If you use Aimco Packing Partner you’ll need to upgrade today due to some changes that eBay have made. If you don’t upgrade collection of sales records will fail with the message “No total” for each invoice.
Packing Partner collects sales records, formats addresses and gives you all the despatch information you need and print labels, invoices, picking and packing lists. eBay have changed the format of the orders page, it doesn’t look any different to previously, but the underlying format of the HTML has changed. This has affected the Packing Partner software.
Any problems you can contact Andrew at Aimco ([email protected]) and he’ll be happy to help get your software upgraded.
97 Responses
as someone that has shouted the praises of this software ,
we are not impressed with having to read about needing an upgrade here,
after
a morning of problems with packing partner,
kudos to tamebay and a big Razz to aimco
they have our email we should have been informed
if they dont hurry up and give us the fix, we will reverse the Aimco label sheets to use SMPs print invoice option for the address label
and never darken their door again lol
Thanks to Tamebay for pointing this out.
Via someone on the PS forum putting up this link,
https://www.aimcosoftware.co.uk/issues.html
I’ve just managed to cure a problem with the upgrade that was causing my Ebay downloads to hang.
Hope it helps, Norf.
Appalling customer service from Aimco. Found out about 2pm about this issue and emailed Aimco for the update, still no reply and its 5.20pm, over 200 orders not going out today because of that, thanks Aimco!! Phone support is a joke, either engaged or leave a message, which I did and no call back. Spoke to the guy on skype and he clearly did not care. Why do we have to pay £30 a year for non-existent support? Very unprofessional!
I’m sorry to hear that some users aren’t happy.
I do think that we have responded quickly and efficiently to fix the problem and update users within a day.
However, there is always room for improvement, so will look into other ways we can notify users.
Andrew
andrew its the product key thing that annoyed us
finding the product key sending it and then waiting for the return is a bit frustrating , when your trying to process and send orders, with a program thats not working as it should, then you have just discovered its not your machine or your doing and you have to fiddle about with emails and product keys to get things moving
Having inadvertently let my support lapse I’m just grateful that Andrew let me renew it late! (Unlike some software companies that will remain nameless who would just say tough, you’ll have to buy the product again!)
We had the same problem but Andrew sorted it out, I wouldnt be to hard on him, we all know what ebay is like for changing things and sometimes not telling anyone till its done.
Reading inbetween the lines im guessing aimco is a one man operation hence the lack of telephone support – hence the voicemail.
We have even spent more money with them today and added the RM Despatch Express add on – Wait for my call somepoint in the next week Andrew needing help as RM are hopeless – lol
Thanks very much for the supportive posts.
Northumbrian, I can see your point. I will look at what we can do about that.
We always post on our forum first – ‘Click here for known issues when collecting’ will take you straight there.
I would say that posting on TameBay added to our level of customer service and has helped keep users informed.
It’s good to get feedback though, as there’s always room for improvement.
Andrew
This looks like the price you pay for ease of use and simplicity. Based on the video on the Aimco website I seriously doubt the eBay API is being used. It looks more like the real software is in the printer driver it installs on your computer and some sort of IE plugin. The driver then parses the html to extract order information. Such applications that work outside the API are going to have risks such as these because eBay can change anything on their site at any time.
I think I have an idea of how to leverage both but the cost would be adding about 2 – 3 minutes during initial setup and requiring an active internet connection during label printing. Unfortunately it wouldn’t eliminate all the risk I’ve described above but may make the product more resistant to such changes.
An obsevation. Aimco is a great product, its the sort of product that you would welcome receiving marketing emails from announcing new add-ons, I cant recall receiving any. Maybe all that is needed is a good marketing database, would have enabled yesterdays issues being resolved by a global email from Aimco
ebuyerfb, Yes there are other ways to make this work, but as you have said ours is about ease of use.
Dave, we do make ammoumcements but many of the email addresses users entered when registering are no longer valid.
Last time we had to update due to an eBay change, we did a mass email but were only able to contact about 20% of users.
That is why we introduced the ‘click here for known issues’ link.
We like the Aimco product and use it.
Bit of a glitch yesterday, but by the time I’d read this, the warehouse manager had downloaded the patch.
Everything went out on time. I’d have preferred it was a Thursday that eBay made the change, not Tuesday, but at least it wasn’t Monday when you’d have heard the packing team swearing all the way down in Richmond.
Northumbrian, I’ll look into that but I do know that it worked for a lot of people yesterday.
Northumbrian, thank you, makes me all warm inside 😉
Is Aimco Packing Partner better than using the invoice features in Quickbooks or is it better to use specialist third party programs?
This is the first time I have heard no update unless you pay maintenance cover therefore the software is rendered useless after paying in full for it.
Andrew will do nothing to help unless you pay him for maintenance cover, I guess another way of Blackmail! so we will no longer use a product that is paid for and then conned into paying extra per year just to use it and for that reason we will develop our own and offer it to other members for £30.00 for a ebay label addition with free updates. Watch this space!!
The whole idea of purchasing this software was because it was a outright purchase and one can decide if they want to purchase maintenance cover, but to find out later that updates are not included then you are renting the software, very misleading on Aimco behalf to say the least. Not only that, it now crashes the computer if you try to use the software after not updating the who computer freezers and needs the power button pushing in to restart it. NOT a very responsible company for these type of tactics.
I am happy enough paying an annual maintenance charge for the reassurance that an update will be provided, usually on the same day, every time that eBay or Amazon make a change. I think Packing Partner is good value considering the time it saves every day. I think it would be unreasonable to expect free updates for life. Remember applications like Tradebox have an initial licence charge then an annual renewal fee.
we dont expect free “updates” for life
just the alterations that are needed to make it work as it was purchased with the site it was purchased to work with
The costs of Packing Partner are transparent. Specified when purchasing, and written into the licence agreement.
Software takes a lot of time and effort to produce and maintain, that has to be paid for.
Just like a car, the cost of that maintenance must be covered by the user.
I’m sorry that some aren’t happy, but it is a necessary cost.
I assume everyone remembers the fiasco of the Frooition “update” when eBay made some changes.
Rightly then and now, most people were outraged that Frooition were charging for an “update” that had to be applied to make the software function.
There is a big difference between an update and an upgrade, updates should be free for the life of the license, where as an upgrade can be charged for.
My understanding is that this is an update and should be supplied free, so long as you have a current license to use the software.
Just like a car, the cost of that maintenance must be covered by the user.
Yes, but if the government changed the way the roads worked which rendered my car useless, I would expect Ford or Mercedes to “update” my car for free.
I would expect Ford or Mercedes to “update” my car for free
Seriously?
That is a safety fault with their product.
However, if you ever find Packing Partner’s Icon running away down your desktop after you’ve parked it, I too will fix that for free 😉
I dont think I am alone in happily plodding along using packing partner
then being a little surprised when I could not get it working again unless I coughed up the maintainance fee
so what ever the T&Cs rightly or wrongly I feel I have been had over a little,
it just has a bad taste to it
even though the softwares worth it and we continue to use it
I presume that you would you prefer that I went bust and everyone loses the whole program?
As has been said first years maintenance cover is included then only £29.95 a year after that which seems pretty reasonable to me. Do you really think updates should be provided free no matter how many changes a year eBay / Amazon make forever? I really think people are over reacting and being unreasonable. Somebody referred to Frooition earlier, I think the difference is with Froo users paid a monthly subscription but were then told it didn’t include updates / fixes so rightly felt cheated but with Aimco paying a yearly maintenance charge you know all updates and fixes are provided.
Under the Maintenance cover section on the Aimco site it says ‘In the event that a site change forces a mass update, priority will be given to users with valid cover’. Doesn’t this imply that the fix would still have been given to users without maintenance cover?
Why dont people understand that software requires maintenance…look at packages like Sage! £30 is nothing..just pay it and be done with it people.
I remember first buying Andrew’s Labelprinter software at auction on Ebay around five years ago and thought it was the best thing since sliced bread! It cut down my posting time significantly.
I remember calling him for advice soon after and asking him why he flogged his invaluable software for a fiver, and why he didn’t use a premium rate number for support like other companies do. Therefore I may well be directly responsible for the changes, lol!
I thought he was one of the most humblest people I’ve ever spoken to. He was taken aback by my questions and indicated he wasn’t into exploiting people or becoming rich, but that the software generated a modest income which allowed him to focus on his charity work. Catch him when he’s got a minute (probably towards the end of the day) and he ask him about his charity work. He does a LOT of work for charity (at least he was back then). I urged him to charge more so that the charity could benefit, too!
Remembering how humble he was/is it’s kinda painful watching him being publicly criticised.
My *only* issue is I think that there should be downgrade rights and support as I liked the simplicity of the original labelprinter software, lol!
thats it argument lost
the charity trump card has been played
Thanks for the support and Debs, your advice (and others who said the same) was taken.
We have just moved to an old farm where instead of a suburban garden, the dogs have 10 acres of field to play in.
It’s worth taking a small amount of stick to see the smiles on their faces as they race round, enjoying the freedom.
We also have quite a few outbuildings where we plan to expand the animal educational and welfare work we are involved in.
Thank you again.
Aimco has also stopped working with roman cart as well this week
Superb all round, Andrews finger seems to no longer be on the pulse, only the wallet
Blimey – and to think we complain about what a pain it is dealing with unreasonable buyer complaints on eBay! Poor Andrew – but at least you didn’t get any negs…
To provide a bit of balance, we’ve had good service from Andrew in setting up the software (we had a few idiosyncrasies that needed ironing out) and the £30 ongoing charge is a drop in the ocean compared with the £600 I paid for labels this week, or the £10k I’ll be spend on Royal Mail.
And does anyone else find it ironic that Tamebay first found out about AimCo / PickitPackIt from northumbrian?
https://tamebaynew.wpengine.com/2008/10/integrated-labels-with-packing-partner.html
North I think you think Andrews charity work should be for your benefit
To the moaners, “Oh I have been ripped off, an IT professional has charged me £30 for a years worth of updates and support”, listen to your selves, and start living in the real world.
This morning I’m sketching out a news and update feed that will come direct to your desktop.
It will send relevant news and updates to all affected users.
It’ll obviously take a month or two to develop, but it will allow users to know about the latest news and updates that affect them.