Q & A

Textbook Prepayment

What if a textbook I need is not on your shelves?

• Hard as we try to avoid this situation, inevitably some textbooks are not yet received, low in stock, or out of stock when classes start. Instead of wasting your time checking back or looking elsewhere, use our unique Shop Once Service.

How does Shop Once Service work?

• Shop Once Bookmark: If you do not see a book on the shelf, look for its bookmark. Give the bookmark to the cashier along with whatever else you are buying. When you “buy” the bookmark, you prepay the book’s NEW price.
• Shop Once Order: Your prepaid textbook order requires a Cal Poly Student customer account at our website. If you do not have an account, your Shop Once order opens the account. We use our website to look for your book. If we are not certain of receiving your book from an outstanding purchase order, a textbook return, or a textbook buyback, we order the book from the publisher or a distributor.
• Shop Once Delivery: When we receive your book, we alert you that your prepaid book is ready for pick-up. An alert is two messages. The first message is e-mailed to you. The second message is posted under My Alerts in My Account. We do not routinely notify by phone.

What are the benefits of Shop Once Service?

• Convenience: We do the work of looking for the book you need.
• New Book Price Protection: If we receive your NEW book at a higher price than you paid, you do not pay the difference in price. You pay the difference in price only when you accept the substitution of another format, edition, or title that has a higher price.
• Used Book Price Refund: Although you paid the NEW price, we may give you a USED book. If that happens, we refund you the difference in price.
• Cancellation & Refund: You may cancel a Shop Once order any time before you pick it up. If you cancel, we refund the price and sales tax. Otherwise, Shop Once orders have the same returns privilege as other textbook purchases.

When is Shop Once Service is available?

• Shop Once Service is routinely available the first week of classes (through Friday) and the previous weekend.

What do I do when Shop Once Service is unavailable?

• Textbook Special Orders begin when Shop Once Service ends. There are two differences between the two services. First, Textbook Special Orders may exclude El Corral Publications. Second, we do not cancel and refund a textbook special order unless we cannot fill the order within a reasonable period of time.

What if I reserve my textbooks?

• Textbook Reservation includes a prepaid backorders option with all the benefits of Shop Once Service. Better yet, the Textbook Reservation option excludes only those not-in-stock textbooks for which we have no price.

Prepaid Textbook Questions