1st experience with Costco/Qualex

In article ,
"Thomas T. Veldhouse" writes:

OK, so I take a few around town shots on a roll of provia 100f that I
have. I decided I will try out Costco and see how things go with Qualex
E-6.
....
I get the envelope
it and it has masking tape all over it. It is manhandled. I get it
home and open up the kodak box. The frames are nice. The images are
developed well ... all 8 of them!!! Out of 35 images, they lost 27 of
them somewhere! The box clearly says they developed 35 images. They
even left the remnant of the film at the end of the roll in the box.
So, WTF!

Does this happen with them often? Do I have recourse? Do I dare try
them again? The price was nice at $3.19.

Legally speaking, you should first read whatever fine print was on your
processing envelope or receipt. Most photofinishers have language to the
effect that they're liable only for the cost of the film and processing.
IANAL, but I'd imagine you'd have a hard time suing them for more than
this, if you wanted to go litigious on them and if the envelope includes
such language.

That said, you should definitely return to the store and complain. There
are two possible benefits:

1) From your description, it sounds like the envelope ripped open and was
re-sealed somewhere along the way. The slides didn't vanish into thin
air, so it's conceivable (but unlikely) that they'll turn up somewhere,
and if you give a sufficiently detailed description of the scenes you
shot, you might get them back. This is a long-shot, though.

2) The photofinisher agreement probably says you can recover the cost of
processing AND film, or at least get a replacement roll of film. Given
the expense of slide film, this is more worth recovering than the $3.19
for processing alone. Of course, given that this is Costco, they're
likely to try to hand off the cheapest roll of 24-exposure color print
film they can find rather than give you a 36-exposure roll of Provia
slide film. Prepare to explain the difference between slide and print
film to the clerk, and come armed with an ad or two for Provia showing
its retail price.

--
Rod Smith,
http://www.rodsbooks.com
Author of books on Linux, FreeBSD, and networking