Ray is a reputable dealer, I have not had an issue with him. You also have to remember that this is also a busy time of the year for him. I would also jump onto aliexpress and chat with him via the chat service
If you buy via Ali-express he has 7 days to ship, and then he needs to ask for more time. I have just given him an extension, as I rather it be late than of bad quality.
He took 30 days to ship a strip I had ordered (Selected it using this spreadsheet) and some dumb RGB modules. I ordered it on the 10th of October and needed it for Halloween.
Sent him a message saying it is needed quickly, about 10 days before Halloween, and he managed to ship it, using another service to the one we had selected, and it arrived the monday before Halloween.
His listings are confusing. I have seen the same things at different prices, hundreds of listings called "invoice for..." and he regularly refers to dumb RGB as dump RGB, but I have never had a problem in three orders from him.
I had hit a brick wall trying to find my way around his store everyone giving him great feed back
as you say different prices for what looked like the same item it was driving mad
I have done the photo of my house and measured up and was trying to find out quantity of strips and power requirements
I can now do this with your spread sheet
On to the next stage working out how meny universe's and how many controlers I need (My plan is to have one univerce or grouped if needed for each prop, hopefully making it easier to sequence later
Still learning and still evolving my idea's but feel I am getting an overview on how it all works
Ray also swaps out links (best summary I can think of). Did a search today on something I've bought multiple times at $0.20 a pixel and could only find it for $0.26. Was concerned there had been 30% price increase during CNY. Then went to my order history and found the item and clicked on it there and the page listing came up so I could make another order. Tried one more time to search for the item and still couldn't find it. My guess is he has links that don't show up in searches or listings but that he still honors if you've ordered before. Just a piece of advice.
These are peoples custom orders (quotes and invoices) .. I always look through these to see how much he's selling things for and what people are asking him to do as far as customising product like different pigtail lengths and weird spacing .. I've even seen people dictate the wiring colour and what order to put them in.