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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To expect better service from mamas and papas?

25 replies

Lime8 · 29/04/2014 16:30

So three weeks ago I ordered a cot bed and other furniture from mamas and papas costing over 500 quid. We got a delivery date of this morning before 12. My self employed husband took day off work and so did I so we could build the stuff and get all excited about nursery.

At 1240 they sent us an email saying there was an issue with delivery and it wouldn't be here!

I called 3 times today (each time spending 20-40minutes on hold to an 0845 number)

They can't tell me what went wrong (a massive technical error that meant lots of customers didn't get their orders)

They can't tell me when my delivery will be here. May be weeks...

They gave me 25 quid voucher to make up for the lost hundreds if pounds it's cost my husband to not work today. And have agreed not to charge delivery (how very big of them)

I'm very very angry and upset. What a waste of holiday.

They admit fault and say sorry but will not fix the issue.

Anyone else had this problem?

Rant over. I will never use them again after this. What terrible customer service!

OP posts:

TheBabyFacedAssassin · 29/04/2014 16:33

Ugh that is really annoying.

How do you expect them to fix the issue?

ComfyLeatherChair · 29/04/2014 16:35

yAnBu- In my experience Mamas and Papas customer service is CRAP. (Still seething 5 years later)

ComfyLeatherChair · 29/04/2014 16:36

Cancel the order? I would recommend John Lewis.

Original poster

Lime8 · 29/04/2014 16:37

I am available tomorrow or perhaps other alternative days. I want them to bring my delivery then. But they are refusing to reschedule. Saying we need to be patient and the delivery company will be in touch. I was patient all this morning waiting for them to deliver.

I asked to speak to a manager but apparently that takes 24 hours to arrange.

Terrible service!

OP posts:

TheMaw · 29/04/2014 16:43

They're crap, they delivered the wrong cot to me and it took them three weeks to send a replacement. Can you cancel it? If you can, I would do that and go somewhere else.

Goldmandra · 29/04/2014 16:48

Mamas and Papas have appalling customer service. Once they had our money they didn't give two hoots about the fact that our top of the range pushchair wouldn't fold properly. They charged us through the eyes and nose to look at it then declared it fine when it clearly wasn't.

They are well know for this sort of behaviour.

If I were you I'd cancel the order and consider myself well out of it.

ComfyLeatherChair · 29/04/2014 17:05

If you speak to them on the phone again, do not give up! Insist on speaking to the manager, or a number of someone who can resolve at head office. Do not be rude, but just keep saying. I'm sorry that isn't good enough, please put me through to someone who can resolve this for me.

Get names of people and ask them to confirm what they are saying by email, and ask for their complaints process. And tweet!

I will see if I can find out any more info online

By the way I have phone numbers for Three Mobiles executive office in London, and the head office for Odeon cinemas if that helps anyone? I wonder of we could start a thread with contact numbers on.....

Ronmione · 29/04/2014 18:17

Cancel your order why you still can! They are beyond shit

Goldmandra · 29/04/2014 18:49

Comfy this doesn't work with M&P. They simply don't give a shiny shit once they have your money.

HoneyDragon · 29/04/2014 18:54

You don't get customer service from Mamas & Papas. You give them lots and lots of money, and if you are very, very lucky when your pfb turns 21 they might, might, just send you one of the items you ordered. With a screw missing.

Don't call them, when they get a call they are trained to put you on hold for seventeen minutes, whilst they dance on their desk flicking v signs at the phone and singing fuck you, fuck you fuck you, fuck yoooooou. Then they say you can't cancel your order and give you an address to write to. They will ignore this too.

In conclusion.

Your totes fucked dude.

Theyda · 29/04/2014 19:54

I recently found this link that has helped me with similar things recently.
www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/delivery-rights

TallGiraffe · 29/04/2014 20:00

Awful company. Don't try to post a negative review on their website either - I wrote a very balanced review pointing out a couple of flaws with a product and they sent me a message saying my review wasn't suitable and they didn't accept 3/5 stars. So why have a star system?!

IfAtFirstUDontSucceed · 29/04/2014 20:50

In my experience truly awful service.
Similarly to you, we spent over £500 on a nursery furniture set. Bought online in the January in plenty of time for DS's due date in April.

From what I remember, I received a confirmation email letting me know that I would be sent a delivery date. After that I freqently received emails saying that the items were out of stock!
By march I finally received a delivery date email, immediately follwed by another out of stock email. I phoned to check what was actually happening - they had no idea! I told them that IF they can't deliver ASAP I MAY have to cancel, get my money back and go elsewhere.
Without any further communication, my money suddenly appeared back in my account - no apology, no explanation! DS's due date was 3 weeks away by this point and had to start all over again!

celticghurl · 29/04/2014 20:53

Mmmmmm

BikeRunSki · 29/04/2014 20:55

M&P customer service is notoriously poor; their products are all style over function.

Cancel your order and go elsewhere. There is a lot of lovely nursery furniture available.

Original poster

Lime8 · 29/04/2014 21:10

Honeydragon I love that post! Made me laugh when I was in such an angry mood earlier! I had pregnant rage!!!!

If I can face another 30 mins on hold I will cancel the order. I was interested to see that a tweet described how their order turned up smelling of fag smoke today. Yuck!

Thanks all for feedback.

Hopefully this post will save some poor person the trouble that we have all had.

OP posts:

JuanFernandezTitTyrant · 29/04/2014 21:16

Seriously follow that MSE link and claim for loss of earnings.

toomanypasswords · 29/04/2014 21:36

I didn't buy anything from M&P when pregnant with DD purely because of the total lack of any kind of service when I went into one of their shops. I really like a lot of the prams / pushchairs (and would still like one 2 years on) but I was so cross about being ignored that I refused to buy one there. I ended up in Mothercare for pram and John Lewis for a lovely cotbed for DD. Couldn't fault the delivery on either. My mum ordered DD's 1st birthday present from M&P and had all sorts of issues with getting it. I only get things from them now if it's on the shelf, on sale and I can get it there and then!

Hoppinggreen · 29/04/2014 21:52

Oh dear, that is a bit shit but we've always had brilliant service from them.
When I had DS 4 years after DD we got the cot out of the loft and discovered we had lost a small part.
DH phoned them and they said the cot was disc but the bloke said he would go and look for the part anyway. He found it and phoned us back nd offered to post it. As we live near their head office DH popped in to get it, they refused to charge him anything for it.
We bought a lot of stuff from the factory shop as well and found the staff there to be great as well.
Must just have been lucky I guess.
Hope you get sorted OP

EverythingsDozy · 30/04/2014 00:03

Mamas and papas piss me off no end. We went in because of a sign that said "20% off all clothes" with absolutely no small print, bought two 3-6 month outfits which were already marked down (still spent over £50!) and they wouldn't give us the money off. They then decided that it wasn't 20% off all clothes.
On another occasion they sold me a pushchair and said "this definitely is compatible with the car seat you have". We bought it, tried it with the car seat and found it needed adapters (which we didn't need for the other pushchair so weren't expecting it to!), tried to order them on the phone and they didn't sell them any more...

Pregnantberry · 30/04/2014 00:33

Eugh, I agree with others that you should try and cancel. That way they don't get your money and you don't have to waste anymore time on them.

I have had good experiences with Mothercare, if that helps instead, and they have a sale on furniture at the moment.

fuckthefuckofff · 30/04/2014 00:46

Comfyleatherchair, I would be interested in 3s, dodgy contract price increase... Haven't got anywhere so far by other methods however this is a year into the contract. Do you possibly have an email address you could PM me?

Original poster

Lime8 · 30/04/2014 12:42

Update: following a tweet a member of mamas and papas high level customer service team called. There has been a massive technical problem with many items not being delivered and "lost".

I am being treated like the queen now :) delivery will be Saturday and this isn't most convenient for me but she is trying to get it in morning so that I don't waste an entire day again. She will follow up in Saturday and Monday to check all is well!

And I got an apology for causing stress during my pregnancy.

Twitter is the way forward people!

OP posts:

Goldmandra · 30/04/2014 12:49

I am being treated like the queen now

I hope that continues throughout the delivery actually arriving on time, being correct and of decent quality with all the bits present

Woobeedoo · 30/04/2014 13:11

One of my colleagues ordered a M&P cotbed. It arrived, he unpacked it to assemble it and discovered a number of the screws were missing.

He contacted them, explained situation and asked if they had the screws that were missing - he'd happily collect them from the store rather than wait for delivery if that was easier.

M&P refused point blank to do this, instead they made him take back the whole cotbed to their store for a refund.

This is probably and hopefully a one-off but I was taking no chances and ordered DS's cotbed from Kiddicare.

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