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I tried to order some decorative melamine (heavy duty plastic) dishes my sister-in-law requested for Christmas. The order total for the dishes was $47, but the shipping was $20! So my $47 total became $69 (tax was $2). When I called to see if someone could lower the shipping rates (the explanation/formulation for which I could not find anywhere on the website), I was given, "Well, that's the price. I can't help you." While on hold for 10 minutes for a manager, I remembered an experience a friend of mine had a while back when trying to order curtains. Her shipping total came to half of her order total. (I've complained to friends about Pottery Barn shipping, but this is ridiculous!) My friend decided, as I did today, not to go through with her order. Truly highway robbery. Those dishes are not fragile, they are not heavy, they are not bulky, and I live in the continental US. There is no reason for shipping to be that outrageous.

Then I thought perhaps if I ordered something with free shipping, I could get the order shipped free. So I put curtain panels with free shipping in my cart. But was my whole order shipped free? No! I did, however, get a shipping discount -- of $1.62. Gosh, I wish their actual shipping charges were in line with their shipping discounts!

Knowing full well there was no way that the shipping on those curtains was only $1.62, I put only a curtain in my shopping cart. The “shipping and handling” price was $5.61, still a far cry from the $1.62 discount. Whoever is getting paid to “handle” sure must be pulling in quite a pretty income.

Something unattractive is going on at Target.com. Their customer service, including the supervisor, was terrible. I ended up calling the regular Target customer service, and the agent there was wonderful. She could not do much for me beyond taking my complaint and telling me she would forward it to supervisors, but she was friendly and helpful. She went to the website herself to try to help me figure out what was up with the outrageous shipping. I thought she had found it when my zip code was in the “special distance fee” category, but that wasn’t it, either. When I tried shipping it to my sister-in-law in a normal zone (still not understanding why I would be outside of a normal zone – I live in a normal town and state, not in Hawaii or some remote mountaintop or something), the shipping price was the same.

As long as Target.com continues to profit from their shipping to a degree I feel is unethical, I will not shop there. I hope this policy does not impact the Target brand overall; I like shopping at their store and do a lot of shopping (almost all groceries, cosmetics, cleaning supplies, a lot of gifts, etc.) there. However, if the situation at Target.com isn’t resolved, I might have to boycott the storefronts, too. I am really uncomfortable with the lack of respect for their patrons’ money.