The incompetence of suppliers...

I am the Senior Lab Technician for one of the teaching labs at a Queensland University. As a result, I am in charge of purchasing new equipment, chemicals and consumables for use in my undergraduate teaching lab. This year I was so awesome at this I had a surplus in excess of AU$10,000 in my budget when all was said and done. I went to my boss to work out what to spend it on. Well the academics fluffed around a bit on what they wanted to buy and the order changed about 4 or 5 times as they tried to work out what was the best purchase. In the end they settled on a pair of homogenisers (fancy, expensive scientific blenders for those of you who don't know) as well as some new balances (scientific scales) and a sonic bath.

Now we have a deadline by which said purchases must be receipted as the Uni runs on a financial budget year of Jan to Dec and not July to June like the normal financial year. This deadline is December 17. No problem. I am told by my supplier that all the items we want (three balances, two homogenisers plus attachments and the sonic bath) are all in stock and we will have them well before the 17th. The balances - no problems; they arrived and I've receipted them. The sonic bath - coming from their Sydney supplier but should be here early next week. O.K. I can handle that. The homogenisers - one unit and two attachments arrived today. So where is the second unit? I called them.

"Oh, its on back-order and will be coming out from Germany. Its due late January."

"Excuse me? I was told they were in stock. That's why I ordered them."

"Oh. Well we must have only had the one."

"Well if the other one is arriving January I can't buy it. The funds need to be cleared before December 17 or I lose the funding. Plus I won't need the extra attachment so I'll be sending that back." (The attachment costs $1500 BTW).

"Oh." (She said that alot)

"So what are you going to do?"

"Um. I'll have to get back to you."

Now this really gets my back up. If I don't spend this money, we lose it. I'll be about $4000 poorer next year and my student numbers are increasing by about 30%. I need that extra money to make sure the classes actually run. I was relying on this item being in stock (which I was assured was the case) so I could clear the account. This is the kind of c-rap that really annoys me. I hate unreliable information.