Publications Update: Frequently Asked Questions

As you may have read an Important Announcement in a recent Journal, Sentinel, or Quarterly, The Christian Science Publishing Society (CSPS) is partnering with fulfillment company CDS Global to improve business practices. Below is an explanation of this process and how this change may affect you.

What is fulfillment?

Fulfillment is the process of delivering a product (such as a newspaper, magazine or book) to a customer. It includes taking the order, billing, and payments, as well as customer service. Fulfillment also includes the support of the following functions:

  • Account Setup / Updates / Inquiries
  • Product Inquiry
  • Placing an Order
  • Order Acknowledgment / Confirmation
  • Order Changes
  • Invoicing / Renewals
  • Payment
  • Returns

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Why is the Publishing Society looking for a new solution?

Fulfilling products and periodicals is not a core competency (or specialty), nor strength, of our organization. It was in fact detracting from our ability to focus on product development, producing magazines that are "kept abreast of the times" and was focusing resources in areas that were not adding business value to our customer. Reasons to switch to an outside fulfillment vendor include:

  • Efficiently and effectively getting our products to individuals and Reading Rooms at a reduced fulfillment cost.
  • Currently—Fulfillment costs take 21% of The Christian Science Publishing and The Writings of Mary Baker Eddy revenue. Industry standards are closer to 5%.
  • Customer service comprises almost 36% of our fulfillment costs.
  • The need to replace and integrate multiple fulfillment systems.
  • Ability to have a robust e-Commerce tool for customers to use, which allows for more self service functionality on our products.
  • Hiring an outside fulfillment partner will allow us to focus on producing the quality content that only we can produce.

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Why is it important to find the right partner?

CDS Global is one of the world's leading fulfillment companies working with publishers. CSPS followed a rigorous assessment of several companies before selecting CDS Global as the best fit to provide fulfillment and customer service solutions. They have a great depth of knowledge in fulfillment that will help us establish and maintain best business practices. CDS Global is expanding their business to handle small to mid-size publishers and are also expanding to become a more global operation. Since CSPS is both, there is the potential for this to bless both them and us. In addition, their plans for expansion—already having facilities in the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia—coincide with areas where we have concentrations of subscribers and customers. Please note that although these facilities exist, customer service for subscriptions is handled exclusively by the offices in Red Oak, IA, USA.

CDS Global specializes in excellent customer service and product fulfillment. We can provide our members, customers, and Reading Rooms with better service at a lower cost to CSPS, than attempt to perform these functions ourselves. The result: We can focus our efforts on publishing compelling and healing content for our publications.

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When will the transition to CDS Global take effect?

Changes will begin to take effect beginning October 2008. Please continue to visit this site as there will be periodic updates and new information.

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Who will be impacted by this change?

All CSPS customers will be impacted (and benefited)—subscribers, one-time purchasers, and Reading Rooms

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What is changing?

Beginning October 2008 we will begin to move periodicals from our current systems to CDS in Red Oak, Iowa, USA. Although CDS has offices in Australia, Canada, and the UK, all our customer service is handled in the Red Oak, Iowa, USA office. During this transition you will see the following changes:

  • New phone numbers—as periodicals move to the new system, CDS Customer Service will begin taking calls relating to your subscriptions.
  • New address for payments—bills and renewal notices will have new payment instructions with a Red Oak, Iowa, USA address.
  • Currency changes—bill and renewals will now only show US dollars.
  • For a few months different periodicals renewal notices will have different payment methods as we work through this transition.

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What is not changing?

While CDS Global handles the operational end of the business, the following customer service components will remain in Boston.

  • Membership/Clerk's Office
  • Editorial questions
  • Branch church activities
  • Journal Directory Services
  • non-English customer service

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Will I still be able to use cssubscribers.com?

Yes. The newly designed website is now available. Please go to www.cssubscribers.com to update your account information.

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What about Customer Service?

Moving the business of fulfilling orders to CDS Global does not lessen a member's ability to communicate with or to access The Mother Church.

If you are speaking with a CDS Global customer service representative and have a church-related question, your call will be transferred to the Membership Services team at The Mother Church.

When a member needs to talk to someone at The Mother Church, we encourage you to contact us via email or phone. There will continue to be a Membership Services team available for you to share your feedback and ask questions.

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