Service industry?

[tamaranth]

I have a two-part document, 450 A4 pages, Microsoft Word format, that I'm interested in having printed to A5 and spiral-bound. The only 'difficult' formatting is a single hard page break, and a 'heading 1' style that produces a soft page break before each new chapter.

I contact the local branch of a national print/copy chain.

Really, jobs to A5, if not being originally worked on 2 up on A4, are a nightmare!. Not trying to be unhelpful but just very realistic

I explain that I don't want perfection -- just a portable copy to edit. It's inconvenient for me to get to the shop, so I thought I might send it via email and simply drop by to collect the finished product.

We don't normally take jobs by email from non-account customers as it happens that sometimes the customer does not turn up to collect what we have done after having been struggling with their emailed documents

OK, what if I give you my credit card details and pay a deposit up front? And make whatever changes are necessary to the file to make it print-ready?

Prices are per straight forward copying put in the feeder and get a copy out, I will not entertain to do anything with your file. I am afraid I will have to see a hard copy before I do anything

As it happens, I could get a hard copy -- 450 sheets of A4 -- and lug it into Horsham; but that's only because I have a cooperative employer. And actually, after all this to-and-froing by email, I'm not exactly impressed with their customer service.

Would you do business with this company? And, if not, could you recommend a better one?

Comments

[ajshepherd.livejournal.com]

Name names!!

I'd never do business with Kall Kwik again after the way they faffed me around when I was MH editor. At one point I had to bring in another master copy after someone had been resting their tea on top of the old one and left a mark! That was years ago, but I'd still not use them!

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

KALL KWIK! Yes, it's them again. Though as marypcb says, they're a franchise ...

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't use them and I'd name them. I don't know any I'd recommend (Kall Kwick is a franchise and completely dependant on the individual manager, ditto PDC, I hear Kinko's are usually helpful but I expect they're franchised too) but I'd probably call - people are easier to blow off in email than on the phone. And I'd enquire about becoming an account customer - it might be worthwhile and it probably gets their interest level up ;-)

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

It was KallKwik and I'm very much inclined not to bother with them -- I did try calling but unable to speak to the person I needed to discuss it with, and frankly after all the emailing I haven't formed a positive impression!

I'll see if there's a Kinko around here -- I did something similar a few years back, in London, via their Holborn branch and they were very helpful.

[naominovik.livejournal.com]

At least here in the US, Kinkos has a fantastic "File, Print" tool -- you install it on your computer and it sticks a little plug-in into MS Word that lets you export a document set up the way you want it, send it directly to the nearest Kinkos shop, pick binding options, etc, and pay by credit card, so all you need to do is go over and pick it up. Also, you can instead have it shipped anywhere you want. I've used it a couple of times and no problems.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

That sounds wonderful -- there's definitely a market for it, at least me!

Nearest Kinko's is London (they don't seem to have crept out of Zone 1 here), but it does look as though they'll ship it. Maybe for the second draft (if there is a second draft <g>.)

Thank you ever so much for this info! Are they very expensive, do you know?

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

Trouble with all these organisations is so much depends upon the member of staff you get. Alternatives? You might check out Staples, the discount stationery store; the nearest one to me certainly does printing/binding from digital media.