to expect Mamas and Papas customer care to pick the phone up in less than half an hour?

[Emo76]

I have had a number of problems with orders from mamas and papas - the latest being car seat adaptors ordered, paid for, in stock and not sent with rest of order. That's beside the point,but I have spent literally hours on hold on their customer services line over the past week trying to sort this out. Is anyone else having this problem? Are they going bust or something and trying to avoid calls?!!

Appreciate this may not be the right place to post this etc

I saw a fight in M&P yesterday the manager called security because a woman had brought back a pram, the wheel had fallen off twice with the baby in it and they refused to refund.
Anyway her husband starts yelling and rather than give them their money back, the manager had them removed.
At least three people put their shopping down and walked out in disgust :(

Mamas and Papas make me sick. We dont have much money but DH wanted DS1 to have really good quality cot and matching chest of draws so they would last and do for what turned out to be DS2. So anyway we went into Mamas and Papas it was snowing and I was wearing one of DHs old hoodies and probably looked a right mess. Anyway the lady on the desk not very discreetly (sp?) went and told the security man on the door to watch us and he followed us about the store literally about a meter behind us for the whole time we were in there and more or less hered us back to the door!

Oh and somebody else came in afterwards, i was picking up an internet order otherwise i would have walked out too, she was having a problem getting something refunded back on to her card, she was pretty pissed off too.
I wonder if they are in trouble financially, wouldn't be surprised.

They're crap for refunds/customer care/general manners.
It is unreasonable but not unexpected I'm afraid.
[grumbles about m&p's]

Unreasonable on thir behalf, not yours by the way. YAdefinitelyNBU.

UPDATE: I finally got through after a good 40 minute wait and the lady I spoke to couldn't explain why what I had ordered and paid for (and has been in stock according to the website for a month) could not be dispatched - something about invoices in computer systems blah blah blah. Just so lame.

I did ask if there was a problem with their systems and she said they were understaffed (not her fault I appreciate).

Not impressed and will not be ordering again.

I've had no problems at all with refunds from M&P - I took a Beabe steamer/processor thing back because the lid wouldn't stay clicked on properly. Didn't even have a receipt, but they found my account on the system and printed me a new receipt and were really nice about it, gave me cash back. Maybe it's down to which store it is?

mamatomany - if the policy is that they can't refund for a certain thing (leaving aside whether the policy is right or wrong) then that is the policy and there is nothing the shop staff can do about it. If customers then get aggressive they have every right to remove them. Don't see why other people were leaving in disgust, if I see customers kicking off at retail staff I always feel sorry for the staff!

M&P customer services absolutely terrible - they are getting quite well known for it acutally.

Lucky, the law overides their company policy the people were completely within their rights to have a refund.
I think anyone would have raised their voice when confronted with such an appalling attitude.

What I can't stand is the way they need your address for any purchase. We bought a pushchair there, fair enugh I thought, maybe something to do with a guarantee.
Then I bought a £5 stuffed toy, paid cash: "Can I have your postcode please?"
"erm...why??"

mamatomany, the law only overrides their policy if there was a fault with the product. The problem could have been caused by misuse by the customer. Regardless, no one deserves to be abused in their workplace and all employers should aim to protect their staff from abusive customers. The manager was absolutely right to ask them to leave if they were being abusive.

They weren't being abusive though, they were getting stressed out by an argumentive manager.
As for the fault, well the wheel coming off doesn't look good for a pram shop does it ?

Mamatomany- I have seen wheels come off pushchairs due usually to people ramming their pushchairs at doors or kerbs to open them. Therefore customer damage and not a manufacturing issue.

You said the husband was yelling. That's abusive, and staff shouldn't have to, and legally don't have to, be subjected to it.

And again, it depends if the wheel falling off was due to an inherent fault with the pushchair, or due to misuse or wear and tear. Yes, if the pushchair had a fault which caused the wheel to fall off then the customer was fully entitled to seek to have it rectified (but still not to yell at the staff), and if the store refuse to do so then it looks bad for them and is against the law. However, if the wheel fell off due to misuse or fair wear and tear then the customer is not entitled to have the problem rectified. The shop may CHOOSE to rectify it, but they don't have to.

Either way, the customer was UR to yell at the staff.

You had to be there, the manager was doing a fair bit of shouting herself.

uanbu to bemoan the customer care line

it is a regular mumsnet theme. What surprises me is that they really must no that people berate their customer service yet don't appear to want to do anything to resolve it.

Emo - this exact situation has just happened to me too - received the rest of my order but no car seat adaptors. This is after a week of grief trying to get the pram itself delivered. Are they delivering them to you or sending a refund? Am tempted to wait a few days to see if they just turn up, but not sure if I'm just kidding myself! 5.5 weeks until the LO arrives, surely thats enough time for them to arrive???

Well my baby is due in 2 weeks or so. What is so utterly exasperating is that the adaptors have been in stock for a month since I placed my order, it was the footmuff which I ordered which was not, and it is clearly beyond the wit of man to send the adaptors with the footmuff now it is in stock.

Basically I have the pushchair (still boxed) and they said they would be sent out this coming week. I expect they will be, however being fobbed off once I finally got through did not help at all. Reading the thread Honeydragon posted this is indeed a recurring theme.

They have a week before the pushchair is returned unopened and I choose a different travel system. Fingers crossed baby doesn't arrive early!!

We had the pram, carrycot and footmuff delivered in three seperate deliveries despite ordering together - so potentially yours are still to come? I ordered the adaptors at the same time as some clothes - received dispatch email saying it was all on it's way - today received clothes and no adaptors. I'm giving them a couple of days to deliver the adaptors and then will start fighting with customer services - yuck. Congrats btw!

Agree their customer service etc is crap. I ordered a maternity dress from them at the end of July: arrived quickly but didn't fit so I sent back, following all their returns guidance. Two weeks later, still no contact/refund from them, so tried to phone- put on hold for ages- gave up and emailed. Had to email again as still no response a week later. They did eventually get back to me (last week in August) and say they couldn't find the parcel.... checked my credit card statement yesterday and suddenly they have managed to do a refund- a whole month after the item was returned...

Customer service seems very poor. We're a little worried about buying a pram from them though we really like the Sola . YANBU.