Blimey! John Lewis , what happened?

[eggplant16]

I had to return an item today. I was one day over the 30 days, a telling off from the assistant who said " On this occasion I'll allow it".
The cafe! 6 people doing nothing, chatting, one poor woman collecting trays and washing up. I ordered 2 things, they were wrong. The tray was wet, the knife was dirty.
I have every sympathy for people on their feet all day btw.

The returns thing you’re being a bit precious about - they’re well within their rights to stick to their policy and most stores would have just refused you.

The cafe though, ours is useless, has been for years. I went for breakfast a while ago, seemed to take five people to work the toast machine, and even then they did a terrible job of it. There was a poor teenager looking very embarrassed, he clearly had more common sense than the rest put together but they wouldn’t let him near it.

As I said the PS said a few days over was no problem.
Never mind.

The toilets in Peter Jones stank last week. Also not a fan of dogs in store either.

it was all a bit depressing really.

@Serencwtch Bear in mind they are mainly very young on minimum wage on rubbish terms

But why does this give them the 'right' to do a bad job.

They are paid to do a job and they knew the terms and conditions when they accepted the job.'Minimum wage' is too often just an excuse for doing a poor job. Why shouldn't people put some effort into their work - and I speak as a person who has done a 'minimum wage' job
And if they're 'very young', what wage do they actually expect? We all start somewhere near tha bottom and work our way up .....

The loos in our John Lewis are grim as well. And mostly out of order last time I went.

Another woman in there was commenting on how disappointing this situation was for a John Lewis.

I guess footfall is down and they're not investing money in maintenance (or cleaning... 🤢). So footfall will probably continue to fall. It's a vicious circle.

Isn’t their chief exec leaving earlier than planned? Think it’s generally accepted that JL are going through a bad patch at the moment. Hopefully someone new will come in and turn things around.

Completely agree. JL used to be a great if an experience where you got knowledgeable staff and lovely products. Now it feels like debenhams used to.

I think there’s a gap in the market for a JL style department store with old fashioned service. I’d happily pay a bit more for quality.

I always find Oxford Street branch good - excellent customer service and the cafe is nice too. It’s the only department store left on Oxford street now (I don’t really count Selfridges or Liberty) so I do my best to support them. I would be very sad if they closed down.
I’m sure the crap weather means that shoppers aren’t buying many summer clothes, or leaving the house if they don’t have to.

Bloody Sharon White has ruined John Lewis. I hope whoever replaces her at least has some retail experience.

I've been in the Oxford St, Cambridge and Welwyn Garden City branches recently - all lovely with no issues. Where are these horrible branches?

I miss my JL - didn't reopen after Covid.

They've been abysmal for a long time. I remember going in a few years ago and receiving rubbish and quite frankly dangerous advice re: car seats for my DC. Then, when I managed to narrow it down to the one I wanted, they didn't have it in stock! They said they could order it in. When I said if I wanted one online, I'd have ordered it myself and have got it for cheaper, the chap shrugged his shoulders and walked away. I've not been back since.

The staff in Chelmsford home department were excellent last time I went in, 2 different enquiries dealt with and they went above and beyond. The cafe was a bit odd tho!

What a convenient drip feed…

I've been to these three lately too and completely agree.

However I had a nightmare with an appliance I brought from them, left me without a fridge freezer for a month. The sofa we brought a few years ago is already knackered.

Both the quality and customer service has gone down.

That said, I do love my local John Lewis and would be very sad to see it go. It would be a big loss to the area.

Trafford Centre store is my local and I'll say 'some' of the staff are appallingly rude. I worked in Argos as a student; nothing fancy but I loved giving good service on Returns and Elizabeth Duke! I was on a pittance but they don't seem to care about prioritising customer service.

Sorry, if you are charging full RRP for items and not giving extra, I'll just buy online. Returns especially for electrical items are poor, they just seem to frustrate the process. If I shop with Amazon/Costco, I know there will be zero hassle with exchanging a faulty item.

And don't get me started with their telephone customer service! Outsourced and shockingly bad.

Their business model doesn't stack up, it's only a matter of time before they go under.

what happened?
They brought in a civil servant to turn around a struggling retail business

By coincidence I’ve just been listening to her on a podcast talking about herself and it’s a bit jarring to hear about JL not paying the staff (sorry, partners) their bonuses when they’re only on £11.55 an hour according to a PP. I’m sure the partners were delighted to prop up its ailing corporate strategy

I agree. I was rooting for her at first, but she's made it a much worse experience. I know retail is hard but M&S are looking great right now.

And she appointed an asset-stripper with no retail experience as CEO when she relented and just hung onto the Chairmanship…..

At one stage the new board had one person with retail experience, the others were from such shining exemplars of customer service as British Gas and (truthfully) Post Office Counters.

JLP have appointed a new Chair who has a very successful career at Tesco, so there may be some hope ( although the denizens of MN will probably faint in horror).

Sadly Waitrose are just as bad. I asked where something was and in the past the assistant would always have gone with me but she just waved vaguely across the shop and said ‘aisle 6’. And the teabags for the free drinks had run out and I asked if there were any more. The man on customer service said no . Just no. I asked if anyone would be restocking them and he just shrugged and said ‘Well, you haven’t paid for it, have you’. The staff in Waitrose always used to be lovely. Sadly that seems to have changed.

Completely agree, “The Partnership” totally lost its way.

Doesn't matter - you were over the return period, you had 30 days to do it. The assistant was graceful enough to accept it anyway and the appropriate response here would be some appreciation.

Yes exactly M&S have been able to turn things around.so despite the difficulties retail have experienced in recent years it is possible to do well if you make the right changes. I used to work for John Lewis and have shopped with them since doing so with my mum as a child, so feel very sad about how downhill they’ve gone. I do someone else is able to turn things around and it’s not too late.

Cost cutting is what's happened. They were built on a foundation of excellent customer service but it's all going to shit it seems. Stores losing their way becoming shabby and staff that don't care. The telephone customer service has been outsourced and is terrible, it puts me off making large purchases now. You used to shop with them because you felt they would really look after you as customer.