Bad Adorama Experience.

651stp · Nov 9, 2012

Just wanted to share my exp. that i had placing an order with adorama.

I called Adorama on the 5th of Nov. to check if they are back in business after the horrible hurricane. The lady that i talked to assured me that everything is back to normal and items are in stock and are shipping the same day again. Well i was glad to hear that because i needed a few things for an upcoming shoot. I went ahead and ordered about 6 items and placed them all on next day air shipping. Well it is to my surprise that even though i ordered on Nov. 6th my order is still pending today considering what the customer service lady said. I talked to her a day prior to me calling in today and she said "i promise this order will ship out today and i promise you will get your items on Friday the Nov 9th." , i said sure no problem even though its late, ok. I received an email today from the Warehouse department explaining that due to the hurricane they have major delays and the couriers aren't even shipping at times which is what i had expected in the first place. The problem here is, im not upset i didnt get my items yet, im upset that the customer service obviously has no idea whats going on in the warehouse department and are just feeding lies to customers. /endrant

manicmike · Nov 9, 2012

It's not necessarily that they're lying. More often than not there is no communication from one department to the next. At least that's my experience from working in retail.

ceejtank · Nov 9, 2012

I disagree. If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.

pixmedic · Nov 9, 2012

the customer only knows what the sales staff tells them. so its important for the sales people to know whats going on. whether they call the warehouse, or the warehouse calls the store when there are issues. when a customer places an order and is assured it will ship on time, you should be able to assume its accurate. poor form on the stores part. no matter which end the fault lies on, its the customer that pays the price. not to mention he paid for next day air, which he obviously didnt get. I would be interested in seeing how Adorama handles this. we usually order from KeH. ive heard a few issues lately concerning Adorama, which has kept us from placing any pricier orders with them.

2WheelPhoto · Nov 9, 2012

99.9% of the time Adorama and BHPHOTO are beyond great. Let's allow a few human mistakes for .1 per cent of the time?

I mean let's asume you dealt with bestbuy....nevermind I wouldn't curse you like that LoL

unpopular · Nov 9, 2012

OP is kinda derp.

manicmike · Nov 9, 2012

ceejtank said:
I disagree. If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.

How do you disagree? You just validated my point by saying they should communicate.

2WheelPhoto · Nov 9, 2012

unpopular said:
OP is kinda derp.

+1.

Hurricane Sandy tears through America, a little miscommunication is to be expected.

Overread · Nov 9, 2012

It could well be that, at the time of your call, there were no problems what so ever being reported to the Adorama rep. However after your call further information or new events might have arisen outside of the normal scope of operations which has resulted in the increased delays.

Generally a major retailer like Adorama gets it right more times than not, but sometimes things go wrong. In a situation like this there are a lot of things that might go wrong or that might simply slow down - the courier companies might be operating understaffed/facilitated and might even just be having increased bulk orders overwhelming their services.

Sadly disasters like this tend to put everything into a bit of a chaotic situation, even for the big companies.

MLeeK · Nov 9, 2012

This would be my GUESS based on what you said:
ADORAMA is back up and running in fine fashion, however somewhere in there you said that the couriers aren't even shipping at times... Totally out of Adorama's control.
I am sure our resident Adorama rep will pop in sooner or later to let you know for sure.

mjhoward · Nov 9, 2012

unpopular said:
OP is kinda derp.

PlanetStarbucks · Nov 9, 2012

Eh...use the mix up to get yourself free shipping on your next few orders. I know this has been a PITA, but I (speaking personally) wouldn't stop ordering from them after all the years of otherwise good experiences I've had.

651stp · Nov 10, 2012

ceejtank said:
I disagree. If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.

Exactly, when a question like that is asked and its answered by "i promise" you'd probably think that they did call and check. "i'll monitor your order to make sure its shipped", yeah right.

pixmedic said:
the customer only knows what the sales staff tells them. so its important for the sales people to know whats going on. whether they call the warehouse, or the warehouse calls the store when there are issues. when a customer places an order and is assured it will ship on time, you should be able to assume its accurate. poor form on the stores part. no matter which end the fault lies on, its the customer that pays the price. not to mention he paid for next day air, which he obviously didnt get. I would be interested in seeing how Adorama handles this. we usually order from KeH. ive heard a few issues lately concerning Adorama, which has kept us from placing any pricier orders with them.

Adorama DIDNT handle it at all. They just said want a refund? i was like, wow... and yes, this was a pricey order.

Overread said:
It could well be that, at the time of your call, there were no problems what so ever being reported to the Adorama rep. However after your call further information or new events might have arisen outside of the normal scope of operations which has resulted in the increased delays.

Generally a major retailer like Adorama gets it right more times than not, but sometimes things go wrong. In a situation like this there are a lot of things that might go wrong or that might simply slow down - the courier companies might be operating understaffed/facilitated and might even just be having increased bulk orders overwhelming their services.

Sadly disasters like this tend to put everything into a bit of a chaotic situation, even for the big companies.

i called on seperate occasions that i didnt explain in the OP to save reading time. Every time i called they guaranteed everything to be a green light. About the courier thing, i believe that wasn't the issue and let me explain. If you've order from Adorama before they tell you what pending means, heres the example:
Pending - order has been submitted and is being imported to our database
On Hold - order is being verified or has payment issues
Ready - order is ready to be processed
Picked - order is currently being picked in the shipping department
Invoiced - order has been finalized and ready to be packed
Shipped - order has been shipped and is in transit
Backorder - one or more of the items in your order are out of stock; we are waiting for the item(s) to become available
Canceled - the order is canceled.

As you can see, for 3 days my order wasnt even in the Ready categorie yet, therefore they havent even processed it yet.
Im sure they get orders right, but im just stating that in this case, they were terribly wrong all things considered.

PlanetStarbucks said:
Eh...use the mix up to get yourself free shipping on your next few orders. I know this has been a PITA, but I (speaking personally) wouldn't stop ordering from them after all the years of otherwise good experiences I've had.

That wont happen, the only thing the lady said to me was "want a refund?" the end. and i said gimme my money back.