Paging Dealer Angelesque / Whitey

Whitey has not been on the forum since 12/12/19. She is currently being paged.

 

I spotted this on the Angelesque website 23 December 2019. I have orders waiting too, I had emailed with details of Order info date and order number to help her find them a few months ago. I receved part of some of my orders in August.

After seeing that 'notice' under the NEWS section of the website and getting worried as there were several things for some orders I'm still waiting on, going back to last March. I logged in and hand wrote all my orders out with their order dates, items, amounts and order numbers.

Really glad I did write the details of ALL my orders out, as today 12 January 2020 the UK site has a 404 error and I can't get in. The .com version of the site is still working but my .uk site log in won't work on there.

I don't do FB but Carol was still posting there on 9th January 2020.
On her FB there was photo of large doll shipment just before Christmas so baring in mind its just her running this, not teams of ppl, its going to take her time to process that order and after putting that note on the website, its likely that she will have been flooded with paincy emails for anyone waiting on orders. Going through those and replying will also take a lot of time.
Waiting times are what they are, and the other countries have different holidays when production stops, add in some times of year when they don't always cast so yeah, delays are what they are, and the whole leaving the EU situation won't be helping anything either.

Its soooo sad that she's not taking new orders. I was about to order a Myou body from her, it was on the website end of December but I hesitated to click it, after reading the statement, and by January 1st the Myou dolls were taken down from the site. along with lots of other brands.

 

I do not know where to put this, frankly, so I apologize, but since this is in order questions and not in problem transactions... Angelesque International is still up and working for most companies (except MYou, f.i., for some reason). It is still accepting orders, you can still checkout with Paypal. Also, Carol is still advertising new dolls on her business Instagram as if you could still order them from her - she certainly does not add 'go and get them directly from the companies instead of from me'.
It makes absolutely no sense why she would do that, and - why not take down the international site together with the UK one? Also, denying people access to their accounts while their orders are still being processed sounds alarming.
So please everybody be super careful, all of this is just weird.

 

So I am not representative of Angelesque, and I actually have had negative experiences in the past (resolved, but they still are negative), but I just wanted to add some more information:

Angelesque is not closing. I don't know why the site is 404'ing nor do I know why there has been no public announcement (presumably everything is rather a mess from the holidays), but I was informed by her directly that she has decided to remain open but severely cut down on the number of companies she represents. Just before the site started 404'ing, she had removed companies she would no longer be dealing for from the site. The reason she is still posting those dolls on Instagram is because they are DollZone, a company she will continue to represent.

Although it shouldn't be the way you have to do so, I strongly recommend using Instagram or Facebook to contact her. I found that in the past email would simply never be resolved. Once I switched to Facebook or Instagram, communication vastly improved, and now I speak about any orders I have with her exclusively on Instagram, where she is very quick to reply.

Back to OP specifically: If you do have Facebook or Instagram, I highly recommend you use those to contact Carol. I know that's not great, but that seems the best method. As for whether you will get your items: I believe you will, but it sounds like you might need to start strong arming a bit. Given the amount of time you have waited, whatever items are in the UK should be shipped to you at no extra charge, because that wait is unreasonable.

 

Yeah, I'm sorry you're having a rubbish experience, and I totally relate, I've unfortunately had my own share of similar experiences. If everything goes right, it couldn't be smoother, but the moment some kind of problem pops up it's hard to tell whether you will get a resolution now or if it's going to drag for an unacceptable amount of time. I would say that she has improved vastly for me, but that hasn't worked out quite the same for others so I am sorry there are still problems.

That said, hopefully the resolution does happen as soon as she says, and you get all the items you ordered!

 

Hello there, i am a representative for Carol and i am trying to sweep through DoA to help put people at ease about recent news and help resolve any problems!

As for the news of her closing.. It's not totally the case anymore! She will remain open but with a smaller company list (not yet confirmed). This is not common knowledge as of yet but i am just putting it out to help any worry about orders and the future dealings with Angelesque.

Please feel free to mail me or get in touch for any questions. Carol is stowed under with the change of business so has enlisted me to come help again haha.

 

Hey there, i don't have access to check myself, but i can message her directly right away. I shall chase this with her immediately and get back to you ASAP. Please allow me a moment, she is still online.

Okay so, i have just chatted to Carol, she says she has managed to contact you today via email but has confirmed with me that she has received a parcel containing your order and it is currently in her offices, which she will be going to tomorrow to open. That's the reason she didn't want to guarantee with you if every item was there as she hasn't been able to unwrap and make sure herself yet. But tomorrow once she gets to the office, she will notify you.

She appreciates the order has taken a long time to come, but sadly that part is out of her control. And i apologise for that also and any lack of communication. But it looks like your order is here and you will hear from Carol tomorrow for certainty of the entire contents!

On top of this, the reason the site may have been displaying as 404 or an error is that both sites were being merged into one. So no more UK and USA! This may have caused some issues, but should be up and working now. Please let me know if you have any problems and i can see if i can get IT to look into it.

But this should work now:
https://www.angelesquedolls.com/home

 

Yeah i can totally appreciate your frustration. I sympathise that something as simple as not getting in touch to update you can make the situation so much worse. This is why i am hoping i can help improve communication problems and at least help some situations..

I appreciate that, thank you! As yes, i wish i had more power to help get your order sorted sooner but i have stepped in at a very late stage i am afraid

I know Carol does struggle with DoA. But now I can at least confirm i will be updating her with anything i hear on her myself.

 

Hello, I had an outstanding order with Angelesque from Sept 2019. I see the new website is up but when I tried to log in, it didn't recognise my log in details or email address. Does this mean that accounts and orders from the old website have not been carried across? And if the order details from the old website have been effectively erased, how can we check up on them to get details of what we ordered, order numbers etc?

 

I've just queried this with Carol. So, the site used to be split, USA and UK, but this meant that Carol was paying a team for essentially two separate sites. With the scale back, it is being merged into just the USA side. So it seems that there's issues with some of the accounts.

So far the best way to check orders would be to check your order number via the email you received when you placed it. But i am asking numerous questions to other issue i assume will arise or that people may be having. Such as, are accounts invalid now or will the IT team sort the issue, will there be a way to recover this etc.. Carol is currently out with her children so not online, but i wanted to leave some sort of reply. I will update again when i have more information for everyone.

In the mean time, if you are concerned or wanting an update, i'm sure you could give me your order number and i can chase Carol for an update personally. Feel free to ask me whenever!

 

I don't have a current order, so no rush for an answer on this one, but I would also be interested to know if our accounts can be migrated. Otherwise not only do we lose that saved info, but also the saved loyalty points.

 

Hiya everyone, i have been made aware of this thread and of course its contents, i would like to say to anyone that i am here if anyone reading this has an issue that they would like me to look at, and so is Kuro my friend who has been answering so far, our aim is never to have anyone unhappy and all you need to do is message me or Kuro on here, you will get a reply and a solution, i dont run the business to upset anyone, and am a human lol so feel free to contact either of us and we will help xxxx
Cheers Carol and Kurolbara

 

Hiya

Please may I ask, as a UK customer,
1. Having seen the .com site is all in $.Does this mean that's what currency all orders will be charged in, going forwards? Even for UK customers
2. If you have in stock items in the UK and I'm in the UK, I don't want to be charged extra fees to be charged in $ for an order.
3. Once things have settled, will our old logins be valid on the .com site, or would we need to reregister there.

Many thanks

 

Thanks for the reply. It would be helpful to know if old accounts are going to be migrated or not. There some instock items i would like to buy but don't know if I should create a new account or not.

Thanks for the suggestions. I don't have Facebook or Instagram so not able to use those as contacts but may be helpful for those who do have accounts there

 

Hi, i made a post last night hopefully to explain this situation, the accounts are still active in the background i have access to and will be until they are all completed, the details of your order, items, order number, date etc are on the original email you will have received at the time of ordering, but if you need any help feel free to contact me xx Carol xx

 

i am trying to answer as many people as i can, i am here, so is Kuro, and any questions you have we are totally happy to help you with, If you are in the UK and are wanting to place an order for in stock items it will need a new account to be created yep, and your loyalty points will be credited as usual If you get stuck drop me a message and i will help xx Cheers Carol xx

 

Hello,
Thanks for posting your questions i will answer them and hopefully the answers will help others too if there is confusion
The Angelesque website has changed in many ways, including how i operate it, it is now one website so yes, all transactions are now in USD, there are a few reasons for this, one being when i pay for customers orders i also use the currency USD $ to pay the companies, like you do if ordering directly to China, so it makes sense for it all to be one currency rather than it changing to £ then again to $, i hope this helps explain.
If you are in the UK and the items are on the website they are now in USD so the £ price is no longer valid as its not on the website so it is this currency for any orders ongong.
Things are now as they will stay, so the IT company i use for the background of the website wasnt able to easily migrate accounts from the UK side and suggested it would be easy to make a new account for people, any loyalty points will be transferred so they arent lost.
I hope this info helps, if not feel free to message me or Kuro
Thanks xx Carol xx

 

Thanks

 

Hiya

I might be over thinking this so appoligies if I am. I ask this with much love and respect

As a UK customer, in the past there were no additional charges at the point of delivery.

What are the additional charges that will now apply to our orders?
(1. Charged in $ so paypal and our banks will charge extra for the conversion) Yep u covered that, just adding it here for a full list in one place x
2.The VAT for example, if the site is showing in $, is it right to assume that these are ex UK VAT?
3. Will you be charging the VAT for Brits at the point of order?

As all UK sales are subject to 20% VAT, then unless its charged at the point of order, isn't it likely the postal services will be charging £8 fee to collect any VAT due.

4. What now happens about the cutoms and import fees, again, does this mean that there will be those fees plus the post office fees for collecting them. or is that covered with an earlier question?

Not throwing any rocks, sending you love, just trying to understand how these changes will impact future orders.

I understand we would get these fees if we were ordering from USA or from Asia directly but for this also has an impact for items already in the UK, and coming across our own country.

Thanks x

 

Having just had a look at the new site, I noted that there's a price difference between what you're currently charging and what Luts charges for the same doll ($20 more from you on a Kid Delf, $50 on an SDF65, for instance). Customs and import on an SDF65 would be something in the region of £150 and the $50 price difference is roughly equivalent to £38, so is this to cover shipping between you and the buyer and then the customer has customs and import on top of that? I'm curious as to what incentive there is to buy from you now we can no longer do so in £'s but instead now have to worry about currency conversion and extended group order wait times? Am I missing something?

 

I don't think VAT was ever charged, was it? Not to the customer. I don't think there were ever any extra charges on the UK site to add VAT that I can remember, because Angelesque isn't a trade wholeseller that can offer VAT-exempt prices. Surely instead VAT would be something that Angelesque pays to HMRC (via customs), because Angelesque purchased the items, then we pay Angelesque for a service more than an item (we pay for the service of having somebody do foreign purchasing for us - the item is a result), and then Angelesque pays any further tax come the end of each financial year.
Angelesque has always paid customs without an addition to a UK buyer's invoice, the postal services already charge Carol for VAT on every order set that comes in. That won't change with the currency change. Because as the company purchasing and importing goods, Angelesque is responsible for the tax on those goods at the point of entry to the country, not the client of the service who then receives those goods.

That's... kind of how I understood it anyway. But it is conjecture based on how I generally know companies to operate.

 

TBH I don't really understand how this works, I'm just trying to understand what if any, additional charges to expect when I place an order. I love that Carols site is secure and there is an English speaking person to contact when I have a question. I haven't bought from anywhere else.

 

Obviously I can't speak for Angelesque, but there really shouldn't be any additional fees/changes in that regard. The change is the currency change, and any additional fees are not from Angelesque, but are from PayPal if you use PayPal to convert currency. In that sense, Angelesque has no control over what those fees are, they are third-party payment processing fees (and Angelesque will be paying fees of their own to PayPal for accepting money for services too). Charging the customer for any PayPal fees is against PayPal's terms of service in many (if not all?) territories, so if Angelesque adds money on to cover PayPal fees, they'd end up no longer being able to accept PayPal payments. It is highly doubtful this will ever happen, because I believe in the UK it has become illegal to charge people to use a certain payment provider? That's why you are no longer charged extra by a retailer or service for using your credit card for a transaction (legally, anyway).

As for VAT, it's hard to explain how it works, but since Carol does group orders, the VAT charged to the company by HMRC is on the value of the order as a whole - which is changeable for many reasons; 1) many doll companies do not correctly declare the value of their doll packages, 2) it is based on criteria set by HMRC (if the imported goods fall into an art category, or fall into a toy category, etc. VAT is actually not 20% for everything. It can be 0% for some items like books, other items are 15%, etc.), 3) it can also be based on what HMRC thinks an import is worth, if they either do not believe the declaration, or the declaration is missing, etc. Basically, VAT on imported dolls is the responsibility of the importer. In this case, that is Angelesque, and that is also the responsibility a dealer takes on.

Dealers will receive - or should receive or they wouldn't do it - a different price on dolls to the average customer (it might not be much, but should be there), so that they can receive the excess as commission. This also means that the VAT charged to them by HMRC is different to what would be charged to you, an individual. Because the dealer gets a different price, some money to cover processing for Angelesque is already built into the default price of the doll. Presumably the reason Angelesque has dropped a lot of companies is due to being unable to keep those particular companies financially sustainable to keep around. In comparison, enough orders are made for DZ, DC, etc, that Angelesque's fees and commission is paid. As for the different prices @Lulu I think these are usually mistakes and will be corrected if you flag them up.

Basically, I would sincerely hope that nothing else is changing at an end-service (our) level other than the currency change, because some of the fees suggested in this thread would be illegal or at least pretty dodgy and impossible to trust.

This is a long-winded post but I 100% understand where your questions are coming from and I also have my own, I wanted to put this technical info here because I'm not sure we would get it otherwise. This way Kuro and/or Carol can confirm or deny the above and we might get a more thorough understanding, if that makes sense.

 

@ nattherat Thanks, I so didn't mean any negativity with my question, in fact I worried it might sound that way and came to take it down but after reading ur reply, maybe I'll leave it up as perhaps others may have the same question. I'm still new to the doll world n still finding my feet. Don't understand the ins and outs of how all this works yet and just trying to understand the process. thanks for explaining it.

@ Carol MUCH LOVE x just trying to figure all this out, know you are a superstar and are doing all you can to help us. Change just frys my brain, thats all.

 

@RavensWing It's okay! I think it's a valid concern since most people don't understand too much about how VAT works. In fact, I'm sorry if my first reply probably sounded a bit snippy! Once you said you didn't understand, that's why I decided to write a better response with hopefully a more helpful breakdown of how certain things work. I've been buying stuff from abroad for probably about fifteen years because so many things I want (or sometimes even need) are not made in or not available in Britain, I can sometimes forget that others might not ever need to do that and might not have the same experience navigating HMRC.

 

To be honest, the currency change is a big problem on it's own for customers since a good chunk of the reason people buy from a dealer in country is the fact you can buy in your own currency. If you can no longer do that, the benefits of an in country dealer start to be significantly reduced.

As for the price variations, they appear to be either percentage based (for Luts, it's ~10% extra on the Angelesque site, for instance), or a blanket flat amount based on company (Souldoll has a $50 extra charge on SD's and MSD's on the Angelesque site, for instance). I'd be interested to hear what those amounts are covering since it's not at all obvious on the Angelesque site.

 

I don't disagree with that, but I think every dealer I've seen charges in USD regardless of location. Our other options are: using US dealers, which will hit us with massive customs because US packages are hit by customs pretty much guaranteed, or purchasing from Chinese dealers like ACBJD, who charge paypal fees and may also get hit by customs. Lastly, you could go direct, but if you're going direct then the chances are you weren't actually in need of a dealer service anyway, and again you'll still be hit with customs.

Sorry, I'm not trying to be contrary here. It's just that whilst the change does change the price for us a little bit, we do still actually get all the benefits of a UK dealer: Carol does the purchasing and importing, including customs. The advantage is not actually that reduced at all. I think currency conversion is 3.5%. Obviously we'd prefer to not pay that, but as far as things go, you'd be paying that to purchase from any other dealer anyway.

However, if the price variations are there deliberately and there to pass the fees on to the end user, then yes you'd be absolutely right in saying that the benefits are significantly reduced. If this is the case, then yes, you will be better off going to ACBJD or buying direct, by potentially quite a high margin if you end up lucky when the item goes through customs.

 

@ nattherat Thanks for your replies, they were very helpful. I tend to stick with the usual haunts, Ebay or Amazon for shopping and dolls via Angelesque as they were in the UK. Anything else was a totally different way to buy from what I've experienced in the past, so still working out what the safe routes are to be sure to purchase legit dolls from legit companies. Its why I have stuck with Angelesque. V sad no more Myous on the new site tho

 

If the choice is to order through a dealer, pay the 3.5% currency conversion fee, the random addition to total depending on company, the cost of shipping from the dealer to me and then wait 9-14 months for a doll I could have bought direct from company in probably 6 months for roughly the same amount once I've paid customs, whilst retaining full control of the order and shipping situation myself...pretty sure I'm going direct and saving myself the headache of threads like this, to be honest. Should imagine I'm not alone in that either.

Regardless of either of our interpretations of the situation, until someone from Angelesque clears up the many and varied questions, fulfils all the outstanding orders that have clearly dragged on far too long and deals with the at best mixed customer service issues, it's pretty safe to say people will be deeply wary of dealing with them.

 

Hello all, i will see what i can do!

 

Hi sorry once again for not getting chance to visit this page, can I ask all customers to check my web page and social media later tonight as I will hopefully be able to clear a few things up, what I can say to put peoples minds at rest is all outstanding orders will be honoured and now I am scaling down on the number of companies hopefully issues will become few and far between. Please don't ask any more questions on this forum instead please go through the Angelesque social media pages and the web site as that is where my focus will be from now on.

 

Could you answer the questions already posted in this thread at least please? I think there are a lot of people who haven't posted here but are reading and would like to know the answers too.

 

What incentive is there from ordering from a dealer rather than direct? Avoiding customs fees and having a go between to handle issues for you/on your behalf.
Honestly it's been WAY less stressful for me letting Carol deal with Dollzone's nonsense for example, than having to do it myself. I'd have been super grumpy by this point chasing up an "in stock" order from June (in stock with DZ, NOT Angelesque).

Avoiding customs is the biggest one for me though. With companies like Resinsoul I always knew they marked down and tended to sneak through customs but if im doing a big order it will get stopped, OR if i'm ordering from a company who are a bit less inclined to mark down and have far more pricey dolls so potentially a very painful £100+ customs fee? Yep, i'm gonna pay the extra few quid to avoid that.

you also need to factor in postage. Which is about $30 for an msd doll from China. So for example, the price of a Luts kid delf is the USD price PLUS that $30 to get to your door, and a risk of a customs fee potentially but it's a risk you take if you decide to go that route.

For me it very much depends on the company and what i'm ordering. I've gone direct, i've used ACBJD and i've used Angelesque and those options work well for me. Sometimes I just don't want the stress and anxiety of whether i'll get a huge customs fee and dealers also tend to offer more generous and flexable layaway terms than direct, depending on company. So that's an incentive there as well.

I would be nervous doing some of my layaways without having someone I KNEW to help me along. Also, if something (heaven forbid) does go wrong it's waaaay easier to persue legal action against someone in the same country than some faceless entity in China. <_< Ahem. Just... sayin. (Sorry carol!)

 

@huzangkor, thank you for the extensive information, especially since not everyone is a member of the social media Carol prefers to chose as her place to publish news and info.

Frankly I have seen this turning of Angelesque supporters on those voicing negative experiences with Angelesque in the last two months all over the social media. And as can be seen above, Carol herself is taking an active role in this. For her to say she does not know of any proof of those bad transactions is a slap in the face of everyone who has experienced these difficulties over years and tried to clear it up with her. Bringing in the kids as an excuse for lacking performance is another unprofessional move. Leaving this discussion and whole forum because she is challenged here for certain behaviour by those concerned after having denied them proper communication elsewhere, seems almost childish.
I do know what I'm talking about, because I know my friend and I have not had a single transaction with her over the last years that has not been faulty in some way, until the last one was a one year long disaster that was built on stringing us along as it eventually turned out - although those got resolved in the very long end, one very unhappily so.
All the time I wondered why bad feedback for Angelesque was so far and few between, because there were always people who would talk about bad experiences in private. I thought that maybe many people did not want to be unkind or felt like they were the only ones and just very unlucky, because loyal (and more lucky?) Angelesque supporters always spoke much louder.

I for my part thank the DoA mods for putting out that dealer caution.

 

This is a pretty disappointing "conclusion". I don't mind the changes, I already order through ACBJD frequently and I am used to currency conversion fees. But this thread didn't warrant that reaction, the questions being asked about how things would work going forwards were valid - it's natural for UK folk to want to know how it's going to work for them.

We still don't have answers to @RavensWing's questions about VAT, or @Lulu 's question about the price disparities. Both of which were perfectly reasonable and understandable questions, and in the interests of transparency could have been answered in literally just a sentence or two. Not doing so fosters this continued distrust, and it could be resolved so easily with just a little more actual communication. Disappointing.

 

Please note that member Merla also has a related thread in this forum, which has not yet been replied to; she is still waiting since July for the correction of an incorrect body that she received.

 

taken this down

 

@RavensWing Have you read Angelesque's company feedback here?

 

Yes.

 

@RavensWing, I'd like to just ask very politely about what triggered your response above? Something offsite? Since certainly noone here got angry by a long shot.
If you read the feedback and pertaining threads here you will have noticed that this is not about the perfectly understandable and well-known side effects of ordering from Asia at all, nor about not knowing how to effectively put together an order inquiry email, and as far as I can see a lot of people seem to have taken a step back and waited for very long already.
I am absolutely sure noone is here to hassle a mother of three, but if family gets in the way of business, then the responsible thing to do is to reduce business before the workload gets dangerously too much, not years after, when people start going public about the effects?

 

Not my intention to make anything worse, so I took my post down.

 

Suddenly everything falls into place; I ordered from Angelesque back in 2017 after seeing tons of good reviews about her. As others have said: her loudest customers are the ones that have praise to say. It was my first doll at the time and it took about 8 months before I got it, instead of the expected 4 months. According to Carol, this was due to a factory moving, but I received no communication about this whatsoever. When I asked about it, even then it took a really long time until I received a reply. I thought I was just really unlucky, but seeing now that more people are having trouble with her, I understand caution needs to be taken.

 

this is very sad to see. I've chatted to Carol a lot over the past few years and felt her frustration at having to deal with agents who give her nothing but the runaround, but lately she's been especially flakey in responses to everyone including myself where previously she was quite prompt. I try to give her the benefit of the doubt, after all, i've never really had a huge problem with my orders from her that haven't been at the actual supplier *cough cough dollzone* end and i've always gotten on well with her as a person. I feel like something has changed and I don't really know what. Stress maybe? Being overwhelmed?

Thing is, I kinda consider her almost a friend at this point so i'm quite sad to see her getting bogged down like this and failing to remain professional. Honestly I feel like real life has gotten in the way too much and the reduced workload was neccisary, but there seem to still be ongoing issues with communication which are really, nothing overly new. People have been struggling with communicating with her for years and I don't feel like she ever got very good at handling that.

Didn't she hire someone to handle the communication side of things and social media a while back? What ever happened with that? There was a big song and dance about it and then nothing.

To be frank, I think she needs another person to take some of the strain as cracks are more than showing.

As it stands, i'm still waiting to be told if she'll even order my DC doll. I've got 2 layaways in progress with her which are chugging along fine and all paid off but I was about to start another and she said she had to go "do maths" because of the pound taking a huge dive in value basically overnight (thank you brexit) and never got back to me. I'm chasing her up about it now because it's a time sensitive order and if she can't do it, I sort of need to know so I can order from somewhere else.

It makes me sad because I don't like to see people fail and I also don't like seeing customers unhappy. I really do hope she can sort this out. Honestly she needs someone to help her out because I don't think she's doing so well handling the work load all on her own and I get the feeling there's some behind the scenes stuff we're just not privy to adding to the issue.

I WANT to give her the benefit of the doubt, very very desperately because I always want to see the best in people and she is a nice person imo. I get the feeling she really is trying, she just can't keep up and isn't so good at actually communicating that and asking for help.

But I would really kinda like to know sooner, rather than later, if I need to put an order in with ACBJD or something instead.

I am of course more than happy to nag her for others as well. I tend to get a reply eventually via facebook, though the past few weeks it's been more spotty than usual which concerns me actually.
I get the real feeling that she's become utterly overwhelmed and sort of shut down.

I honestly hope she's okay.

and I hope those orders DO get resolved soon.

But yeah, i'm gonna keep trying to get a response from her.

I'll let you all know if I have any success.

 

Best of luck @purple_monkfish ! Honestly I'd be inclined to say just go to ACBJD instead.

I haven't posted about it here or anywhere, because the issues were technically resolved in the end (...sort of), but I have placed many orders over the years and not a single one has been correct. Between missing items, delays, unclear communication, in two cases the item I ordered wasn't even ordered at all, in another case I very very strongly suspect that my order was sold as stock to someone else (my exact order, but instead of being sent to me, it was placed as stock and sold), etc. I've had years of bad orders. But I came back off and on anyway, because I didn't believe it to be malicious. And by "resolved", I mean I gave up because it's more hassle fighting over some things than it's worth. Dolls have been sent to me on the wrong body multiple times and I'm not sitting through how difficult the process is again for the sake of correcting the problem.

I've gradually transitioned to using ACBJD as my dealer now, because they pretty much never get anything wrong, the process is incredibly painless, and they're happy to ask companies for specific requests on my behalf. After all of this with Angelesque, and how poorly it was handled, I think I'll probably just use ACBJD at all times now.

I have noticed that some of the comments on her posts - which aren't getting replies - are people asking why they haven't received answers to emails and the like. This is a PR disaster for the dealer tbh.

 

It really is unfortunately not good pr and I think she's really gotten overwhelmed by it which makes it worse.

I did manage to get a hold of her and yeah, her profit margins mean that she can't do the 12% discount which I understand, I mean when you factor in shipping and customs you really can't charge exactly what the shop charges if they aren't giving you a decent bulk dealer discount and it doesn't sound like she gets a very good discount from a few of the companies she works with.
So yeah, it's like £50 cheaper to order from ACBJD but i've never done a layaway with them so I emailed them about it.

ACBJD aren't great at communication either I find, which annoys me. I'm still waiting on some clothing order from them which they didn't tell me was out of stock and had a huge backlog till i emailed them 2 months later all "er what's up with my order?"

So to be honest, I find a lot of the dealers to be a bit shit at communication. *sigh*
and when it's a LARGE chunk of change that's quite anxiety inducing.

But yeah, given the only way you seem to be able to corner Carol is via facebook and by pinging her several times, it's not brilliant. I hope she can resolve this and that the smaller list of companies etc really helps her get back on track. I feel like maybe things expanded far too quickly and for several years she's been struggling and this whole thing NEEDED to happen to sort of... force the issue. Sometimes you gotta burn it all down to rebuild you know?

 

Wow. Not sure if I should be posting here, because I have never ordered from her - in fact, I prefer to order directly from the companies themselves whenever possible. But...I'm chiming in because I have used other dealers several times when it was more convenient to do so, and that includes within the past couple of months. I've used Alice's primarily (and contrary to a previous poster, found their communication to be incredibly fast and helpful, to the point where they've gotten me deals and extras from companies when my order didn't necessarily merit them - so I'm not sure what happened there), but also Legend Doll, Denver Doll and even Dolk. None of them made excuses regarding the holidays or coronavirus, because the former is SOP every year, and frankly, the latter has had little effect at this point on shipping times to the western countries. Every order I placed was sent within the expected parameters.

Basically I guess I'm just saying that there is no reason to order from Angelesque right now, and if she is the only dealer that you have used, and are therefore under the impression that these delays over the years have been normal, they're not - and never have been. All of the dealers I've ordered from have been 100% professional, highly organized, and never cited personal life as part of the routine. I hate to see any business fail, but as customers, it is not our responsibility to pay the price for someone's poor business practices. I'm certain that she is a very nice person irl, but reading some of the posts tells me that she has not drawn the extremely important line between internet 'friendship' and business - and that she is taking advantage of the fact that people like her to be disorganized and slow. If she can't handle the heat, then the onus rests on her to hire help or get out of the kitchen.

 

Hey there! Yes that was me who was to be a voice here.
I wanted to try and help people not feel forgotten on Den of Angels and try get some info out to people as she didn't use this site often, i hated seeing people confused and looking for answers.
But sadly Carol has decided to step away from Den of Angels all together, so i am just here for myself now! I love the hobby myself, I was just sad to see people feeling lost and left out..