Everyone at Icons wants every one of our customers to get their order in time for Christmas. We will do everything we can to help but we wanted to explain the deadlines and why they are what they are, and try to lay this out as clearly as possible.
Icons use FedEx for 98% of our shipments. The remaining 2% is for shipments too Scotland, Northern Ireland the UK islands such as Jersey where we ship using the Royal Mail next day signed for service to keep costs down.
As such we have to go by FedEx's own delivery guidelines. There general postage guidelines to us are as follows and importantly, days here refer to working days. Our post goes at 4pm each working day, we get all orders out that have come in over night and up to midday, but after that they then go out the next day from the office. This is why we say on the site that it takes 48 hours to dispatch. Then the FedEx timings kick in. If you order beyond midday on a Friday for instance, it isn't dispatched until Monday 4pm from London.
- Ireland, Benelux & Mainland Europe - next working day by 10am
- Non-EU and Eastern Europe and the Balkans - next working day by the end of the business day
- USA and Canada - next working day by 10.30am (to the vast majority of ZIP codes)
- The Middle East, Carribean, Central and South America - within 2 working days
- China, Australasia and Africa - within 2-4 working days
We send out normal and deluxe packaged items direct from the UK office so you can get them within these time constraints (Dispatch times plus FedEx delivery times). Now things go wrong of course, like last year when the UK postal system ground to a halt when snow closed the airports, which is why we use FedEx. They allow us to send out tracking numbers to all our customers so they can see where their item is on the road. Last year most non-UK customers could see that their presents were stuck on airfields. We know FedEx is more expensive but we don't want to cut corners with the delivery of our items, we want to do everything we can to get them to you on time and in perfect condition.
BESPOKE FRAMED ITEMS
It takes the same 48 hours to process and order, then an overnight postage to Coventry where our framing factory is. It takes 7 working days to have something framed. We cannot stress enough that that is working days, and does not include weekends. On our site we have the option to frame any product listed. We call this bespoke framing and up until Thursday December 10th you can get anything framed, to anywhere on the planet in time for Christmas. However, a bespoke framed item to China, Japan or Australasia needs two working days to be processed, one day to get to the framers, seven working days to be made and then 4 working days for FedEx to get it to you. Therefore an order placed on Friday December 11th before midday, will arrive in say Australia on Christmas Eve. Hence the warning and the point of this blog and calendar
PRE FRAMED BEST-SELLER ITEMS
For the first time this year, we are going to pre-frame a number of items for about 15 best-selling shirts, boots and photos. This isn't everything on the site, just the best sellers, and there will be finite amounts of these. Because these items will be framed and ready to go we can dispatch these items with the same deadlines as the normal FedEx post. As such we can send a pre-framed Gerrard Liverpool Shirt to Japan on Monday December 19th, if the order is placed before midday UK time. We can dispatched pre-framed, deluxe and normally packaged items right up until Thursday December 22nd as it takes one working day to get to the UK, Ireland, mainland Europe and most major cities in USA and Canada. Obviously this leaves no margin for error on the delivery side, so if you live outside of a major city in these, or any other country, factor this into your timings. We are open til 5pm that day so you can call into to our Kentish Town office, or asked for something to be biked if you want to pay for it, but these are for real last minute special exceptions.
FINAL FINAL DEADLINE
We are working on Friday December 23, but not Saturday 24th. We can dispatch an item using FedEx's Saturday delivery service to any of the countries that are within one working day. This costs more so you will have to ring or email the site and pay over the phone or through another channel. The office is on +44 020 7267 3934. Again the post comes at 4pm and we need some time to process the order, so realistically the order needs to be placed before 2pm. We are in the office on each day until 6pm and in at 9am so you can call between these times, or email any time.
CHRISTMAS
Of course if you item is not for a Christmas present then please, please tell us. We will assume everything is and rush around getting it sent or framed, but if it's for work, a January birthday or you don't care about Christmas, then let us know and we can put it on a different schedule.
OFFICE OPENING TIMES
We are not in the office from the end of the day on Friday December 23rd and we're back in again at 9am on Wednesday December 28th. The days in between are all UK holidays, we will be checking the email and backend system to check if there are any disasters but we'll be on a skeleton staff rota.
JANUARY SALE
The January sale always starts on Christmas Eve, so we will change the site and put up the showcased special offer products then. If you have questions about them, we will most likely respond when we're back in on the Wedensday.
Subscribe