my viptrades chip ordering experience

[Lottery Larry]

I ordered red diamond chips from viptrades in the recent past, since 5stardeal.com was out of stock on the chips. Here are my comments about my less-than-perfect transaction:

1) Their website has a prominent "we'll beat our competitors' prices by 10%" boast, yet when I asked about that claim, the person on the phone just laughed and made a comment about the fact thay 5stardeal was out of the chips, so why would they beat the price? I wasn't too pleased with that answer, though we were only talking about a penny per chip. I ordered anyway, since I wanted the chips in time for my first tournament.

2) When I checked on the UPS link for my order for a day or two afterwards, I couldn't get any information. After contacting viptrades again, I was informed that they were running behind a few days due to demand. So, my hopes for a pre-tourney arrival went up in smoke

3) When the chips actually arrived the day after my tournament, they looked pretty much the same as the 5stardeal diamond "clay" chips- seemed about the same toughness as well (see my post in this forum comparing 5star chips to my regular pokerchips.com set). However, when I tried to put them into a standard plastic chip rack, I found that they could only fit 19 per row, not the expected 20. The 25-chip rolls had "Made in Taiwan" on the plastic wrappers, and the chips individually seemed to be the same diameter and width as my 5stardeal chips.
Stacking 20 of each type next to one another, the difference wasn't easily visible, but no matter how I stacked them in the rack, I could not force 20 chips into one row. I did manage to get 10 viptrades chips and 10 5stardeal chips into the same row, but it was pretty tight.

But since I didn't want to have spare chips loose, or counting problems later, I returned the chips to viptrades. Strangely, the phone contact didn't even ask WHY I was returning the chips- he was actually excited to be getting them, as viptrades evidently needed those red chips to fill other backorders.

So, I spent $18 in shipping for no reason. Luckily the February 10% off deal was still in place at 5stardeal, so I got back a few dollars on the cheaper-than-viptrades red chips and I shouldn't have a problem with fitting the new red chips into my chip racks.

This is just my experience. It may mean that there is a problem with your order from them.