Argos never delivered, can't request refund

idkwhattosay

Hi,

It's been a week since I placed an order for next day delivery (£450 small item - TV). Item never arrived, no delivery attempts made, tracking details still say in transit (tracking was working next day and I could track the driver until I was next delivery on GPS when it suddenly reset back to "in transit" and it's been sitting like that for a week now). Nobody's come over, no card, nothing.

Unable to request a refund due to parcel being in transit, unable to speak to a human because both their live chat and phone line are chatbots keeping me trapped in a loop saying I first have to refuse delivery (which I can't do since there's no delivery being made) before kicking me off and I tried various things to try and trick it to speak to someone and it won't let me through.

So can't get through to anyone, can't ask for a refund and don't have the item I purchased.   

I know I can report them to Trading Standards and file a small claim, but I don't know in which order I should go about it. I appreciate any advice on this. Are there any prerequisites and/or dependencies for both the report and small claim?

Kind regards,
Dan

TadleyBaggie

How did you pay?

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Chargeback with card provider OP, 15 days after ETA for VISA and 30 for Mastercard IIRC.

Myci85

Have you tried googling to find a local Argos number that gets you through to a person?

powerful_Rogue

idkwhattosay said:

Hi,

It's been a week since I placed an order for next day delivery (£450 small item - TV). Item never arrived, no delivery attempts made, tracking details still say in transit (tracking was working next day and I could track the driver until I was next delivery on GPS when it suddenly reset back to "in transit" and it's been sitting like that for a week now). Nobody's come over, no card, nothing.

Unable to request a refund due to parcel being in transit, unable to speak to a human because both their live chat and phone line are chatbots keeping me trapped in a loop saying I first have to refuse delivery (which I can't do since there's no delivery being made) before kicking me off and I tried various things to try and trick it to speak to someone and it won't let me through.

So can't get through to anyone, can't ask for a refund and don't have the item I purchased.   

I know I can report them to Trading Standards and file a small claim, but I don't know in which order I should go about it. I appreciate any advice on this. Are there any prerequisites and/or dependencies for both the report and small claim?

Kind regards,
Dan

You can report to CAB who will pass it onto Trading Standards, however it won't help your situation.

idkwhattosay

TadleyBaggie said:

How did you pay?

Online via Apple Pay.

idkwhattosay

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

Chargeback with card provider OP, 15 days after ETA for VISA and 30 for Mastercard IIRC.

Will that affect my credit score in any way?

powerful_Rogue

idkwhattosay said:

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

Chargeback with card provider OP, 15 days after ETA for VISA and 30 for Mastercard IIRC.

Will that affect my credit score in any way?

No such thing as a credit score, only a credit history. The credit score you see is a made up number for credit referene agencies to try and sell you a product to improve it. No-one sees the score apart from you and the credit reference agency.

idkwhattosay

powerful_Rogue said:

You can report to CAB who will pass it onto Trading Standards, however it won't help your situation.

I know. I don't expect any action to be taken honestly, I just think it's not right if I leave them the £450 since they're not a small business to be forgiven like that. The report would be filed just to make the Law aware of Argos' bad practice, nothing else. It's like when you report a crime to police just to make it count in the statistics even though you know they won't do anything about it.

I understand things happen and have no issue with that, that's why I judge businesses based on how they respond to and manage an incident and I think this case serves as a warning to all online shoppers that we live in a new world littered with AI, chatbots, automation... where it's very difficult and sometimes even impossible to reach out to a human being. If your query doesn't fit one of the predefined loops, good luck!

idkwhattosay

powerful_Rogue said:

No such thing as a credit score, only a credit history. The credit score you see is a made up number for credit referene agencies to try and sell you a product to improve it. No-one sees the score apart from you and the credit reference agency.

I meant history not score, apologies for the confusion. By "affect" I meant will it be returned as a result should a potential lender or a service provider do a lookup at my financial history one of these websites like Experian?

idkwhattosay

Myci85 said:

Have you tried googling to find a local Argos number that gets you through to a person?

They only have one which is the brilliant automated system. Each branch has its own phone number too, but they can't help me as I ordered online and need to follow the return process on their website (which I can't do as explained in the opening post).