Monday 6 June 2011

What a difference a change makes....

I always do my shopping at Tesco's, ever since I moved in with Gary seven years ago. We lived close by and we could get Clubcard points so it was great for us. We have since moved away from that side of town and have taken the car off the road so it isn't convenient for us to get there, so I continued as a customer by doing online grocery shopping.

For a while I was happy with the service that they provided. The drivers were always on time and we got the shopping that we wanted. I have noticed over the last few months that the service has gone downhill quite considerably. We would have frequant substitutions, and the picker had obviously not used their common sense, sending us products which were not similar to our required item, a basic example was unsmoked bacon rather than smoked, could they not just substitute it for another brand of smoked? I have heard of more extreme examples from friends such as strawberry yoghurt's sent instead of strawberries. Then I requested a butternut squash, they sent me the worlds smallest squash which was the size of a banana, the next week I got the worlds largest squash, probably big enough to feed my whole street, and I live on a very long road! Another thing which would annoy me was for a 50 item shop, I would get 30 bags, most items packed individually, and it would take me forever to unpack everything. The thing that put the nail in the coffin for me was when I would look at the use by dates on my fresh produce and it would all expire by Monday, when I had it delivered on the Friday. What was the use of that, I have a tiny freezer so I could only freeze so much. We had obviously ordered a weeks shopping because of the amount of meals ordered so why have we been given the stock which Tesco's need to clear as soon as they can. I may not be a very profitable shopper by not visiting their store and having impulse buys, but I have spent thousands of pounds with them over the past 7 years, they should treat online customers customer the same as anyone which visits their stores and gets the best produce on the shelf.

So, I complained for the first time ever. I wrote to them and got a reply the next day, they were very sorry, said that my complaint was going to be passed onto the store which provided the groceries so that retraining could take place, and sent me a code for £6.00 off my next shopping. I tried them again to use the voucher and had high hopes that I would be more satisfied. I wasn't, nothing had changed so I decided instead of wasting more time complaining I would spend my money elsewhere.

On Friday I had my shopping from Sainsbury's instead of Tesco and I have to say I was very impressed. The website was easy to navigate, and I found a voucher code for a £10.00 discount which actually worked! When the shopping arrived the delivery driver was very talkative, he noticed that I had brought baby products and asked if we had children which is always a good thing to ask a parent, then he said he knew it was our first delivery from them so he wanted to go through the basics of their delivery system. They have to call us if they are going to be late, along with giving us a £10.00 voucher as compensation, and he explained their receipt and how they show what substitutions have been made. He was very pleasant, and cheerful, and it was like he was serving us like in the supermarket, rather than just dropping our shopping off.

After he left I took a look at the shopping, instead of 30 bags, there was 6, all in order of where they would be kept, e.g. fridge items, and cupboard items which made putting it all away much easier, and less frustrating. All of the fresh produce had a decent life, every packet of meat had a different use by date spread over the week which makes cooking a more pleasant experience as we can eat what we wanted whenever rather than having to eat what was going out of date. I was also very impressed with the packaging, it seemed like wherever they could they had cut down on unnecessary packaging which is something that I think is very important. Since the delivery I haven't found a single negative point with the products we have received.

I am so impressed with Sainsbury's that I am going to continue buying from them, Tesco's loss is their gain. This week I am going to try the feed a family for £50.00 scheme, the menu's look yummy and hopefully it will save us some money.

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