Bismarck Tribune

When I moved to Mandan at the end of August, one of the first things I did was to start subscribing to The Bismarck Tribune. I anticipated I would enjoy the same quality of service I had experienced with various newspapers since I started subscribing to daily newspapers in 1980. Unfortunately, I was mistaken. Specifically: Home delivery. It took numerous calls at the beginning for the carrier (carriers?) to reliably deliver one newspaper a day to my house. The culminating event was the day I reported the non-delivery of my paper three times, and still received no paper. While delivery has been more reliable in recent weeks, this was not an auspicious beginning. Your computer system. Your computer system is not reliable. To date, it still says I am only getting The Mandan News, and doesn’t indicate that I am receiving The Bismarck Tribune. I used your automated system to suspend delivery of the paper while attending a funeral in Montana. I thought I stopped delivery from October 25 through October 29 with delivery to resume on October 30. There was a paper in my driveway on October 25. When I called I was told I stopped delivery on The Mandan News, which doesn’t make sense since it only comes on Friday, in this case October 31. The person who answered the phone also initially told me I was subscribing to the Lincoln, NE paper. Obviously, there are continuing problems with the computer system. Credit for papers not delivered. When I called in to report that delivery of my paper had not been suspended as requested, I was shocked to realize that I would not be credited for the papers not delivered. I was given two options: either donate them to education or have them all delivered when I returned. I was told I would need to suspend the paper for more that two weeks in order to have my account credited. This was the first time I was made aware of this policy, since it is not explicitly stated that my account would not be credited either in the paper or on the website. I know that this is not standard practice in the industry. In the past, I subscribed to newspapers in Columbia, SC; Seattle, WA; Detroit, MI; Albany, NY; and Chesapeake, VA. None of these papers refused to give me credit for papers not delivered. It would be one thing if the policy applied to one or two days of suspended service. However, the two week criteria is extreme. I must stop the paper for security reasons when travelling. And I see no reason to read through days of papers when I return, given the timely nature of the content. As detailed above, I have experienced numerous problems with The Bismarck Tribune in the short time I have tried to maintain a subscription. The most egregious issue is the policy that results in the newspaper keeping my money for services not rendered. Most of my travel consists of trips less than two weeks in duration, and this policy could become quite expensive for me, especially since I have retired. At some point, I will probably cancel my subscription because of this policy. And I will not recommend you to others individuals. Based on my experience, The Bismarck Tribune is not focused on providing good services to customers, unlike the other daily newspapers I have been fortunate enough to enjoy in the past.