Entire online food delivery cancelled.

[Vagessence]

For fuck sake. My whole ocado shop for today has been cancelled. Generally speaking it's tricky for us to get to the shops but by some rare stroke of luck my partner had to bring the car home this weekend (usually kept at his parents many miles away). Thankfully we'll be able to drive to the shops but what about those who can't? People in self isolation or those who have to rely on online shops for other reasons? Slots aren't available until next week, midweek at the earliest!

I've been telling myself to stay calm, only buy what we need, don't add to the problem of shops being out of stock. But now I'm panicking it's really hard to stick to that. I'm now not sure if I'll be able to hold back from panic buying now. We have barely any food in the house and usually we only get enough to last us a week but I think I'll have to stock up on two weeks worth now. We might end up not even being able to get anything today due to shelves being bare.

When I tried Ocado, this morning I was asked to sit in a virtual online queue and it would take 2 hours of waiting just to access their website- It also instructed, that access was only for orders already made that needed amendments because there were no slots left for new orders/deliveries and it's fully booked for the next week ahead.

I managed to get a Free 1 month delivery pass trial with Tesco (12.99 thereafter)- This opened up Flexy Delivery slots for me. Being delivered between 12&4PM tomorrow.

watch this space

We are also in isolation..with 3 kids. Hubby works for NHS, me the DWP. The irony of it.

I had 2 Tesco orders booked. One for last Saturday and one for yesterday. They both got cancelled on the day...... MASSIVELY frustrating.
I’m trying to sum up the energy to face the actual shop. I have underlying health condition, enough to be isolated from the new guidelines, but what choice do I have?

The litter I usually buy (Cats Best) hasn't been out of stock previously, I used to buy a bag a week (four cats) and didn't have issues. I guess everyone is understandably stocking up but it's very frustrating when it's available when I place the order (over a week ago) and then somehow goes out of stock by the delivery day. Not like there is any obvious alternative to litter either (but if they had a different brand in stock, I would appreciate a substitution rather than not getting any at all).

I've made two orders with Asda over the past couple of weeks and neither have shown up. They were click and collect. I go there to pick it up and they don't have it! No explanation. Not even an email!
So when I click on 'checkout' after putting my details in, where is my money going?!

This is really started to worry me. I weekly shop waitrose online – now the site has packed up completely. No slots on Sainsbury. There is sweet fa regards toilet paper, eggs, rice, flour, pasta in the shops. No cat food either. I don’t know what we’re going to do. No car. What in gods name is happening with these shops? This government are doing NOTHING and have basically told us to get on with it. People are going to die because of those creeps

@viccat have you tried Zooplus for cat food and litter? Apparently they’re receiving higher than usual demand at the moment, but the website seemed to be working as normal when I placed my order yesterday (unlike Ocado).

About Ocado’s recommendation to book delivery slots in advance - I thought they only hold slots for two hours normally?

About Ocado’s recommendation to book delivery slots in advance - I thought they only hold slots for two hours normally?

Yes, but once you've checked out then that slot is yours. You need £40 in your basket to checkout. I usually add gin and a bottle of wine or two to take me above that so I can checkout - something that won't mess up with their stock level monitoring too much and isn't a disaster if I forget to take it out/go back and edit my basket with what I actually need and it actually gets delivered!

My Morrison's delivery happened! I'm relieved to say the least...

I've just realized he didn't give me the (in stock/paid for/no substitutes) frozen stuff 🤦‍♀️

I noticed that Iceland also are opening early for OAPs. I did think, however, that most elderly people aren’t good at getting up and out first thing

I work for Iceland.
Most stores are allowing a 2 hour time frame for the elderly to do their shopping. The store opening hours have been reduced to 9-5 in most stores meaning the shopping times for the elderly is 9-11 on specific days. I say elderly. It’s for anyone over the age of 60. There will be staff manning the doors as well to ensure that only the relevant people are let in at that time on that day.

I'm sticking to pottering around small newsagents and local shops every day and just picking up a few things to cobble a meal together xx

Mine was cancelled today too

I haven’t read the full thread but there are some really snooty attitudes towards others on here and it’s made me really uncomfortable.

“Think companies should prioritise long term customers who pay yearly upfront (like us). Been with Asda paying this way for the last 3 years.

Pissed off that I’m fighting for slots with Johnny come lately all of a sudden & will be emailing them to say so. One typical weekly shop, that’s all I need, I’m not asking a lot and ordering 300x dried pasta every other day like all the loons”

Shit like this ^^ makes me rage.

Oh bloody hell. I’m worried now as I can’t drive as I have epilepsy and totally rely on home delivery.

My Tesco order came today. A third of it was out of stock and I had a huge number of substitutions. There are no available slots now til April 3. I had one booked for payday and as soon as today's arrived I've booked a slot for the following week.

It's just madness

I am self isolating because of health issues. I also have mobility problems. I shop online weekly, and have a pass paid in advance, but my local Sainsbury do not have any delivery slots available for the next three weeks. Even if I took the risk and got a taxi to and from the supermarket I would not be able to carry the shopping the considerable distance from the car park to my front door.
If people would not panic and stop being greedy there would be enough to go round. The nation survived food shortages during the war. And no I am not old enough to remember.

If people would not panic and stop being greedy there would be enough to go round.

Yes, that’s the infuriating thing.

We are self isolating due to having symptoms and have a Tesco delivery due tomorrow (booked last week before things kicked off). It is a large shop as we are at the start of 14 days isolation period and we also have allergies to consider. If most things don't arrive I'm not sure what we will do, I have some things put aside but certainly not for the full duration we need to be at home.

Hi everyone just tried to speed read through this thread. I work in retail, have done for many years, head office buying positions and now in strategy. Worked at Ocado, Tesco JS & Waitrose
Just to clear a few things up:
*All Ocado deliveries are picked from a depot not in a shop
*If you live in London, whichever the retailer, your shopping is most likely picked from a depot
*You usually get better availability of products when they are picked from a depot as you know the orders and you know the stock coming in.

From a retail perspective, what is happening at the moment is absolutely insane and genuinely there is no precedent to plan around. Retailers are selling more now than at Christmas. Panic buying in stores is being replicated online. Servers just cannot cope with the huge demand which is why they have broken. Stock replenishment is harder to plan as people's buying patterns have totally changed, suppliers are already at capacity. It's a perfect storm.

The really sad thing is that if people just bought normally, there would be enough for everyone. Please, please remember this when you go shopping

I do think specific times for over 60s first thing is great. I tend to go out with DS who is immunosuppressed early to avoid the masses, just when we need fresh milk or bread (plenty here of those at the moment thankfully, when stocks reduce we would just buy very occasionally) as no one else can go for us; it would mean we wouldn't really have the chance to go.

Mine arrived today.

Yep, our entire online Waitrose shop- booked a week ago- was cancelled this evening, 2 hours before it was due to be delivered. Email said due to sick driver.

My wine delivery site is no longer delivering...
Lordfrontpaw made me 🙂 not being flippant, just trying to lighten the mood. We had our wine delivery from Aldi today 🍷
Have booked a grocery delivery for 1st April - what could possibly go wrong!

Just to offer some hope to people, my Tesco shop was delivered this afternoon and I had no missing items or subs.

I guess that this is very much location dependent, I’m in the Midlands.

Plenty of cat litter in our local Pets At Home this afternoon

If anyone is near any asian food stores they are worth checking for essentials like cooking oil, rice, lentils etc. The queues are often shorter and when I went to my local ones they had more stock than the bigger stores.