Ocado suddenly gone right downhill?

[FattyArbuckel]

My last few orders with Ocado have been full of damaged stuff and items that have gone off well before date.

Before the last few weeks I have been really happy with my deliveries - has anyone else had lots of problems recently?

I am fed up because I have just paid for a year's delivery up front so i feel a bit tied in now.

how much do you pay for a years up front delivery. Seems like loads of people have paid up front and standards have slipped. I was going to give them a whirl as just starting in my area but after Ocado annies waffle i am staying loyal to Tesco who have always been fab and gave me great subs always a brand or 2 higher.

I'm normally a big fan, for their reliable deliveries and very very few substitutions, but am currently sitting here in stinky jeans because I have just unpacked my delivery and the brine from a broken pot of rollmops has just spilt all over me.

How peculiar! I nearly started this very same thread today.

I can't even put my finger on how its gone downhill except that the deliveries are nearly always late or certainly at the end of the delivery time.

The drivers are mainly ok but I am missing the Eastern European drivers, they were incredibly polite. The packaging seems less logical and I'm mighty pissed off that I cant use my John Lewis card anymore.

Can't use your John Lewis card?

What?

Please tell me that's not right! I use mine and get loads of JL vouchers to spend on me essentials

Exactly, and when you get your replacement JL card, Ocado no longer accept it.

I have a Marks and Spencer card which I have got registered as my payment card now so I'm just going to have to food shop at M&S when I get my lovely vouchers through.

Nooooo. That's a disaster.

nannyl Mine's from Leeds too.

OcadoAnnie - From your post I see that you're agreeing the Ocado branded stuff isn't comparable to the Waitrose products. Do you think that there could be an option added somewhere so we could specifically ask for Waitrose stuff not to be substituted with Ocado stuff?

The reason we stopped shopping at our local Sainsburys and switched to Ocado was because the fruit & veg wasn't great quality. If I'm not getting the Waitrose quality veg I may as well go back to Sainsburys where I can wander round the shops and have a coffee too

Obviously the disaster isn't the M&S bit but the John Lewis card bit!

Good idea about the M&S vouchers.

We've also signed up for a deal with our electricity supplier to get M&S points on our bills. I never thought I'd be glad to have huge electricity bills!

ours will be leeds but the other days fiasco was blamed on the 'depot down south' the fruit and veg is normally fine - ocado mixed peppers etc are good.

The ocado hot cross buns were just awful but then my dd works in Bettys now and our tastes have changed !!!!

Waitrose deliver - hmmmmm i did this a couple of times but the salads were all limp and wet - i felt they'd sat on the store shelve for twelve hours before being shipped

The lack of substitutions is what shifted me from sainsburys .... ocado ( up until the very recent past) has actually been a pleasure

oh and these are worth any delivery fee !!!

AnnieOcado - We are not denying that Ocado is the best of a bad job What we are saying is that standards are slipping and that needs addressing - rather than just focusing on the positives.

Am not sure it is even the best of a bad job tbh - I am getting a lot of rotten food - I want out but have bought a year's free deliveries!

Don't ever buy the Waitrose or Ocado apples.

They are always bashed and covered in bruises. I think they play keepy uppy with them in the warehouse. All the feedback reflects this now and I reordered (hope over expectation and all that) and they were even worse than ever.

Totally agree with NotaMopsa. Sort out and deal with negatives Ocado. I couldn't give a stuff about the future plans. I just want the old service and quality back, not smashed jars, split milk cartons, smashed up fruit and missing items. And I certainly shouldn't have to chase a refund 3 times.

Not too many complaints here, on the whole they are very good, although the bananas are bloody awful. The machines that pack your bags need to be programmed not to put salad and other squishy things underneath heavy things though.

Customer services contacted me at the start of the year to say that my Ocado pass would rise from £59.99 per year to £109.99 per year. Unsurprisingly I told them to bugger off.

I then had an email back saying 'ooo well would you like it for £3.99 and pay month instead then'? I know I should be pleased that they changed their minds and knocked £60 off the proposed price but actually I feel irritated that they tried to seriously rip me off in the first place.

Well I got ripped off

Fatty - i always think about the pass- just cancel the standing order??? I did not sign anything so if i pull out what can they do?

Mine is Leeds as well, if that helps to pinpoint a problem.

We keep getting the same substitution of something DH orders, even though the website says it's available. Very annoying. But nothing as bad as all this smashed stuff, that's crazy.

this thread has made me place an order.....

NotaMopsa - can I sell you a car?? It's a bit rusty and only goes uphill on Tuesdays.

Oh, and there's the mould.

...and it might be haunted.

It's up on bricks.

Mine can't be coming from Leeds, or Tamworth because I'm in Hampshire.

Barbara - if you shop with Waitrose Deliver you can get 2kg of beautiful Cox's apples delivered for the price of one bag of 5/6 bruised apples. No bruises and they are keeping out of the fridge for 2 weeks.

Fatty - just ring up and cancel, it's what I did. I got a refund for the month I cancelled in because I hadn't had a delivery, so you ought to get a refund on all your unused months.
I found it quite telling that no-one was interested in why I was cancelling, even though I now get almost daily e-mails with offers and adverts from Ocado.

I agree - Annie it is all very well coming and spouting a load of marketing spiel about how things are going to improve, blah blah. The point is, that lots of us were very happy with Ocado. The packing was always good, and I had no substitutions for the first year that I shopped with you. What has gone wrong? Why have the standards slipped so very badly?
I take your point that people are more interested in value for money than ever, but the reason that a vast proportion of people shop with Ocado is that they like the good quality - and therefore good value - of Waitrose groceries. Getting substituted items of an inferior brand, is not what I signed up for. It would be a good thing if a customer could chose to opt out of Ocado branded substitutes, and skip the 'why don't you swap your lovely mature cheddar for this cheap mild version that tastes of nothing and save 3p per kilo' page. Cheap doesn't equal good value, and it is beyond infuriating to have to go out to another supermarket and buy replacement items for either substitutes that you don't want to accept, or items which are damaged in some way.

Please could you actually address some of the concerns that we have all raised, rather than just giving us an answer that the PR dept. have framed?

what Ali said

Hmph follyfoot- I had same thing (annual pass increase) so I cancelled, but I got no lower offer grrr.

delivery charge was an eye watering 6.99 for a single delivery last tim,e I placed an order

No problems with quality though.

Yep what Ali said!

Wherever my orders are coming from are fine. "m not sure how I tell where they come from but I've had no late deliveries, no substitutions, no damaged stuff and nothing going off. The problems clearly aren't everywhere.

I have paid a £109.99 one-off annual fee in advance, so am unable to cancel a monthly direct debit iyswim

I find Ocado customer services to be less helpful than Tesco and this pains me to say as I am naturally prejudiced against Tesco due to its world domination.

So OcadoAnnie, tell us what has changed? My previously huge stock of goodwill to Ocado has all run out. Agree with other posters that Ocado doesn't seem to care a jot about the loss of previously loyal and satisfied customers. I'm just glad I don't have Ocado shares.