Thumbs Down

A week or so ago, someone posted a link for an Israeli company selling 'quality childrenswear delivered to your door'.

The clothing looked promising, the prices affordable and well, 'delivered to your door'! Plus they were advertising a special - order before Pesach and it's 10% off orders of 300NIS or more.

I posted a link to the catalogue in my own FB and posted to the Ariel Yahoo group, asking if anyone would be interested in ordering. Figure we'd make it to the 300NIS for the discount. Plus, according to the literature, delivery was free for orders over 400NIS. (They advertise 18NIS for deliveries in Jerusalem and 28NIS 'outside Jerusalem').

I got two responses. All total, the bill was just under 650NIS. I called it in and the saleswoman was very nice and helpful. A couple things weren't in stock so I made a couple calls, made some adjustments and the order was finalized. She said she (or someone else) would get back to me with regard to just when delivery would happen.

The next day I get a call, I think it was one of the owners. There was going to be a problem with delivery. Their driver (I later found out it's the owner's husband) felt that our order wasn't really worth his time to come out to us (we're about an hour from Jerusalem. Door-to-door, it would have taken him 90 minutes each way).

The woman made some suggestions.

1. Send it by mail. Yeah except with Israeli post, it could take 2 days or 12 days or they could go on strike tomorrow. Plus they were only willing to pay up to a certain amount on postage. We'd have to cover the rest of the cost.

2. Have someone pick it up from them in Givat Shaul. Um... it's a couple days before Pesach, no one making an order has a car and there aren't very many people with a car who work in Jerusalem (that we know and could call) who would be willing to schlep to Givat Shaul.

3. Cancel the order.That was definitely a possibility... and was looking more and more likely.

4. Find someone in Jerusalem they could deliver it to who could bring it to Ariel.

There's one person I thought of who works in Ein Kerem (we'll call her Y). So I called her up and she was willing to have them deliver it to her. I gave her the number so she could call them and arrange with the driver the logistics of getting the stuff. Basically she told them he should call ONE HOUR before he was due to arrive so she could finish her labwork for a few minutes and meet him by her car in the massive parking lot. Plus she made her own order.

In the meantime one of the other women who had gone in on the order called them to complain. I mean really... if you're going to advertise delivery 'outside Jerusalem' with no caveats, then you need to expect people to call you an hour or three outside Jerusalem who expect to get what you're advertising. The woman said that if we could get '10 orders', we could have the delivery (although I'm not sure if they expect us to pay the 28NIS or we'd get it for free). Like the way she planned her advertisement, I think she was just pulling figures and suggestions out of the air without thinking things through because '10 orders' could be as little the 650NIS they refuse to deliver for, or it could be 2000NIS (which I think was what they were aiming for).

Anyway, we now have someone in Jerusalem for them to deliver to and you'd think the saga would be over.

Uh no.

First, the guy called Y FIFTEEN MINUTES from delivery time. Then he had the nerve to say we had to pay delivery fee. AND he was charging us the 'outside Jerusalem' fee (and he argued with Y about this).

First of all, Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital/Campus is IN JERUSALEM. And second of all, it's a 20 minute drive through the Jerusalem forest from their offices to the hospital. It's not our fault the guy decided to make our order the last delivery of the day.

In the end, they didn't charge us anything... but it meant yet another call to their offices.

And now for the order itself... um... one thing was missing (and we were charged for it), another item (which someone ordered 3 of) was out of stock and no one called me to let me know and they incorrectly wrote the quantity on another item so we got 1 instead of 2 (and were only charged for 1).

With all this hassle, I'm not sure if any of us will be ordering from this company any time soon.

In addition, this whole thing was very 'small picture' for the company. The first order was 'only' 650NIS... but if they had given us good customer service the next one could very likely have been 2000NIS. Now... I'm not so sure they'll even get another 650NIS worth of orders from us again.


(If anyone in Israel wants to know which company it is, PM me and I'll tell you. You can decide whether or not you want to give them your custom, or in the very least you'll know some very specific questions to ask them regarding their delivery policy).