Ocado are suspending their reserved order system

[Neednewwellies]

I’ve been using Ocado for 12yrs. We pay extra for a reserved pass. A week or so ago they emailed to say existing customers were priority and especially those with a reserved slot. Made a thing about supporting loyalty etc. Now today I’ve received an email telling me that not only is the delivering expecting tomorrow not coming but they’ve decided to suspend the reserved slots and it’s every (wo)man for themselves. Of course, there’s no slot available for weeks.
I’m angry and worried. Why not continue to prioritise those who have a set slot. Surely adding those thousands into the traffic of people desperately trying to get a slot will just make the situation worse? As soon as this is over I’ll be leaving them. No way will I continue to pay extra when they’ve behaved like this. How can they leave it until the day before to drop this on us? £150 a week plus the monthly fast pass fee to be treated like this. I wouldn’t even mind if they were on twitter holding their hands up but they’ve gone silent.

@EveryDayIsADuvetDay, as I’ve said, if my slot was being temporarily used to provide a delivery to the vulnerable then I wouldn’t been angry. But I have instead been told that it’s effectively going into the mix to make chances of booking fairer. The vulnerable must take priority but after that, loyal customers should take priority over those who have just joined in the hope of getting a slot.

The government is offering help to shielded group. That includes access to delivery slots. They can't do it unless supermarkets do this.

@WindFlower92, of course, as I’ve just said. But Ocado aren’t saying that at all.

But I am reminded of the rich guy in Titanic who tried to pay his way onto a boat ahead of the women and children with these complaints about passes and loyalty there's been a few now.

There's only one thing I can think of to say, really.

Tough shit.

Ocado can have no idea who's vulnerable and who's not. I've been a customer of theirs for 16 years and I'm not sure they even know my date of birth. They certainly know nothing about how many people are in my household, what my state of health is, what kind of work I do or anything else that's relevant in deciding who should get a priority delivery, other than what their algorithms might have guessed from my shopping patterns.

@blacksax, and that’s your opinion. My opinion is that I’ll vote with my feet when this is over and having just joined the FB page I realise that thousands will be doing the same. Again, this is not about denying those in shielded groups access to a slot, thus is about them taking on too many new customers and now deciding that all (non vulnerable) customers need to join the scramble. Well fine but expect all your loyal customers to bugger off when this is over.

AllOutOfFucks

How does one use the shield system to get access to delivery slots? I just got a set of yes/no questions and it never asked anything about supermarket deliveries.

And there didn’t seem to be a way to make individual enquiries (at this stage, at least). Have I missed some options?

(I’m now worrying that I’ve done the sodding registration form wrong, as I’m feeling incompetent all round!)

If you are able to get to the shops then I think you should let a house bound person have your slot. Sorry but I think Ocado have done the right thing morally. Yes they should refund your subscription and yes you have the right to go elsewhere. I’m with Tesco can’t get a slot either but I’m just grateful that currently I can drive to the shops.

I am also a long standing Ocado customer with a paid-for delivery pass and have found the communication to be dreadful. I have had very few emails and the couple I've had have been contradictory. I was very pleased I managed to add my mum's address to my account (she is a widow, 85 years and heart condition) so in 12 week lockdown not even seeing family. I drive and my household is small, so would have been very happy for ocado to have said 1 slot per week only per account and to have swapped it to her. I would like to be able to book for her 2 weeks time but no slots available at all.

For a company that advertises that they are an IT company who sells food, I dont think they've done a very good job.

Drivers fabulous as normal and customer services staff normally lovely.

My experience is that Ocado are not prioritising the vulnerable

If you know they are, and have any idea how on earth you can get in touch (in a way that they will actually read/act on, rather than send a generic email and hope you go away) please would you PM me?

@Beansandcoffee, what evidence do you have that they are offering my slot to the vulnerable? That’s not what they’re telling me and clearly that’s not @iVampire’s experience.

The government has identified shielded group. If you are noy in iy, you are not officially most vulnerable.

Sainsbury's have been dreadful - promising to support vulnerable and disabled customers and then changing that to only the very vulnerable - so don't think they'll do any better.

Yabu to try to hold into a weekly slot when unless you have a huge family you could presumably offer for 2w at once or even go to the shop.
I think that should be the way forward as long as they let people offer enough bread and milk.
I think though Sainsbury have angered me as they won't let people sign up even. And yet you could have been spending loads in the store. Same with morrisons.
I agree with pp that click and collect
And the veg boxes etc needs expanding.
Even if not highly vulnerable most families will have a asthmatic or high bp or t2 diabetic in.

Looking at Tesco they have so few deliveries per store it's like 30 maybe incl click and collect so nowhere near enough.

OP - did you get a confirmation email 6 days before as normal?

My order is booked for tomorrow and then next Friday too but not thereafter but that may be because I’ve edited both to take out stuff I won’t need rather than having the same recurring order.

I do agree their communication hasn’t been good at all. Their ordering limits are also quite random. I’m really happy for them to have the limits but they do seem to cover unrelated items that you only find out when you try to add the second one. And then have to work out what the limit relates to and prioritise. All very odd!

How do you prove you are vulnerable? I know an 82 year old non-driver, who uses a walking frame to get around and relies on home deliveries, but doesn't qualify on vulnerability grounds, as she has no underlying health issues.

@iVampire I understand someone contacts you about what help you need after you have registered on gov.uk and they have checked you are in shielded group. I have only just registered though. I said I don't have someone to deliver food for me - true as neighbours will do milk etc but not a weekly shop.

There’s a number of catering suppliers near us who are doing deliveries of fresh stuff at least - it may be worth googling to see if there are any near you.

asda are adding slots in the wee small hours. managed to get one at about 6am today for delivery on saturday.

perseverance and blind optimism is the only way forward. and i say this as someone whose asda delivery today was cancelled last minute as they tried to charge the wrong card, and sent an email at 4 this morning asking me to rectify it.

so, no delivery today but we live in hope for saturday.

stalk asda in the middle of the night. it’s the only way.

To add though I would be fuming like you are reasonably that they have cancelled an existing slot and so soon.

A lot of services we usually use we are all losing money on
Swimming lessons.
Gym
I know some might be refunded but probably still a loss.
Zoo membership. I've already lost 3w.
National trust.
Plus adding on uht milk etc.
So yes it's crap. Hopefully a lot will get refunded.
I'm sure supermarkets are under a lot of pressure and selling to 1 vulnerable elderly will likely lose them money as they will spend less.

@eddiemairswife As I understand it it is those in shielded group. If woman is that vulnerable does she get support from SS so contact them?

@littlebearpad why do you think you are getting those orders? I also edited my orders - but I think Twitter was saying even if you had edited them they still were not going to be sent for delivery?

There are 1.5 million in shielded group, we won't all get slots either.

I am totally in favour of online deliveries going to the most vulnerable first. What I'm dubious about is whether the supermarkets have identified them. I'm not vulnerable personally and my husband, who might technically be considered vulnerable, has had no letter about it, so I assume he's not. Are the supermarkets matching lists of NHS-supplied addresses to their customer databases? Surely to be totally fair and sensible, though, they should be asking their customers if they are shopping for someone on the list who doesn't live with them, as clearly a lot of people are?

I'm reminded of something that happened at work years ago. A new system was introduced. There were huge problems with it. Nobody knew how long it would take to get it sorted out. The end users were fobbed off with vague promises, defensive responses and also patronised by new colleagues working on this system who didn't grasp that the old hands actually knew what we were talking about when we said there were serious consequences to these problems. Then, hallelujah! a new colleague appeared who spoke to us frankly. He accepted and acknowledged that there were lots of problems, he listed them and he told us which ones would be tackled first and which would have to wait. Suddenly we were all working together and it was manageable.

Ocado had such goodwill going into this but their communication has been abysmal. Be honest with us! We know these are very tough times. Just give us the truth, regardless of how unpalatable it is, and then we'll have some certainty and can work with that.