Due to receive a Nook soon? Better double check

If you have a Nook on back-order, there's new uncertainty about whether it will arrive at the appointed time, and perhaps the need for you actively confirm that you still want the device if it will ship later than you expected.

As our colleagues at The Consumerist reported over the weekend, some of those slated to receive the new Barnes & Noble e-book reader by December 24 have received a message from the company warning that their back-ordered Nook may not make it on time, and offering compensation if it doesn't.

According to B&N spokesman Mary Ellen Keating, "a very small percentage" of Nooks promised for delivery by Christmas won't make that deadline. The message received by The Consumerist's reader said such customers will be informed on December 23rd if that is the case, and offered a $100 gift certificate for Barnes & Noble's website as compensation. The device will then be shipped overnight, the message read, for arrival on December 29th.

If you were slated to receive your Nook on a date prior to December 24, you may also have received a message pushing out the expected delivery time. Be aware that such a message may require a response from you in order to keep your order alive.

Consumer Reports, who purchased a Nook on November 9th to replace the press sample on which our review was based, received such a message last week. It revised the expected arrival date of our Nook from December 18 to December 24 and required us to follow a link to actively reconfirm that we still wanted the device. If we didn't, it warned, the order would automatically be canceled within a few days.

When our buyer logged on to his B&N account to check the expected delivery date, however, it was listed as January 18, or about three weeks later than the date cited in the e-mail message.

It appears we should believe the date in the e-mail rather than that in our account. B&N's spokesperson told us in an e-mail that all customers the company considered in danger of not receiving a Nook by a promised December 24 deadline have already been notified of that fact. However, our advice: If you notice a similar discrepancy in promised delivery dates, and the delivery date is important to you, contact B&N for clarification. 

By the way, there's still time to order and receive (with free shipping) a Kindle, formerly "the Kindle 2," the Amazon e-book reader that we recommend over the Nook, at least until it's clear that B&N can fix some of the glitches we and other reviewers noted with the device. Amazon's shipping information suggests that Kindle orders placed as late as tomorrow will ship with free two-day shipping and arrive by December 24.

—Paul Reynolds.