Grey Area Guaranteed Delivery

What it is

Grey Area Guaranteed Delivery is a guarantee we make ourselves and honour ourselves. If you add it to an order and that shipment is lost while the carrier has it, we replace the shipment once, at no additional product cost to you, on the terms set out below.

It applies to the shipment it was bought for, and to that shipment only.

What it costs

1% of the merchandise subtotal of your order after discounts, with a minimum of $1.00, rounded to the cent.

Shipping, tax and the fee itself are not part of the figure it is worked out from. The amount follows your cart: change what is in the cart and it is worked out again, and the figure you are charged is always the one shown on the order you place.

Choosing it, or declining it

The choice is made at checkout, on every order. Nothing is chosen for you and nothing is ticked in advance: the order cannot be placed until you pick one of the two options.

What you pick is stored with the order, along with the date, the amount, the subtotal it was worked out from, and the version of this page in force at that moment.

What is covered

A shipment lost while it is in the carrier’s possession, which means:

• a package that stops moving, on the timeline below;
• a loss the carrier confirms;
• a handling failure by the carrier that we can identify, on review.

What is not covered

• an address that was wrong or incomplete when you gave it to us;
• package forwarding, or an address changed after the order shipped;
• a package refused at the door, or left unclaimed and returned;
• a package the carrier records as delivered;
• theft after a confirmed delivery, including a package taken from a porch;
• fraud, or abuse of this programme;
• interference with the delivery by you or by someone at your address;
• seizure by customs, a government body or law enforcement;
• other circumstances excluded by these terms.

The final decision on any claim stays with us.

When a shipment counts as lost

We work to one timeline, and you can ask us where your shipment sits on it at any point.

• 7 days with no meaningful movement — the order is marked Delayed — Monitoring. You are welcome to report it before then.
• 14 days — we open a trace or a claim with the carrier and the order is marked Carrier Investigation.
• 21 days from the last meaningful scan — the order is marked Lost — Replacement Eligible, and a protected shipment is replaced.
• 30 days — the shipment is counted as lost, absent unusual circumstances.

Delivered, but you cannot find it

A carrier scan of Delivered is not a loss. Check the places a package is left at your address, ask anyone else who might have taken it in, and give it 24 hours — a package marked delivered early often arrives later the same day.

If it is still missing after that, tell us. The order is marked Delivered — Customer Cannot Locate and looked at on its own facts. Theft from a doorstep after a confirmed delivery is not covered by this programme.

The replacement

One replacement of the eligible original shipment, sent at no additional product cost and no shipping charge to you. It is a replacement, not a payment.

If something on the original order is no longer available, we will offer a substitute, a store credit, a refund or another remedy, at our choice.

If the original turns up later

You keep both.

We do not ask for the first shipment back, we do not charge you for it, and the claim is closed. A guarantee you have to argue about afterwards is not a guarantee.

If you decline

Declining is a real choice with a real consequence, which is why it is shown beside the option at checkout and stored with your order in these words:

I understand that I am declining Grey Area Guaranteed Delivery. Once Grey Area Research has properly shipped my order and the shipment has been accepted by the carrier, Grey Area Research will not be responsible for packages lost while in the carrier’s possession. I understand that a replacement, refund, or store credit is not guaranteed for an unprotected shipment that is lost in transit.

Declining does not change anything else about your order, and it does not affect the damaged-or-incorrect-shipment rule in the Terms of Sale, which applies either way.

Making a claim

Call 888-600-2088, email [email protected], or use the contact form. Give us your order number and what the tracking page shows.

We open the claim, work the timeline above, and tell you where it stands. Your replacement never waits on the carrier paying us — that is our business with them, not yours.

Changes to this page

We can change this policy. The version in force on the day you placed an order is the version that governs that order, and every order keeps the version it was placed under. This is version 1.0.

See also Shipping & payment and the Terms of Sale.