Sainsburys Complaint

[TheFruitWhisperer]

I wrote a complaint letter to Sainsburys about 2 weeks ago because we got there one night (about 8.30) and after doing our shopping, found there were no tills open.

We asked a man who looked like he was in authority and he said they couldnt open any tills, but there were self service check outs that were open and manned in case we didnt want to put our shopping through ourselves.

We had a deep trolley full of food and these tills are designed for baskets only, they are tiny! Most of the freezer stuff melted because it took about 40 minutes to put through, the poor lad helping us had to scan it as quickly as possible and look after 5 other tills and customers, and some things went through two or three times as there was no packing room and he'd rested the items on the scanning area. No packing room also meant we had to put the packed bags on the floor around us as the trolley still contained the unscanned shopping at the other end. Honestly it took forever, and if DP hadnt been with me to help Id have dumped the trolley and gone to Tesco.

Sainsburys refunded me the double scanned items and told me to take back the perished freezer stuff to store (2 weeks ago, and obviously no one keeps gone off meat, so why would I still have it in my possession to return?!)

In total I got £6 off them and a rubbish letter saying the manager wasnt aware no tills were open and loads of people were off sick.

Im still angry and want to write again to tell them so! Is that unreasonable?

If you accepted the refund when it was offered, then I would say you have accepted the recpmpense offered and should drop it.

Hopefully someone from Sainsbury's will be monitoring and will respond to your post .

I havent accepted anything, Ive got a letter and a gift card which is unspent! I just feel like going in there and having a word with the manager directly or writing again!

DP says I should let it go, but he was really angry at the time too. He just lets it go quicker!

Sainsburys used to be the best for service and now they're the worst.

If I'm scanning my own shpping I want to scan straight into a bag, pay and leave. Not take over from the checkout girl and bag packer.

While I'm on the subject, why can't we have American style service in Supermarkets? I wAnt a packer and a till operative and I don't want to be called love or mate.

I don't shop with you anymore Sainsburys, unless it's an emergency. It is trial by trolley.

I dont mind packing my own stuff if I have about 10 items. Thats the only time I go to those tills. I think that expecting customers with over 100 items to pack in an area as big as my kitchen sink is a bit much.

And when food is on the floor and perishing because its taken 30 mins to get through the scanner, it probably deserves more than ££6 and a lame excuse.

I refuse to shop with sainsbury after my last home shop was delivered with sandwich filler one year out of date.

I have experienced mouldy food from Sainsbury's on a number of occasions and have taken items to customer service from the shelves.

OP I would write to them again (head office) enclosing the gift card and re-state your issues and what resolution you expect.

Good luck.

YABU . I cannot for the life of me see how all of your freezer goods defrosted and perished because of a 30 minute wait from freezer to car. I have often taken my time going round the supermarket and/or diverted to other shops on the way home and still had frozen food by the time I arrived. The only time I would be concerned is if I had ice cream and nothing else frozen to keep it from melting. I really cant see how meat would have gone off in such a short time. Its not as if we are in the throes of a heat wave at the moment.

Yanbu.

Sainsbury's have seriously gone down hill lately! They used to be brilliant with online shopping. Good quality food and they'd bring it down stairs to my front door. (flats)

The last couple of times though the driver has dumped all my food at the entrance of the building, despite being clearly heavily pregnant and carrying a 16 month old in my arms and when checked the eggs have been broken, strawberries with mould on them, crappy joints of meat.

I've had to start buying food as and when we need it from the local co-op because I'm reluctant to spend money on what is, basically, shit food!

I have the same question as SrStanilaus. 30 minutes and your meat went off and all your freezer goods melted? Seriously? Where is this Sainsburys, in the tropics?

I had to really chase a complaint tothe last year.

Picked up a multipack of soft drink, one of the bottles fell out and broke my toe - seriously this could only happen to me.

I've got my Mum (Nurse) and littlemad with me, um goes off to find the first aider can't find a member of staff to help for 5 minutes.

eventually first aiders arrives, can't do anything stands wringing her hands so Mum says 'err maybe a chair? something cold for he injury?' Oh yes say first aider, comes back with a 2 kg bag of peas, props my leg up and drops (yes drops) 2kg of forzen peas on my broken toe. (cant give me any strapping, don't offer to call ambulance or get me home etc etc

I take this up with the manager who tells me - ready for this. She's normally a good first aider, but she always turns a bit useless around her 'time of the month'
He then hands me a bunch of flowers and says goodbye. I go

I wrote (and wrote, and wrote) including me disugust at the managers comments to the customer serivce people and eventually they offered compensation which was more than the 'here's some extra nectar vouchers I was expecting) But I did have to persist. Trick is I think getting hold of a 'name' and then then tend to deal with you, but defiantely got to head office rather than the store manager and quote your nectar card number of everything so they know you're regualr customer.

I must have had an unusual experience then! Sent a hormone/ new born induced rant when I had a really poor time on my first shop with a new baby. I wrote the email as 'feedback'. Was invited into the store to discuss with the manager and to walk him through what happened. I was really impressed when he rang me to let me know what changes he had tried to make. He did say that he had been in the forces and was trained always to address an issue and finish the job but I was so impressed.

Its a bit tricky for them in that you persevered at the time only to complain later...did you not notice things were fully defrosted when you put them in your freezer at the other end? It does seem quick for them to have done so. And surely they wouldn't be off that quickly that you then threw them out - I know you are not supposed to refreeze, but they wouldn't have been "off" either?

If they were no longer in a state to be consumed you should have really put them aside to take them back, otherwise its difficult for them to know whether you are just trying to get quite a bit of money off for what sounds like a rather large shop.

The double scanning is poor but they have refunded you for that.

I'm not saying you received good service that night, far from it, but it must be hard to deal with these complaints if you have nothing to show for your claim of off food.

I'm not sure you are being unreasonable though, but I'm not sure they are either?

How did they double scan stuff? Once an item is scanned, it has to be put in the bagging area before anything else can be scanned. Hence it can't scan again just because it's sitting on the scanner.

Sorry, I also don't think it would be the case that all the frozen food was defrosted and the meat had gone off. Half an hour in the evening when the weather is cooling down anyway is nothing much.

Sounds like they are as sceptical as me!

They can't possibly expect full trolleys to go through a self check out till?

Why couldn't the manager open a till, he could have manned it!

Sainsburys are dire. I only shop there in emergencies.

My local tesco is pretty bad, too. A couple of months ago I complained because the trolleys were so disgustingly filthy I didnt want to put my 21 month old ds2 in them! they had rotting fruit in the bottom, were rusty and filthy. Complained but they couldnt have cared less.

I really hate those self scan machines.....its just a way for these companies to cut down on their staffing levels. Soon they will be expecting us to just take stuff out of boxes piled up on the floor and not bother stacking the shelves either!

Its all part of the "ryanairisation" of the service industries.

That was a bit of rant, wasnt it?

I too think Sainsbury has got worse and I think it's the 'well Tesco get away with this so we can too' attitude.

I think you either have to shop online or go to Waitrose if you want help TBH.

'They can't possibly expect full trolleys to go through a self check out till? '

They can....I had 'words' in Sainsburys yesterday when they tried to send me through the self-scanner with my weekly shop. If they are phasing out tills operated by staff or regularly expect customers to self-scan large numbers of items, then self-scanning tills should have the same space allocation as normal tills so at least there is enough room to do this. I think it's insane - self-scan is surely for if you're just nipping in for a few items.

At our Sainsburys they have a big self scan check out for trollys, not just the small basket ones.

And I really don't know how things managed to be scanned twice, as things have to be placed in the bagging area before you can scan anything else. I'm worried this could happen. How did it?

And how could it take 40 mins to scan a trolly of food? Unless you aren't in good physical health, what were you faffing around doing?

You needed to get another trolly to load into, rather than leaving everything on the floor. Between you, your DH, and the Sainsburys guy did none of you think of that?

I don't think it's unreasonable to complain again that there were no tills open. This is something they need to address.

go to waitrose, tis the only answer. you won't spend more as it's not full of buy 3 for 2 offers on stuff you won't eat. or "bargains" to tempt you on non food stuff.

not having even one till open is ridiculous. did you not ask the guy helping at the self service tills to open one?

I don't see how your meat was rotten and frozen goods defrosted? In my home town, there was no supermarket. The nearest one was a 45 minute drive away. We always did a large amount of shopping there weekly and - by your timescale - everything should have been ruined by the time we drove home. And yet it never was.

Your OP is a bit and perhaps exaggerated because you're rightly annoyed? Your experience does sound like a PITA, but nothing more.

The meat could have been rotten anyway I've stopped shopping at Sainsburys and Tescos because of the number of chickens, fish etc I've bought only to get the wrapper off and find it stinks to high heaven :(

I hate hate hate Sainsburys and Tescos

YANBU but you were either exaggerating or there was something wrong with a lot of the food already, as it wouldn't defrost and go bad that quickly. In the days before I was a driver, when I'd been to the supermarket, I would regularly have to wait up to 30 minutes for a bus then be on said bus for 30 minutes to get home. My shopping, including frozen items, would be out of a freezer all that time and still be fine when I got home. I'm inclined to think maybe you were looking for ways to make the issue bigger, but given the inconvienience, I'm not sure I blame you for wanting to make the most of the complaint.

Despite poor customer service, tbh it's what I would regard as an unfortunate incident. I don't think you've got much argument about the food though I'm afraid. I'd accept what they've offered you and draw a line under this.

Just for those that doubt Im telling the truth, the ice cream, lollies and frozen curries had melted. Please consider that I hadnt taken it straight from the freezer to the till. There was meandering time before that. The meat also didnt go directly from the fridge to the till, its the first aisle in the store, so we walked around with that for a good 30 mins, then had a 30 min palaver at the till, followed by a 20 min drive home. Most of it went off before its use by date.

Also, items were scanned twice and I have a receipt that says so. I dont know how that happened either, not being a till operative. For Galana, there WAS no bagging area, we had too much stuff for it to all go in the bagging area. Food was on the floor because the bagging area was already full. The till boy was using the till in attendant so there was no annoying announcement after every scan.

I photocopied the receipt and highlighted the scanned items. Further proof is that we noticed some of these errors at the time, and the receipt shows where the boy helping us had voided errors we noticed.

I wish Id taken a photo of the meat actually... gaaargh... instead Im just going to go to Tesco!!!

Frozan food should be fine for an hour or two without perishing