalry early May and like Dianna Ross I’m still waiting :-[Nine months later and still nothing.I think I can safely say this is now theft.Another pal who ordered at the same time hasn’t had his figures either. PayPal were no help either. Chalk it down to experience I suppose and warn everyone not to deal with these fraudsters.
I did email after a couple of months which possibly got the ball rolling again, it does seem to be a hobby rather than a business and I have no issue with that but some transparency, especially for those new to their company, wouldn't go amiss.
Congrats.I meant to ask, does your friend/servant Hung Ho also paint your minis? :D
My aforementioned gamble of an order came after 7 weeks, which prompted me to get hung ho and make another small order which came in....4 days :o
I meant to ask, does your friend/servant Hung Ho also paint your minis? :D
I order from them regularly, including an order today and I already got a tracking number.
BUT — I try to limit my orders to what is on sale for any given week as that is what they are currently casting. If you order other items and they are out of stock, there can be significant delays until they can fill the order.
Do you order from the US or UK site?
As I understand it, it's a one person operation so while I obviously prefer fast turn around, the slowness is - to me - understandable (and kind of matches my experience with a couple of other boutique manufacturers as well).
I'll also note that the miniatures were cast to a high standard - no flash at all, and very minimal mold lines (on many minis, basically none). This contrasts favourably to the GW LotR metal minis I received as a present at Christmas (what a mess).
Personally, I'm happy to order from them again.
I knew them personally 20 years ago, when they were based in Nottingham. The tales I could tell you of their business practises would make your toes curl.
I wish The WAB Forum was still in existence; just to link up the Black Tree thread from the forum.Here you go: link (https://web.archive.org/web/20160423032143/http://wabforum.co.uk/index.php). I couldn't find the thread in question, but perhaps you remember where it was located.
I really do not understand why people take the risk of ordering from them at all. They have had an appalling record for over two decades!
I know quite a few one person show companies that get the miniatures cast to a very high standard who get them in the post very quickly and they are with me within a few days max.
I've never ordered from them due to their dreadful record going back many years- not just on this forum- they were notoriously bad even in the days of The WAB Forum and that's going back a bit!
Here you go: link (https://web.archive.org/web/20160423032143/http://wabforum.co.uk/index.php). I couldn't find the thread in question, but perhaps you remember where it was located.
I placed an order on December 27th for some UNIT troops for a Dr Who game, they are still showing as 'unfulfilled' on the BTD website and l suspect that the will never be fulfilled!
I ordered a similar quantity of UNIT types from Crooked Dice last Sunday, l received an email telling me my order was complete the next day, they are more expensive but at least they will turn up, it is just a shame CD do not make anything resembling a Cyberman :-[
A warning to everyone, don't use this company me and a wargames friend have each been robbed of over £60 by this outfit.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED
Despite all the warnings, I ordered a couple of packs from Black Tree on 1st April. On 11th April I changed my mind and cancelled the order. I chased this up today for a refund and got it credited back soon after which I thought was pretty good. I replied with thanks mentioning the forum bad press but their swift response in my case had been much appreciated. They came back with:-
“I know there are lots of complaints on the forums, most of them are warranted. We were hit very hard by the Pandemic as were many companies. We are beginning to make headway on catching up but it is hard. We will keep soldering on :)”
Despite all the warnings, I ordered a couple of packs from Black Tree on 1st April. On 11th April I changed my mind and cancelled the order. I chased this up today for a refund and got it credited back soon after which I thought was pretty good. I replied with thanks mentioning the forum bad press but their swift response in my case had been much appreciated. They came back with:-
“I know there are lots of complaints on the forums, most of them are warranted. We were hit very hard by the Pandemic as were many companies. We are beginning to make headway on catching up but it is hard. We will keep soldering on :)”
Yeah. what was the excuse before Covid? Spanish Flu? Ebola? It's not as if this wasn't an issue before March 2020.
Yeah. what was the excuse before Covid? Spanish Flu? Ebola? It's not as if this wasn't an issue before March 2020.
Here you go: link (https://web.archive.org/web/20160423032143/http://wabforum.co.uk/index.php). I couldn't find the thread in question, but perhaps you remember where it was located.
I think a lot of the issues are around with dealing with a small outfit, who is kept very busy with, is it pretty much a one man band?
One that (allegedly) used to be registered in the UK but could afford to peg it to the USA?
I have no idea what the setup or financing history of the company is/was/may have been. My dealings have been with a few orders over a period of time within the UK. I think there may have been a US and UK setup which then split some years back. I recall the website login changing although quite some years back.
other than as a customer I've had no dealings with the operation and setup or can vouch to either. I would caution against conclusions based on those external to the company see. As how it seems a company is operating maybe based on some partnership/affiliation with other companies or inidividuals setup, cash injection, line of credit that as a confidential business arrangement is generally not known to the rest of us.
Thats why I was simply asking if a one man band or not as I don't know, and that could be a factor in the context I mentioned. Just wishing to clarify, not trying to start an arguement.
I've heard of issues over the years and was just advising of my own personal experience has been upto now are positive. I think the issues are more how the company is run than about the integrity of the owner.
Following the success of my last order l placed another on 24th March, more Dr Who figures. It arrived yesterday, all complete! It is not the fastest service but it has arrived!