Online shopping substitutions

[Mauvg]

I have a click and collect order to pick up later. I have just had an email to say that the potato cakes and fruity teacakes I ordered have been substituted.
This normally wouldn't bother me. Except the potato cakes have been substituted with tomato and herb bagel thins (not jealousy).
The fruity teacakes have been subbed with scones. Scones. How are you meant to toast scones?! Not only that, but I only ordered a single 4-pack of fruit teacakes. I'm being given 24 scones. There's only me in the house!

You could always go to the shop and pick your own??

It’s literally slim pickings at the moment. Either they send you nothing in place and you twine then or they pick whatever is left and you still twine.

Warm the scones in the oven. Freeze the ones you don’t want now.

@ItchyScratch Considering I'm vulnerable (underlying health condition) and need to be socially distancing as much as possible, going to the shop is a non-starter. If I had the space for a large enough shop for delivery, I'd be doing that. I know it sounds easy to just say "do the shop yourself" but it really isn't always as simple as that. I either have to rely on online orders or not have any food in because I have no one nearby who can shop for me. In the case of the potato cakes substitution, I would much rather have been told it wasn't available. Scones at least are close to fruit tea cakes, but it's more than is needed and will just create food waste at a time when we need to be avoiding it.

@GirlCalledJames I simply don't have enough freezer space to hold 20+ scones for the length of time it would take. I'm not a fan of them and would normally have a single scone once a year if that!

You can refuse the subs when you get there. I work in a supermarket doing click and collect. Refusals are very common.

Just refuse the subs when you pick it up? You are allowed to do that. The bagel thins sound a bit random though!

@swampytiggaa The Asda website says they aren't currently accepting refusals. You have to take all the items and then request a refund online.

If you are getting stuff substituted that you don't want, then just stick the section saying no substitutes. If you haven't done that, you can't really complain.

Can you not reject the substitutions - as it is click and collect? Just leave them there if you don't want them?

I have the opposite problem in Delivery. I very grateful to get online home delivery. It's a life saver. We lose 20-25% of our shopping - it's just missing- on each order to out of stock but they don't substitute! Please substitute!! We'd eat "bread scones" ! 🤣😋

We're still sometimes getting no bread, flour coffee cola pizza etc. I'm in shielding group and been in hospital /ambulance a few times since lockdown for my health condition , so there's zero 'popping out' to shops from DC or me - we go without if they don't substitute

@1000mangoesinabirthdaycake Yeah, I did think that about the bagels. Had they been plain bagel thins, I'd have considered them edible. I just can't stand tomatoes. The scones are at least kind of related to fruit teacakes (loosely). However, giving 3 packs of 8 when you only order a single 4 pack of teacakes feels a little bit like overkill.

Sounds like their pick system is more random than ours! Get the refund and freeze the scones 💕

Your order only contained two subs. That is pretty good going for the current times. People's shopping habits have changed significantly over the past three months and supermarkets are doing their best to meet demand. I think your order is in good shape with only two subs - a bit of give a d take is required here. Yes, you might end up with a couple of things you don't really want, but that is the current price you pay for the convenience of online grocery shopping. Life isn't perfect at the moment for anyone - lower your expectations a bit.

@LadyPenelope68 if it had been something even closely related to potato cakes (which bagels are not), I wouldn't have an issue. For example, I ordered crumpets. The ones I ordered weren't in stock, so they've subbed in unicorn shaped ones. I'm not going to moan because they're crumpets.
However, when the item substituted is just randomly pulled from the same department, it's a little different. When I allow substitutions, it's on the understanding that I'm going to get something that's at least similar to the out of stock item. Bagels and potato cakes aren't even remotely vaguely similar items. And tomato and herb bagels should just be banned as an abomination (as should tomatoes)

The bagels sound nice!

Today I'm mourning the fact that my muffin tins aren't in my order for the third time. The kids are desperate to bake!

Potato cakes are really easy to make- mashed potato, egg, flour. Form into rounds and fry. You can make a batch and freeze some then zap them in microwave.

Can you contact your local mutual aid group and arrange for someone to drop them at a food bank? Then request the refund online. It is annoying when you are sent random substitutions but hopefully you got all of the rest of your order..

@HandfulOfFlowers there were more than 2 subs. The others were pretty much like for like. Those were the 2 that jumped out for the randomness and over compensation.

I’d keep a pack of scones and give the rest to neighbours in your situation. That’s what I’ve done with some of my milk substitution - 4x 2pints of milk instead of a 4 pinter (my picker obviously isnt great at maths )

It's perfectly reasonable to be bewildered, amused and disappointed at the current shopping situation.

Enjoy what you can, op, and get creative about the rest. Do you eat fruit crumble? Crumble the scone and use for that.

And yes, give away what you can, too.

You can get unicorn shaped crumpets?

@UnalliterativeGeorge From Asda, yes. I'm not sure how accurate they are, so will report back once I've collected them.

I’ve said before please don’t blame the pickers for odd substitutions. Blame the device which tells them what to put in.

It’s a hard job and currently lots of people are doing it who wouldn’t normally. The expectation is to pick about 140 items an hour. The pickers don’t have the autonomy or the time to make their own decisions.

Please blame whoever set up the system 🙂

@swampytiggaa whoever programmed it is evil and twisted to think tomatoes in any bread product are acceptable substitutions for any non tomato bakery products.

I’m very disappointed- started using click and collect when lockdown began and haven’t had many subs. And the ones I have had have been sensible - so I can’t start a thread about it! I’ve only rejected one - coffee pods with milk and we only drink coffee black, so,even that was sensible.

The unicorn shaped crumpets are quite cute. I was tempted to get them for DD but didn't want to set myself up for a unicorn shaped bakery good expectation that doesn't currently exist!

One memorable sub I was supposed to give was value weetabix rather than a variety pack of biscuits. I ticked that there were non available as I figured I would rather have nothing than that!

Tbh as pickers we sometimes stand muttering at the machine that there are better alternatives than what we are directed to give but we really can’t over ride the system