Filco blue switch request

[eliOcs]

Hello,
I've been searching through the website and I want to know if there will be black tenkeyless filco blue cherry switch keyboards for sale. If so what would be the cost to get one of them and a set of black blank keycaps shipped to Madrid (Spain).

Thanks in advance.

[Hakhu]

I just compared prices myself and I think that with the current exchange rate of the US $ you are better off buying from elitekeyboards.

Judging from the Filcos with brown Cherry switches:

Keyboardco
103.50 £ + shipping (should be at least 10 £ to Spain)
~ 126 €

Elitekeyboards
115$ + shipping (something around 35$)
~ 102 €

The keyboard is not available at either site.

[eliOcs]

Thanks for the calculation , I'll wait for a new shipment to arrive at EliteKeyboards

[Hakhu]

You bet. At least when buying keyboards. Not for stocks though.

[Kraicheck]

You forgot VAT for Elitekeyboards so it's actually around €120, which is close to the KeyboardCo price.

[Hakhu]

Two valid objections. Seems I didn't think it though all the way.

We need a German distributor for all available mechanical keyboards!

[Bruce]

Tenkeyless with Blues are on order. Due in the same shipment as our 105 Majestouch models.
Also going to have blank, black Cherry MX3000 by Christmas.

[Hakhu]

Also going to have blank, black Cherry MX3000 by Christmas.

Hmm ... nice! Never seen those. Are they a special order or does Cherry carry them regularly?

[Bruce]

Hi Hakhu

Yes, It's a special order.

[itlnstln]

Are those 3000s going to be in an ANSI or ISO layout?  I might get one if they are ANSI.

[Bruce]

Sorry itlnstln
It's going to be a 105.

[itlnstln]

I thought I'd ask.  Thanks, anyway.

[Thaxll'ssillyia]

Are you also getting Filcos with blue switches, euro layout and blank keys?

[leos]

Also returns would be a lot easier.  I don't know the Keyboard Co. policy but Elitekeyboard's one year warranty is North America only and RMA shipping would be more expensive.

and dont forget the extra tax(es)+VAT inside Europe.

for Germany +19% tax +VAT

Keyboardco
103.50 £ + shipping


Elitekeyboards
115$ +VAT +*19% + shipping (something around 35$)

edit
taric code 8471300000

VAT is 0  link

[Buckling_Summer]

Two valid objections. Seems I didn't think it though all the way.

We need a German distributor for all available mechanical keyboards!

Anyone, but metadot.


So what is the final verdict for someone who lives in Europe?
KeyboardCo or elitekeyboards?

[itlnstln]

I would buy from Keyboardco if I lived in Europe. I think you lose the waranty or it's very difficult to exercise (not that you would need it) if you buy from elitekeyboards and ship overseas.

[Buckling_Summer]

Yes warranty is a great thing to loose.

Murphy's Law for
"Ordering from elitekeyboards.com will result statistically in a 100% good keyboard, unless you live outside US"

[vhaarr]

I tried e-mailing keyboardco.com about an order, and I never got a reply.
I bought from elitekeyboards.com instead.

This is the whole e-mail I sent sales@keyboardco.com on Nov 12. 2009;

Hey, I put together a shopping cart on your site with the following items;
2x WEB094       WASD keys for Cherry MX Switches
2x FKBN87M/EB   Filco Tenkeyless N-Key rollover, Tactile Action, USA Keyboard
1x KBC-M10B     Black ScrollSeal Washable Optical Mouse
1x FKB104/87    Blank, Black Filco Keyset
1x FKB118       Black key puller

But before I order, I have several questions for you, in order of priority;
1. FKBN87M/EB (the keyboard) is not in stock. If I order them from you
today, will I recieve them before christmas (assume 7 days for
delivery)?
2. Will you carry the variant of this keyboard without any key names
printed on (making the FKB104/87 keyset redundant) before christmas?
3. Is the "FKB118 Black key puller" included in the FKB104/87 keyset?
I ask because I was browsing a US retailer and they had it bundled.
4. Will you carry the version of the "WEB094 WASD keys for Cherry MX
Switches" that have only the arrows and blue keys[1] but not the
"[ASDW]" labels?

Please note that a simple list of answers from you such as the following;
"The answers to your questions are, in order; Yes, no, no and no."
Will be sufficient, I do not wish to keep you from more important work.

Footnotes
1: http://elitekeyboards.com/products.php?sub=access,keycaps&pid=hh_wasdn

Thank you,

[keyb_gr]

That reads like "very picky costumer, and heaven forbid anything goes wrong with the order, then probably all hell will break lose".

[vhaarr]

It's supposed to be a "easily readable and parsable list of items with a prioritized list of questions for someone who might be more busy with orders that might provide more revenue or more important customers".

I see that as being friendly and helpful.

[Bruce]

Hi vhaarr

I am really sorry to hear about this, I can't apologise enough.
sales@keyboardco.com comes onto my desk and I answer everything, even the awkward stuff. I don't remember seeing this one.
I can't imagine what happened, email is not 100% reliable I guess. And I am human.
Funnily enough we did get an enquiry that day, for 2 of the same model, from your neck of the woods, which was replied to.
For the record, there is nothing about the email that would have been a problem to us. We make our living selling people keyboards and if those people have questions we answer them. That's what we do - I don't have more important work.

[vhaarr]

Here's the pure text e-mail http://pastey.net/130558 in case you want to investigate further (don't do so on my account, just in case something might be wrong with your e-mail provider or something). It is possible that your reply ended up in my gmails Spam folder, I guess? I don't check it regularly. However that would be strange, I've never had any false positives in there before (that I know of, hehe).

I didn't mean to sound awkward or hostile or anything in the e-mail, it's just that from how your website looks it seemed to me that you deal more in large quantities and orders tailored towards businesses or government institutions, for example, so I thought maybe my order would not be the top priority of the day.

I was just being humble, I never intended to be picky or anything. I guess it's just the way I write that makes me come off strange sometimes. I don't sprinkle my texts with fifty smilyfaces, for example. Simply because I don't sit around grinning like an idiot all day Doesn't mean I'm angry or anything, it's just reality.

In any case, apology accepted

[vhaarr]

Really? It looks more like a small shop to me.

From the "About Us" section I learned that the company was quite old, the "Returns" and "Trade" pages list "Company" as the first data entry, their price list does NOT include VAT by default, phone support is listed as the main entry to the company, and the website is not carefully designed, leading me to believe it's more of an "added" way to deal with KeyboardCo, and not the preferred way (which would be business deals in person and via phone).

These things combined lead me to believe KeyboardCo was a company focused on the larger business and government markets and not tailored towards individual customers like myself.

Which is not a bad thing at all, quite the opposite in fact, but that's why I wrote the last part of my mail where it says

Please note that a simple list of answers from you such as the following;
"The answers to your questions are, in order; Yes, no, no and no."
Will be sufficient, I do not wish to keep you from more important work.

Which I'm guessing is the part keyb_gr "objected" to.

And don't get me wrong, all the qualities above appeal to me, and I like them, that's why I e-mailed them first instead of going directly to elitekeyboards.com

[Bruce]

Hi vhaar

Feedback is very valuable. Our IT manager is investigating to see if we can learn something from this so the headers will be useful. Thanks.

Usually, if there is a big email outage you can't help but notice, it is the odd stray like this that's more frustrating and difficult to deal with.
It won't be in your spam folder, I never got the enquiry and never replied.
I would ask anyone who does email me to please feel free to send a chase up email if they haven't had a reply in 24 hours because we all aim to answer emails within 24 hours so you can assume there is a problem. Allowing for weekends.

I don't want anyone to think we've got bigger fish to fry. You are correct in that we also deal trade and public sector, but believe me, it is a pleasure to deal with you guys as you tend to know pretty much what you want and what you are talking about. This makes my life much easier.

The Keyboard Company was started 20 years ago because keyboards available to the trade were not available to the wider public. It was then and is now our wish to correct that. We have never had a minimum order value and every single customer is valuable to us.

[Bruce]

Update.

Turns out there was a problem that day. We couldn't connect to our ISP for a few hours. We were told that no email had been lost - seems that was not 100% true.

Anyone know of a bullet proof email service?