Steve Windebank

Appalling Customer Service and Delivery Service - Avoid this company!

I ordered a range cooker. Was given the delivery date and was sent several reminders of this confirmed date and told to be in all day otherwise I would incur a charge with any subsequent requirement to delivery. The day before, as advertised, I was given a time slot of between 1600-1800. At 1805 on the delivery date I was sent an automated email to say they would not be delivering my range cooker. As I had also paid for removal, (I would have paid for installation but not available in my area (Cornwall)), I had no option but to comply with Markselectrical delivery instructions which insisted that I have the gas and electrical connections disconnected and the cooker moved from its installation, prior to the delivery driver arriving. All of which I did, on the day and only once I had final confirmation and a confirmed time slot for delivery. This cost me an electrician and gas engineer call out fee to undertake this work on the afternoon of the confirmed delivery.
When I subsequently tried to call Marks to query the automated “not delivered’ message, they were closed! When I tried to ring the following day to find out what had happened with my delivery, I was told that due to traffic they couldn’t get to me! They also were not able to provide any forecast for a delivery on subsequent days. I also discovered that my cooker was back in their warehouse in Leicester, over 5 hours away! I therefore believe the delivery team took one look at the delivery address and decided not to drive all the way to Cornwall but no one had the courtesy to ring me in good time to either reschedule or tell me not to go ahead with the disconnection of my old cooker. All of which cost me a considerable amount of costs including having to take a whole day off work as, despite their confirmed delivery slot, they still state that you have to be available all day! Please be very wary of the customer service provision and especially of the delivery team which lack any professionalism. I would add that to send an appliance from Leicester (depot) to Cornwall (my address) is about a 12 hour round trip therefore undertaking any other deliveries on the same day or not providing overnight Accomodation for their drivers somewhere , is always going to run into the issue of driver legal daily driving limitations and should have been addressed in the driver scheduling. Not rocket science!

Follow up response. Having complained to Markselectrical about this issue and laid out all the cost and inconveniences of not having a cooker for numerous days; their response was pretty much….Tough! Their T&Cs say that in the event of ‘extraordinary circumstance’ they may not be able to deliver in the time slot provided. In my case they said that due to traffic the driver couldn’t get to me, however he was able to get the cooker back to his depot in Leicester. Had they had the flexibility to schedule and authorise overnight stays for the driver, a reasonable assumption for a delivery of this duration, then I could have received the appliance the next day. Markselectrical offered nothing in response to my complaint and did not even accept any responsibility. They simply quoted T&Cs and said there is nothing they could do. When I subsequently asked to have it re delivered, 10 days later, with an assurance of prioritising my delivery address to ensure this same problem wouldn’t happen again they said they couldn’t do that.
I reiterate my initial statement… appalling customer service… avoid this company.

I need to amend my previous review as the customer service, although initial great, is now appalling. I left positive feedback, freely on my first purchase couple of purchases and, as a loyal customer, I was offered a ‘free’ subsequent bottle of cologne if I tried an alternative fragrance and left a positive review. I decided that given my previous interactions, that this agreement of a full refund for the subsequent order, would be honoured. However, after I had completed all the requirements to meet the full refund, Alt subsequently ignored all of my emails. I then reached out, numerous times to enquire about my refund but all emails were ignored despite their previous rapid communications. This ‘offer’ of a ‘thank you’ purchase is clearly a scam by Alt and I feel very let down by the way they have treated me and as a result of this break in trust, I will never buy from them again. Additionally, and unbeknownst to me at the time, when I made this order there through Amazon I assumed that any issue would be covered by Amazon’s return policy. Imagine my surprise then when I didn’t get a response to all my emails and went to Amazon intending to return the item I was informed that the Alt.Fragrance items CANNOT be returned and you cannot get a refund. Also there is no way of contacting Alt other than through email which they refuse to respond to!!! I am therefore stuck with a cologne I didn’t want or need, accepted only because I thought the cost would be refunded and paid over the odds for! Please don’t make the same mistake as me and avoid this dishonest company! Also don’t trust their reviews as they incentivise customers to left positive reviews and then scam them and refuse to communicate. Avoid, Avoid!!

Finnair provided me with boarding passes for a trip from Crete - Helsinki - JFK New York and On to Norfolk Virginia. I was boarded onto the flight to Helsinki however when I went to boarding gate for subsequent flight to JFK i was told that there had been a problem with my ticket, booked through the United States Defense Booking Service, and i should not have been granted boarding in Crete. there was no way to resolve this at the boarding gate and so i was forced to stay in Helsinki and incur hotel costs and a 24 hour delay to my flight while the ticket issue was resolved. FINNAIR refused to accept any responsibility for their mistake and would not compensate me for my hotel costs or my lost travel time. As FINNAIR are not part of any EU or worldwide Airline Dispute Resolution (ADR) service the options to challenge their unwillingness to accept responsibility would only be possible through Finnish courts which is not practicable. the review status of FINNAIR, on this site, speaks volumes about how appalling FINNAIR's service and subsequent customer service is. I was also shocked they were not part of an ADR however given how poor their service is, maybe this shouldn't surprise anyone. Please avoid this airline at all costs.

Terrible customer service. Avoid! I tried to cancel my eSIM as not compatible with phone immediately after purchase! Told refund would take up to two weeks to be repaid. Waited the full two weeks but heard nothing. Reached out to their complaints team and told to wait online /whatsapp for 2 hours to speak to someone who could actually deal with the refund. No one has the time to wait around for two ours online in the hope of getting a refund for a relatively small amount. The fact that you have to wait so long to get a customer service rep I suggests how busy their customer service team is! In which you don’t want to be another customer waiting around to be supported. Go somewhere else… there are many other, better providers!

Terrible customer service. I will never order again from Saks again. They sent my item to the wrong address. Then took forever to refund but only sent a partial refund. They didn’t pay for the postage or tax charges which were both considerable. I complained in writing 3 times and never had a response. Went on the online chat twice and each time they timed me out. Finally got through on the phone and after about 40 mins they eventually agreed to the postage and tax refund but acted like they were doing me a favour! Avoid this company, they charge premium prices for products that are NOT premium quality and their customer service is as far from premium as you can possibly get. It was only when I went on to leave this review that I realised that many others have had the same experience.

Please avoid this company at all costs! Their customer support and workmanship is appalling.
I am a landlord and was contacted by this company to install an AIr Source Heat Pump, solar panels and additional internal wall insulation. I agreed to the work as it was on a beautiful old barn conversion that was relatively expensive for my tenant to heat. The initial correspondence with Ecosmart was all fine however; it was clear when the work commenced, that their ‘subcontracted workmen’ had no interest in the job, lacked basic professional knowledge, accountability or recourse, and everything they installed failed to work correctly. Indeed several weeks after the install, the Air Source Heat Pump still doesn’t work correctly and the customer service input, to rectify this, is almost non-existent!
This company has a dedicated Customer Liaison manager; which I can now see why they need a permanent position in this role! However, his position seems to lack any influence in actually undertaking any rectification work. His role appears to simply be to stall, delay and blame
other areas of the company. In addition to the very poor equipment installation work, the wall insulation requirement meant that almost every wall in the house had to be re-plastered and new skirting boards fitted. Despite written agreement on the type of skirting and redecorative work to be undertaken; the sub-contracted painter arrived and stated he was not allowed to do what had been agreed to. Herein lies one of the most frustrating elements of dealing with this company; it appears that the project managers, customer managers and sub-contractors do not talk to each other, have no regard for what other departments have agreed to and rely on this disjointed approach to ‘fob customers off’. The result is that I have rooms and stairwells with skirtings painted in two different colours, original wood stain and white, which looks ridiculous and as for the quality of the paintwork, to say a child could have done a better job….. Additionally, I also have walls with missing skirtings. Add to all this a heating system that still doesn’t work, an installation that took three times as long as the company stated it would, a tenant that was left with no heat for almost 2 weeks in Winter and a customer liaison manager who is not prepared to honour his written agreements (and won’t elevate the issue to anyone who oversees the entire process); you hopefully get a sense of why I strongly advise you to avoid this company. What is also frustrating is that this work was done under a government grant scheme that my tenant was eligible for and so, as well as all the hassle they have caused my tenant and the long term damage to my property ( don’t get me started on the holes drilled into external walls which were in the wrong place and the stonework cannot be repaired), the value to the tax payers and energy companies who fund this scheme is highly questionable. I am not usually somebody who feels compelled to write a poor review but in this case I really think this company should be exposed for their appalling workmanship and customer service. As I said at the start…please AVOID!!
PS. I will happily amend this review if the company ever resolved these issues or respond to my reasonable requests but, having written over 20 emails detailing my complaints, I have no faith in ever getting a reasonable resolution.

Do not buy from this company! It is a scam and will not provide you with a refund! Avoid!

I came into the truro branch for the first time in a while and I will not be back. The place is filthy and this was at 10am. I never seen a single member of staff clear a table and as for the bathrooms…. I went to another restaurant as they were disgusting.
Won’t be back until they sort their hygiene.

I had a challenging and complex replacement flooring requirement and, from first contact, the Luxury Flooring experts could not have been more helpful or knowledgeable. They led me through the various considerations and helped me choose the most suitable and stylish solution. The completed flooring exceeded my every expectation and I couldn’t be more pleased with the outcome.

I have purchased many items from Carat over the years and always been reasonably happy with the product and service however; this year I feel compelled to warn others of their appalling customer service. I ordered two sets of earring as xmas gifts on the 13 Dec in good time for these to be delivered as xmas presents. There was no indication on the site or in any correspondence that the order was facing stock issues. On the afternoon of the 23rd Dec, having chased the order, I was informed that one of the earring sets would not be delivered until the 17th Jan! Whilst I fully accept that stocks do run out, Carat must realise that an order placed in Mid Dec is likely to be a Xmas present and if stock is an issue they should warn customers or inform them as soon as they know there is an issue in satisfying that order in time. Leaving it until it is too late for someone to source an alternative xmas present (when they have sat on an order for 10 days) is unacceptable customer service. My advice is to stay clear of Carat if you are ordering a gift against an important date. There are many other jewellery providers who are more caring of their customer needs and service. This has spoiled a Xmas present for a very special person and is the last time I will ever use Carat. I would also add that I have seen a sharp increase in complaints against Carat in recent months so I see this as a trend and not a one-off. Be careful.

High percentage of broken tiles . Order had items missing and delivery forecasts were all late. Would not use again. Also courier service was appalling.