This is OK and there are bargains to be had, but be careful.
>Only join Books For Children if you are prepared to accept books delivered to your door at average prices most times, with the need to reject unwanted choices every month and the odd clerical error and annoying marketing ploys.
The basis of the above statement is that I am finally at the end of the "you must buy 6 books before the year is up or we will purSUE you for all the £60+ that you saved accepting our bargain introduction offer" period. I purposely spell the word pursue in the preceding fashion as will be explained further on!
The fault that this book club, and others like it, have is that it FORCES you to buy at least 6 other books from their catalogue before a time limit, and if not, then it surcharges for the "savings" on the introductory package.
Another fault is the constant stream of recommended books that you have to REJECT each time or otherwise have to spend time and possibly money returning.
I got the introductory package as an inducement to join this site because it included Thomas the Tank Engine Magic railroad at £5.99, and The Silver Tower CD by Enid Blyton (not that she programmed it of course being that she is pushing up the daisies). Also a couple of other free books including a huge A3 stereoscopic Dinosaur picture book (complete with red/green lenses).
My first irritation with them was the difficulty in logging into their website, as the programmer had not allowed for anyone with the CAPS LOCK on, as I frequently have. The error messages were so obscure that it took me quite a while to see what was going wrong.
The website is useful to reject the Editors Choice, which is a MUST if you do not want their decision on what is best for your child. The problem with returning the paper based order slip with the rejection on, is that once out of your sight you can not prove what was on it if they make a mistake and send the book on to you, then charge you £2 for a return label to get a refund for a book that you would never have ACTIVELY chosen. This sort of passive action by default is a real annoyance, and karenuk has mentioned it in her moving account of DEBT a few weeks ago on Ciao.
Talking of which, even the category of child age is selected as 0-3 years by default so you could end up with both an unappreciated book AND the wrong age range for reading it anyway. The first time you order or pay with their billing slip, you are supposed to change the default age range of your preference to 3-5, 5-7 or 8-12 years old.
My second irritation was more of an annoyance, as I had ordered 3 books, and confirmed with the gentleman taking my order and payment, that the postage was indeed FREE as stated on the order form. Well you guess it; I got charged £2.99 for postage as well as the books.
I logged onto the website and contacted the administrator via email from a link on their site and got a nice email by return the same day apologising and stating that they would adjust the bill.
I wrote back and stated that I had seen opinions on both Ciao and Dooyoo talking of BFC sending in DEBT COLLECTORS and I was worried in case late payment of the original bill would automatically trigger off their computer debt recovery.
They replied with a less nice email, still polite but rather terse, saying that I would not have to pay until the new revised bill had been received.
When I finally got it, a booklet accompanied the bill with bargains in, and low and behold, the item I had bought for £65 was now £45 saving £20.
So I phoned this time and complained that by the time I had got the bill for the item in question it was on sale £20 less, so I was going to return it for a refund and buy the sale item back. Before I could finish the girl taking my order/payment said that I would not need to do that, as she would credit my account with £20 immediately. This was very pleasing as there was no arguing. Full marks to BFC for that. In case anyone is wondering the item in question was a Noddy 24 book boxed set (with free soft, and I mean VERY soft, Noddy-in-a-car toy made of rubber).
Other than these 2 instances, and the general irritation of having to reject the default Editors book of the month, I am actually happy that I found their website and joined.
For one thing, it saves me having to waste all my lunch hour walking to and from the bargain bookstore in Bristol in the Horsfair, only to find that they have nothing that takes my fancy.
It also does NOT need a credit card! Instead the books are delivered and an invoice follows. If you are responding to the website special offer then the invoice actually comes with the books the first time. Otherwise the books turn up one day and the invoice comes with the next month’s magazine. There is variable delay depending on season, but I have usually received stuff after only a few days of ordering on the website or by letter. I have always been happy with the delivery, except that once the Noddy toy was delivered much later than the books, causing unnecessary concern, but that most likely was down to delivery error by the courier.
I am free to cancel my membership now, and if I do, I will do what I advise others to do, EMAIL the cancellation and confirm in writing. You are supposed to give 4 weeks notice in writing, so expect another magazine at least to turn up and remember to REJECT the latest Editor’s choice or you will have to return it or pay for it, all extra, unwanted expense when you think you have got rid of the need to worry about this.
In case anyone wants to risk it, I enclose the link. Note that unlike many, members here I do not earn anything by referring, there is no member ID embedded here, it is just a courtesy to other Ciao members to save them hunting for the site.
http://www.booksforchildren.co.uk
The site is bright, cheerful, colourful, being mostly black text on white background, and red text on yellow background, well designed. Possibly a bit too much going on at first sight, but you get used to knowing where to look for information quite quickly.
There are the classic children’s writes listed on the right of the screen, POTTER, MILNE, LEWIS, DAHL, TOLKIEN, BLYTON and POTTER each linking to more information and books to be bought.
The left side of the screen has the contents of the site and the club magazine image, which itself has a contents drop down menu. A nice red text on yellow background, effective.
There is a search facility for Title, Author or order Code at the top of the site, quite useful, as the only way to order a book online for a book discovered in the paper based magazine, is if you find it on the site and then click on the “add to basket”. The only way to find it quickly is to search for the order code form the booklet. Otherwise you could spend all day trying to find where some of the books have been hidden.
The magazine is not identical to the website version, I have found that there are some of the less popular book choices that do not seem to be shown on the website in the same context as the magazine. Not a real problem, just makes you wonder what bargains are going undetected if it is so hard sometimes to find what you know MUST exist somewhere on the site. Trying to find Enid Blyton's Silver Tower was one example where the only way I found it was to search for the order code.
Only then could I write a short review on it for the site. This is done for free, unlike getting paid by Ciao in case you wonder.
The site has the categories Bestsellers, CD Roms Audio Books and Competitions at the bottom of the main page.
The CD Rom section has Tweenies - ready To Play for £15.99 save £4. Not much of a save when you consider that their sister site (The Home Software World) is doing it as an inducement to join HSW at £2.99, as is also Bob the Builder CD Rom, and Thomas the Tank Engine 2: Trouble on the Tracks CD Rom.
Notwithstanding all of the negative comments I have made, I am overall quite satisfied with the BFC site and service. I wish them well, and would continue being a member longer of it were not for the fact that I can never get away from that annoying REJECTION malarkey.
It would be nice if the owners allowed their loyal customer base, once through the initiation rite of “6 more books or a pound of flesh” phase, could carry on receiving the magazine and special offers without the need to reject every month. There's a novel customer orientated approach to increasing sales overall.
And that is my final thought for today brethren!
Books For Children is OK 
