Canadian b*tch - frackin' leapfrog.com!

[EllasMum]

So I got in on the recent amazon.com bargain of $13.99 for a $20 LeapFrog app center gift card. Of course, amazon.com would not ship to a Canadian address (this should have been a harbinger of future trouble), but when I bitched about it to a friend, she said she was going to Spokane for a little cross border shopping and I could just have the gift cards mailed to her at the hotel and she would send them back to me. Great. Got the cards, went to use them, only to discover that the cards can only be used in the States! WTF?! Seriously?? What is gained by this?! Ridiculous! So, now I am stuck with 3 gift cards that are unusable. SIGH. Might have to go hunting for that gift card swap site.

[MontrealMum]

I'm so sorry, and also, I hear you. This is a rant that is close to my heart.

For example, last year I tried to buy a tag reader and some books for my DS from TRU Canada. In English. Because we're Anglo and DS was in a French preshcool. Gee, they don't ship to Quebec. WTF??? So, I bought the English TAG from TRU in the US, had it shipped to my dad in the States and promptly forgot about it though he gave it to me in the Spring. Black Friday weekend this year I remembered that we still didn't have any books to go with this thing so I tried to buy some from TRU Canada during the big sales. No can do. English TAG books aren't labelled for shipping to QC. Niiiiice. Again, bought them from TRU in the US, had them shipped to my dad, and he shipped them here. Yes, this was cheaper overall. Crazy. Oh, and it's working very nicely now

Long story short? Shopping online from w/in Canada sucks. Apparently very few Canadians shop online. That's what my DH told me....over 15 years ago. He read some article somewhere. And the online shopping landscape up here has changed very little in that time. We've got Gap.ca charging 10%+ over what it costs on the US site, MEC saying you have to buy a G/C over the PHONE!!!, and various US sites which are blocked in Quebec because they've refused to translate their site into French. To continue my rant...Etsy refuses to offer their site-wide gift cards to non-US consumers - or to publicize that, and Amazon.ca is still very limited. And Amazon.com is now charging up front for perceived "duty/tariff/customs charges" and is cracking down - without any sort of warning - on all sorts of other things as well. I used to order books from them all the time because they shipped so much faster than retailers w/in Canada (2-7 days vs. 4-6 WEEKS!). But no more In terms of Canadian retailers online I shop at Indigo/Chapters and that's about it. We are waaaay behind on online shopping - decades behind. It's pretty sad.

[Neatfreak]

I totally have ordered gift cards online from MEC before - that's all my sister ever puts on her wishlist! They don't offer that anymore?

I have to admit that I prefer to order from American retailers that do handle the duty charges, like LLB and LE. It's easier for me to know that I'm within my budget if I know the full total that I'll have to pay ...

My annoying surprise of the week was ordering my mom's Xmas gift from BlueNile.ca - they added a duty charge at the check-out. I didn't think that was right b/c I was ordering from a Canadian website! Grr.

[Hemlock]

I'm so sorry, and also, I hear you. This is a rant that is close to my heart. .

[3blackcats]

This is why I still have my us credit cards and ship everything to a us address.
My peeve? Being redirected to a .ca instead of the .com. Especially Disney they won't let you look at the us content.

[EllasMum]

My peeve? Being redirected to a .ca instead of the .com. Especially Disney they won't let you look at the us content.

This is the exact problem I am having. I have the cards for leapfrog.com and it keeps redirecting me to the Canadian site. I tried setting up an American account, tried a DNS 'mask' site (whatever they're called), and no dice. Keeps redirecting me to the Canadian site. GRR!!

Stupid, useless gift cards!

[MontrealMum]

My peeve? Being redirected to a .ca instead of the .com.

Yep. I'm ticked off along with the rest of you. I've only recently figured out how to override Garnet Hill's automatic redirect to the .ca - with the higher Canadian prices - so that I can order from the US site and have it shipped to my dad in the US.

My favorite rant these days? Anthropologie has opened a Montreal store. This means they have to come into compliance with Quebec's language laws regarding their website. Did they translate the website into French like Gap and other stores with a B&M presence in QC? Nooooo. They've totally blocked it and invite shoppers to "visit them in store". Thanks for nothing. I left a rant on their FB page that was "liked" by a few other Canadians, and I emailed their cs but I've gotten absolutely no response from them whatsoever. They have completely lost my business because 1) I'm pissed 2) they've made it almost impossible for me to shop there. I mean, who goes into a store these days w/o knowing first what they have? I don't have time for that! I can't even see their online catalog to pin things or see what everyone else on here is linking to. The thing is totally blocked. And considering that their sister store, Urban Outfitters, has been here in QC w/o a website for something like 15 years, I'm fairly sure they won't be doing anything about it.

[mikeys_mom]

My favorite rant these days? Anthropologie has opened a Montreal store. This means they have to come into compliance with Quebec's language laws regarding their website. Did they translate the website into French like Gap and other stores with a B&M presence in QC? Nooooo. They've totally blocked it and invite shoppers to "visit them in store". Thanks for nothing. I left a rant on their FB page that was "liked" by a few other Canadians, and I emailed their cs but I've gotten absolutely no response from them whatsoever. They have completely lost my business because 1) I'm pissed 2) they've made it almost impossible for me to shop there. I mean, who goes into a store these days w/o knowing first what they have? I don't have time for that! I can't even see their online catalog to pin things or see what everyone else on here is linking to. The thing is totally blocked. And considering that their sister store, Urban Outfitters, has been here in QC w/o a website for something like 15 years, I'm fairly sure they won't be doing anything about it.

My mother was pretty irritated about Anthropologie also. She had the exact same remark about wanting to see their website before she went to the store. What is the point in her going if there is nothing her style?

She has been having lots of problems with US sites blocked in Quebec because they aren't translated into French. She is a snowbird and likes to order stuff online and ship it to FL for when she gets there. She was able to do it in the past and all of a sudden this year, several sites were blocked.

[Neatfreak]

I hadn't realized that non-English websites were being blocked in Quebec! That would really frustrate me!

MontrealMum, what is the trick to your override?

[MontrealMum]

My mother was pretty irritated about Anthropologie also. She had the exact same remark about wanting to see their website before she went to the store. What is the point in her going if there is nothing her style?

She has been having lots of problems with US sites blocked in Quebec because they aren't translated into French. She is a snowbird and likes to order stuff online and ship it to FL for when she gets there. She was able to do it in the past and all of a sudden this year, several sites were blocked.

Exactly! Who has time to take a trip downtown to ONE store if you don't even know what they have? I mean, I like to shop as much as the next person, but do people really still window shop these days? Who has the time?

My parents live in the US and between them visiting me here, or me going down there, I can usually plan my shopping to take advantage of the greater US sale discounts. We just never see those kinds of discounts here in Canada. I am NOT pleased about Anthro

I hadn't realized that non-English websites were being blocked in Quebec! That would really frustrate me!

MontrealMum, what is the trick to your override?

Actually, it's the English only sites that are being blocked! They're supposed to be French (along with whatever other languages) if they have a B&M presence in QC. I'm guessing it's a little known law that is only recently being enforced because it's not something that I really saw widely until this year. Kind of like how Loblaw's coming to QC brought the laws regarding grocery store staffing into play (only 4 staff on the store on the weekends). Lots of laws on the books, but noone bothers to enforce them unless there's a big push.

So, for the Garnet Hill, I tried a lot of clicking around and I don't really have a step-by-step process, but basically, clear your cache first, and then, if you're on a laptop like me, when you go back to GH, go fullscreen. I was missing some of the options at the bottom and edge of the page because of my small screen. When the splash page comes up and asks "are you shopping from Canada" or "shipping to Canada" (it's one of those two), click NO, and then scroll down to the bottom. There should be an option after all the other countries are listed to "ship to US". That overrides it and you can then shop in US pricing and have it shipped to the US. Seriously, when we've been nearly at par for YEARS now there's no way I'm paying $150 Can. for something that is listed at $100 US.

Another online shopping tip if you have a US shipping addy...you can order from BodenUSA w/ a Canadian credit card if you put the cc and its billing addy in the "notes" section. Simply select your US shipping address for both shipping and billing (they won't process it as such, but you need to fill out the section and it won't let you put a Can. one here), and they will manually process your card w/ its Canadian address once they see it in the notes. Gets you deeper discounts, ebates, and no duty because you're shipping to the US