To think retail stores will never survive if they don’t let customers try things on?!!

[TheNewLook]

How are we supposed to give them our money when we can’t try anything on? Nobody want to schelp into town, buy a tonne of clothes, trail them home only to return most of it?

Same with online shopping. I return far more than I keep. It’s an exhausting process. Ordering, opening, trying, parceling up and waiting at the post office!

Let us try things on!!

I don’t care if the person who tried it on before me was harbouing Covid. It’s highly unlikely to live long enough on fabric to be able to contaminate me afterwards.

My little local clothes shop that I try to support won’t let you try on nor return things. So I have stopped going there - as has everyone else!

What's even worse are the many shops not letting you return clothes and get a refund. I bought hundreds in clothes on my credit card thinking I could return most of them when I could see what would fit and look nice - tried to return them and they'd only give me credit in three shops! Absolute scam.

It's not just not returning clothes though. I bought a top in a supermarket recently, took it back and was met with the woman on customer services visibly flinching when I took it out of the bag, she was wearing gloves but snatched it off me and threw it on the floor behind the counter.

Bought a pair of trousers in a local Department store, when I refused to hand over my email was told that if she gave me a paper receipt and I had to return them then my paper receipt would be full of virus, madness.

I only order online now. The high street will be gone forever soon.

Agree. I'm desperate for new bras and no way can i buy without trying on first

Absolutely pointless shopping in person if you can't try on, might as well just buy on line with an easy preplanned return option!

Might need to brave Primark for my DD who no longer has any leggings or trousers longer than capri length if I don't get lucky with Vertbaudet or Gap stuff, but I don't generally take her shopping with me as she's 5...

There was a thread recently on here about Debenhams telling off op for trying on a coat. There was a shitstorm on the thread because op said to the sales assistant who told her off that Debenhams was already struggling and now she's going to spend her £100 pounds elsewhere because she couldn't try on a coat she wanted to purchase. I agree with you op, some rules are over the top and not feasible. I live miles away from the nearest town centre and I don't have a car and I can't afford all the hassle that comes with it. Jumpers and T-shirt's and underwear I can understand but with coats, jeans, some dresses and shoes should be allowed if the High Streets want to survive.

YANBU.

I don’t understand why you can’t try things on anyway.

Surely buying it, taking it home, trying it on, bringing it back is more risky than trying it on in the store? They can easily clean the fitting rooms between each customer & even isolate the clothes for a day or two before putting them back out.

I tried a jacket in a few weeks ago in the shop, & my daughter was mortified. Scared we’d get thrown out of the shop (she can be a bit dramatic). Nobody noticed, but I felt like I’d committed a cardinal sin so I just didn’t buy it in the end.

Some shops allow you to try shoes on, others don’t. They are just making up their own rules.

Agree. I am ashamed of the state of the bras I am wearing at the moment, but even when measured in M&S I need to try on a dozen or more that they bring me of different styles and sizes before I find one that fits.

I'm the tailor in a small menswear shop, we are measuring you (with masks on both us and the customer) letting you decide which suit or item of clothing you want to try on and getting the one that's closest to your fit. We are bringing shirts, jumpers and any other items you might want to look at to you. Because we know fairly much what sizes to bring men are either buying the items and I'm doing any alterations needed or the clothing that's been tried on girls into the back area for 3 days.
After customers have left we wipe down all areas.
We are also managing to do hire suit fittings if you bring in a rough idea of your measurements.
It seems to be working okay and hopefully more people will support us during this time and like the personal service.

I feel the risk of people using changing rooms is too high.

I agree.
I think its quite unlikely to catch coronavirus from an item of clothing.

Yambu, there are some things people just will not choose to buy if they can't try them on. They'll just soldier on until bras fall apart, get a cheapo second hand one to tide them over etc.

Surely buying it, taking it home, trying it on, bringing it back is more risky than trying it on in the store? They can easily clean the fitting rooms between each customer & even isolate the clothes for a day or two before putting them back out

Returns are kept separate before being put back out on the shop floor.
As a HCP cleaning between each patient is taking a lot of time and resources so I understand them not wanting to do it between customers who would, presumably, remove their masks to try tops on. Plus, if fitting rooms were open, people would take multiple items in so the store room would have to be the same size as the shop floor to quarantine all the tried on items.

I can see why they would prefer not to allow people to try clothes on or return items. But for me this is the reason I bother to go in to an actual shop rather than just order from the internet.

I'm not sure how that it's much more dangerous to sell clothes that may have been tried on by someone else than to sell clothes that will have been touched/breathed on etc by lots of people. I recently bought a load of clothes for DD- half did not fit so we returned them and I noticed they were back on the shop floor within minutes. I'm sure that must be more dangerous.

If they want to be safer, surely there could be a changing room provided and items put on a rail in the back for a couple of days before they are returned to the rail.

YANBU. This thing spreads through breathing primarily. I really want to go properly clothes shopping but what's the point? I did buy a few things I was pretty sure would fit and went to try them on in a loo. No one sanitises the loos between use so I'm not sure why fitting rooms are such a danger. But I'm not going to buy a nice dress this way. Or an expensive coat.

It would be less of a problem if clothing sizes were consistent. Then you could buy a 10 or a 12 and know what you are getting.
How are shoe shops coping?

If anyone works in retail I'd be interested to hear the rationale and risk assessment, because it just doesn't make sense to me, so tell me if IABU, I'll try and understand!

Agree! I have been moaning about this for ages! Another issue is when you are on a tight budget. I order a few things online, then try on, wait til I get a chance to send back and wait sometimes 14+ days for a refund during which I can't afford to buy anything else! This is tough when you are trying to buy something you actually need like bras, shoes or a coat for example.

It depends - certain small boutiques near where I live are letting you try things on - ta da - more likely to buy from there.

However, they don't often have what I want/right price point etc.

Funnily enough I was in Debenhams - wanted to try on a denim skirt and they actually let me - out of sight of someone (doorway) - only because I was in West End and I said I wouldn't be up there much.

I personally think if they isolate the clothes or steam after then things you can try on over your clothes - why not?

In our little high street have lost our only two clothes shops over the last couple of weeks. I didn't even rummage through the closing down sale as there is no point buying if I couldn't try anything on. So sad. I'm sure using changing rooms is no more dangerous then using public toilet, and surely tried on clothes could go on a rack for 3 days?

Surely buying it, taking it home, trying it on, bringing it back is more risky than trying it on in the store? They can easily clean the fitting rooms between each customer & even isolate the clothes for a day or two before putting them back out.

No it actually isnt.

I work in a supermarket that sells clothes and we have closed our fitting rooms. This is so that we know exactly what has been tried on and we can quarantine only what is necessary.

If you take it home, it gets quarantined because we know it has been tried on. If you just try stuff on on the shop floor then we dont know what has been sanitised and what has not. If you take 4 sizes of Jean's into the fitting room but the first pair you try on is the right size, we still have to quarantine all four pairs ... but if you just take one or two home and return the wrong size, we only have to quarantine one pair.

Anything that gets returned has to be put into quarantine for 3 days, sanitised and then returned to stock. We do not have space in the warehouse for this so our fitting rooms are being used for the quarantined items - each day the rail of clothes that have been returned is wheeled into a fitting room, door closed and a note put on it as to what day it was quarantined, and each other fitting room is filled with previous days rails. This also gives colleagues a confined area to sanitise everything and check it is saleable before returning it to the shop floor

@leiaskye

YANBU.

I don’t understand why you can’t try things on anyway.

Surely buying it, taking it home, trying it on, bringing it back is more risky than trying it on in the store? They can easily clean the fitting rooms between each customer & even isolate the clothes for a day or two before putting them back out.

I tried a jacket in a few weeks ago in the shop, & my daughter was mortified. Scared we’d get thrown out of the shop (she can be a bit dramatic). Nobody noticed, but I felt like I’d committed a cardinal sin so I just didn’t buy it in the end.

Some shops allow you to try shoes on, others don’t. They are just making up their own rules.

I got bitched at majorly in Zara when I tried to try a jumper on there the other week - it was quiet there too. Guess what? Didn't buy it

To those saying it’s easy just to clean the fitting room between every customer, it’s really not, we are already incredibly tight on staffing levels between the number of people with confirmed cases, those having to isolate because of these people and the foods section having become much busier.

Added to this we need people to clean every basket and trolley, to constantly clean escalator and stair hand rails/lift buttons/till areas/pin pads etc regularly, then add people needed to count the number of customers in and out etc. There just is not the resource to do this. In an ideal world yes of course it would be done but as we are all only too aware we are far from that.

Yanbu.

Me and dd1 badly need new bras but it's impossible without trying them on. For myself I can have a good guess at size and order online but I wouldn't even know where to start for a 12 year old with autism related sensory issues