Waitrose - no meat being delivered…..

[FlamingoSocks]

I’m just fucked off and wanting a moan
Ordered a rib of beef from their Entertaining range months ago, to be delivered this evening as the Christmas meat. Got the email about what is being delivered and guess what? No beef! So no meat for Christmas Day, 10 people coming, a house to get clean and children to entertain and now have to try and find a joint of beef.

Also not being delivered - Christmas pudding, Yule log, cheese, booze…. Basically we have to now go and do a full shop. It’s fine, we can, DH is home and we can drive, we are lucky…..

If they’d even said sorry I wouldn’t mind, but the woman I spoke to in customer services was the rudest most dismissive person I think I’ve ever dealt with in a Customer Service context. I’m in a mood now and I don’t want to be, it’s Christmas!!!

I don't understand the mentality of booking a slot weeks in advance and risking this sort of thing. I took a trip to big Tesco earlier on and you could get pretty much anything you needed for an entire Christmas spread. I was just going in for a few things but it was pretty civilized. Some good last minute offers too.

I find it really hard to believe that you had poor customer service. I always find Waitrose excellent.

I'd have expected them to phone you and suggest a replacement.

You should have had an email before the delivery showing your total order and what was missing. Did that not come?

I picked up a click and collect order today including the turkey ordered in October and everything, bar one small item, was there.

Obviously this is picked in store, apart from the turkey.

Very happy. Sainsburys on time today and no missing items or subs. However didn’t risk essential items like turkey or ham. Secured that from the local butchers.

@FlamingoSocks Waitrose delivers from your local store apart from the entertainment order. Not like Ocado with a central warehouse.

Why have they run out of cheese and Xmas puddings? My local store was heaving with it all yesterday and everything bar one small item was in my order collected today.

I had an email from them around 2 weeks ago saying that all turkey orders were being fulfilled (because there is shortage with bird flu) but I was thinking of Plan B until I heard that.

If anyone has to go out, it's worth trying M&S late at night
I went last year and ours is on a retail park. Everything else was closed but they're open until 11pm and there wasn't a single person in there last year! Also loads of food. I think nobody realised they were open so late

The mentality is easy to understand.

There is nothing worse than fighting with everyone else as my DP is clinically vulnerable so I limit my time in busy stores.

I booked mine in October, but always have a Plan B in case something goes wrong.

So, if a turkey is ordered I might bung a large chicken in the freezer, just in case. Or some nice meat of some sort.

The reason stores run out is because the online shoppers often start picking before the deliveries arrive.

When I worked in ASDA, the pickers started at 3am but the deliveries didn't arrive until after 6am. So if you booked an early morning slot (say anytime before 10am) you'd likely get a lot of substitutions or missing items.

Whereas if your order doesn't go out until 4-5pm, the pickers have more to choose from as the shelves are generally fuller and there's more in the back as well.

That doesn't make sense with Waitrose.

I wanted to add things to my order that were according to their website' Out of stock online' so presumably they were allocated to existing online orders.

We have ordered via M&S twice and neither time got everything. We had the meat so it was fine.

The megashop from Ocado came on Wednesday with no subs, one item out of stock (cucumber I think). Veg box schemes like Riverford have been reliable too.

I have a smaller Waitrose delivery today and every Christmas specific item is missing. Fortunately for me the Christmas items on the Waitrose order were mainly "extras". I've heard similar from Tesco/sainsbury customers.

Ocado's ordering systems are fairly effective at reserving the stock in your order, the supermarkets generally pick on the day so in general you have a better chance of getting the full shop from Ocado. I assume box schemes do the same. Not a cheap option though when budgets are tight.

I tend to buy anything freezable in November and stick it in the big freezer even since the great crisis of the missing chocolate yule log a few years ago.

Marks in Swindon had very few turkey crowns (found one at £94!). I went to Sainsburys instead. Lots of empty shelves. Very disappointing as we shop there every week. Couldn't get our regular items.

Something I never understand about items being missing from an online delivery, is that whenever I go into a store to shop, at whatever time of the day, I never have a problem with any items ever being missing from a shelf? Makes me wonder if the picker just couldn't ba to look for them. We won't be having crackers and soft cheese over Christmas, as apparently in my local huge superstore of ASDA with half an aisle dedicated to crackers, there wasn't a single alternative to plain jacob's crackers and Carr's water biscuits and the only alternative to boursin on the 22nd was cheese with pineapple. İt's annoying because you pay for pick pack and deliver and then have to go out again and pay for transport. My christmas delivery was also more expensive than when I ordered it. Some items had gone up by 25-50 percent in the space of just over month.

Boycott Waitrose!

Out of stock online often just means the delivery hasn't arrived at the store yet, so they can't pick the item at that precise moment.

They can't say whether a store will have a specific item available at any given time as it changes constantly.

Our bigs Sainsbury's was busy but not mad today. So if you have to go out after a delivery let down go early.

I got nearly everything on the list. Large Pouring cream were sold out, some of the wine boxes, mini carrots. But nothing vital.

I can highly recommend COOK, we ordered a £120 Xmas dinner with all the trimmings and turkey crown for 8 and it arrived on Fri 9 Dec, fits into one large freezer drawer. Looks absolutely delicious and all as ordered. Love all their food, it’s better than anything I can cook myself!

I don’t believe you.
Their Christmas Food to order, via christmasfood.marksandspencer.com/ is guaranteed. If you bought it via Ocado, that’s a different thing.

If it's ASDA, they're told what alternatives they can choose from (unless the customer has specifically selected something).

It's not necessarily that there isn't a sensible option available, just that they can only pick from say, two different options.

Sympathies OP. I was caught that way by Tesco a few years back, again pre ordered stuff not available on shelves booked weeks in advance and no substitutions. So I don't trust the Christmas ordered stuff at all. I go in person and do the Christmas shop.

Ah okay, this explains why many a time they haven't been able to send bread, despite having about forty types of bread to choose from!
Why is that two choice rule, do you know?

I have no idea. The system was really bad though - there's no way I'd ever order an online shop from ASDA knowing what a shambles it was

I've been very jammy this year because 18 year old son is on a year out before university and is working at Tesco. I had an online order from Waitrose yesterday - a couple of things were missing (sprouts, Christmas pudd) so I texted him to pick some up at the end of his shift. Today I've decided I need more wrapping paper, so about to text him again

I had an Ocado delivery today with only 2 substitutions and 1 item not available, which wasn't a big deal at all. I have to say, Ocado's availability is better than Waitrose for sure as Waitrose is picked from your nearest store so it all depends on if it's in stock. We ordered our meat from a local butcher and when dh went to collect it earlier he heard a woman saying "have you got a duck please" and he said he had no ducks but could do a goose" so some people clearly leave it and buy whatever is available.

Oh yeah my dad used to deliver for them and was forever being shouted at by the customers. He said it was always chaos. I always try to tip them now if I have change, because I feel so sorry for them. Someone said the basic range of ocado doesn't work out much difference in price so may give that a go. Or just go to aldi and pay for a taxi home from now on!

İ also always end up with bruised fruit or food about to expire, whenever I do Asda delivery. İt's making me wonder why I bother?!