Why 1-800-Flowers will always (from now on) get my US business

[debgeisler]

This is the last time I ever buy from Teleflora. Ever.

I decided to order flowers for Mom for Mother's Day from them because they offered a specific combination of flowers that I wanted to send Mom. But unlike most people who order from floral services, I was at Mom's home when the arragement arrived.

(1) They screwed up the order. It did not contain premium flowers for which I'd paid a premium price. Cymbidium orchids do not look like Gerber daisies.
(2) I called Teleflora. Their way of repairing the screw-up would have been to send someone to take the first arrangement away that day...and then bring a *new* arrangement two days later. Um, no. Offer number 2 was to give me 30% off of a *future* order. Um, no. Eventually, we negotiated 20% off of the current order, to be applied within 3-5 business days.
(3) Today is past 3-5 business days, and no discount was applied to my credit card. Telephone Teleflora a second time to get this fixed.
(4) I was on hold for ~14 minutes total (~8 after they answered; I'd been warned there was a delay, so I only count that 8 or so) while they "investigated" this issue today. And they have the most hideous waiting system and music in the known universe...probably to convince callers to hang up.
(5) Now, I have been told that the first person did not "completely process this refund," that it will be taken care of *this* time, and that I will receive the refund within 3-5 business days.

Do I believe them this time? I do not. Do I believe that they assume people will not double-check? I do.

The woman from the call center whose English was *not* good sent me email that read

"This is to confirm a credit of $xx.xx has been applied to this
order. You will either see this as a credit on your next billing
statement or be billed the lesser amount."

No, dearie. I was told "within 3-5 business days" a second time, not in my "next billing statement." And if I do not receive this credit within 3-5 business days this time, I will have my credit card company flag this for non-payment. Because I am peeved that you did not deliver orchids to my mother - a flower that should have been in that bouquet and was the sole purpose for my purchasing *that* bouquet.

And Teleflora? Never again. You are not a professional organization. I don't do business with non-professionals.

Comments

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

It is really frustrating when something that should be simple gets messed up badly. I've had several bad experiences with online florists. Have you found that 1-800 is better?

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

The best thing to do is to call a florist local to whoever you're sending the flowers to (Google is your friend here if you don't know of one) and talk to someone on the ground who can actually tell you whether the flowers you want are available in the area you want them sent to. The national companies don't keep track of what's available at every single florist they franchise with, and substitutions are a regular occurrence when you use them. It's just part of the deal.

I call a florist in the east Texas town where my mother lives directly when I send her flowers, and I've always had good service, as well as honesty when I've seen something I like on their website (or on the website of one of the national companies that they franchise for) and it isn't available.