1 & Only Amazon Japan Thread

[something]

Originally Posted by HitokiriShadow

and uses the exchange rate listed on my credit card statement

Wish I had that - would sure be handy. I never know exactly what the exchnage rate was when I got charged. All I see is "Amazon.co.jp" and a price, basically.

Of course I'm paying no currency conversion fee so I guess it all works out.

The yen item price isn't a problem, since I can just update it when it ships and then again when this situation comes up.

Yeah that's why I need to start separating S&H and item cost.

Shipping calculation is more of a problem for CDJapan orders, when I have to try to figure out how much of the shipping to apply to each group of items

I just divide evenly by number of items. Too tricky to take weight into account.

[HitokiriShadow]

Originally Posted by something

Yeah that's why I need to start separating S&H and item cost.

I just added the shipping column in sometime last month. I think it took me about 45 minutes to fill it in for everything I've already imported, and I think I have about half as much as you do at most. Have fun!

I just divide evenly by number of items. Too tricky to take weight into account.

Oh, yeah, I don't bother factoring in the weight. It's just trickier because of the larger number of items. Oh, and the coupons and point discounts, which are applied to the total, so those also have to be calculated and distributed. Actually, come to think of it, the reason it was tricky was because I was factoring in each items price, so I applied the discount and shipping to each item proportionate to its price, and I have no idea why I did it that way. I guess just evenly dividing it by item number, giving each one an equal amount would make a lot more sense.

[something]

Originally Posted by HitokiriShadow

I just added the shipping column in sometime last month. I think it took me about 45 minutes to fill it in for everything I've already imported, and I think I have about half as much as you do at most. Have fun!

It took... er, a really long time! But I'm twisted so I do this sort of thing for fun. Hours of staring at a spreadsheet and Amazon orders + thinking up ever more asinine ways to track purchases + listening to lots of Vocaloid = ...a hobby?

As expected, I ended up going more detailed than intended. I now have 6 cost related columns.
1) Item price - Will almost always be the price it got ordered at, unless it's one of those rare situations where I save money even after the PPG bug kicks in, in which case I replace with the lower shipped cost (only Railgun 4 and 6 and Drrr!! 6 fit that criteria)
2) S&H cost - Pretty straightforward. Taken from order emails for stuff already shipped, calculated as Total_S&H/#items for unshipped stuff. I'll adjust for exact S&H costs as shipment confirmation emails come in.
3) PPG Refund - Logging the amount I get back here so I can easily calculate the total without having to modify Item price except in the rare situation mentioned above.
4) Total [¥] - This should be as accurate a calculation of true final cost in yen of an item as possible.
5) Total [$] - Taken from credit card statements. For stuff not yet shipped/charged, I get an approximation by using...
6) Today's cost [$] - based on the exchange rate at the moment. (86.957 fuuuuck)

I suppose if they ever actually fix the PPG bug (hahahahahaha...hah) I won't need to use the refund column anymore and will have to just modify the item price as things ship.

Now my import anime spreadsheet has 27 columns. >_>

And I have the sheet I mentioned earlier, dedicated specifically to tracking price at time of order, price at shipment, discrepancy between them, whether I've filed for a refund, and whether I've received that refund yet.

Of course the same old issue of getting an accurate dollar count remains: I have no way of knowing what exchange rate my credit card company used, although for 1 item shipments I can take the price as is; for multi-item shipments I calculate it based on what % of the shipment total each item was.

I've turned ordering stuff and receiving packages into such a complicated production.

[alexd00]

Originally Posted by something

Now my import anime spreadsheet has 27 columns. >_>

Wow, mine has nine. I can't even think of what I could add to get to 27.

Also, you have Capital One, right? The exchange rate doesn't show up in the day-by-day transaction section, but it's listed on the actual statement. You can view this online if you don't have statements mailed or e-mailed to you.

[something]

Originally Posted by alexd00

Wow, mine has nine. I can't even think of what I could add to get to 27.

Let's see if I can remember them all off the top of my head:
Series w/Vol#, #discs, #eps, #mins, ova/movie/tv, dvd/bd, disc region, distributor, original r2 distributor (for r3tw releases), watched y/n, item (yen), S&H (yen), PPG refund (yen), total (yen), total ($), today's xchng rate price ($), month ordered, month in-hand, retailer, on preoder y/n, part of a set y/n, seen the fsubs y/n, has eng subs y/n, animation studio, initial air date, age in yrs since initial air date.

I see to be forgetting just one, figures.

I also have totals per franchise, per series, and per release (for boxsets) as appropriate so there's some vertical hierarchy too. Excel's Grouping function is so handy, since it allows me to collapse down to franchise level or open all the way out to individual volume level.

Also, you have Capital One, right? The exchange rate doesn't show up in the day-by-day transaction section, but it's listed on the actual statement. You can view this online if you don't have statements mailed or e-mailed to you.

Ah, I never check that, just the brief transaction list. Thanks, I'll have to look into it. Although it means being patient enough to wait for the statement each month.

[HitokiriShadow]

Originally Posted by something

Let's see if I can remember them all off the top of my head:
Series w/Vol#, #discs, #eps, #mins, ova/movie/tv, dvd/bd, disc region, distributor, original r2 distributor (for r3tw releases), watched y/n, item (yen), S&H (yen), PPG refund (yen), total (yen), total ($), today's xchng rate price ($), month ordered, month in-hand, retailer, on preoder y/n, part of a set y/n, seen the fsubs y/n, has eng subs y/n, animation studio, initial air date, age in yrs since initial air date.

I see to be forgetting just one, figures.

I also have totals per franchise, per series, and per release (for boxsets) as appropriate so there's some vertical hierarchy too. Excel's Grouping function is so handy, since it allows me to collapse down to franchise level or open all the way out to individual volume level.

Geez, I only have 12 columns and four of them are dates. Mine are:

Series name and volume #, order date (this is important for finding the e-mails with other information at later dates, I'm glad I started doing this from the get-go), release date, item price (yen), shipping (yen), cost (dollar), store purchased from, ship date, arrival date, episode count, cost per episode (dollars), and..... I'm forgetting one as well. *checks* Oh, I have the price per episode in yen as well. I have a 13th column I use to mark the original price I was charged for titles hit with the pricing error. I also have totals for prices, episodes, and overall price per episode for each series. I've been thinking about adding the animation studio and distributor, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

[HitokiriShadow]

Oh, Amazon.jp, just when I thought your combined shipping policies couldn't get any stranger. So, as everyone here may know, Amazon.jp's "Combine for fewest shipments" option is pretty ridiculous, as they will ship DVDs and BDs separately even when they are released just a day or two apart. But now I'm ordering the September issue of Hobby Japan for the Black Rock Shooter DVD, which they have in stock right now.... and they combine it with a BD that comes out in October. Meanwhile, I have a DVD that comes out next month and another BD that is released in September, and they are shipping out alone, as usual. LOL Amazon.jp.

I've already e-mailed them once about this, but their initial response was just to basically say "It's because you clicked the 'fewest shipments' option, choose the other option if you want it sooner." I've sent them another e-mail, trying to get them to combine it with the DVD that ships next month, so hopefully they can actually do it. I mean, there's really no reason they shouldn't be able to, but you just never know what strange crap you might have to deal with. But good grief, they can't ship two items that release a day apart but they want to hold onto that magazine for three months?

[something]

Originally Posted by HitokiriShadow

Oh, Amazon.jp, just when I thought your combined shipping policies couldn't get any stranger. So, as everyone here may know, Amazon.jp's "Combine for fewest shipments" option is pretty ridiculous, as they will ship DVDs and BDs separately even when they are released just a day or two apart. But now I'm ordering the September issue of Hobby Japan for the Black Rock Shooter DVD, which they have in stock right now.... and they combine it with a BD that comes out in October.

They do this from time to time on the order confirmation screen with my orders, but they end up shipping individually anyway. I don't pay much attention to the initial shipment schedule.

For my part, they say they're going to ship it out with the AB! OST, so it's going out at release date (or a day later I guess, 7/31).

[HitokiriShadow]

I've occasionally see things that coming out close together show that they would ship together and then one would split off, but it was all pretty reasonable. It was the way you would expect the "combine orders" option to work. I've never seen anything this insane from it before. And Amazon.jp's system is screwy enough that I could honestly see them deciding to hold the item for three months.... and then selling out of it before my order ships, which was my main concern.

[Betenoire]

How is Amazon JP at adding things? As long as I am already in for (a good number of) penny(ies) I just realized I could add Kuttsukiboshi.

Is adding an item a hassle with them?