Does anyone complain about their school uniform supply company? May I? I might complain enough for the rest of us.

There's a long history of discontent but the following bumblings stand out in my mind.

To begin with, at the end of May, the company came on campus to measure students and take orders. I explained my blank order form to the measuring tape-holding representatives by saying that I would order online during the summer ... as always. Maybe they didn't believe me. For whatever reason, they didn't bother actually to measure my boys. They made some guesses, perhaps educated guesses, but guesses nonetheless about my sons' likely sizes in their company's clothing line come fall. And I'm finding that their guesses are wrong!

Measuring growing boys not an exact science, you say? Yeah, but they never held tape to waist or inseam!

Even with perfect measurements, the clothing has incorrect or missing labels! Last year I received khaki slacks labeled "6 Regular". Holding them up to the other 6R pairs in the same shipment, it was obvious that these were not 6Rs. Some sweats have no size labels sewn anywhere, not in the neckline, not in the side seam, not in the waistband. I compare these with articles of known size and mark with my laundry pen accordingly.

Maybe the shortcomings are more noticeable to me now with two children in uniform. I mean, I need to sort between them, whereas in the past, everything was Kenny's.

After Kenny's first year in uniform, I gathered what he had outgrown into a single storage container, the dress clothes. Last year, he reused about half of his uniforms, the gym clothes, but I ordered larger sweatshirts. This year, except for the sweatshirts, he needs everything new. Fortunately, with so many people not returning to school this year, I received from others things for Kenny to get him through the first week of school until the stuff that I ordered last night arrives.

Tim is different in that he needs XS gym pants and shorts. Kenny wore S at the same age, so I haven't any XS on-hand. Even for Tim, then, I ordered a few things.

The online ordering system is easy to use and I prefer it to their confusing paper order form. But, the first year that I ordered online, I noticed on my receipt that the leading '0' of my zip code was snipped. I tracked my shipment across the country ... to Somerton, AZ ... and back, as a result. As soon as I noticed the error, I called and told them that their online ordering system has a problem of striping leading zeros. I could not believe that I was the first to encounter this glitch! But they seemed quite unaware of the problem and didn't really seem to understand what I was telling them. Now, this company operates in some six East Coast states and has certainly mailed shipments to NJ! Does everyone else order or shop in person at their stores?