Sainsburys is ignoring me for 3 months - can anyone help me?

afm_2

Hi Everyone!

I have bought the "Sainsbury's 2 In 1 Biological Powder" last June and used it to wash my clothes. After taking the clothes from the washing machine I have noticed that there were many bleach stains on them. After that I have called the Sainsbury's careline and they advised me to make a complaint in the store.

I went to the store twice to make the complaint and the staff was not helpful. They avoided the claim telling me to wash the items again to see if it would remove the bleach marks. Of course it did not. At the third time I was offered a £5 voucher, but I have not accepted it since the damaged items are worth at least £70. As I have not accepted that offer, they told me I had to leave the product with them so that it could be tested to see if there was something wrong with it. So, I left it there on the 23rd of June and I was told that I would be contacted in 1 month time. I have waited for more than 2 months and no one contacted me.

Tired of waiting, I have decided to go back to the store and ask explanations about what was happening. The member of the staff told me that there was no registered complaint and he did not know what to do. I told him that the complaint was registered in their agenda and luckily, after my insistence, he decided to look for it in the agenda and I saw it there. The member of the staff told me that he would try to solve it in that day and that he would contact me in that same day. However, no one called me. So, I went there again in the following day and a different member of the staff told me that I should go there the following day. Again, I went to Sainsburys the following day and I was told that finally the complaint was officially registered.

I did not trust their staff when I had to leave the product with them and I am almost sure that it was lost and that now they do not have how to test the product. It is inadmissible to treat a costumer like this. Two weeks ago, I have sent them a written complaint by email through the http://www.howtocomplain.com/ and told them that I would wait two weeks for their reply. After that, I would take this to the Trading Standards Office and Citizens' Advice Bureau.

Those two weeks are gone and I have no response. What should I do now? Who should I contact and how? I cannot accept this. I buy all my groceries in their shops and they are completely ignoring me. I would really appreciate some help.

Thanks,
Alexandra Mendes

niceguyed

Alexandra, I sympathise with your situation. I guess they would have to lab test the product and go from there. By the sound of it either:

a) They are taking their time with the lab testing but will get back to you with the results in due course.

b) The results were not favourable to them and they have decided not to come clean (pardon the pun)

As you would have opened the powder it would have been prudent to hold a sample for yourself as you now have no evidence should you wish to pursue this. Without evidence you stand no chance and are at the whim of whether Sainsbury's will actually test the product and feed back the results. I would perhaps try one more time and write to the head office recorded delivery.

Best of luck, niceguyed.

Rosemary7391

I'm biased. I work for Sainsburys!! (But please don't have a go at me!)

Have you taken it to the store manager? To be honest, some of the people on the customer service desk can be a bit not with it. But if you go at a quiet time and ask to talk to a manager about it, you might get somewhere. If you do send emails/letters, then make sure they are clearly addressed to the member of staff dealing with the complaint - its not always easy to work out who they should go to!

Having said that, I'm not sure it actually is a complaint that should go through the store - we don't make the washing powder!! I can't recall there being any problems in our area with washing powder. Its a bit strange. Sorry I can't really help more!

afm_2

Thank you very much to both of you.

Maybe it is not common to receive a complaint about washing powder but I've spoken with many people and most of them had problems with washing powder. However, they usually don't complain because they are not sure about the cause of the bleach marks. I am sure that the problem was the sainsbury's washing powder since I have washed an item alone with that powder and it got the same bleach marks.

About talking with the manager, I presume that the staff there did it. They have called some superior which, in my opinion, didn't really care.

I am thinking about sending a letter to the following address:
Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd. 33 Holborn. London. EC1N 2HT.

Does anyone know to who should I address it? Should I just write to "Head Office" ?

Many Thanks.

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joanne0620

The complaint would go through the store and then it would be forwarded to the Quality Team to be forwarded to the manufactuer for testing, once it has been tested by the manufacturer they will then report their findings to Sainsburys who would then report back to you

Just out of curiosity, what colour are the garments that have been damaged? Are they cream, beige, or similar pale colour? The "bleaching" you describe could be optical brightener. This is an ingredient in laundry detergents which is designed to make your whites appear brighter, if detergent is allowed to come into contact with clothing undiluted/undissolved it can cause light patches on clothing which can look like bleach marks. The manufacturer will be able to tell if this is the case.

It's unusual for Sainsburys not to action an own label complaint, I would return to the store and ask to speak to the manager.

Rosemary7391

I've only been at Sainsburys for 6 months and I'm certainly not a manager, but I really can't see any of our managers treating people like that!

Surely if this was a specific fault with the brand as a whole it would be easy enough to buy some more washing powder and wash some rags with it to see the outcome? Then you have evidence again if it has been lost, and it shows whether it was just a one off bad luck type of thing.

sparkleworld

I too used to work for Sainsburys on the customer service desk,

Can I ask if you obtained proof from Sainsburys via a written receipt date stamped etc for the clothes and also for powder you handed over- Also did you make a note of the batch number etc printed on the top of the box of the washing powder.
I can't help but agree with the previous poster- regarding sending items away for lab testing- it costs soooo much money to have this done that we were advised to try and placate the customer in every way possible BEFORE venturing down this route- free wine -chocolates- flowers anything customers were be prepared to accept really.

Also my branch had a queueing system for the printer which was shared by 5 stores in our area- (I kid you not!) and sometimes it could take 3 days for the relevant document to come through- meanwhile joints of meat - perishables and the like were left hanging around whilst the correct paperwork was printed off-As it couldn't be sent without it-Don't know if this system has been updated since. But anything that that wasn't infected probably would have been by the time it reached the labs! Also plenty of time for items to go missing.........

Your complaint is more likely to be taken seriously if you contact Head Office- Adriano Somebody?? As they hate having to deal with customer complaints.

Good luck With this though!

afm_2

Hi Everyone!

Many thanks for your posts. Answering some of your questions:
Joanne0620: Most of the garments are green. If the problem was the optical brightener then sainsbury's should be responsible for that, right? The powder was not for whites.

Rosemary7391: I haven't spoke to the manager. I've spoken to the staff and I presume that they are prepared for these situations. If they aren't prepared for this then why should we take our complaints to the customer service? I haven't bought more washing powder because there was no point in doing that. I though that they were competent enough to take care of this. It turned out that they weren't. They are the ones who failed, not me. I've done my part. I've bought a product and paid for it so the least I can have is some respect from them. Also, I have known that they didn't have registered the claim 2 months after leaving the powder with them. After two months they had enough time to take fix the fault.

Sparkleworld: Unfortunately, I don't have a receipt for the washing powder I've handed over. And I didn't take any notes from the box. I just have a small sample that I kept since I didn't trust them and the receipt from when I bough it. The lady in the store told me that she had to keep it so that the claim could be done. The only proof I have is that the claim is registered in their agenda.

Thanks for the help!

grandslamgirl

Keep calling the customer care line and insist that they investigate for you. Mention trading standards and your consumer rights.
I have had dealings with Sainsburys and had to virtually harrass them to get my refund.
Good Luck

uktim29

grandslamgirl wrote: »

Mention trading standards and your consumer rights.

Are you going to explain why and exactly what rights?

As far as I know the sale of goods act doesn't mention anything about compensation. The company will just have to investigate this.

It's no good saying the words `trading standards` & `consumer rights` to someone dealing with a complaint without knowing exactly what you are talking about, you'll just sound thick! The person dealing with the complaint will have heard this 100 times today already, you won't be scaring them, they'll probably have higher knowledge about rights etc than the average consumer anyway, so you may as well know what your talking about.

d123

uktim29 wrote: »

Are you going to explain why and exactly what rights?

As far as I know the sale of goods act doesn't mention anything about compensation. The company will just have to investigate this.

It's no good saying the words `trading standards` & `consumer rights` to someone dealing with a complaint without knowing exactly what you are talking about, you'll just sound thick! The person dealing with the complaint will have heard this 100 times today already, you won't be scaring them, they'll probably have higher knowledge about rights etc than the average consumer anyway, so you may as well know what your talking about.

Actually, the Sale of Goods Act does apply, the compensation would have to be the value of the damage caused by the product that was faulty or unfit for purpose, so by the OP's account, a minimum of £70.

Page 16 of the DTi information

When a buyer suffers loss as a direct
consequence of a faulty product, the buyer
may be able to claim damages. In extreme
cases, buyers might suffer injury or damage
to other property which is directly
attributable to the faulty product, and these
losses might be recoverable as
consequential losses. In less serious
situations, the buyer might find that he
incurs extra expense as a direct result
of buying faulty goods