Until the past few days I always had positive vibes about John Lewis compared to Comet/Currys et al, not anymore.
I ordered a new 42" Panasonic plasma TV & stand online on the 23 April, they sent a confirmation e-mail on the 24th which stated,
' the card number given will not be charged until the goods leave the warehouse'. They also promised to contact me to arrange delivery.
The following day I was contacted by mobile phone at 9.30am by a gentleman and a delivery date of Saturday 5th April between 7.00am
and 3.30 pm was agreed. When I checked my e-mails at lunchtime I had another one from a woman saying that she had tried to ring me to book a delivery time but was unable to do so, but if it was OK by me they would deliver on the 5th April between 7.00am & 3.30pm, this e-mail was timed at 10.45am.
I suppose that should have set the alarm bells ringing but I replied to that message explaining that I had already agreed to that date & time, I received another e-mail to confirm that date was OK.
As I am self employed and do a fair bit of work on Saturdays as well as all week, I rebooked my Saturday calls for the Bank Holiday Monday. I rose early on Saturday morning and spent a couple of hours lugging out the old ( very heavy ) TV & stand and wiring up a complete new surround sound system. When the hour of 3.30pm arrived and the delivery from John Lewis hadn't I phoned their CS department. The lady I spoke to confirmed that all me delivery details were correct and she put me on hold to check on the progress of same. I listened to three full Beatles songs playing in the background and then she returned to tell me that the dispatch warehouse had no record of my order.
I am a very placid man by nature and it was not her fault so it was agreed that someone would phone me ASAP this morning. I waited until 10.00 am and rang them myself.
I got lots of apologies and was told that they would ring me later with a new delivery date as they had a backlog due to the bank holiday. When the did ring back the earliest date they could offer me was next Monday between 7.00am & 4.30pm.
I somewhat reluctantly accepted this, wondering how I was going to manage to take another full day off work when the post arrived. I opened my Barclaycard statement to find that they had charged my account on the 25th April, a full ten days before they 'forgot' to send me the damned goods.
That was the last straw, I phoned and cancelled the order, did a quick ring round and found that although my local Curry's had no stock the one in Rochdale had 2. Popped down later this afternoon, bought TV & stand for just over £100 more than the John Lewis price, I took the stand home so that I could assemble it and get my new hifi system off the floor and they are delivering the TV tomorrow between 12.00 & 2.00pm.
I will just have to monitor my card closely to make sure they don't cock that up, I have already had an e-mail confirming the cancellation which also states,
'I'd also like to assure you that no charge has been passed to your account in relation to this order'.
A bit bloody late for that methinks.
Jim.