Complaint Review: Conlan Press

On January 8, 2009 Connor Cochran of Conlan Press contacted me in an email offering me the opportunity to purchase for $82 a special hardcover copy of The Last Unicorn book he called the "Extra Deluxe" version.  It was supposed to be personally signed to me by Peter S. Beagle, and also include some extra pages of handwritten text by Peter, plus a unicorn sketch by Connor.

On 1/18/2009 I sent the $82 PayPal payment to Conlan Press and eagerly awaited my special book.

2/10/2009: I emailed Conlan Press asking for an update on my order because I had heard nothing after sending my payment. I did not receive an order confirmation email or an order number, only a PayPal receipt. This should have been my first red flag something was wrong with this company. Connor responded the same day reassuring me my order was good and I would be contacted as soon as my book was ready to ship, but it was taking them significantly longer to complete the books than they expected.

In fact, Connor would admit in a general email update to everyone waiting for an Extra Deluxe book that he and Peter hadn’t even begun to work on adding the signatures, the extra text, or the sketches to ANY of the 200+ books until FIVE  MONTHS after he began taking our orders.

After that it was one melodramatic excuse after another as to why the books were taking so long to finish and tedious email "updates" repeatedly promising the books would all be finished soon, just keep waiting!...  keep waiting!...

I sent numerous emails over the years to Conlan Press trying to keep in touch on the status of my book. Several of my emails went completely ignored. Or I would get some reassuring excuse from Connor, or I would get a delayed response from a new customer service employee because the old employee had been replaced abruptly, which gave Connor the convenient excuse to throw his employees under the bus by claiming they left everything in chaos… we're picking up the pieces as fast as we can… be patient…  keep waiting, your book is getting so close to completion!… Just keep waiting... Keep waiting!...

Rapid employee turnover should have been another red flag that something was seriously wrong with this company.

Another red flag was the fact that Conlan Press has never gone out of their way to directly contact me first about my order throughout this ridiculous 7 year saga. Legitimate, professional businesses do not make their customers hound them via email to beg for scraps of info about their overdue orders or their refunds.

On April 18, 2016, after 7 years and counting of being strung along, I requested a full refund. Connor responded the next day and promised a refund check would be sent "right away."

It is now June 25, 2016 and I still have not received a refund check. (That is 2,716 days that Connor has been holding my payment hostage.) Connor either ignores my emails or he responds with more melodramatic excuses, blames his employees, and keeps making more empty promises that the check will go out "this week" … "right away"… "soon" … Just… Keep… Waiting!…