Adventures in birthday shopping

Alex had a birthday a couple of weeks ago. Per his request, I ordered parts to upgrade his guitar and guitar tab software. Mind you, I have no idea what this stuff is, really, other than guitar stuff. The parts were electrical and needed a soldering iron to install, but we have a friend who does that stuff and was happy to come help.

Problem #1: One of the guitar parts got left off the list. No biggie. I went back to the site and ordered it. When it came in, Alex's face fell. It was the wrong part. I e-mailed the company: "I got the wrong piece. The invoice says I'm supposed to have H23 but the box says I23. How do I exchange it?"

We were on vacation when I got this reply: "There is no record of an H23 on any of your orders. Please send a copy of the invoice and, if possible, digital pictures of what you received."

Umm, OK. When we got home, I scanned in the invoice, but I couldn't find the camera. (Go figure.) So I went to their site and, now being quite familiar with how to find things, sent a link to the piece we got. Today I got this answer. "Please send the piece to (address) and we will send your H86 right out. Thanks for shopping with us and reply to this e-mail if you have any other questions."

Jeez, H23, H86, whatever! Why can't you just send me the part? Send me what I mean, not what I said! (Why, yes, the box DID say I86! It's still the wrong piece!)

Problem #2: I ordered the software and it went on back-order. They can't give back-order status on-line, and remembering to call has been a lost cause lately. However, the company has a store near here, and I just happened to be in that area yesterday while we were shopping for school clothes. I'm such a nice mom that I went into the store and bought the software. When I got home I grabbed the phone to cancel the internet order and discovered they'd shipped the software already.

This is the part where I should stop shopping on the internet, but you know that's just not going to happen.