Terms and Conditions

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

Welcome to the Terms and Conditions page! Please read this document in its entirety so you have a good idea of how the site operates before you buy anything. Most of the content here is fairly straightforward, but I figure that making things as clear as possible is worth a few sentences 🙂

OK… here we go!

SHIPPING

Unless otherwise arranged beforehand, all items will default to shipping by the dates on the homepage and in the alerts on the check out page.  Now that I have begun retirement 2.0, I plan to set default shipping to something like the last Wednesday of each month; but as of this writing I haven’t made the formal shift to this schedule. Once I DO shift to the “last Wednesday” modality, I’ll still be shipping anytime I swing by the ol’ storage and receiving facility…. So usually you won’t have to wait until that last Wednesday for your game to hit the mail stream!!

Long-time customers know that I often ship ahead of set dates… and that if you reach out to me about shipping your game early, I will try like mad to make that happen!! And again, no matter the shipping dates, I often swing by early to get things moving! Please keep in mind that this happens often… but not always… 😬 Unless, of course, there is a special request and I am actually home!

Upstart Boardgamer is just me… so things can get a little busy… but I always strive to provide the absolute best board game shop experience I can! Doing the right thing, helping people, and caring… these things are very important to me.

In terms of the specifics for making the cut on any scheduled shipping date, orders received by 2:00 pm the day before the scheduled shipping date will be sent out. So, if shipping is set for 15 March, then the latest you can get an order in for shipping on 15 March will be 14 March at 2:00 pm. This way someone doesn’t order on the shipping day at 8pm and wonder, “why didn’t my game ship?!?” 😅

Of course, if I’m packing and shipping games and your order hits… it’ll go out right then! As always, I’m just trying to leave myself some default buffer so I don’t disappoint anyone!

As always, I will post the next available shipping date at the top of the homepage and on the check-out page BEFORE you click “buy.”

While I will generally bend over backward to help get a great game into the hands of a fellow board gamer (smile), I am the sole employee of Upstart Boardgamer. This means that on occasion I may have to adjust the shipping dates to accommodate some far off adventure… hehe.  But I always update the site when this happens and I do it AFTER I ship all existing orders. So you’ll never have a situation where you order the game with the expectation that it will ship on a certain day… and then you find out that I just up and changed the date.

What?!?!

Some of you are probably thinking, “Well, why did you even START this shop if you aren’t available 24/7 to ship product?”  The short answer is that my want to make a handful of Deluxe or Kickstarter Edition board games available to people who were trying to find them at fair prices simply outweighed the practical consideration of waiting until I could be available 24/7 to do nothing but work on the company… which quite honestly might have never happened…  🤔

So, I could either start getting cool games out there at the 95% solution level, or I could just wait.  And well, waiting… it’s the hardest part… or so they say.

Please accept my sincerest apologies if this seems completely insane to you.  Just know that I honestly thought it would be better to have Upstart Boardgamer as an option for finding fairly priced Deluxe and limited-print-run Kickstarter games even if the shipping wasn’t “Prime.” 🚛💨

Of course, I am happy to work with you on figuring out a way to get around the occasional shipping limitation.  If you see on the site that shipping will shut down for 6 days the following day or what have you, shoot me an email or grab me on Facebook Messenger and we’ll try to get you those games! Honestly, if I’m going out-of-town I will happily throw your shipment in my suitcase and mail it from my destination. If you and I are attending the same board game convention, I will gladly pack the game in my suitcase and deliver it free of charge.

** Bottom line – If there’s a way to make things happen and all it takes is a little extra effort on my part – I am there for you! **

Also, I should note that if I’m out and about and can swing by the storage facility where I keep my inventory, I will work to ship orders as they come in… but, at the very worst case, that last Wednesday of the month will hold the line!

Scotty: “Captain, it’ll take 5 hours to get our warp power back… there’s nothing I can do, sir.”

Kirk: “I need that power NOW, Scotty!”

Scotty <3 minutes later>: “Warp power coming online now, Captain!” 🤓

Anyway.  Hopefully, despite this limitation, you will still find some happiness in taking home a great Kickstarter Edition or Deluxe level game at a reasonable price!! But, if you would prefer to shop elsewhere, I completely understand, and I sincerely hope that you get that new game to your table soonest! In fact, if you’d like to buy the game elsewhere and you want some help finding it – just say the word… I’m here to help!

Beyond the peculiar shipping situation that resulted from my own overambitious personality flaw, the rest of the basic terms and conditions are standard fare for any e-commerce or blog site.

CANCELLED ORDER POLICY…

Unlike a return (see below for the return policy), the cancelled order paradigm involves someone reaching out to me to ask if they can please cancel their order before I’ve shipped their game. I am always happy to cancel an order like this… with the only caveat being that I will refund everything (cost of game plus shipping costs) MINUS the PayPal or Stripe (credit card processing company) fee of 3%. I do this because these companies do not refund the paid fees to me when I refund the order to a customer. Back when I first started Upstart, they did! But, sometime around 2019 or 2020 they changed their policies… and I’ve changed mine to avoid losing money due to changed minds and what have you…

Upstart is a very small, one-human company… and while I am not looking to make any sort of profit from Upstart, I also can’t afford to lose money due to a change of heart. As a ready example (in case this policy seems absurd to you 😅)… if someone buys a large, Awaken Realms game that costs $350… and the shipping to California is $50 because the game weighs 25 pounds and ships in a sizable box… that 3% fee is $12. Now, that is not a large amount of money… but for a company where the markup on some of my standard-sized games may only be $15 or $20… losing $12 randomly is kind of not the best thing… 😬

Basically, I can’t keep margins super slim and offer amazing prices and eat any costs associated with cancelled orders too… something had to go! And for SURE… it wasn’t going to be great prices!!

As always, I truly appreciate your understanding, my friends! ❤️

RETURN POLICY…

The basic gist is this – if you are returning something because I made a mistake and shipped you the wrong product or made some other unimaginable error (smile), I will send you a pre-paid label to ship the item back to me at my cost so long as we have talked about the return and you have a return authorization code.

Please don’t simply send the return overnight FEDEX or Private, black-car courier at your own cost and then email me to say, “Hey Drew… you owe me $285 for shipping.” 😳

And now, the details…

There are two basic categories for returns:

The first is a situation where I made a mistake in your order or there was damage to the game in transit:

  1. For games damaged in transit, please take a few pics of the external box as well as the board game box itself (this will make my claim with the carrier a bit easier). In the case of mistakes on my end, simply proceed to step 2.
  2. Reach out to me via email at Drew@UpstartBoardgamer.com or call me at (619) 208-3910 to let me know what is going on.
  3. I will send you a paid mailing label to return the game or, in the case of damage, we may be able to work out some other mutually agreed upon solution if that makes sense. The default for most of these situations will involve me sending you a pre-paid return label, but in cases where a game is severely damaged/entirely destroyed, I may have you toss it in the trash and either reimburse your payment or ship another one to you.  Easy.

The second is a situation where the game arrived in perfect condition and the order was correctly filled.  Generally this means that  you’ve decided to return the game because you are no longer interested in owning it.

Perhaps you just realized that your best friend bought the same game and you don’t need two copies in your gaming group.  Or, perhaps between the time you ordered the game and received it you suddenly developed an aversion to worker placement games (smile).

  1.  The item must be unopened, in its original packaging, and in the same condition as it arrived. (i.e. intact shrink-wrap,  etc.)
  2.  You’ll need to email me at Drew@UpstartBoardgamer.com, or call me at (619) 208-3910 (mobile) and ask for a Return Authorization Number within 30 days of the original order placement.This number needs to be included with your return to receive a refund or credit.
  3.  You are responsible for shipping costs in these situations.  Following receipt of the item I will then refund the product cost MINUS the PayPal or Stripe (credit card processing company) fee of 3%. The original shipping costs will not be refunded as that money will have already been spent getting the game to you. 😉

To keep things comfortable in this situation, I recommend that you insure your shipment, as by default, I won’t reimburse for items that don’t arrive successfully back at the shop. Mind you, if there are some weird extenuating circumstances, and you paid for tracking but the carrier truly lost the game, we will likely be able to work something out that is mutually acceptable. I mean, I do try to make things stress-free as much as I can.

Upstart Boardgamer, LLC is certainly a business.. but in my mind, everything boils down to relationships; and I will do everything I can to help! [Side note – USPS includes insurance up to $99 with priority mail for no additional charge]

COPYRIGHT

All content contained within this website is covered by standard copyright law.  The site’s original graphics, visuals, posts, etc. are the sole property of this website and its owner (me).  With that said, if you’d like to use some of my images on your own site or on your social media profile or what have you, please reach out and let me know!

More often than not I’ll be willing to share so long as you ask first. It is important to note that some of the images on the site are the property of various publishing companies and designers and have been used with their express permission.  This artwork cannot be shared outside of this site.

Bottom line – if you have any questions, please contact me!

Lastly, if you feel that I have inadvertently used your content somewhere on the site without first asking permission, please contact me straight away so we can get things ironed out! I cannot foresee this ever happening, but I figure I should at least mention it for completeness. 😉

PERSONAL CONDUCT WHEN LEAVING GAME REVIEWS, ETC.

In short, I welcome you to post comments and reviews wherever you would like!  Please note, however, that all comments must be written in a polite, cordial, and inclusive manner.  Trolling, inappropriate language, obscene commentary or pictures, inflammatory comments, threatening behavior, defamatory remarks or any commentary vaguely affiliated with any of these categories will NOT be tolerated and are expressly forbidden throughout the website.

Also, the use of heavy sarcasm or passive-aggressive shenanigans is also forbidden.

I would hope that this is rather obvious, but I include it simply for the sake of being thorough.  In my experience the VAST majority of board game enthusiasts are friendly, cordial, and fun.  But, sometimes the rare, angst-filled gamer can get out of hand when posting… so I would like to be clear upfront.

Bad human behavior will not be tolerated at Upstart Boardgamer, LLC. Period. Paragraph.

TEAM EFFORT

I’ve put a ton of hours into the development and maintenance of this site, but I am not perfect (of course).  If you see any errors or you have any suggestions on ways to make the site more responsive, easier to navigate, etc, please do not hesitate to let me know!  I welcome any and all feedback.

If your suggestions can make the shop (or this website) even better – I am all for it!

Thank you for your time… and thank you for being part of the Upstart Boardgamer team.