In the many years of using Amazon, I think they've only messed up an order once. I ordered 2 of something, they shipped the first one out quickly, but I waited a couple of weeks for the 2nd and though their web site said it had shipped, it never arrived. There was tracking information but the shipper claimed that the number didn't match anything.

I contacted Amazon and they sent the other one superfast (it wasn't same day delivery, but almost).

Another good experience with them was a TV order. I ordered a used "like new" 50" plasma TV from their "warehouse sales" unit. (I'd previously gotten a 42" LCD that was indeed like new and nearly $200 less than their usual new price.) It arrived, I helped the delivery guy unbox it and we plugged it in before assembling it. It only buzzed and no picture displayed. :-( We finally look at it at the appropriate angle and saw that the screen was shattered. :-( We boxed it back up and he took it with him.

:-(

I kept waiting for another to appear for sale, but it didn't happen.

I got a refund from Amazon a day or so after they got it back.

What was surprising was that I got a $50 additional refund of shipping charges a few days later even though shipping was free under Prime. And I never asked for it.

Amazon's been very good to us. Prime's nice in that we no longer have to wait around to have $25 worth of stuff to get free shipping - we can order things whenever we think of them. They seem to have enough sense to wait a few hours before shipping stuff to us so that if we order 3 times in a few hours, they often end up in the same package. We also occasionally get stuff a day faster than Prime's "2nd day" delivery commitment, but that is fairly rare.

Amazon's a behemoth of a company, and they're often not uniquely the cheapest on electronics and the like (B&H is sometimes cheaper and often has free shipping too), but it's nice that as they've gotten huge they still at least go through the motions of having competitive prices and good service. In contrast, I haven't bought much of anything from NewEgg in years because too much of their stuff now seems to be at MSRP or at least far more than Amazon.

Oh, and J recently ordered a $8 travel book from Amazon and eventually realized she already had a copy or that she didn't want it. She went through the returns web page and it said to keep the book and they would credit her account. (I guess the paperwork and handling stuff wasn't worth the trouble to them, or they wanted to keep her happy, or something.)

</ramble>

Good luck.

Cheers,
Scott.