[buffington]

I'm not sure I want to know how much I've spent on Amazon, but I'm sure it's a lot. I too went years with nearly weekly purchases with no issues at all. Maybe a delivery that was later than the estimated date here and there, but that's it.

In the last few months though things have become measurably worse for me. In the last three months I've had to send nearly every order back. Orders have been incomplete, or wrong (like, children's Shrek t-shirts instead of reams of copier paper). They've sent incomplete orders, or obviously not-new "new" items (with finger prints, food crumbs, wads of newspaper), or the products advertised were not even remotely what was described.

It's not that surprising to see Amazon posting poor numbers. I've stopped purchasing from Amazon, buying direct from the people making the things I buy if possible. It costs more, and takes longer to arrive, but now I'm not burning time fixing Amazon's stupid problems.