.. And that is no exaggeration.
I ordered a coat for my grandson. The order was canceled, due to the item being sold out. At least that's what they said, even though the item showed available on their website. I chose another coat and attempted to use the 20% discount code they gave me in the email, but the code didn't work. I called customer service and got someone who clearly didn't speak or understand English well. I am not and I have never been one of those people who gets angry about someone with a foreign accent. As long as they can understand what I'm saying and communicate well, I don't care. However, that was not the case and my nightmare began.
This all started at 9 AM. I made nine calls between 9 AM and 1 AM and still didn't have an order placed with a discount applied and expedited shipping, which I was willing to pay for. My orders kept getting canceled due to "problems with my billing address". I was shipping the items to my grandson in Tulsa and my billing address is in Florida. For some reason, this was an impossible concept. I'm sure it happens every day, but they could not comprehend that I had a separate billing address than the ship to. Remember, I tried to place this order myself online, but could not because I could not get the discount code applied. And to add insult to injury, my orders kept getting canceled because the non-English speakers could not enter my address correctly. Every time I hung up thinking the problem was solved in my order was placed, I would get an email telling me that the order had been canceled, due to inconsistencies with my billing address. I literally had my order placed and canceled six times.
Exasperated, at 1 AM I finally decided to send an email. I explained my problem in great detail, only to get a very condescending message back saying that they had added the items back to my cart and I could place the order, as long as I was careful to be sure I input my address correctly. Once again, they had not applied my discount. I wrote back explaining how incredibly frustrated I was and saying that I would gladly replace the order once they applied my discount, which was the problem from the beginning, if only they had cared to read the history. I added that any issues with my address being input correctly was on their end. Over and over and over and over again. To my complete shock and amazement, I got an email telling me that I could not order online, but I was welcome to visit a store.
I'm an intelligent woman. I'm a business owner. And I even managed a call center for Spiegel catalog for four years. I'm an excellent communicator and I did everything humanly possible to get this problem solved. In 58 years of life, I have never encountered such a frustrating, insulting, and impossible customer service experience.
I now have a call in for a callback from a supervisor, because as usual, none were available. As I write this to you today I am more than 16 hours in and my problem is still not solved.