To tell this shop owner I think her behaviour is unprofessional

[Dressily]

I am buying a few expensive items from a shop (expense relevant because I expect a certain level of service when buying expensive items). I went into the shop a few weeks ago and selected the items I want. These items aren't just for me so last week the other person involved went to see the items themselves. Once they confirmed that, yes, they agree with my selection all was good and I wanted to go ahead and make the order. There was some rush to this as the items have (for a limited time) been placed on sale. This was further complicated by the fact that I don't live in the UK so needed to pay for the items from overseas using a foreign bank account.

I found the woman I dealt with in the shop (the owner) extremely unprofessional for the following reasons:

• All email communications from her are extremely sloppy. She does not proof read so there are many spelling errors/typos. Whatever email program she uses is plain text so the emails look scruffy anyway, no footer image or contact details.

• She has hounded me to pay for these items, despite knowing that I was waiting for the other person to confirm. I get explain to me that the discount is for a limited time so please confirm ASAP but to keep emailing so often is a bit much

• I told her I would make a card payment over the phone expecting that she would ring the transaction through and then do a "cardholder not present" payment on the till. Nope, I called to give my details and her response was oo let me just get my pen. No! I don't want you writing down my card details! The connection was so bad that the call was terminated before I gave all the details.

• I asked for a load of details to do an international transfer (you need more info than for a regular transfer) but she only gave me the usual account no. and sort code. When I pointed this out and asked her to refer to my previous email she sent me some details saying "this is what you need for an international transfer" but obviously hadn't read my request because she didn't give me all the details I needed. This was followed up a couple of hours later with a "how's the payment coming" email.

• I really need/want these items, especially at the sale price, so I don't have much option but to buy from her

AIBU to email her letting her know that I find her behaviour very unprofessional and detailing why that's the case?

Obviously not all customers were but those those awful, entitled ones stick so much they colour your memories of every interaction.

Having been a small business owner I would like to point out some things to you.

Firstly we get ALOT of people giving us the rum around and we CANNOT just hope that you are true to your word.

Secondly we often go into the business because we love what we do not because we are Richard Branson. Some of us are navigating the world of business and will not have the resources to have someone do the admin. This can sometimes come across as sloppy but is not intended in this way. We are simply trying to grow our business.

Finally I would be thankful that she has tried to keep you in the loop and contacted you about the item. It took me a long time before I realised that i had to take a “they either want it or they don’t” approach to sales. Too much time was wasted in the first few years holding items for people who eventually did not want it.

In fact in this type of transaction either you or the shop owner should have insisted on a deposit being paid.

Yes yes rabbit to your post. Too many times I was messed around with customers saying they wanted an item, we would do everything we could to facilitate a sale but more often than not they were just pratting around.

As I said in a previous post either buy it or don't buy it. Stop faffing

"I remember when the customer was always right". Customers with that attitude are rarely right, just a massive pain in the backside.
Reduced numbers means lots of places no longer having the staffing levels to kiss your arse and serve everyone else at the same time.

Fwiw OP, don't email this woman, you'll piss her off massively and I think she is probably trying her best. However, I can see how it's not a straight forward transaction.

She's a shop owner not a solicitor. She is selling you goods not services. "Professional" is a high standard to be met by the professions - doctor, lawyer, teacher, who have tertiary education in the sector they are to be professional in. This poor woman is a shop owner she's not holding herself out as "professional "

You are BU. I work retail and take many orders over the phone in store. She is small business in assuming, whereas I work for c a company that has processes in place. Regardless of whether you come and pick up your purchase at a later date or request for us to send it to you, any order taken over the phone has to be written down. If there is a problem with the card or ita a credit card order over a certain amount, we have to verify with the merchant and do additional checks. So yes, it needs to be written down including your name, billing address etc. Same as what you would do with an online order. There are strict protocols in place meaning that payment details are destroyed as soon as the payment goes through, but all other details pertaining to the order have to be filed away in case there is a future issue.

You've had these items on hold for you for so long and she may have their people wanting to purchase them. She is doing you a favour, is the presentation of the emails really that important?

She's not going to hold items without payment for very long, especially as there is no guarantee you will actually pay.
If you mean you needed the IBan and swift code to do an international payment, most people don't have a clue what these are, so don't worry too much about her being unsure about them.
You said the line was bad on the call, you can't blame her for that, there's every chance it was your connection that's the email.
You can't really moan about the format of an email. Likewise, English may not be her first language, so some grammar rules may trip her up. She may not do vast quantities of work through email if she's a shop.

Basically your being a bit dramatic.

Also be aware that international transfers incur a charge by the receiving bank; the seller will be out of pocket by somewhere in the region of £10 by accepting this method of payment. She is clearly unfamiliar with international transfers so might not know this, so I would suggest you add at least £10 to the final purchase price to compensate her for this.

Oh yes...it's Maui!!!! Awesome!!!

I think OP should email now so shop keeper knows the level of customer care involved and can decide whether she wants her as a customer if the items have to be hand delivered abroad -on a silver platter.

YABU. Have to agree with pps - you sound entitled and pushy. I have an image in my mind of you stamping your feet

If you don't like the service, go and shop somewhere else - I'm sure there are some other suitably expensive places that you can spend lots of money

I think OP should email now so shop keeper knows the level of customer care involved and can decide whether she wants her as a customer if the items have to be hand delivered abroad -on a silver platter.

... to her tastefully decorated 5-bedroom house?

Card transactions for card holder not present where I work have to be done via computer and then cannot be processed until an order is raised to put it against.

Also, her card machine may be linked to her till, so again, not able to put the card through until she has rung the order/sale up.

hence needing to write down your details.

And because you didn't contact her when the details she gave you were wrong, how is she to know what was happening with the payment?

You need to deal with you may have got poor service directly, as you can with any purhcase, no matter how Expensive. Its a long way to January pay day you know!

Ah the old, 'I've tried buying this item at x, y, z competitor but you're the only place who has it in stock'. Closely followed by 'I can get this item cheaper on Amazon will you price match' asked repeatedly despite explaining reasons why not (i.e. we have to pay rent, we'd actually be losing money to sell it for that amount, we like to pay our valued staff a decent wage). 'I want to buy'...(insert big list of items) spend hours putting the order together, 'actually I only want this and this now'. These are truely the best types of customer!

By all means send her an e-mail calling her unprofessional, I enjoy reading these and laughing at the entitlement. The beauty of being your own boss is you can decide who you want to do business with.

Wow, I am amazed at some of the responses on this thread.

Of course you're not being unreasonable expecting a certain level of service if you are purchasing high end items.

Of course you're not being unreasonable to expect a shop to know how to do an international transfer, or to find out how to do one in the event of an international customer wanting to purchase items.

Of course you're not being unreasonable to suggest that writing a credit card number down is a data protecftion risk.

And you're not unreasonable to think ungrammatical and misspelled communications are unprofessional either.

People are so contrary on here. I don't believe that half of those who are saying YABU would react any differently to the same level of service in person.

Whiskyowl. I don't know if you've noticed but many pp work in or have worked retail, or are small business owners who deal with customers regularly. You can't discount what they are saying - people like me deal with this type of entitled customer all the time.

She’s doing you a massive favour by holding items at sale price when you haven’t paid. For all you know she could have sold them 100x over. Generally shop owners/workers don’t need to email in an ultra professional way. You sound like a nightmare customer tbh.

Wow. YAB so U, on all counts. I feel really sorry for the woman running the shop. Maybe she’s shortsighted, dyslexic or not very good at typing? And you HAVE messed her around, to be fair.

I know retail is a hard job, but I honestly don't think it sounds like this customer is super demanding. If I had an international customer, I would ring the bank and find out how to do the transfer rather than just guessing. That's not some high level of customer service, it's basic competence.

When I hear 'international bank transfer' I think 'scammer'. Please do post your email on here if you send it so we can all smirk at it.

OP, can you hear yourself?!