You too, eh?
Nav... I posted the following a few hours ago as a response on another thread. Amazing, isn't it, how there seems to be so few options for us Canadians? I thought the problem was only me, but maybe it's for all of us in Canada. I think you're absolutely right: waiting a few days, a week, fine. 3 to 4 weeks? Not acceptable especially when you're paying $3000 to $4000 Cdn. In your case, at least they offerred you $50 off! They didn't even suggest it for me. Why there should be such a difference between Canada and the US - other than maybe for shipping - is beyond me.
Quite likely, if the unit is purchased in the US and then shipped over, you WILL be charged duty. Electronic goods are high profile items. I'm not sure what the rate is, but you can likely expect about 10% duty, plus GST. You might be better off going to a Canadian reseller that has the PB in stock and picking it up through them, or ordering from a reseller in Canada that has stock on hand and can ship within the country (and thus will not have to order it themselves).
Good luck. Maybe I should have cancelled my order as you did: I was thinking seriously about it.
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I'm starting to think that I'm the only one that's gotten stuck here: nobody else seems to be having laptop shipping delays. I ordered a BTO 17" PB on July 23. It was scheduled to ship August 2. Nope. It has been pushed back to August 10. I spoke with Apple and was told that there was a lot of demand (backorders) and that because I had a BTO one, it would take longer. Can't recall any shipping delay warnings: I would have seriously reconsidered my order if I had known about such delays. Supposedly a stock purchase maybe would have been faster. And because I'm in Canada, shipping will take anywhere from 7 to 10 business days. Altogether, I'm looking at 3 to 4 weeks from the time I ordered.
This is unacceptable, especially because this is a business purchase: does Apple expect people who need equipment for work to wait around for 3 to 4 weeks? I can't see such delays being very fair to regular retail purchasers either.
The worse part is:
1) Apple could not say whether my order would be "likely" built soon or delayed further.
2) Apple could not tell me anything more about shipping times.
3) If you BTO, you cannot cancel your order. IMHO, a larger hard drive and slightly faster video ram, while "customized" does not constitute a massive change in hardware.
4) There is no consideration to get the item to customers faster given the delay. Unless, of course, you want to pay out more of your own money to expedite shipping.
5) I'm hostage to Apple's delivery because if I cancel, by the time I requisition a alternate PC laptop, the PowerBook would have probably shown up.
The person I spoke to was nice, but hey, she has little control over what the corporation does. So, bottom line, Apple could not tell me anything, could not promise me anything, and cannot do anything. This is the second "incident" I've had with Apple/Apple resellers. I'm having a hard time recommending Apple to my colleagues. A superior OS is only helpful if you have the machine to use it.
You may not be able to get away with that, since my package was probably worth $90 CAN, while a computer is obviously worth enough to tax like mad.
