Are you thinking of buying furniture from Lifestyle's very own Home Center? Don't!
I could write stories about their inefficiency and dead pan looks they give when confounded by their utter stupidity but I'll save it and write a rather small piece of a text which will give you enough sense to steer clear of it.
I ordered a cherry colored High Book Case and on taking the full amount they told me that it'll get delivered in one week.
Fast forward one week to Saturday. I called them to ask whether the delivery is on time. The lady crooned that sorry the stock's empty and it'll get delivered only on Monday. I said Monday we won't be available, it can only happen today or else refund our money. The lady held us on call for 5 minutes, frantic discussions were happening in the background. Finally she said OK to delivery on Saturday itself but it'll happen late in the night. We objected to that but the book case too good to be missed so we grudgingly agreed for a late night delivery.
After probably one hour the lady called back again saying that the walnut book case we ordered ain't available so they can only provide a cherry book case. I shouted back that it was only the cherry colored book case I ordered and not the walnut colored one!! To which she apologized under breath as if she only dropped a spoon.
Come 9 o' clock, no sign of the Lifestyle idiots. I called them up, the call changed umpteen number of hands and finally a guy called Joseph announced that they'll be there in minutes. The minute took half an hour and they came in with the material. But wait! there's enough drama left. Our man incharge didn't bring the drill with him and not that he forgot it, he just though he's gonna punch in all the screws manually within reasonable amount of time. Those idiots!
There were 3 guys, none of them had any frigging idea what they were doing, have you ever seen a monkey with a mirror. These guys were doing all there R&D there with the pieces of the book case. All the boards were pieced together incorrectly, the edge was creaking here and the door was rattling there. Finally after 3 hours they understood that they would need a driller to do the stuff and they apologized for the mistake and said that they'll be back next day with the drill at around 1 0' clock in the afternoon.
Sunday, 1 o' clock. No sign of them.
2 o 'clock, no sign of them still. Angrily I gave them a blasting call. Few numbers were given, few phones changed hands and I was given a time of around 2:30 at which they'll be there at my home.
They came armed with a driller. But again they had no clue as to what they should be doing. They tried completing yesterday's job but were failing miserably. After around 2 hours, I demanded an answer as to why such a simple thing as assembling a case should take so much time, afterall they would have done it plenty of times before but I got a lame excuse that they are staff and not carpenters so they are having difficulty assembling it. That did it. I told them to stop the work and face me. I lambasted them right and left and told them to get a carpenter right away.
I called the Lifestyle store, told them that this and this was the problem and they said that they are gonna send a carpenter right away. After an hour the carpenter came and fixed the whole case within 45 minutes.
Now anybody reading the above should pay heed to following point before buying any furniture from Lifestyle -
Read what order they have noted down in their books especially the color and the item.
Tell them specifically that the time they are saying for delivery is when they should get your goods delivered.
Ask them to send carpenters and not any staff members.
Hold back a little amount from the full payment if possible, or tell them that you are going to write a post dated cheque. Only after full installation should you sign the papers that the item was delivered to you in proper condition and assembled fully.
