B&Q - Completely Useless

AngryAtBnQ

Hello all! New here and I just thought here would be a good place to rant and let off some steam about B&Q!

I've had two bad experiences with them recently...

(If the below is too long for you to read, the short story is that they made a big mistake, and rectified it with a £10 voucher)

First bad experience

I ordered 2 items to be delivered in store to their Solihull branch (I'd rather do that and pick them up at my leisure rather than have to take a day off work to wait in for them). It took almost 4 weeks (which I wasn't made aware of), but this was ok because I wasn't in a hurry for them.

I received a phone call on a Wednesday to say the items had arrived, so I went on the Friday to pick them up. I walked into the store and spent a couple of minutes trying to find a member of staff, and when I eventually found someone, I asked him where I would go to pick up items that I had ordered in. Without even looking at me, he mumbled to go to the customer services desk, and before I could ask where that was, he was walking away from me. Not a good start!

I found the desk and the girl there was pleasant enough, but didn't have a clue what was going on. I handed her my order sheet and she handed it to someone who went off with it. I waited about 10 minutes and asked where the man was. She just told me he was coming (didn't actually check). Another 5 minutes later, a man arrived with my items on a trolley but I immediately noticed that one of the items was incorrect. I approached him to ask if those were my items and all I got out was "excuse m..." and about a split second of eye contact before he looked away, walked a wide berth around me, handed the order sheet to the girl behind the desk, and then ran off!

I told the girl that one of the items was the wrong one. She had to call over 3 different people before one of them eventually took the time to actually stay with me and sort out the problem. I had been there over half an hour by this point. The man explained that although the correct item was ordered in, the wrong one had been sent to them. I asked what he was going to do to rectify the mistake and he said he could get one to us within a week. What was really annoying is if they can get things in that quickly, why had it taken 4 weeks from when I initially placed my order?

When I received the call on the Wednesday to say the items were in, I booked a builder in to fit it (it was a fire surround and back panel & hearth), so now having the wrong surround meant I'd have to book him again a week later! I told the man this wasn't a good enough solution and asked him to source one for me at a different branch. First he tried Selly Oak - no stock. Then Halesowen - stock system said 2 in stock, but when he phone for a physical check, there were none (how can 2 fire surrounds just go missing?), then he phoned Erdington who did have one in.

Anyway, the end result is that I drove over 45 miles that day to get the items I had ordered from B&Q a month ago. I sent them an email of complaint and as an apology they are sending me a £10 B&Q voucher! I'd rather have had compensation for the extra petrol I used up that day.

Second bad experience

This time I was in the Selly Oak branch and designed a kitchen with them. The lady who did it with us was VERY helpful. She walked half way around the store with us so we could physically see the products we were adding to the plan on her laptop. After planning it all out, we said we'd be back in a couple of days with my fianc!e's Grandmother because she has a Kingfisher Group discount card that gets her 20% off. I asked if we'd be ok to use this, and she checked with another member of staff who said that it would be ok if her Grandmother was with us.

We went in two days later with my fiancee's Grandmother, only to be told we now can't use the discount card! Apparently they can only be used on things that are in stock and not on things that are ordered in.

We explained that we had been told just two days before that we can use it but the lady who said we could is now on holiday for a week!

So yeah! Not happy with B&Q at all right now! We're now going to have a Howden's kitchen and pay a bit extra just because I don't want to give B&Q my custom any more.

Stay away from B&Q!

EDIT: Does anyone know if maybe B&Q would be legally obliged to let us use the discount card now? I'm assuming not because I only asked the lady and got a verbal response and don't have it in writing that they'd let us use it.

System

i have a discount card but items must be delivered to my address presumably your gran doesnt live with you

AngryAtBnQ

Had a message left on my phone yesterday: "Sorry, my manager was incorrect, your nan can actually use that card to buy the kitchen for you".

Plonkers. I've decided to go elsewhere now anyways so they've lost the sale.