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 PS was talking BS.

Pity the poor sod at the till, who Will get it in the neck for doing the return. Breaking store policy means someone further up the food chain dumps on you for every little thing.

Of course, she could have tried to find a manager, but there are never any to be found, and no additional colleagues as staffing numbers have dropped quicker than a whores knickers since covid. Sometimes it's easier to placate the customer who will leave. We just deal with our own telling off, negative staff reviews and file notes that will result. All on the grand salary of, oh, minimum wage, irregular working hours and no sick pay.

Whatever store you talk about, they're all doing the same, trying to compete with 24hr Internet shopping, while paying their ever decreasing staff as little as possible.

You may have misinterpreted curt, as stress. Think about that.

I no agree that it has got really bad lately. I bought an expensive high chair in store a couple of years ago and when I got it home it was covered in food - it was disgusting! Their cafe is awful too - horrible food and drink at ridiculous prices!

I had a very good experience at John Lewis in Cheltenham recently. I’d just tried on a Whistles dress which I was surprised to find made me look dreadful. As I handed it back I was approached by the personal shopper who asked lots of questions then zoomed round the store, returning with 3 dresses, one of which looked amazing. They got a sale and I felt very well served plus ecstatic with my purchase.

I did think. I spend far too much time thinking. I was told by the PS , that they would cut me some slack. The assistant was curt. I was nothing but polite. I have never ever lied or cheated or been rude to an assistant or a waitress in my my life

Never heard of the ‘glass cliff’ before. Interesting, for all the wrong reasons.

That said, as far as Sharron White is concerned, she had no retail experience and had spent her career in the civil service. It was a ridiculous appointment from the start.

Actually the staff on John Lewis have always been poor, and I hate to say that because they always had longstanding staff who tended to be older than retail staff in other stores (who come and go). It was disappointing to see that this led to complacency and a total lack of interest in serving customers, with the exception of the cosmetics staff who may not be JL employees at all.

But in fairness I have always found their returns good, and the conditions are clearly set out in the receipt.

@Rollinghilly 100% correct. People not shopping at JL anymore are literally the reason JL is struggling. If you're not making money how can you spend it investing in store experience / service?

People are clearly completely unable to grasp very basic economics.

Also - those of you with older teenage kids..... would you want to be served in a shop by them? Because that's the future of department store staff.

John Lewis customer service has been getting more and more rubbish for years, I’m on my own personal boycott of them now after having an absolute disaster of an order and the cs just being so incredibly rude, I’ve had way better service from Argos and the like.

Neither have I heard of this term but it seems a bit 'conspiracy theory' to me. Are women immune from being crap business leaders?

So you were told you’d be able to return something after the deadline and then… you were able to return something after the deadline.

Seems fine to me. I quite like JL though.

I got caught out on a return a few weeks ago, JL had a 35 day returns period but have reduced it down without announcing this to customers.

I had a holier than thou sales assistant, who eventually called over a colleague for a second opinion, second colleague (not a manager) said it was absolutely fine and issued an e-gift card. I’d have accepted a decline on the refund, it’s the patronising tone suggesting a late return is some sort of mortal sin that irritates me. Life happens and people can’t always get back into the city on time.

On the other hand, I buy a lot from the children’s section at my local store and the staff remember us and my little girls name which is a nice touch.

I started my working life at M&S and customer service was drilled into us. I’d always offer a gift card at the current selling price for a late return instead of upsetting a customer, resulting in them shopping elsewhere in future.

Got two, well one is 20. Them and all their friends would be fantastic.

it's not a people on the shop floor thing IMO - it’s outsourcing customer service and shitty policy & strategy that’s the issue.

I like to treat myself to make up, went into John Lewis yesterday and it was really hard to get anyone to advise me. Its happened to me before in there, even when it's quiet. They look me up and down sometimes- it can be annoying. That being said, last year I almost fainted in store (early pregnancy)and staff were lovely, made sure I was okay and brought me juice from the cafe and a cake. They sat and chatted with me for a while to make sure I was okay. I do feel it's gone a little downhill recently but it's still somewhere I enjoy shopping occasionally

I was in my local M&S yesterday and it was a ghost town. I specifically made it my business to go in and buy something I had in my basket on the app.

If we want a retail experience we need to support bricks and mortar retail and stop online shopping wherever possible.

My local M&S moved to an out of town shopping centre rather than being in town. I used to stop in 2 or 3 times a week to at least buy food. I now don’t bother.

I’m not sure it’s the customer who wants shoppers to move on line - the stores seem to be making it deliberately hard to attend a physical shop.

I've noticed the same in our Waitrose. At one time as soon as a queue started forming they would open more tills. Now the aisle is getting blocked by people queuing and no one cares. Most of the tills were staffed by older women who had been there for years and years, now it is all teenagers and a strange man who is weirdly over friendly.

Well at least the strange over friendly man has given me a laugh!

I think I might know him!

😱

Yes, i agree. The actual toilet seat was cracked and broken in my local store, and in the next cubicle. I literally can't understand when everything got so grubby and disgusting everywhere. Coffee shops are the same - everything is slightly sticky.

I work in retail. Retailers are losing millions and millions of £ every year. I have no doubt that John Lewis will shut some shops and / or go to entirely online as the business model for physical estate non food retailing just doesn't work anymore.

Retailers usually have a 30 day policy to give them a chance to sell the item if there is nothing wrong with it. Yes, you were only 1 day out but that item may have been taken off sale already - the sooner they get the item back the better. They gave you a refund even though you weren't entitled to one.
That Personal Shopper had no autonomy to say that to you - they cannot change company policy - feel free to report them, as they said something that they had no guarantee would be honored.

In any retailer, if the loos aren't up to scratch, please tell someone. Cleaning is usually contracted out to a 3rd party and needs to be flagged if they aren't doing their job to requirement. Unfortunately, there are customers who are just grim and don't clean up after themselves.

Some customers are just vile (and violent). Yes I am sure you were perfectly pleasant but many people aren't and sometimes it is really hard to just switch automatically between nice and horrible customers. There are of course some people who should just not be in customer facing roles (including me) - again, report these people.

I'll get off my soap box now - in the next few months, I will probably be put into consultation, maybe made redundant who knows - retail is such a precarious & brutal sector.

I know what you mean OP, I was told off by an assistant in Booths earlier in the week for some perceived voucher infringement as was the woman in front of me. The woman in front of me apologised, I didn't as I hadn't done anything wrong and the assistant then sulked, didn't ask me if I wanted a receipt or say thanks/bye. And that's Booths, she is not one of the poor sods in Asda/Tesco in a deprived town where customers are absolute arseholes.

I think attitudes like this is why shops which previously offered great service are failing. How can they afford to indemnify every misfortune. Was it even a JL branded skirt???

Agree about the toilets, absolutely disgusting and all the hooks for hanging a bag on have been pulled off. So hovering over the dirty loo hanging on to my bags (would never put them on the floor) is quite tricky.

My Waitrose has ripped out a lot of tills and gone self-service. In fairness, when the baskets only queue get a bit long (more than four, it seems) they are very quick to get another cashier on to help out.

And they'll come with me to point stuff out if I can't find it.