Really cheap food...however

poet123

In many ways Dan has made a rod for his own back by previously responding to comment on this thread. It is not a good way to conduct a buisiness really, although it may seem so at first glance. When a company is small it may be feasible,but as it grows it becomes impossible,and then some see it as a failing when things change.

My issue is not with communication,but the seeming failure to process orders in date order.

Mrembo

sellercheckuk wrote: »

I am not 'tired of waiting' and have not suggested otherwise.
Methinks that for whatever reason your reading of posts is 'blinkered' with your comprehension of comments that are not blatantly only praising the supplier in this case making you 'defensive' rather than neutral.

Devils advocate as you called yourself if you are not tired of waiting good.Then please just chill and wait for DHL to deliver your goods it could take along time thou.

hallnaomiuk

People are choosing Af over tescos and asda - due to the value of the food and great customer service that some poeple have had. However due to increase of sale etc, which cant be helped it does seem that customer service is struggling a little, and lack of communication and updates.

I think one of the main things that is bothering people, is how the orders are being processed as some people have been waiting weeks for orders (which we know there is a back log - so dont mind waiting) however others have had there orders after a few days - hence people wondering what on earth is going on - and why they have had no communication on what is happening with there orders - and on requiring they are just being given a generated email - which should of been sent out in the first place to keep people updated - so they know where they stand.

hallnaomiuk

i know people recon old orders havent been completed as items are out of stock etc - but customers have not been notified with any proplems with there order.

Hence why they wonder whats going on with theres when others are being completed?

sellercheckuk

approvedfood wrote: »

I really appreciate all the constructive input there has been on this thread recently, as well as the huge amount of understanding of the challenge we are facing.

The current situation is that, as a result of the huge increase in orders two weeks ago, we are running out of some popular items. Fortunately we have a number of new lines that we can offer as alternatives so we will be phoning people to sort out their orders and ensure that they are happy with the final order.

We have just improved our stock control system again (hell of a learning curve this!) and so out-of-stock items will be indicated on the website. Remember that, as this is clearance stock, supplies are often limited or erratic.

The media exposure continues (thanks to Hush-Puppy for the heads up) but our priority is still to offer the highest possible quality of sevice together with the best bargains available.

Cheers :beer:

Presumably you will phone people (customers) on a first come first served basis?
If so, when do you expect to be phoning people that ordered 2 weeks ago (17th January) and have not yet been advised of any shortages or received advice of shipping from DHL?
Also, do you intend to phone customers for whom you do not have any alternative items for out of stock items?

Mrembo

Porky wrote: »

Get real will you? It would cost far less in lost revenue and goodwill to get someone else to do the mundane things and for he himself to get on top and chase the system to keep the customers satisfied. A company must keep customers happy.
"Sorry, I can't deal with decisions, I have to read this forum".

Silly.

There are thousands of happy customers.The boss of the company has provided his mobile phone for anyone to phone him with customer service issues I just don't see how employing someone to read the forum will enhance his business.

tricki1

sellercheckuk wrote: »

"There is nothing wrong with the customer communication" ? OK, apart from...
a) The information given being inaccurate ("shipped within the next couple of days")
b) The 'promised' phone call being non-existent.

My point is that while I DO understand the situation and am NOT desperate to receive delivery, my SUGGESTION to Dan (Approved Foods) is that to achieve customer satisfaction, which will be to the benefit of his business, he needs to focus on proactive communication with his customers.
It's an internet / online (web site) purchase, with email confirmation, so the follow up communication should be by the same method.

Not keeping the customers informed and having more people to pack non-existent goods does not help the situation.

While others here think you are moaning, you do have a legitimate complaint; you were promised to be called back, and haven't. It might have been forgotten because of the rush. I can only suggest ringing back again to make sure the message hasn't got lost. I understand your frustration in this, it should be the companies responsibility to contact you if they say they will, and its annoying to maybe have to chase it up yet again, so your suggestion is constructive in that you think contacting customers is the best thing and will help keep customers happy.

But its possible that because he doesn't avoid dealing with customer orders etc that he is being taken away from other matters that also require his attention such as the backlogged orders.

As you noticed, AF IS phoning people

approvedfood wrote: »

The current situation is that, as a result of the huge increase in orders two weeks ago, we are running out of some popular items. Fortunately we have a number of new lines that we can offer as alternatives so we will be phoning people to sort out their orders and ensure that they are happy with the final order.

So he IS being proactive, but there are a lot of customers to ring and that takes time.

sellercheckuk wrote: »

Presumably you will phone people (customers) on a first come first served basis?
If so, when do you expect to be phoning people that ordered 2 weeks ago (17th January) and have not yet been advised of any shortages or received advice of shipping from DHL?
Also, do you intend to phone customers for whom you do not have any alternative items for out of stock items?

Hard to say how hes handling it, I know if I were in his shoes I'd find all the orders that can easily exchange items of the same weight and price, and get them out of the way quickly so can work out the best way to deal with the more complex cases. To answer you and poet below, it isn't quite fair to the older dated orders, but it would clear a large amount of the backlog much more efficiently than starting at the oldest and working forward one at a time, and his biggest problem atm is the amount of orders to process. So if he was doing something like that it would be only because he has little choice.

poet123 wrote: »

In many ways Dan has made a rod for his own back by previously responding to comment on this thread. It is not a good way to conduct a buisiness really, although it may seem so at first glance. When a company is small it may be feasible,but as it grows it becomes impossible,and then some see it as a failing when things change.

My issue is not with communication,but the seeming failure to process orders in date order.

In a way it is true, but remember that there are a lot of new orders from the publicity elsewhere who won't know of his problems apart from the message on the website. This forum is an easy way to inform several people of the problems and more personal than a general note on the website. So while seeing a nice friendly store owner posting to this forum may have encouraged people to buy and flooded the store with orders, at least they are able to find out why there are problems in the same manner.

matt1987

It does seem stange that people who ordered 2 weeks ago havent had theirs despached yet, as where as me, who ordered on the 26th has been despatched.

The only logical reason i can think of is they have some sort of tray where new orders are put, and the warehouse staff check the tray for orders. But becuase of the volume of orders, they are checking the tray and only grabbing orders that are on top of the pile, hence new orders going out first, and old orders staying at the bottom of the pile.

Im only going by how the warehouse where i work goes by. But we dont grab from the top, we take from the bottom, and despatch the older orders first!

sellercheckuk

tricki1 wrote: »

"While others here think you are moaning, you do have a legitimate complaint; you were promised to be called back, and haven't. It might have been forgotten because of the rush. I can only suggest ringing back again to make sure the message hasn't got lost. I understand your frustration in this, it should be the companies responsibility to contact you if they say they will, and its annoying to maybe have to chase it up yet again, so your suggestion is constructive in that you think contacting customers is the best thing and will help keep customers happy.

But its possible that because he doesn't avoid dealing with customer orders etc that he is being taken away from other matters that also require his attention such as the backlogged orders. "

I have not been and am not making a 'complaint' and I really don't feel any 'frustration'.
The reason for posting was to:
a) Make a suggestion that Dan (approvedfood) might read, by a method that would not distract him (as emails and phone calls to email) would. i.e. If/when he reads this discussion it would hopefully be at a time when he's taking a break from the day to day activities.
I do not intend to phone Dan or approved food as it's my belief that they are 'snowed under' and don't have the capacity to deal with the administrative load that they already have, let alone more.
All that I'm suggesting is that within 2 weeks of order placement and acceptance of payment, approved foods 'should' be sending an email to their customers to advise the situation specific to each customer's order.
i.e. Advice of any shortages and suggested 'alternatives', if any And/Or a suggested revised order with refund amount with the option to accept within say 48 hours AN/Or a partial or full refund.
and
b) Put another viewpoint (to those from wearers of Rose tinted specs), and share my experience in case it is meaningful for others.

I have not been personally promised a phone call and the only mention of 'phoning people' was made by Dan himself and others in this discussion thread.

Approved_Food

I take all the points that have been made and fully appreciate the efforts of all those who are trying to help with constructive suggestions.

Firstly I must explain why some people have “jumped the queue”: because of the pressure of numbers and the insecure nature of our supplies, we found ourselves in the position of having to contact the majority of our customers about replacements. Obviously the night shift could not phone customers, so the only way to keep them occupied was to employ them completing orders that had come in recently and for which we had the products in stock.

However, the current situation is that we have a huge, and ever-increasing number, of boxes partly filled and contacting all of these customers by phone is making the situation even worse.

This clearly requires drastic measures and what I propose to do is this:

Any order already placed before January 31st that leaves our building more than 12 days after it was placed will receive a discount of £5.25 (the postal charge for the vast majority of you).

By doing this our three shifts will be able to work swiftly through the backlog. Of course any missing items will be refunded as normal.

The fact that all items at the moment appear as “temporarily unavailable” is not because we don’t have the stock, but it was the only way I could put a stop to people making orders this weekend. Normal service will resumed as soon as possible, hopefully during this coming week.

I can assure you that, as from now, orders will be dealt with strictly in the order they were placed. Also I will update you via this thread as to where we are up to with the orders on a daily basis.

If anyone is unhappy with the arrangements, they only need to call either of the numbers on our website in order to cancel their order and receive a full refund.

As I’m sure you’ll all appreciate, I’m determined to resolve the present problems and re-establish the level of service we were able to provide before the media explosion.

Finally I must apologise for any inconvenience caused by our inability to cope with the increased demand and once again thank you for your support and encouragement.

Cheers,

Dan