No shows: Currys dearth

No, nothing here about the writers strike in the USA. But a gripe about the tripe service from Curry's, subsidiary of DSGi.

Before Christmas this particular item was on sale for £299. After Christmas and in the new year sales, it was again on sale for the whopping amount of... £299!

So deciding this particular bit of metal wasn't going to come down in price, anytime soon, the purchase was made. Expecting two weeks delivery, we (flatmate and myself) were very surprised when a slot was available just five days away. So a great big YES was said to that.

Oh and then - not to forget - the extra added value of a £20 delivery charge on top; after the transaction had been put through. And a firm NO, to the extra insurance protection plan!

...

Five days came and went. The morning before anticipated delivery, we called the number on the receipt to find out whether everything was on schedule. This turned out to be deceptively good. An automated service which located the order and the associated special delivery instructions and time. Delivery, 2.15pm to 6.15pm. Very precise. Let's just see if it lives up to the billing!

...

Delivery day arrives and quickly speeds around to 2pm.

6.15pm comes and goes. No delivery!

6.30pm Dispatch service is called. And there is nothing on the system that indicates that the delivery has been cancelled suspended, or even running late. Even they are quite surprised, that we haven't heard from the driver.

6.52pm receive a call from the drivers assistant, saying they'll be arriving in 5-10 minutes.

7.03pm get a call from the driver. He has finally parked up (150 metres away) and we'll have to go and collect it!

So as the driver argues with his assistant saying he doesn't want to get a £120 fine by parking on a double red line - which would be taken out of his wages and that was more than he earned in a day - we told him that the bay outside of the flat was a single red line, with a sign specifying 'no parking 7am-7pm'. And since he was already 50 minutes late and it was now 7.06pm, there was no fear of him been ticketed by a warder, unless he was still there at 7am.

But no, he was going to drive away, or drop it off in the street; after we'd been waiting in all day - afternoon - for delivery. Leaving us to carry it - a full sized cooker - 150 meters!

Eventually they take it out of the lorry and wheel it to the pavement by the roadside. Still leaving us to deliver it, the rest of the way in.

So once more, Curry's! First place for Rubbish customer service in store. First place for Rubbish delivery service out of store. The only saving grace at this time, is the appliance doesn't appear to have any dents. Whether it works as expected, we will find out tomorrow. When it gets installed.