The US parts department is staffed, or at lest used to be, with very nice people. They have always been accommodating with me and I have had few problems with their service. The problem I have is how the German ds keeps the US ds stocked. They used to get many orders in a year but more recently they decided to only do a few big shipments which is why I think they have such a high out-of-stock rating. Now they are less likely to sell off inventories to collectors to avoid parents not having access to the same parts one at a time. It's a tricky situation. If US collectors could just buy from German ds through the pcc we could all avoid the hassles. I am now going through playmofriends to get parts outside the US.