Dec 23, 2009 12:12 AM
4735 Views
(Updated Dec 23, 2009 11:03 AM)
Its been a long time since I shopped at Hometown. But somehow I could never rest in peace until I wrote about this incident. I was looking for a bed and sofa set and landed up at hometown last year. They had some offer going on. I selected a combo offer which consisted of a Sylvia sofa set worth 64+ K and had a bed, dressing table, wardrobe and two side tables absolutely free with it. It looked to be a good offer. I was told that the delivery would be made within 3 weeks time.
Having visited places around Marthahalli area like Maharaja, oak and oak etc and found their prices reasonably high I thought the combo offer was decent. Guys like Maharaja etc were saying it will take 1 month to deliver a made to order bed or sofa set. Compared to that 3 weeks for all the items was really good. The Home Town executives were very confidant that the delivery would be made within 3 weeks. I was asked to make the full payment. That was one of the biggest mistake of my life.
After 2-3 days I got a call from home Town telling me that they are coming for the delievery of items. I was really surprised to know that items had arrived in 3 days instead of 3 weeks. When the actual delivery hapenned it was a small shipment with the material required for assembling a side table. For delivering that small piece of wood the delivery person requested tips from my wife. Its a different thing that she did not give him any tips.
A carpenter came and fixed all the smaller pieces to make up the side table in next 2-3 days time. In the next week the material for dressing table arrived and a different carpenter assembeled it for us.
After these two items were deliver withing first two week there was no news for almost 2 weeks. So I called up home Town to know about the status. They noted my bill number and informed me that someone will get back to me. After 3-4 days the customer service manager called Subhash(cell number 9741971200) calls me up to inform that the imported shipment has been delayed and will be delievered within next 1 week. I waited for the next week and contacted him again. I got the same reply. For the next 2 weeks Subhash was proactive enough to call me even before I could give him a call and inform that it will take another week.
In all this already 2-3 months had passed and I was still not getting the items that I wanted to buy in the first place which were the bed and the sofa set. One day I got irrited with Subhash's promises and started arguing with them that they should not have charged me full amount in the first place. Subhash said he'll give me good discount when I come to shop with home Town next time. I asked him how much discount he'll give me. He said around 10% discount. I needed to buy a matress for my bed so I enquired with Subhash what is the best offer I can get from Home Town. the response I got from him was so bad that I wouldn't even want to share it here.
I was so frustrated at one point that I said I don;t want the items anymore and want to cancel the order. These guys were shamelessly willing to cancel the order and pick the items which were already delivered. I wish they realised what kind of pain they were causing to the customers by making such statements. These buggers have so much of sale that they don't really care for things like customer satisfaction and loyalty. may be their designs are superior to many other brands. But the things which matter the most, they are totally missing in Home Town executives.
Having waited for 3 months there was no point in cancelling the order and searching for those items again. I wish Subhash could understand the problem that I was facing before saying we'll pick the items which have been already delivered.
In my opinion Home Town service is really really bad. They really don't care for their customers. People like Subhash are very rude at times and don't know how to deal with customers. I would not recommend anybody going for Home Town if they are not getting the item on the spot as there is absolutely no gaurantee when that item will arrive at your doorstep.
