Go Outdoors

[Vickyjs]

A cautionary tale…
We've just spent nearly a month trying to buy some tents from GoOutdoors 'Group Buy' department, the value of the order was £1000+. The customer service is unbelievably bad, and that is when there is actually someone there to deal with your order, mostly they are 'in meetings' - the leader dealing with the order for our group (who is normally very calm and can negotiate her way through all most anything) was literally reduced to tears after weeks of dealing with their customer service people by phone and email.

Getting a quote was difficult and slow, they quoted for the wrong tents and at one point accidently quoted the cost price of the tents and then retracted that - of course.

Eventually they cobbled together an order of tents of different colours when we'd ordered identical tents.
Then the day they told us the tents would finally be available for us to collect in store, we found out that they were actually still in a warehouse somewhere.

The guy on the phone just laughed when he was asked what tents were our Guides going to sleep in this weekend because they had let us down again by not supplying what we had ordered! (they were quite happy to take the money though)

The delivery man that finally arrived with the tents admitted that problems with 'Group Buy' orders were not uncommon.

So… we just wanted to warn you that their prices are low and you can get a bulk buy discount of up to 15% BUT prob. easier to just buy what is on the shelf in the shop and don't get involved in 'deals' unless you are VERY patient, tolerant and determined!

In an attempt to be fair - I'm sure they must have satisfied customers, but just be very wary - we won't be dealing with them again regardless of price!
Vicky

 

[udamiano]

Ive also come across the lacklustre, couldn't be bothered corporate part of this company. My advice move on, there are plenty of companies out there that offer much better prices and services. and are interested in their customers.

My advice, walk away.

 

[Ivan...]

Hi Vicky its Ivan , you remember the chap that bought all your stuff ! Let me know by PM if you have not had your issues resolved , because i have ways and means to shake this motley crew up , were you dealing with a chap in Exeter ? And i presume it was for your guide group where i visited you ?

Hope you are well , other than this episode .

Ivan...

 

[Vickyjs]

Hi Ivan, how are you, yes we got the tents yesterday thank goodness!!! They still owe us a bit of a refund (one tent free as more compensation so not quite finished with yet) they were delivered by a member of staff from the Plymouth store who said they had even let the Royal Navy down - they'd placed an order for 300 of something and been really messed around.

They had seven tents in plymouth (instead of 10) and we (not them) phoned around and found that they had 4 more in Exeter so they eventually had a member of staff drive around and sort it out. Ann was in pieces though, really upset, I haven't seen her in such a state for a long time - she is normally really good at negotiating and could sell snow to eskimos but go outdoors found her limit!!

Yes the tents were for Guides
We've got some blue nylon 5 person vango's (Idaho's I think) to sell on now but they aren't really your thing (I don't think) as we are still downsizing! (and some elsan toilets!)

Guides is going really well, we're on track to find land for our new hut now (just about sold our other bit of land), our unit is full as usual and really busy, we'll come look at your place sometime. We're also doing forest school now so life is really busy. Hope things are going well for you also. Nice to hear from you.
Vicky

 

[mountainm]

Get social - "next time" voice your concerns on twitter. They are very active on twitter and will not like the negative publicity, therefore I suspect they will be a little more proactive in helping. Especially if you can get other people with similar experiences to retweet.

 

[swright81076]

I second that about twitter. I've voiced my displeasure at 2 separate companies following very poor service and on both occasions the problems were sorted out. One of which went above and beyond (must have a dedicated web relations team). I ended up with about £200 of freebies

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

[oldtimer]

Bad luck! Our Oxford branch staff are always very helpful and efficient.

 

[Ivan...]

Hi Vicky, sorry to hear of your hassles , well it must have been very frustrating, although i only met Ann briefly , she is a strong character ! sounds like they are on their way to redeeming themselves .

You are right about the vangos , but they should sell, in all fairness give them a couple of weeks to put it right , if then no joy give me a shout ,and i will reduce some of them to tears !

Sounds like the rest of it is slowly coming together nicely, hope to see the girls one day .

Atb

Ivan...

 

[Scots_Charles_River]

Sounds poor right enough. Although I have had great service as a buyer personally and for school. I bought a Softshell jacket a few weeks ago, on offer at £22. So I -reserved and collect- online but never got to the shop for three days. However they still gave me one at the offer price, which was £50 off !

I spent over a £1000 on climbing kit and what they could not supply as per the quote they gave us better models ! They also delivered free.

 

[Vickyjs]

An update to my 'tale of woe' with Go Outdoors!!
We used 6 of the tents straight after we got them and were pleased - they were what we wanted.
Then, this weekend we used the last 4. When we opened one tent it was obviously used - the outer was dirty and there was a big tear in it. The alloy poles were bent and the metal eyelets that the pegs/poles go through on the bottom of the tent were dirty and misshapen, the pole bag was also missing and the poles were wrapped in a tesco carrier bag. (ie. it was not just used but VERY used) The outer bag was very clean looking and was identical to the others - no sign of wear. We had to have someone drive out to camp at night with a replacement tent.

One of the other tents had a manufacturing fault so that will need to be changed as well - not the fault of Go Outdoors, just Vango quality control.

So now we have to start trying to deal with them all over again to get these two tents replaced!!

Tuesday Evening: One of our leaders drove to Exeter with her husband, we knew they had 2 tents in stock and demanded replacments which were eventually given, with a £20 voucher. Hopefully we are finished with the whole sorry business now.