Unhappy with John Lewis Online

Geminist

Recently ordered a small £13 gift from John Lewis. Noted that I had to pay for delivery and was happy because it says 3-5 working days. It wasn't written anywhere on the delivery that there might be delay due to this time of the year.

Five working days gone, not receive gift. Sent an email asking where is my gift.

Received a response in 2 days, full response below.

Thank you for your email regarding order number -snipped-.

Please be advised that your order has been dispatched via the Royal Mail. As this order is being delivered by post it cannot be tracked.

Normally your goods will be delivered within 5 working days. Mail is still delivered on Saturdays which should be taken into account. Please be aware that the Royal mail delivery times can be longer at this time of year.

As this time has now elapsed and you have not received the goods please contact your local sorting office to enquire if they are in receipt of this order. If you have not received your parcel soon please contact us.

If I can be of any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards,

My gift arrived another 2 days later, and it wasn't delivered by Royal Mail, it was a courier service. I was unhappy because:

1) I needed the gift on the 5th day which is why I ordered from John Lewis as there was no mention that there would be delayed yet the email above implies that I should have known implicitly?

2) The customer service basically asked me to go find the parcel myself - It's out of our door so not our problem approach.

3) I marked the order as a gift. Received the gift outside the box, had to pack it in myself. In addition, I wanted a message to be printed, it was printed on a printer with leaking ink (which means it's not something you can give to someone).

Photo attached. See the black vertical lines.



The message is on the right. I snipped off most of it for privacy.

I sent another email to customer complain, noting the incident and just said I am sending this as a feedback and not asking for anything else. Not had any acknowledgement back.

I spoke to a few friends and they agree it's John Lewis's fault in this case. I would also say having been through Amazon's excellent customer service, I was hoping a company like John Lewis, whose products come at a premium price, would be at least comparable when it comes to customer service.

Also as a quick comparison, I ordered a £10 book from Amazon on a Friday, free delivery and arrived on Monday, nicely packed!

Whilst I am an unhappy first (and last) time customer at John Lewis, I've posted the details above so everyone can decide for themselves. Also, I have no association with Amazon but to me, if someone is doing an excellent job, they deserve a mention

Oliver14

I think your getting in a tiz about nothing. So john lewis never told you there may be delays to the postal network near Christmas but that's just common sense I'm afraid.

As for telling you to check your sorting office that's standard procedure. Would you rather your parcel got returned because you didn't check?

Then shock horror at the busiest time of year they made a mistake and told you it was RM when it was a courier. Mistakes happen I'm afraid.

From your post it feels like you were just looking for something to complain about no matter what.

withabix

Who delivered it?

Clipper Logistics operate a goods storage, handling, order fulfilment and despatch service for retailers, including John Lewis.

The fault probably lies with Clipper.


To provide balance to your point of view:

I ordered a gift from John Lewis at 3pm yesterday.

Free Delivery option chosen

It was delivered at 9.15am this morning

geri1965_2

I ordered something from John Lewis on Friday and it came on Monday. It's usually two days so I was impressed. I find John Lewis to be one of the best companies to deal with.

Geminist

Thanks for the responses.

Oliver14

1) It is common sense yes. One could also argue it is common sense to put it on your website if delivery might be delayed so I could have planned accordingly? Else people would assume it would be delivered on time?

2) I was actually expecting them to call the post office up? They as the sender should have more information than me and also, it wasn't delivered by RM so they wouldn't have known anyway.

3) This is why I left the topic title as me being unhappy and posted the details for others to consider for themselves. I considered John Lewis to be a good brand similar to Amazon and hence my expectation of similar level of customer service.