Shipping Time

You new sooner or later someone would have to ask. After seeing that Ed Ford and the Shapeoko3 team still have not shipped their orders and are dealing with delays until at least May/June on most machines, do you expect any similar delays? It’s a bit of a mess there with people not too happy and feeling a bit “stalled” for answers. Unlike the Inventables team, they were not so transparent and customer oriented as the situation unfolded, I think due to staffing issues. I wish them all the best on thier fine machine, but I sure am glad I chose the X-Carve. So please tell me Christmas is coming on the planned dates? Besides my son’s birth I really can’t compare the anticipation!

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I guess I have a similar question. I’ve always hated pre-order type things for some of these very reasons.

If I order this week (or next), will I be included in the (roughly) Apr 30 ship dates? Or will my order get kicked to later May or June based on number of pre-orders already in? Will I get shunted out into a second or third production run for being so late to find this?

Hi Guys,

These are totally valid questions. I am traveling today so I can’t go check personally on the status. I’ve asked for a status update from our operations team that is focused on X-Carve shipping and will have an official update to share when they get back to me with specific answers. The last time I asked them we were waiting for two parts to clear customs. They had to go through an X-Ray at the customs depot. I don’t know the status of that procedure at this time but will update you when I get the next piece of information.

Thanks,
Zach

Thanks Zach.

I would appreciate knowing if there’s some sort of pre-order close date that would assure an order placed before that date would most assuredly be shipping in the first days.

I’d rather know now if I should look into other options, rather than end up finding out May 3rd that I’ve been put into a backorder queue. Taking 100% of the money up front to wait any longer than the 29 days left is one of the few things keeping my wallet in my pocket.

Hi @AlanDyke we are doing a first in first out process. This means we will start shipping the orders in the order we took them. We promise on the page we will start shipping by April 30th not that all shipments will go out on April 30th. To ship the kits there are four stations:

  1. Receiving and part quality inspection. - This is where we go through the shipment from the vendor and determine if the parts match the specification on our specification document and engineering drawing. The parts are then put in our “company store”.

  2. Kitting station - In this station we take the component parts and put them into the bundles on the configurator web page.

  3. Packing station where we take items off the bundle shelf and put them in the box.

  4. Q&A and shipping where we verify the right items are in the box and put the shipping label.

This will be a continuous process that we promise will start before April 30th.

I will give a more detailed update once I hear back from my team with specifics.

Absolutely understood. I guess my question was more on the lines of – do you have enough that someone ordering this late is likely to get one shipped in the first few days/week or so, or is there any significant chance of getting bumped into a few months later?

On Facebook it says the plan for the first batch is about a 1000 units.

Let me put some context around this answer before I say one way or the other. This is a complicated machine with lots of components that are manufactured at different locations. Some parts are off the shelf and some parts are designed per our design requirements. Some of the parts are available in the United States while others are imported. On the imported items we are not able to control the speed of the customs process. In addition to that we have data on the rate of sales based on what we have sold so far but I don’t know how that will change the day we start shipping.

Based on the rate we are selling them right now and the dates we have been quoted from our suppliers we do not expect to have an interruption in shipping after we start. In some cases we have already placed our second order with suppliers on long lead time items. If this situation changes I will provide an update on our blog. In addition we can provide a full refund to anyone that wants their money back at any time if they do not want the machine and we have not shipped.

We will be working on writing up a more detailed official update tomorrow and posting it to the blog next week. It is true that we ordered enough for the first 1000 units in our first batch.

I’m sorry I can’t give a definitive “yes” or “no” but there are too many variables out of my control to be able to provide that kind of certainty.

I very much appreciate that you’re able to come here and discuss stuff as candidly as you are.

If there doesn’t appear to be any interruptions - and it’s based on spot in line - I can only hope there’s not a monster “rush” right between tonight and when I can finally pull the trigger.

We published the official shipping update #2 on our blog today.

I will say that customer service is pretty good at Inventables but as far as the delay part, I ordered an Xcarve about 1 1/2 months ago and they say the ship date isn’t till May!! That’s pretty frustrating! I email Inventables last week to see if there were any updates on the shipping time and still waiting for an answer!! So even though I know I’m going to be happy with the machine, when I get it, the wait time kind of has me bitter right now!

There is no delay as of now, When the X-Carve was announced it was available for pre-order and the dates were made very clear from the beginning that no units would ship until 30 April. I’m surprised to hear that you didn’t receive an email reply as Inventables has always been very good about replying to me or answering the phone if I call.

Usually they good about getting back to me! Except this last time but then I found the thread with the update for shipping so no big deal!! And don’t get me wrong, I’m not blaming Inventables about the shipping date, I’m just… Disappointed in myself I guess you can say because I didnt do my research before purchasing the Xcarve as far as I did not know I was preordering! I would have still ordered it regardless, but if I would have known about the preordering, I wouldn’t have been surprised and disappointed. My own fault!! Lol

I got an email the the other day about shipments saying still on course for April 30Th shipments and a update on the blog.
says 3 parts have not been delivered to Inventables as of yet .
the same as yourself i would like a delivery now, i accept it was a pre-order and that i will have to wait .If it makes you feel better i have to have the parts shipped over the Atlantic so you will proberly get your x-carve before me

Hi @ThomasGonzales I am sorry for the confusion. To be clear the X-Carve is not delayed. When we launched on Tuesday May 3rd we promised we would start shipping orders by April 30th. The update we gave this week confirmed that we are still on track to meet that promise.

Just curious if there is any sort of general or rough estimate on when an X-carve ordered within the past week would ship out. Would a rough estimate be 2 weeks or more like 2 months beyond the April 30 first-ship date…? Again, just looking for a rough estimate, not a guarantee or promise. Thanks…!!

On an order of magnitude basis if there are no unforeseen problems that come up we expect it to be days or weeks not months.

Zach, that is wonderful to hear…!! Thanks so much for the quick response.

Hi, is there any place on the order form to delay the shipping until the very end of May? I won’t be home (Guatemala) until June but I need to order and pay now (changing country, need to close bank account here). Thanks.

@MikeByrne email help at inventables dot com with your order number and they will note your order so it gets held by the shipping team.