There's lots of horror stories about Thompson - quite a few of them have been posted here in other threads like this one. Over many years, I've purchased a few "super" deals from Thompson - the last, a number of months ago, was a box of CAO Criollo Conquisadors in the 2002 original drawers box for $69 with free shipping. A couple months ago, a friend got a similar bargain from Thompson on a box of Comacho Connecticuts. Not sure about their auctions (never tried it).
I dunno... seems to me that whenever one is buying on line one has to be super careful (no touchy-feely -- the ever present element of the unknown) -- almost every on line vendor uses the same tricks as Thompson (i.e., substitutions in samplers), but Thompson seems to do more of it, so I am even more careful when dealing with them. Their telepmarketing doesn't bother me - I got one call when they started doing that, told them to remove me from their call list and they haven't bothered me since.
As for the "beetles," it's an unavoidable part of doing business (this has also be a topic in other threads here). The beetle eggs are in a lot of our cigars -- fact of nature. A lot of the more OCD of us actually freeze all cigars upon receipt - Fridge, Freezer, Fridge, Out - a four day process. Hell if I lived in Texas and my cigar orders were delivered after sitting in a hot UPS truck for a day or three, you bet your ass I'd be freezing every cigar on receipt and then making damn sure the humidor(s) are always in an environment that's well under 75 degrees F. (which is when the beetle eggs hatch into larvae and start munching).