People in England just do not understand customer service, or convenience the way that we North Americans are used to. Now I realize that we lead a very different lifestyle in North America then they do in Europe, but there are certain things about customer service here that just don’t make sense to me.
ASDA (aka Brit Wal-Mart) offers a grocery delivery service. An excellent idea in theory. However, in practice it didn’t end up as easy as it sounded. I put in my order and my credit card information, and confirmed that the groceries would be arriving after school on Monday! Check! So excited by this new, convenient, method of grocery buying! They texted me (add this to the list of weird things about England – texts are a main form of communication – companies have your number and send you a text to like, pay your bills, etc. – so weird). Anyways, ASDA texted me to tell me to confirm my order between the hours of 9am-1pm to ensure that my groceries would arrive that day. Easy enough, right? Except I teach school from 9am-330pm and received that text message at approximately 4pm. Meaning that my order was cancelled, and I would not be receiving any groceries. Damn them. So I phoned them up and asked them very politely (questionable) how I could confirm my order without calling them between 9 and 1 because, I am a school teacher and I can’t make phone calls during those hours. The answer is a firm “No, you must call during that time in order to confirm – it is the only time our billing offices are open.”
“Okay, but I’m just confused. I put my credit card info in, and hit confirm on the internet. So I obviously want those groceries, right? And you have my credit card number, so if I’m not there when you arrive, just throw the groceries at my window or whatever and charge me for them anyways, right?” I’m actually super confused.
“That is not how our service works, if you want the groceries tomorrow you must confirm between 9 and 1.”
“I teach school between 9 and 1”
“You don’t get any breaks?”
“Have you been to a secondary school lately? I don’t get breaks because my students have detentions during breaks.” (true, say.)
“Well, in future you may not be able to use our service.”
“I’m just still really confused about the internet thing. I confirmed my order and paid already right?”
And this conversation went in circles for a really long time. I won’t bore you with anymore of it. Am I wrong though? Is this not ridiculous? Honestly.
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