Stung by Mountain Warehouse Click & Collect "delivery" charges

Jimixter

When one opts to go to the effort of visiting a store to collect an item in person by choosing Click & Collect, one usually expects to save on postage costs. Not so with Mountain Warehouse!

I recently purchased a fleece hat for £4.99 via the Mountain Warehouse website and duly opted to visit the local store and save on postage costs by selecting Click & Collect. I was then presented with a £2.50 delivery fee. Thinking this was a website glitch, I switched to deliver to my home and then back to Click & Collect again, but the delivery fee remained in place. There was no explanation for why this fee was there, so I put it down to a website error and went ahead with the inflated purchase price before contacting customer services via their website in the hope of being able to get a refund on this additional fee.

I received no response to my customer services email, and had to chase them up 7 days later. When I did eventually receive a reply to my second email, I was told that "Click and collect orders below £20 do have a £2.50 delivery charge on them as they are still packed and shipped from our warehouse to store". Apparently this is detailed on their website, but it was not at all obvious to me when I placed the order.

I eventually received an email to tell me that my order was at the local store, so I went to the effort and cost to go and collect my £4.99 hat. The staff there then informed me that they could have ordered the item into the shop for me for free! But they refused to refund me the £2.50 "delivery charge", and so did the online customer services.

What a dreadful shopping experience. The store informed me that I was not the first to complain about the lack of transparency about this on their website. I cannot recommend shopping with Mountain Warehouse.

elsien

I can’t see how there was a lack of transparency when the fee was clearly shown before you paid.
Perhaps checking  before placing the order if you were unclear rather than presuming a website glitch.

Mountain warehouse aren’t the only ones who do this, by the way. 

And before you get to check out, it does show the following if you click on delivery options.

Jimixter

There was no obvious explanation of the £20 spending threshold when I placed the order.

Why should I have to pay for Mountain Warehouse to put stock in their own stores? 

Why was I not informed that the store could have ordered the item in for me for free?

Why should I have to chase customer services twice to get a response? If I had contacted customer services before ordering the product, I would have lost the promotional price on the hat.

So many questions... I'm amazed that you are content with such poor customer service.

Pollycat

On the home page of the website, it says:
"Free delivery over £50".

If you click on that it gives you numerous options which incudes 'click & collect'.

Click & Collect3 - 5 days Order by 8pm£2.50 or FREE over £20

That seems pretty transparent to me.

You just made an assumption that cost you £2.50.

Always check the delivery and return/refund terms when buying online.

I see no reason to accept your recommendation not to shop at Mountain Warehouse.

TKMaxx also charge for 'click and collect' under a certain amount.

baser999

Agree that their customer relations isn’t perhaps as good as it may be, however as @elsien has pointed out it does clearly state they’ll be a charge for whatever reason. If your items are having to be couriered from a warehouse to store, there’s going to be a charge. 

molerat

Pollycat said:

TKMaxx also charge for 'click and collect' under a certain amount.

As do Boots

And numerous other stores.

Agreed the charges are made very clear.

[Deleted User]

Hi,

Jimixter said:
What a dreadful shopping experience. The store informed me that I was not the first to complain about the lack of transparency about this on their website. I cannot recommend shopping with Mountain Warehouse.

so if your fleece hat has the Mountain Warehuse logo on it you won't wear it as it will be advertising them.

bluelad1927

The website detailed the correct price, you weren't happy with it but continued to complete the order.

That's not a company problem that's just a very strange way to do your shopping

SteveJW

molerat said:

Pollycat said:

TKMaxx also charge for 'click and collect' under a certain amount.

As do Boots

And numerous other stores.

Agreed the charges are made very clear.

Had a similar thing at Boots instore, staff could order for me via  click and collect for free

baser999

bluelad1927 said:

The website detailed the correct price, you weren't happy with it but continued to complete the order.

That's not a company problem that's just a very strange way to do your shopping

Had OP been that aggrieved at the checkout stage, he could have called the store and asked if there were any other options available? 

Pollycat

baser999 said:

bluelad1927 said:

The website detailed the correct price, you weren't happy with it but continued to complete the order.

That's not a company problem that's just a very strange way to do your shopping

Had OP been that aggrieved at the checkout stage, he could have called the store and asked if there were any other options available? 

MW even offer 'live chat' contact.

It seems very strange to assume that a delivery charge added to an order is a glitch in the website instead of either reading the information on the website or contacting the company.