FAQ Entry #499

This is a respond to a previously asked question about the A' Design Award and Competition. The full list of frequently asked questions can be accessed here.

#499: I am a professional edition winner, do I need to pay for the delivery and shipment of my winner kit to my address using an express courier? Am I obliged to order the winner kit?

Winner kits are distributed free of charge in the gala night and also you are not actually obliged to order the delivery and shipment of winner kits; If you are attending the gala night you should not pay anything; you will get your winner kit on stage; this is our way of thanking you for joining the gala night and award ceremony and honouring us with your existence. In the previous years, if you did not attend the gala night, you were simply not given a winner kit. After request of many designers, we have changed this policy such that you could request a winner kit delivered to your address by paying a shipment fee as well as for our time for preparing a parcel, applying a second layer of packaging for the winner kit, handling the winner kit to courier, sending an email you about its shipment status and tracking code, and eventually sending you items again if they get lost. Furthermore, unlike other awards we do not sell you certificates, yearbooks, trophies, and merchandise : professional edition winners got a free set of yearbook, framed certificates, posters, trophies and many more items, when we put all these together, the package becomes really heavy; literally heavy such that it costs a lot of money to ship them especially using express courier; we can ship for sure other methods like sea, and cheap courier but then we got hate emails that says “you did not wanted us to win and that is why you sent us everything broken” which of course is not the case; so what happened in the past was that the cheaper shipment methods not only resulted in many broken trophies, certificates and damages yearbooks but also create a hazard for people who open such packages, given this, we were also no longer able to use the cheapest courier; which in addition to all these problems lost many packages; now normally if a product is lost you could just send another; but your items are customized, your certificate has your name for example; so when items are lost this creates a logistics nightmare, plus when using the cheap courier, we cannot track pages and the problem with not tracking packages is that several designers who had themselves ask us to send by cheap courier opened payment disputes saying their packages were not delivered; we had to refund the fees of these people initially but then we see their social media posts with the trophy, yearbooks and certificates; so we got into a bad situation just because we were trying to help the participants, given all these issues, you will understand that we cannot ship items with the cheapest postal service; so we do not accept any statement that says “it will cost way less to send me the package using post” because that is true; but then we cannot use a “fast courier with tracking” which is legally required for us to be able to prove, in case of a dispute, that your package was sent. Furthermore, in terms of agreements, and even at no further fees policy page it is noted that you might pay for delivery; but only if you want us to deliver you something; you should remember that unlike other awards we do not legally oblige you to order your winner kits either; you can decide not to order them; you can get free from gala night. But if you want us to deliver your winner kit, please understand that we are legally obliged to use a delivery method with tracking, and also we would prefer to use a better delivery option such that when you receive your items; trophies, yearbooks, certificates and merchandise; you do not get a bad surprise; you find your items nicely delivered instead of broken, and that is why we ask you to pay a lot for winner kit shipment because we will too pay a lot for the winner kit shipment. Now, in the end we understand as a designer participating to professional edition who has won the award, you feel entitled for the delivery, but remembering the fact that 1) all the winner contents are provided free of charge (yearbook, certificates, trophy, merchandise) that you would normally pay hundreds of euros if you were to buy them 2) the fact that it is noted in delivery page, terms and agreements, and even at our no further fees policy (albeit with little characters at the disclaimer section), 3) the fact that it costs us a lot of time to a) prepare all items and check all contents once again, b) package for delivery using additional packaging materials and filling materials, c) request a delivery pickup and hand to courier, d) update you with a tracking code and e) eventually if your package get lost we share responsibility and at least prepare your items once again free of charge – these all cost money; and we cannot sustain the competition: If you want your items delivered, please pay us the shipment fee; 1) first of all it does not remotely cover the cost of items included in your kit; your kit already costs us much more than the shipment; 2) the shipment itself is very expensive 3) we cannot pay for you both the cost of all items and the shipment; we are paying already the cost of all items, we expect you to pay at least for shipment but we do not even oblige you for that; you can just come to gala and take it free of charge or you can just don’t take it; if you do not want to take your kit because it costs more; you could consider making a digital edition entry; this way you will also save substantial amount for entry fees; but lets remember that the pro edition in addition to attending gala for eventually getting your free kit, also contains international exhibitions and more.. so if you joined pro edition you still got many benefits; but please understand that we cannot ship your items free of charge; we want you to come to gala, we especially create this as an incentive to pull people to gala; and those who do not want to attend the gala have the possibility (but not the obligation) to at least request a delivery, but of course in this case shipping fees should be paid by you. Finally we would like to note that the fact that there is a shipment fee is noted in at least 5 pages listed : 1) fees page, 2) no further fees page 3) terms and agreements 4) delivery page at control panel 5) design prize 6) nomination tickets page - with a special note that the Golden Nomination ticket also includes eventual shipment of winner kits. So in summary we cannot send your kit free of charge as we need to use express courier and it is expensive, but we are not charging you for the contents plus we also agree that you deserve it free but it is economically not feasible for us to send you, so please accept our apology, hope this explanation at least helps you understand why we cannot send because we do really want to send for free but we cannot; it is economically not sustainable, please accept our sincere apology once again.

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The following questions could be related:

• #190: I'm unable to order by winners kit as it already shows delivered. What should I do?
• #243: I have ordered my winner's kit to be shipped to my address, however now I have changed my mind and I will attend the gala-night, what will happen to my kit and what will happen to the order?
• #420: Could you please tell me if a work wins the design award who will receive the winner package? The profile owner or the Company that commissioned the work?
• #459: I have noticed that the shipping address of the Winner's Kit is not correct, can you use the correct address as shown on our profile? Can you send to a different address?
• #465: I have not received my award, winner kit and everything else and it's been a long time since the Awards ceremony, how can I have them?
• #475: We didn't go to the awards this year and we have not received any items from you, how can we have our winner kits?
• #483: We are honoured to receive the awards from A'Design Award, however, we did not receive any certificates and packages, how do we get our stuff?

If you did not find your answer, please feel free to check the faq pages for more questions and answers. You will also want to check our webpage for details; thanks to our transparency policy, we document and publish everything.