After I pay, how long until I receive my registration code?
The time delay between your payment and receiving the reg code depends upon many factors. There are three time delays; the delay in getting the payment to us, the delay in processing it, the delay in the author getting you the reg code after the payment has been processed.Delay in getting to us + delay in processing
Online Order Processing: max 2 days
Online orders are sent to us right away, but not every day is a business day. We do not work on Sundays and we do not work 24 hours each day.Email: max 4 days
Email takes a day or two to reach us and a day or two to process.Fax: max 6 days
Faxes take a day to reach us but we have to print them and give them to the data entry person. The longest delay is if you send it Saturday after noon our time. By then we will have printed and accounted for the previous incoming faxes and will have delivered them to the data entry person Saturday around 1pm. So the data entry person next returns Tuesday at 4pm to pick up your fax that we received noon Saturday. That fax gets processed and returned to us Thursday at 4pm. We do our processing of her data entry overnight and by Friday morning you should be sent an email. That's a 6 day delay for faxes. Basically the delay depends upon when you send it in relation to the pickup and delivery times of the data processing person.Postal Mail: Weeks
Postal mail can take a week or two to reach us and then the longest delay for processing is if we receive it Friday. Received friday, we pick it up at the mail box Saturday to give to the data entry person who returns it Tuesday and we get a reply out to you typically Wednesday morning. It can be several weeks.Delay in the author getting you the reg code after the payment has been processed
For some software there is no reg code so once you've paid, you can click the I've Paid check box. For other software we issue the registration codes so when you receive the acknowledgement from us, you also receive the reg code. For some software the registration code is generated by the author and the time delay starts when you receive our payment acknowledgement message. The author receives a copy also and how long it takes them to reply with your reg code depends upon their personal schedule.
Some authors seem to live online and as far as I can tell, they never sleep. They reply with your reg code within a few hours. Others have jobs that take them away from email for periods of time (such as on military maneouvers) and their delay depends upon forces beyond their control. Most authors are somewhere inbetween.
Most authors have provided us with estimates as to how long the delay might be between receiving the payment info from us and getting you the reg code. We send that estimate to you when you receive the payment info from us.
So the minimum for some software is an hour under ideal circumstances and up to four weeks when all the delays are at their maximum. Basically, it depends.
What Next?
If you have waited longer than the delays shown above, perhaps something went wrong. Either we have made a mistake, or you have made a mistake, or the internet ate our email to you. Please check the common mistakes page and see if any of these mistakes are possible. Then if appropriate, use the web form that asks us to trace your payment.
Modification Date: Thursday, June 12, 1997