I'M WRITING FROM IRAQ, STATIONED WITH THE US ARMY ABOUT 15 MILES NORTH OF BAGHDAD. SOME OF THE SOLDIERS WOULD LIKE TO LEARN THE GAME OF PETANQUE. A PURCHASE WAS MADE FROM THE COMPANY PLAYABOULE.COM FOR A SET OF 1-2 STRIP BOULES OF COMPETITION WEIGHT AND SIZE. PLAYABOULE.COM ADVERTISED FREE SHIPPING WITHIN THE UNITED STATES. WHEN AN APO AE ADDRESS WAS PROVIDED (A US DELIVERY POINT FOR COLLECTION OF MILITARY OVERSEAS MAIL), THE COMPANY RENIGED AND ASKED FOR SHIPPING CHARGES. BECAUSE OF THE ADDITIONAL CHARGE THE ORDER WAS CANCELED. HAS ANYONE ELSE HAD PROBLEMS WITH THIS COMPANY? WOULD YOU RECOMMEND A DIFFERENT SUPPLIER? WHAT FOLLOWS IS MY CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE COMPANY:


C N wrote:

What is your decision concerning order number VRC 4--- being sent to Camp Taji Iraq? The set is to be used for the recreation of deployed soldiers within the warzone approximately 15 miles north of Baghdad. Will you honor your advertisement for free shipping?
If so, please ship as soon as possible, our military chaplain and soldiers are building a "coffee house" and we would like to build a pentanque area nearby.


Dr. C N
Camp Taji, Iraq
-----------------------------------------------------
Dear Mr N

Because we are not a charity we are not able to supply to individuals with perceived needy causes. If we were we would quickly go bankrupt with suppling product to that cost us to make each delivery. This includes, those with disabilities, debilitating illnesses or struck by undue hardship. We do however support and gladly make charitable contributions both financially and with free product to the Organizations that support those individuals.

Our web site clearly states that we pay the shipping cost only in the mainland USA. Any costs to make delivery beyond uses our small profit margin and that means we are selling at a loss ( the manufacturer is paid the shipper is paid ).

Regards

*Bede Kortegast

*Playaboule
---------------------------------------------------
Dear Playboule.com,
You are mistaken in stating that the APO AE address is not a US address, in fact, letters and packages are sent to a destination in the USA for distribution at the military's expense to overseas locations. Your company has entered into a special arrangement with a package delivery service which charges an additional fee for delivery to APO addresses. Rather than stating this upfront in your advertisement, you have attempted to pass your charges through to the customer.

I am aghast that you would not only dishonor your advertisement, but also to refer to American Service Members as a needy charity. Your military service members will continue to fight and die for your right to chase profit without sensitivity or responsibility. I will forward your response to petanque.org.

At this point I have no interest in further correspondence. Kindly VOID and CANCEL any transactions pending between myself and your company, specifically orders number VRC-4---, and VRC-4---.

Good day to you.


Dr. C N
Camp Taji, Iraq
-----------------------------------------------------

Chris:

I have had great success with Petanque-America's owner, Philippe Boets.

(336) 454-4129
Petanqueamerica@Gmail.com
www.petanqueamerica.com

Petanque America has VERY high quality petanque boules. My suggestion to you is to buy the Satin finish boules in the sets (non-competition) which are VERY high quality, and Name-Brand (OBUT is a big time maker of boules).

Much luck to you, have fun, and if you think of it, send photos of you guys playing petanque in Iraq.

Jeff Widen
President - Detroit Petanque Club
jeffrey@detroitpetanque.com
www.detroitpetanque.com

Sadly this has gotten out of hand and its whats missing that concerns me. My response via e-mail sent to Mr N before he made his original posting. See below.

The question begs why did we not just send a free set. The fact is we do. Again see below.

Dear Mr Nystuen

I was pointing out that we do make contributions to worthy causes these do include the military AND other organizations that approach us because they deserve our consideration. Its a matter of channels.

That is in effect exactly what you were implying we should do not because of our advertisement of free mainland US shipping but because you are in the military and that there is a war on. That is even further evident in your threat to "report us" . We work to resolve any issues with all of our customers but find it difficult when that sort of tactic is used.

Please take the time to follow this link http://www.boccemon.com/combat-bocce.shtml

The balls that you see in those photos ( several sets ) at that US Camp in Iraq were supplied and shipped by us as at no charge. This was part of a group effort made by several small business's in this area.

This is just one case, we do care and we do support the military and its men and women. It all depends on how the approach is made.

I have been on the road on business and picked up on this thread without all the required information. I made the wrong assumption that this was being shipped to Hawaii so fell outside of our shipping policy. We do need to re-look at the cost to ship to an APO. This has never been a problem for us before as those that have ordered for APO delivery understand that there are extra charges for those addresses.

We have canceled your order as you request. If you want to call and discuss this further I am at your disposal. Ph xxx-xxx-xxxx

Bede Kortegast
Playaboule

Chris,
First, may I take this opportunity to support what you are doing in Iraq. My heart is with all the American troops and their family.

Second, I fully agree with the whole contents of Jeff's reply. On three occasions I bought boules from Petanque America and was fully satisfied each time.

God bless America,

Guy

While I have no experience with the military forces of the USA.

I am under the impression that Australian soldiers receive a wage salary that they can spend as they wish.

I would be very surprised if American solders don’t receive some type of payment as well.

If they spend this money on alcohol, cigarettes or petanque balls is a personal choice and the availability of such items would surly be an issue for these personnel to raise with management.

It may even be that if Mr Nystuen consulted an atlas he may realise that Iraq is a lot closer to France than America there could possibly be a saving in freight in “dealing direct” with a European company rather than having the balls freighted to Iraq via America.

I am sympathetic to your cause that in business the scenario of “I want the good/service but I don’t want to pay for it” seems to be very common.

It is a sad fact that there are no free lunches or even free delivery it is just a matter of who pays and how this cost is passed on to the community.

Perhaps Mr Nystuen would give the American taxpayers better value for money if he spent his time in Iraq looking for weapons of mass destruction rather than whining about the excessive price of postage to someone who has no control over the price of postage and harassing an American company who no doubt pay their taxes that pay is wages/salary.

Mr. Australian, perhaps you like mixing it up over the internet, tough guy, but we're in the thick of it here in Iraq and we don't appreciate it when you belittle the day to day work we do in a dangerous zone.

I personally, as do many of our soldiers here, did not ask for this assignment, we were placed here to do a job, regardless of the overall goals/reasons of our gov't. Nevertheless, when you say we ought to be looking for Weapons of Mass Destruction - instead of looking for some sort of recreational relief from an hour-by-hour pressure of living in a dangerous situation, I think you owe us an apology.

I'm sure whatever job you do is vastly safer than what we have to deal with, give us a break, put yourselves in our shoes... we're dealing with a job we don't want but personally have no other option but to follow through with. All we wanted was to try out a sport which seemed relatively easy to get equipment for and didn't need a whole lot of set-up and room.

Maybe, if you're being so helpful, you can point out a French website from which we can order our boules from easily - I didn't find anything which presented itself as easily as Playaboule. As far as I saw, the Obut, Integrale, and Boule Bleu websites didn't offer an easy way to order equipment, while the websites in America offer english and phone numbers and clear websites.

Maybe we ought to just play with hand grenades for all you care - aussie

Last time I checked an atlas Turkey shares a border with Iraq

from

http://www.petanqueturkey.com/petanque.oyun.htm

Bize Ulaşın: nural@petanqueturkey.com seems to be a contact email address

From http://www.petanque.org/clubinfo/

There is the following information about middle east Petanque organisations

Country United Arab Emirates
Members 6
Founded year 2006
Playing grounds CAFE MORE AL MUROOJ
Contact Person Marc MOLATTE
E-mail molatte@yahoo.com

Telephone 971-50-251-8926


Turkey
E-mail email.ademyknc@mynet.com

Telephone 0090-535 362 7615


I would suggest that it may be wise when contacting these people to remember it is them doing you a favour by helping you and they may not share your sentiments that you deserve a discount/charity because of your employment status.

I personally am flabbergasted that with the logistics of the US military that they are likely to be moving tonnes of equipment on a regular that less than 20Kg of petanque balls is such a challenge for them.

Or is the real problem that Mr Nystuen is just too stingy to pay the appropriate postage?

It seems to me that this thread has gone astray from the original problem. The problem had nothing to do with charity, the search for WMD, the rationale from ordering from a US company vs. a European one, the capability of the US Army to move freight, etc.

The only questions are:

1) Does Playaboule advertise free USA mainland shipping for the products in question?
2) Is the APO on the USA mainland?

If the answers are "yes" to both questions, where is there any room for debate?

The postage to an APO address is considered domestic, so the company should deliver as they advertise, if not I believe it's punished by law.
Now you need to fill in a custom form, which is not extremely complicated, and USPS can pick up the package for you.

So I believe the effort can be made. This is not philanthropy, this is business, which means that you have to abide by the law AND satisfy your customers whoever they are, no matter what your personal beliefs are.

Thanks for you lecture on geography, but thinking out of the narrow box and for obvious safety reasons, having a business from a muslim country send a package containing metal to a US FOB in the midst of the Iraqi war zone is not the best of ideas.

And again, the military will take care of the delivery of 20kgs of petanque boules. Now, I don't think any US taxpayer would complain about that, after all the USA are a democracy and a majority of the taxpayers voted for this war so I'm confident they totally assume it and support their troops even if they did not vote for it.

BTW, what do the australian taxpayers think about the use of a EDU.AU email address for personal matters?

I think it is very simplified to suggest there are only 2 issues

3) Is it reasonable for Playaboule for to be able to choose the delivery method/company of their choice?

4) Is it reasonable for Playaboule to vary their prices for customers who require special service?

5) Is it reasonable for Playaboule to adjust their prices because of inflation?

6) Is it reasonable for Playaboule to be expected to have intimate knowledge of the US military logistics methods/systems?

7) Is it reasonable for Playaboule to be able to recover there costs of providing the good/service and enough margin that they can continue to offer this good/service in the future?

8) Should Playaboule cease this offer to all US residents because of the war in Iraq?

9) Should customers who have unusual circumstances/needs be expected to explain their situation?

Other than the disappointment of missing out on a bargain what loss/damage has this customer suffered?

It seems Playaboule is happy to fulfil the order however the customer doesn’t wish to pay a price that is acceptable to Playaboule.