"I ordered on this catalog Nov. 1st for my daughter's princess party. I saw this cute little fun shaped notebooks. Her party is Nov. 12 so I am like, I have plenty time to receive this package. Per website order status, it was shipped Nov. 4 and had UPS tracking # that I checked everyday and it has the same status BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED. I called UPS and they said it was not ship yet. I called Lakeside and told me it left their warehouse Nov. 4th but once it reached UPS here in FL that's when I will update status. I worked for a catalog company and the major bookstore in US and never heard of such. UPS will have tracking info as soon as they have the package and it will roll. This is not my 1st time ordering online either. This company made me so mad for lying completely on my face. They are telling me that standard shipping is 8 to 10 business days after ship date but guess what? That information is not in their website's FAQs so everything is false information! Ok. So, since the package will not arrive before my daughter's party tomorrow, I am declining that stupid package and will NEVER ORDER from this company EVER AGAIN!"

"I was very skeptical about ordering from this company after reading all the negative reviews,but decide to anyway. I don"t know how so many people had so much trouble,because I didn't. I placed my order of 6 items totaling a little over $77.00 on the 6th of November.I kept checking the site for my order status. It took 5 days to ship from the warehouse(just like they said it would),which would have been the 11th. It was on my porch the 13th when I arrived home from work. Everything was in one box and looked good(actually better than I had expected)with the exception of a book. the corners had gotten damaged in shipment do to the fact it was able to move around in the box. A few days later I called them. I admit it was a long wait on the phone(longer than the 20 minutes they estimated it would be),but I finally got a very nice woman. I explained what was wrong with the book. She said she understood and offered to send a new one to me,which I said yes to AND I didn't even have to send the other one back.She explained an offer they had going on while she got the information from my previous order so there wouldn't be any dead air while I waited. I again kept tabs on the website for it to ship.It left the warehouse 5 days later(the 22nd),and arrived on the 26th.I think this one took a little longer because of Thanksgiving being in there.But the book was PERFECT. I just wanted to let people know that not everyone has trouble with this company.
Sandy "

"I sent for a pair of solar powered rechargable candles on the 28th of September,and in October I made contact with Lakeside to ask where they were. I was told that they were on back order. After a follow up call in November,an extremely rude young man told me that I owed shipping charges,and the candles were still back ordered. I asked him how much I owed,and was put on hold,then hung up on. I called back,and was put on hold for about 10 minutes,and then a young woman answered and was able to assist me. I sent a check to cover the charges,and after about a week,one candle arrived in the mail.It worked one time,and has been sporadic at best ever since. The second candle arrived last week,and it's performance is the same as the first candle.It doesn't work!
The telephone calls I made to get my candles cost me as much as the candles did,because Lakeside doesn't have a toll free customer service number. The candles do not give satisfactory service for the money,and the whole experience has left me feeling slightly used and very dissatisfied. I would not recommend Lakeside Collections to anyone.As my grandson says,"We got gaffed." "

"I have been a customer of lakeside (Lakeside Collection) for 7 years I have had few problems but then I am use to how they work. I usually get 90% of my orders; only the items shipped are ever charged to my credit card so this is fine in my opinion. They send an email telling you what items are out-of-stock. It usually takes a month to receive the out-of-stock items; you can choose to cancel them or wait on them. When they are shipped they charge your credit card for the items being shipped. That seems pretty normal to me. If you realize that they sell many thousands of items and that you're probably not going to get 100% of your order I don't see why it's a major problem as they don't charge you for the out-of-stock merchandise anyway. To save about 50% over store prices it's a good deal I have no complaints:) However, if you're in a hurry for your merchandise Lakeside is not for you. When I order Christmas gifts I order them no later then November 10th as they can be very slow during the holiday season.
"

"DO NOT BUY FROM THIS WEBSITE OR CATALOGUE!! I have bought from them a couple times & am always disappointed with something. The first time I bought with them was about 2 Christmases ago. I bought things in Sept to actually not have to rush to buy people presents. What the website doesn't tell you is that a lot of the items are out of stock or on backorder. I didn't find that out until after I already paid & was looking at my order status. They shipped maybe 2 things out of all of it. I spent almost $200 on my order so that wasn't even half of it. They then go & ship things every once in a while but I never received what I wanted to give for Christmas, so in Dec (over 2 1/2 months after I ordered everything) I canceled the rest of my items that were still on backorder. They e-mailed me back saying that they would cancel it & they are sorry I didn't want the item & that they always try to ship things in a reasonable amount of time. Seriously?? over 2 1/2 months after I ordered the items & it still wasn't ready to be shipped for who knows how many more months & that's a reasonable amount of time?? After this time, they did start posting some things were out of order on their website, but when I purchased with them again they still had many items saying they were on backorder, but only letting me know AFTER I already paid for them!
However they have such good pricing & I don't make that much money so the next summer I bought more items from them, but not for Christmas items. Again it was the same deal. They ship you a couple items, then you have to wait up to 2-3+ months to get all of your items that you bought. Those items I wasn't in a hurry to get so I just let it go that time.
Again this year I bought some more items for a total of $154.15. Again I only got a couple items at a time because they never tell you that the item that you want is on backorder until after you already purchased it. I kept checking the status every week & they would get one or two more items ready once in a while but other items would have an estimated date that they would be ready, & that date would pass & they would make another estimated date for a couple more weeks later. That date would arrive & be passed. So again after two months of waiting & still having one item that seemed to be always on backorder so I couldn't get it, I canceled the last item in the end of June. They oked the cancelation. I should have checked sooner to make sure my account they took money from was balanced accordingly but just checked yesterday (9/29) because I want to purchase more items from them & won't until I knew everything worked out from my last purchase. It was a good thing that I did- They charged me 6 different times for my total, but they had overcharged me $1.91. My total was $154.15 & they charged my account $156.06 & never reimbursed me for my canceled item. So I e-mailed them to let them know that they overcharged me almost $2 & I wanted to be reimbursed for my canceled item also. They e-mailed me back saying that they originally check the account at the beginning to make sure all the money is there but don't charge until after the item is shipped. & that all west coast buyers are charged $1.96 because UPS charges them that amount. They don't state that charge anywhere on their website! I e-mailed them back saying that I was charged even for the item that wasn't shipped & wanted my money reimbursed & got the same computerised message saying they don't charge until it's shipped. I obviously was charged tho & had my transaction records to prove it so e-mailed them back asking for a fax # so I can prove they overcharged me. I'm waiting for their reply e-mail so we'll see what happens. I'm very upset tho, I didn't know that they always charged an additional $2 everytime I ordered something. They should put that in the total at the end of checkout when you're approving the amount. They seem very shady since they don't have that anywhere on their website & they take months & months before you actually get all your items so they can charge you months later & you won't add up the total to make sure it's balanced out."

"This company is hard to deal with. No 1-800 number, do not respond to cancellation emails in a timely fashion, cannot understand the customer service person that you finally get. Will be interesting to see if I actually get the return labels and the money credited back."

"In searching for coupons, i came across a coupon for free shipping from Lakeside. Upon ordering, a little box came up and said "spend only $18.19 more" for your free shipping. Uopn checking out, no free shipping was posted. Needing the items i ordered i figured i would call the company and explain the situation. Phone lines were always "Busy" so i emailed them. Only after my items shipped, (dec 10) did they get back to me to say "sorry, but your items shipped, so there is nothing we can do" They claim to have no coupons for free shipping. Try googling it and you will find them which will take you right to their catalog. This companys customer service is horrible. This company sucks and i will never order from them again"

"After 4 weeks of no merchandise, I found out it was returned to Lakeside. After verifying address,it was reshipped. I still did not get it,it was returned again. It took a month to get my $ back then a month later they sent me a bill for merchandise I never got. Many phone calls (each with a 50-60 minute hold time). Many emails (none were returned). Get as far away from this company as possible!!!"

"I WISH I had found this page before ordering from this company. I placed my order and found out they place an authorization hold of the funds for the entire order immediately, then they charge for the individual items as they are being shipped, while still having that hold on your credit card/debit card for the original amount. I was told it will be released back to my account within 3 to 5 business days.

I placed a fairly large order exceeding $200. I now have pending transactions equalling the $200+, in addition to finding a pending charge for $89 yesterday and another pending charge for $29 today. I called customer service and was on hold for over 2 hours (I put it on speaker waiting to hear an actual person). After 2 hours, I then used my cell phone to call and pressed 1 as if I were placing an order. I was immediately transferred to a person. Then was transferred to the credit department. Fortunately, I have the funds to cover this because if not, I imagine incoming checks or other charges would have had me bouncing more than Tigger! It will be interesting to see what items I do receive, considering the bad luck of others here. I will not be ordering from them again. What a shady little practice they do not reveal when placing an order."

"I recommend AGAINST ordering from the Lakeside Collection. They have no order information on their web site for my order. They DO NO respond to my emails. As a last resort, I called. They said the wait time will EXCEED a half an hour. To avoid this, call back between certain hours. I hung up and did just that the next day. The hold time is still EXCEEDING a half hour. I am still on hold. I have no idea if I'll get my products or when. But this is definitely not worth the frustration. VERY BAD BUSINESS PRACTICING. Avoid if you can. "

"This company uses the classic bait and backorder. They hope by listing a popular item at a very low price you will also find other items then they ship the other items and backorder the one you really wanted. Very hard to contact. I ordered a mp3 player and some stocking stuffers. Two shipments came and I was charged for shipping for each, now more than 2 months later still no mp3 player. I do not recommend using this company and I think the customers on this site that speek well of them might be hired to. "

"I orderd this for my 12 year old Grandaughter on March 17th, she was so delighted that she took the ad to Lowes and had 2 colors of paint made to match the bedding and with Dad's help they painted the room it looks so cute but it's now June 23rd and we are still waiting! I received a card from Lakeside after a month that stated the items were on back order and I could wait or cancel, I choose to wait as she loved it so much. It's been over 3 months and my poor child is still waiting, no more word from Lakeside. I went online today and looked at my order status..it says canceled, THEY NEVER INFORMED ME OF THIS! Guess we buy new paint and start all over, she is so dissappointed over this! I hope I can find something she likes just as well. :("

"Very good prices. Shipping is slow but worth it if you are patient. No problem getting the product I ordered."

"WOW!!!! I just move to my new apartment and my mother thought this might be a good catalog to order from, so I did. I ordered things in January of '09, and the first thing I must say that turned me off was the fact that the shipping charges were terrible. I was charged for each item rather than one clear distinct charge. Then I did not get my first iten until almost a month later. That was not so bad. Then about 2 weeks later I got the next item. So I am feeling really good that this is working out for me! Oh, but low and behold---it is now JUNE 1st '09 and I am still waiting on a 'back order' to get here!!!!! What the heck????? I wanted to cancel it, but I really liked the item and I have not been able to find it any where else. Plus I was told that it would be here the end of march which wasn't so bad. After April came and went I ended up forgetting that I had even ordered something! One day I in May, I suddenly remembered that I had a back order and called and was told that it will be here in about a week, well here it is June 1st! So I called and found out that my order was on back order STILL!! or should I say again!!!! So I canceled and was I told them I would NEVER order again and that I was placing a complaint and telling as many people as I could not to order from them, and she said I understand! Do you really???????? "

"Horrible experience. I ordered on Jan 13 2008 the status has stayed ready to ship with no shipping in sight. They charged me right when I placed the order but no one can tell me if and when my order will ship. Never again will I order from them. I wish I would have checked the reviews here first. "