I got a mailer that said Snapfish would develop three rolls of film for only s+h, so I sent in three rolls and my money. They sent me an e-mail yesterday saying I owe them money, and in their price breakdown it appears they've only developed ONE of my rolls for free. I've sent an e-mail to their customer service, but I'd like to know if any of y'all have used Snapfish before and, if so, what you thought. Is this a common trickety thing or just a fluke?

::bump::

I want to hear about people's snapfish experiences too!

I use Shutterfly - and have nothing but great experience with them.

I just starded using Snapfish over the summer and I love them. Their service is reliable (if I send a roll out on Monday, my photos are consistently posted by Thursday), the prints are of a good quality, and it's oh so wonderful to get the pics on my computer since I have no digicam. And even with the cost of developing and shipping, they are still cheaper than taking the film to the local drugstore.

I thought that their advertising and mailers were pretty clear that only your first roll of film gets free developing. Though if you believe that you were wronged, then you did the right thing by contacting customer service. Hopefully they'll give you a refund or some free developing.

I really like snapfish. i don't have a digicam or a scanner, so it's the only way I can share my pictures with online friends. It's about $5 for development and getting your pics online--what a deal! They turn the film around really quickly too. I find their prints to be a bit dark, and I know some photographer friends who think their print quality is crummy, but as a non-photographer they look fine to me.

I think when I first signed up I got three free rolls too, but I do know they prefer for you to use a credit card, so maybe the deal was only free that way. read the fine print, maybe it says somewhere. i've never had a bad customer service-type experience with them so hopefully it is just a fluke. good luck!

I've just started using Snapfish as well. I'd agree that in general the prints are good(not great) and I can get 5X7's for the price you'd generally pay for 4x6's at a drug store. Very nice! But out of the first 4 rolls I sent in, one of them had the edge of the negatives ripped off up to and almost into the images. They "fixed" it by sticking a piece of paper down the edge of the negatives. I'll admit to being a bit picky when it comes to my film(and even more so since these are photos I just took on a trip to China), but this definitely concerned me. I did write them, and they were pretty quick to respond. I then sent off 7 more rolls. They were posted online very quickly, but only one of them has come back so far(film sent off at the same time but in different mailers seems to have a tendency to get separated[ie got one roll of seven on friday and the others haven't arrived yet; this didn't correspond with when they said they shipped them], but I guess that's to be expected). I guess I'm waiting to make up my mind.

The mailer I got (which I received in one of those new-baby junk mail coupon packages I now get every month or so) involved an offer to get up to three rolls developed for free. I copied the mailer before I sent it just in case something like this happened, and I included their wording in the e-mail I sent to customer service.

I use Snapfish since I have a digital camera. They are really great. They have a lot of sizing options and the price is really good too. The prints come fairly quickly and they are great quality.

The only thing Snapfish doesn't offer is development of black and white prints. I was disappointed about that. If that's what you want, Shutterfly is a great choice. It costs a little more though. They also have the options to print your pictures in sepia tones too.

ooh, shutterfly does B&W? that was always snapfish's one downfall. Good to know there are options! Thanks!

I've been using Snapfish for over a year and a half, and I love them. I love that they save all the pictures you develop with them. Just last month I went online and found an old picture, and had it printed.

Yesenia

Hmmm...I'd be curious to hear how shutterfly print quality stacks up against snapfish if anyone has used both. Also, just checked on the B&W processing and it looks like shutterfly only does C-41 compatible film...which covers some of the newer stuff labeled as b&w but not the traditional stuff(ie TMAX etc). But please correct me if I read that wrong, cause I'd love it if they did regular b&w too!

Oh you are right...here's what shutterfly says:

Shutterfly currently accepts only undeveloped APS (ADVANTIX®) and C-41 compatible 35mm film. We do not accept processed 35mm negatives or previously-processed APS (ADVANTIX®) film.

Additionally, we do not accept other formats such as 110, 120, or 126 cartridge film; black and white film; Ilford XP2 (even if marked "C-41"); or slide (transparency) film.


Well, snapfish will take that new B&W stuff too, i'm sure, since it's processed the same. boo.

Okay, so they got back to me really really quickly and said they'd correct my account. And today all my pics are online, so I'm a happy girl. The prints will be the deciding factor for me, since there have only been a few of y'all who had bad experiences with/don't like Snapfish. Thanks for your input! I knew I could count on the glitterati!

(If Snapfish still doesn't work out, I will definitely look into shutterfly. Thanks for the rec!)

- m_l

i know i'm late, but i've been using snapfish for well over two years and i love it. once, just once, my film got lost in the mail--which is not snapfish's fault at all--they never received it. despite that, they gave me 24 free prints and a free photo cd for my next order. one roll of film out of the 50 or so i've sent in is ok by me.

their prints are a bit dark for my taste, but it's only as good as the highschooler behind the machine and for $5 i'm not picky.

i had to have my b&W film (that i bought accidentally) developed at a real lab, and a) i waited forever to hear back from them and B) there was nothing on the roll! which has never happened. never had that experience with snapfish. no more b& w....EVER! ;)

I'd never heard of these services before. I'm gonna have to check them out!

For years, I'd wondered - "I used to take such good, creative pictures, but now all my photos look like crap. What happened?" Well DUH, I used to have a good camera, but I got rid of it because it was so big and bulky, and lately I'd been using cheapie little snapshot cameras - sometimes even disposable ones.

So last time I went to visit my folks, my dad gave me his old Olympus - and what a difference it makes! I'm snapping pictures of everything now. But my goodness, getting them developed is expensive. $7 and up for a roll?

I'm definitely going to look into Snapfish - I'm looking forward to getting back into B&W photography (even if I can't have the fun of printing them myself).

Yeah, I love B&W, but lindastar's post reminded me of a similar experience with a regular lab and B&W film.(sorry this is sort of off topic, but I wanted to throw the warning out there cause I really got burned) Anyway, I have had traditional b&w done at drugstore type labs before but often they'll also only do C-41 compatible. The kicker is that with all the new C-41 compatible b&w out there now, some folks working at the labs don't know the difference. I ended up getting back 6 completely clear rolls of negatives[from a trip to Amsterdam no less:( ] b/c they ran my regular b&w film through their color processsor. I must have asked at least 5 times and they assured me they could do it, but I guess the girl working there had just never been told the difference. Sigh. Lesson learned.

I love Shutterfly, but I only use it to upload (and order) prints off my digital camera. I don't even remember how regular film works anymore...

But it's cool being able to crop or edit or enhance your photos - including making them black & white - or sepia. And you can order note cards with one of your photos on them - for about a dollar a card. Even those come in about 2 days! Seriously - they commit to processing your order within 24 hours of receiving it.

Just to bring this whole thing full circle: I finally got my pics in the mail today. Three rolls worth of pics, and almost *every* *single* pic has blue ink on it from where the date stamp on the back of the pic in front of it bled onto it. (Does that make sense?) Even the pics in the front of the packages have the ink bleed! I'm so pissed off.

Damn fish of snappingness. Back to Target for film developing for me. Even my worst experience there wasn't this bad.