Approved Food - general discussion thread

mdecker_london

Sarahsaver wrote: »

AFAIK the contract between you and AF is completed when you receive the goods, as it would be when you order from a catalogue, or online supermarkets.
I mean good grief the amount of times major supermarkets therefore 'breached' something - substitutions, missing items etc...

Please may i remind you before i get some much needed sleep to be nice to all moneysavers and be nice to one another. Dan is one guy with a massive surge in business to deal with and I think that needs support from us at MSE.

My initial comment was to note that a poster making a perfectly fair comment about slow delivery and half their order missing was criticised for no real good reason; which you then followed up by supporting the criticism!

No ifs, no buts - if a vendor cannot cope with orders then they must NOT take any more until they have dealt with the back orders. Secondly, they must NEVER take money for items they know they won't be able to deliver.

Just because Approved Foods is 'one of our own' at MSE doesn't mean we shouldn't apply the same standards we would to any other business that lets down its customers. How long does the list of unhappy customers here have to be?

Certainly a contract is completed when both sides have received their due. But this is a *breach* of contract, where one party is entering into a contract in the knowledge that they are unable to deliver their part of the bargain. The contract starts when one of parties does their part - in this case make payment - which is why many online vendors do *not* take money until goods are actually ready for despatch.

Oh, and supermarkets' online trading sites have lengthy T's&C's covering substitutions etc, and the customer is given the choice in this regard.

Approved_Food

We have just about completed orders from January 23.

Even Barak Obama admitted this week that he'd "screwed up" and we at AF aren't perfect either ... but we're doing our very best to get there, and are learning from our mistakes.

sellercheckuk

Sarahsaver wrote: »

AFAIK the contract between you and AF is completed when you receive the goods, as it would be when you order from a catalogue, or online supermarkets.
I mean good grief the amount of times major supermarkets therefore 'breached' something - substitutions, missing items etc...

Please may i remind you before i get some much needed sleep to be nice to all moneysavers and be nice to one another. Dan is one guy with a massive surge in business to deal with and I think that needs support from us at MSE.

I'm disappointed that you (a Board Guide for the ShopButDontDrop board) posted that on this forum (which is at a 'consumer interest' site), without first checking to establish the facts about consumer and contract law.

A contract has not been 'completed' unless and until both parties have fulfilled their obligations.

Just one piece of relevant legislation...
[SIZE=+2]Statutory Instrument 2000 No. 2334[/SIZE][SIZE=+1]The Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000[/SIZE]
7. - (1) Subject to paragraph (4), in good time prior to the conclusion of the contract the supplier shall -

(b) inform the consumer if he proposes, in the event of the goods or services ordered by the consumer being unavailable, to provide substitute goods or services (as the case may be) of equivalent quality and price; and

(c) inform the consumer that the cost of returning any such substitute goods to the supplier in the event of cancellation by the consumer would be met by the supplier.
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2000/20002334.htm

nanna_jack

After reading and about approved foods from the threads, I placed an order on wednesday, if that order can't be fulfilled I'm sure I will offered alternatives.
That is fine by me.
I'm sure that Approved Foods wasn't much heard of before it became popular on this site. that is why there are delays now?Please correct me if I'm wrong.I don't mean to offend anybody:D (maybe locally heard of?).
I am happy to go with the flow.
Now my mother wants to go halves the next time I order lol. She is the worlds worst for throwing things away that are past the date, but she is learning from me, and from 'old style'

lindseykim13

well seeing as they are dealing with the 23rd and assuming they are dealing with one date a day i've still got another 5 days to wait and then time for delivery that will be 11 days + 2 days min for delivery. I do hope my stuffs there as seems that in another 5 days i bet there wont be anything left.

I have to admit i ordered once before and it was great but if this order is only half there i won't be ordering againas i couldn't justify postage.

I'm all for af but the comments about ringing af up to sort subs out etc don't seem fair to customers. I for one hate making phone calls and don't see why i should. Af should be contacting us to tell us whats going on and i appreciate a lot of people don't use this site so i feel sorry for those that don't have a clue whats going on.
A bulk email to all customers appolgising for the delay may help.

sellercheckuk

Mistymaid wrote: »

I'm not being rude, mdecker - at least I'm not trying to be so, that's a plus.

Thing is, you could have taken control of this situation whether you knew about MSE or not.

Looking at it from your point of view, if I'd have gone into the site and seen that a) stuff I'd ordered was no longer in stock, and b) My order went over the guideline dates given on the homepage ... and considering the weather down south ... why didn't you just phone up?

No need to be nasty about it, just a polite phone call to enquire about the status of your order.

Now what are you doing; quoting rules and regulations, breach of contract, all manner of stuff that could have/should have, been easily remedied.
Dan did not know the stock was not available when he advertised it. Dan put up on screen, as soon as the new system was in place, that items were out of stock.(sometimes just to stop more orders)
When he lists stuff it is there and available. The problem is he has been overwhelmed with orders. He explained, quite clearly, that he orders a couple of pallets of items, if they sell well, he suspends the trade until he has got more.

You can't go into Asda's site or any other supermarket and place an order and then start yelling breach of contract if they then inform you it is out of stock, so why AF?

People are also going into the store and buying direct from him, this is something else you have to bear in mind - it's not just an on-line service - and they don't know who is going to walk in every day.

Sorry, but yelling breach of anything, just gets my back up. Particularly when you haven't made any move yourself to resolve the problem.
You may expect the company to phone you, that is your right, but it is also your responsibility to first try and resolve any problems - that's just the mature way to behave.

You're not the only person to have had a few problems - quite a few of us did - but we worked with the company, sorted them and are more than happy with the end result. You could be too ...

I suspect, as has been suggested by others, that 'stock control/stock level management' (or lack of) is at the root of the 'problems' being experienced.
Although that may be understandable it that doesn't mean that I or anyone else shouldn't point out what is patently 'wrong' and/or unacceptable to us as individual consumers.

nanna_jack wrote: »

After reading and about approved foods from the threads, I placed an order on wednesday, if that order can't be fulfilled I'm sure I will offered alternatives.
That is fine by me.
I'm sure that Approved Foods wasn't much heard of before it became popular on this site. that is why there are delays now?Please correct me if I'm wrong.I don't mean to offend anybody:D (maybe locally heard of?).
I am happy to go with the flow.
Now my mother wants to go halves the next time I order lol. She is the worlds worst for throwing things away that are past the date, but she is learning from me, and from 'old style'

Based on my recent (this week) experience I wouldn't feel/be so sure about that.
I am happy to temporarily give AF a bit of slack and, like you, 'go with the flow' because I'd like to see them remain in business.

sellercheckuk

lindseykim13 wrote: »

well seeing as they are dealing with the 23rd and assuming they are dealing with one date a day i've still got another 5 days to wait and then time for delivery that will be 11 days + 2 days min for delivery. I do hope my stuffs there as seems that in another 5 days i bet there wont be anything left.

I have to admit i ordered once before and it was great but if this order is only half there i won't be ordering againas i couldn't justify postage.

I'm all for af but the comments about ringing af up to sort subs out etc don't seem fair to customers. I for one hate making phone calls and don't see why i should. Af should be contacting us to tell us whats going on and i appreciate a lot of people don't use this site so i feel sorry for those that don't have a clue whats going on.
A bulk email to all customers appolgising for the delay may help.

I feel much the same except that I think AF should at least be intending (they may well be of course) to put an order processing and stock management system in place so that:
a) It's not possible for orders to be accepted for items that cannot be supplied within a reasonable time.
and
b) Orders are individually reviewed and each customer notified by email with information specific to each of their orders within a reasonable time.

Presumably what is 'reasonable' will depend on not only what AF decide to set as achievable service standard targets (which they should publish) but also what their customers, existing and prospective, are prepared to accept.

I must admit that many of us (me included) may have had the impression that AF was/is a much 'larger' and 'mature' organisation than is the reality, which is quite often the case with relatively new internet/web based businesses.
It's understandably frustrating for customers to be left uninformed due to the administration side of the business being in need of upgrading/upscaling.
In the mean time I hope that the speed and quality of communication improves so that potential repeat customers (who's business will probably be required for the upscaled business with increased overheads to remain viable) won't be turned off through disappointment and disillusionment.

Approved_Food

Hi all

We should finish all the 24th by the end of the day
Cheers Dan

Approved_Food

mdecker_london wrote: »

I'm not angry, just disappointed and irritated. This is my second order, and I was pleased with the first one. But it arrived within the times stated on the website at the time of my order, and there were only a couple of minor substitutions, one breakage/leak, and a lot of inedible stuck-together raisins. I can put up with that; the food's cheap and the guy's building a business.

But my second order included items that weren't ever going to be in stock by the time my order was picked and packed, and the vendor KNEW that at the time he took my money.

I didn't know and that was the reason that has caused us so many problems, it shouldn't happen again now that we have a system in place

THAT'S what annoys me the most. Well, that and the way my wife's going to say "I told you so" when the second order eventually arrives and is half-empty. Much though I love a bargain, it'll be a lot easier to just take her to Tescos in future...

Mistymaid

mdecker_london wrote: »

I'm buying a little bit of food for less than £100 - I don't have the time to devote to what should be a simple, small transaction: why should I "go back to the site and see items are out of stock, phone them, discuss and agree substitutions, 'work with the company', 'sort them'" etc?

You seem to have a somewhat odd idea of the relationship between buyer and seller - but I suppose that shouldn't be a surprise, given that you have posted fifty times on this site, and around 90% of those posts are written in support of Approved Foods! Without wishing to appear to point a finger, as of course it may be coincidence, but you only joined MSE a month after Approved Foods first started being mentioned here....... And whether you like it or not, it's unlawful to take money for goods you know you cannot deliver.

May I politely suggest you take a step back, and have a hard think about whether you *really* think it's acceptable to take money for goods you know aren't going to be in stock, and then fail to tell customers for a couple of weeks that their order is a) going to be late and b) is only half-there?

Sorry, but I thought you actually knew what items you had ordered were out of stock - it is why you posted in the first place, isn't it? You weren't going to get the items you had paid for - are you now saying this isn't this case - if so your original posting is defunct.

Could you clarify exactly what you mean by the second statement highlighted in bold - you appear to be accusing me of some collaberation but aren't being specific and it would be must easier to respond if you were. It also seems rather strange that you don't have time to go through your own food order, but do have time to go through my posts! Rather you than me, but there you go. I must admit I do find it rather amusing.

I can't comment on the lawful issue - I have no idea what money has been taken from your account, if any, and, according to you, you don't know what items will not be available to you. So, for the time being the whole thing is a mute point.

Although I will say that you keep repeating that AF knew they couldn't deliver the goods they were advertising. As a general point, it seems to me, that at the point of advertising the items were available and every effort has been made by the company to either supply the goods ordered, offer substitutions, give refunds and, as a sign of goodwill, refund postage.
Additionally, if you did decide that none of the above were enough recompense for you - a court would actually want to know what action you had taken to reach mutual agreement before instigating proceedings and since you have already stated on here that you had no intention of making any efforts whatsoever - when in practice others that had, reached a satisfactory solution with the company and had advised you to do the same, it usually isn't a point in your favour.

As a point of interest, I would actually like to know though, exactly what is it you do want? Refund - not good enough. Substitutions - not good enough. Postage refund - not good enough.

I don't have an odd idea of a relationship between buyer and seller - I don't do, 'desperate, needy, or grateful,' but considering the current financial climate, the fact that I live on an isolated island and have to pay over £50 just to get to a supermarket to shop, and factor in possible huge forthcoming increases in inflation and falls in the pound which is going to make food both more expensive and in short supply - I'm not daft enough to look a gift horse in the mouth. Especially when that company has admitted they've had problems, and done (Proven) everything they can to put it right without resorting to legal get outs and switching the answerphone on to avoid customers.