Why, why, why Ikea? (to the tune of Delilah, thus lighthearted)

[whiskyowl]

Is there a more miserable experience known to man than ordering a kitchen from Ikea I ask you?

My case, m'luds and m'ladies:

• The Ikea 3D kitchen planner. Clearly a tool invented by a sadist intent on inflicting maximum frustration on the poor, unsuspecting customer. It doesn't work in any single browser, instead parts of it work on Chrome and parts on Firefox. It doesn't work at many times of day, either - instead you have to log on in the wee small hours (or the wee late ones) to get it to process what you are doing.
• The in-store ordering process. This took 3 visits, totalling 6 hours, being told conflicting information from each individual. Eventually we managed to get an appointment with someone competent which reduced the total bill considerably, since the former individual had ordered enough cover panels to clad the inside of a Russian oligarch's yacht.
• The process of obtaining 0% credit. We had to wait 3 days for a reply, despite having a perfect credit score. By this time, all the pre-Christmas delivery slots had gone, meaning we couldn't have the kitchen until the new year. This was in mid November.
• The process of delivery: they only managed to deliver half of our kitchen - the utility room - between Xmas and new year. No proper explanation given, the other half is AWOL, assumed lost in battle.
• The delay for subsequent delivery on the kitchen was 10 days. 10 DAYS! This means that all the time we had booked off work to put the cupboards together was useless, and we'll now have to pay the builder to do this. We both work in institutions with a term that necessitates us being there, so we can't just book different days off.
• Not only that, but a couple of cover panels are delayed 6 WEEKS! They won't be with us until late January. Templating for worktops can't really happen until these are here, since they are right next to the quartz. So that means the whole kitchen is also delayed.

We don't have a kitchen in place, we haven't had one since October because of building work. We've just had Christmas eating only food we can cook in the instant pot and MIL's awful roast, which was barely large enough to feed a church mouse. I am thoroughly fed up with both readymade pasta and with Ikea. I want to give them a good, hard kick in the Swedish meatballs.

Oh Whisky, what a saga! I am sorry you have received such rubbish customer service!

DIY Kitchens? Your post is sadly what puts me off Ikea.

I am sorry to hear you've had such a terrible experience!

We have just bought our IKEA kitchen and my experience could not have been any better. They've been fantastic in every step of the way. It is shocking to hear that it seems like a lottery whether you get good service or not. I do hope everything is sorted out for you.

Best of luck.

We had the old Faktum kitchen 4 years ago, and although the online planner was slow and kept doing odd things at times, it worked out fine in the end.

The ordering was quick and easy. Staff were helpful and competent. We were missing 3 items when they delivered but those items were with us within 3 days but then we are literally a few miles from an Ikea.

My kitchen is beautiful, I still love it and it looks amazing.

Re cooking, we ordered a cheap as chips Andrew James 2 ring induction hob off Amazon as ours was a kitchen extension meaning we were without a kitchen for a while. It also helped sway us over to an induction hob for the kitchen. No regrets.

I am sorry you have had issues, but just think how amazing it will look when it is done. This was the only sentence that kept me sane through the building works.

Sorry to hear this. I could not have been happier with mine. The planner was not great- it had a couple of tantrums which necessitated a trip to Ikea tocuse it in store but once we had that, the ordering was so simple. He had to ring as the computer said no to finance but that took about 3 minutes. It was delivered 4 days later with 3 items missing. They were delivered a week later. Then a panel was damaged in fitting and I realised I had forgotten to order enough end panels. They replaced the panel for free. Delivered it for free and also added my extra panels to the delivery for free (I paid for the panels).
I then decided I wanted another unit and was able to order it (had to go to the store as there was no answer on the phone- turned out there had been a fire alarm issue all day that day so the store downstairs was shut and only showrooms were open) and collect it that same day.
They then refunded on all of the leftover items like plinth which we had miles too much of and cornice which we couldn’t fit in due to a wonky ceiling.
The end result is the bees knees.

When we ordered our kitchen many moons ago, they quite literally delivered everything but the kitchen sink!

well, I can confirm that also having your kitchen FITTED by IKEA raises the experience to a whole new level of misery. We have just had ours done and the whole thing was one of the worst experiences of my life! So many things were messed up it was unbelievable. Never again!

We bought an ikea kitchen, was great, no trouble at all and would highly recommend. You must have just had a bad experience. They are one of the few companies who cater for people with tiny kitchens so a good fit for us.

I have now been to the store 3 times to pick up a variety of pieces that were damaged or missing in action.

My kitchen is coming in 7 separate deliveries, which last from late December to mid February.

Customer support is abysmal. Those on the end of the pohones can do absolutely nothing to help in any way, being without any power to intervene in anything, so all you get is a load of meaningless apologies and assurances that "At IKEA we treat every customer the same, whether they have bought a £5 table or a £500 piece of furniture". The idea that the complexities of a £7k kitchen that comes in 250 pieces might require a bit more support than is required by customers putting up one shelf has passed them by.

They are selling a kitchen - right now - which they know has severe supply problems owing to a lack of plastic bottles in China (it's made from recycled bottles). This has meant a tailback at the factory in Italy that makes the panels. If you have the misfortune to buy the Kungsbacka line, then you will wait months for the pieces to be delivered. Despite this, it's still on sale in store. They know they are dishing out misery to anyone who gets it, but they're still flogging it.