Audrey F.

Barnes & Noble has significantly gone downhill.

As a grad student, I've used them since 2014 to order my textbooks, but in the last year or so, my books show up later than what's promised on their website. They have several shipping options like: free, standard (arrives in 6-8 days); $8.99, express (arrives in 2-3 days), and $15.48, expedited (arrives 1-2 days). The first time I ordered from them, I chose standard and my book arrives about a month late. The second time I ordered from them, I chose standard & the book never arrived. I kept checking the order tracking & it showed it was in a town about 20 miles from me, so I kept waiting. I eventually contacted B&N support and they told me the book was lost, nothing they could do.

The most recent time I ordered from them, I ordered the book on Tuesday, 9/12 and paid for expedited shipping, expecting it to come Thursday or Friday. By Saturday, the book hadn't arrived, so I contacted customer support who told me it takes about 7 days for their processing center to even process the order and that I could expect it October 5 -- over 3 weeks after I put in the order. It's extremely misleading to have it in checkout that if you order a book using expedited shipping, it'll arrive in 1-2 business days and to charge over $15 for that shipping if the book is going to arrive 3 weeks later.

TLDR Shipping is an absolute mess, shows up much later than advertised. This is why B&N is losing business to Amazon.