WHSmith online. Awful service

shoppingnoodles

Hi there.

I ordered a book on 12th December which had to arrive by 20th December at the latest. The website stated 3 to 6 working days for delivery to a local store, so I felt confident that it would arrive. The stores had the same book in stock, but it was £7 more, hence I ordered online (tbh, I think its very weird to have 2 prices with one company anyway).

WHSmith took payment from my card on 14th Dec and the order status was "in progress", so I had no qualms that it would arrive on time.

By 21st Dec it was clear that not only had they missed their delivery date, but also my deadline for the gift. The website stated that I was now unable to cancel as the item was still "in progress". I emailed them asking to cancel as it was now unwanted due to WHS completely missing their latest delivery date.

To date, I have heard absolutely NOTHING. It is very difficult to find contact details on their site and apart from email, they can only be contacted via an 0845 number, which I am unwilling to call as I don't want to put any money in their pockets.

I am going to contact my credit card company to see if I can be refunded without the stupidity of having to actually collect and return the item.

My advice to MSE ers? Avoid WHSmith online like the plague. Disorganised and frankly, dishonest.

powerful_Rogue

shoppingnoodles wrote: »

Hi there.

I ordered a book on 12th December which had to arrive by 20th December at the latest. The website stated 3 to 6 working days for delivery to a local store, so I felt confident that it would arrive. The stores had the same book in stock, but it was £7 more, hence I ordered online (tbh, I think its very weird to have 2 prices with one company anyway).

WHSmith took payment from my card on 14th Dec and the order status was "in progress", so I had no qualms that it would arrive on time.

By 21st Dec it was clear that not only had they missed their delivery date, but also my deadline for the gift. The website stated that I was now unable to cancel as the item was still "in progress". I emailed them asking to cancel as it was now unwanted due to WHS completely missing their latest delivery date.

To date, I have heard absolutely NOTHING. It is very difficult to find contact details on their site and apart from email, they can only be contacted via an 0845 number, which I am unwilling to call as I don't want to put any money in their pockets.

I am going to contact my credit card company to see if I can be refunded without the stupidity of having to actually collect and return the item.

My advice to MSE ers? Avoid WHSmith online like the plague. Disorganised and frankly, dishonest.

Sorry to hear you've had a problem, but ive ordered numerous times with WH Smith and had no issues at all. I certainly wouldn't call them disorganised and dishonest.

Unfortunately these things happen. I wouldnt have thought your credit card will be able to assist as the order im presuming is under £100.

flashg67

Sad to say, this pretty much sums up the poor service we've had from WHS online too. Even sadder to say, my OH works in one of their stores and even she couldn't get an order update!

When we did finally get a reply, it was of the generic type with no useful info whatsoever. Amazon it is then from now on!

angelil

I've also had problems with them this Christmas. In late November, I ordered a quiz book for my dad which wasn't available elsewhere. Ordered 2 more items that I had wanted anyway in order to qualify for free delivery. Those 2 items arrived, but the quiz book did not, and I was unable to log in to the website to track the delivery as I had forgotten my password. Clicking the 'forgotten your password' link to be sent a chance to reset the password yielded nothing, meaning I had to email them to ask about the delivery status. At least I got a reply (credit where credit's due I suppose...) saying it wouldn't even be dispatched until January as they were awaiting new stock meaning my sister had to buy an alternative gift at the last minute. They offered me the option to cancel but I have opted to leave the order in place for now as my dad's birthday is in February. If it doesn't arrive by then I shall definitely be cancelling it however. What a palaver! If the quiz book had been available elsewhere I wouldn't have ordered from them initially and I will now be reluctant to do so in future.

shoppingnoodles

Finally today had a reply to my email sent 11 days ago, telling me that the order cannot be cancelled and I have to wait for it to be delivered to the store, then collect it, then return it. No sign that the item has been dispatched still, yet they took payment almost 3 weeks ago. No apology that they were dishonest regarding the delivery date, no sorry for poor service and disorganisation.

I am glad that an earlier post states they had good service from WHS, but from the other posts, this seems to be a rarity. Truly a dreadful company to deal with and an experience I won't repeat.

keyser666

shoppingnoodles wrote: »

Finally today had a reply to my email sent 11 days ago, telling me that the order cannot be cancelled and I have to wait for it to be delivered to the store, then collect it, then return it. No sign that the item has been dispatched still, yet they took payment almost 3 weeks ago. No apology that they were dishonest regarding the delivery date, no sorry for poor service and disorganisation.

I am glad that an earlier post states they had good service from WHS, but from the other posts, this seems to be a rarity. Truly a dreadful company to deal with and an experience I won't repeat.

You sent your email 11 days ago but there have been 2 bank holidays and 4 non working days, so that's 5 days to respond to your email

keyser666

^eh like !!!!!!?

shoppingnoodles

Just for the record I have still not received the book. WH Smith took the money from my card on 12th December. They state that they do not take payment until the order has actually been picked, ready for dispatch. I honestly don't believe that this can possibly be true.


I have just requested a charge back from my credit card company as I cannot get any reasonable answer from WHS. They keep telling me that I cannot cancel and must wait for the item to arrive at the store before I can return it for refund, despite the fact that it is now over a month overdue and was supposed to be a Christmas gift. Simply terrible service.

Billie-S

They're an over-priced old-hat store anyway, who don't seem to have moved out of the 1980s. I am surprised they're still going.

Hope you get your book OP.

Timalay

Put it on their Facebook page, and then email it to [EMAIL="facebook@whsmith.co.uk"]facebook@whsmith.co.uk[/EMAIL]. That seemed to give them a nudge for me.

shoppingnoodles

Timalay wrote: »

Put it on their Facebook page, and then email it to [EMAIL="facebook@whsmith.co.uk"]facebook@whsmith.co.uk[/EMAIL]. That seemed to give them a nudge for me.

Thank you for an inspired suggestion - I hadn't thought of that at all. I'm off to find their Facebook page straight away. I shall let you know if it works!