Selfridges??? I'm 50-50!! (Selfridges)

Member Name: shopaholic!

Product:	Selfridges
Date:	04/12/03 (1220 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: nice spacious stores with all the good brands

Disadvantages: bad communication between departments/stores

Hi,
Terribly frustrated, was desperately seeking a certain coat i had seen in selfridges (every one in the UK i had asked!) a month ago, but they hadn't had my size. Although not completely happy with the "we don't know what stock will be coming in" answers, i respect that as it is through no fault of the assistants.
So anyways, was nearly OVER-THE-MOON when the London Oxford street store confirmed that they had the coat, i asked them to reserve the coat for me for pick up the next day leaving name and details. But because i was busy in the day, i sent my boyfriend down from Leicester to London with the mission to collect it. As he hadn't seen the coat before, he picked up the coat the kind assistants had set aside for me and set off back to Leicester. As for me, i jumped on the first train i could at night for Leicester to collect my coat from him, smiling all the way sure that all the effort calling up the selfridges stores and being constantly transferred to the wrong department was all now worth it. My boyfriend met me at the station, not looking too pleased. I asked why, he said that he can't believe that i asked him to go all the way down to London to get such an hideous / bad style coat. Confused, i hurried to his flat to see the coat. And my word, was i FUMING. They had reserved me the WRONG one. First thing i got on the phone to them, they were apologetic... but said they would not be able to do something about it unless i take it back for a refund. Firstly, before i reserved it, i made the assistant double check that she had the right coat i was describing.
- i explained that the coat had NO lines/stripes on the sleeves or hood as i understood that there was another white knee length coat in that department. - i gave them the style name AND style number (which is clearly stated on the coat labels) - also explaining that i live up North of UK so can't afford a mistake! Is it just me or would ANYONE get frustrated
?? Sigh.. please note that there was also an 28 days return policy, i had to somehow travel to one of their stores (closest is 1 and a 1/2 hours by train - and everyone knows that train tickets aren't cheap these days!).
Anyways yes, i had just returned from a trip to manchester with my boyfriend- just to return my coat. Its been 14 days so far. So we went into the Selfridges store in town. Went to the till to ask for a refund, only to be rejected because the coat smells 'musty'. You do not know how angry me and my boyfrind was, not that we were shouting (we have manners!) i mean - we had to travel on the train etc and go through town, of cause it won't smell as 'fresh' as they described. I had never worn the coat, i live in a non smokers household, and it was hung up on a hanger in my room (i tidy and clean my room frequently). As for the 'musty'smell it was so faint that you had to really sniff into the fur for several seconds, and if you wasn't told of it, i swear you wouldn't have noticed. However much we tried to persuade, we never got the refund, although this whole incident was mostly Selfridges fault. Tired, fed up, stressed and feeling insulted, we left (though thinking back we should have really stood our grounds.) By now i was pretty streesed (near tearful), and my boyfriend then suggested to try the other flagship store in Trafford cetre, the shopping mall about 30minutes away from town centre. I mean we might as well right?
Well got there, asked at the till yet again politely, but this time the staff were very friendly, only asked why it wasn't suitable. I explained that it was the wrong one reserved, and that was all they had asked. I got the refund, and they had checked the coat and it was in perfect saleable condition, not even creased. Nor that 'musty' smell was detected. finally a sense of relief, we decided to check out the other stock in their department, and found that the smell of th
e same style coat was more or less the same!!! GRRRRRRRR... it must had been the suede material.. the cost of this trip was- twentyish pounds to go to London from leicester, underground fares + bus fares = another 10 pounds. Train from Leicester - sheffield - manchester (my boyfriend had to come with me because the coat was payed by his credit card) = another 20ish pounds. + my fare = 10 pounds. Manchester - trafford centre by bus - 6 pounds return. so total is 66 POUNDS WASTED. The end of a disappointing, money and time wasting experience with Selfridges. i swear never again.
But i do advice people to consider carefully before buying about garments especially if you have a long way to travel to and from - and try to go into the store yourself instead of reserving. sorry about dragging on - needed to get it off my chest!!

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