Thursday, March 13, 2008

Poor service from st. louis furniture shop

We bought a 3 + 2 seater sofa from St. Louis on 1st January 2008. The design we chose was the exact same one at their showroom at Furniture Mall, The Plaza.

When the sofa was delivered on the 24th Jan, the 3-seater design was actually different from its 2-seater. The back rest should have a vertical stitch design and the 3-seater didn't come with that. Blur me actually spotted it a week after its delivery. So i called them up again to check on it.

The moment the sales girl heard my complaint, she just laughed and implied, "Oh, so it's you who has THE other half?" Yup, they actually swapped these sofa set with other customer. The other customer had called to complain before me.

She asked me to wait for their office/customer service to call up the following week as their office was still closed for CNY. That was the start of the wait..

After a week they finally contacted me, saying they were taking back the 3-seater from me to FIX.
I asked how long? 2 weeks she replied.
So long? How are u fixing it? We're gonna re-construct a new 3-seater for u.
Ok good! But in between this period, can u do something about it? Ok, we'll loan u a sofa.

After they took back the 3-seater in Feb 20th, I waited for 2 long weeks to hear from them again. And they set Mar 11th to deliver back my FIXED 3-seater. That summed up to total 3 weeks of FIXING. It'd better be perfect this time!

So last tues hubby and I happy jolly took off again to receive our 3-seater.
My oh my! Not only the 3-seater was dusty all over, it was 'extra decorated' with lots of black patches all over it. The leather wasn't as bright as the 2-seater that's sitting on my living room. Lastly, The cushion was firmer, i never once asked for extra firm!

I took the initiative to wipe the leather. Yes, there was evidence of dust on the wet cloth. But the black patches were still there. It's hard not to think that it wasn't a new set at all.

Unhappy and totally disappointed to the max, we called to the office again and requested an explanation. One of the staff took my hubby's feedback professionally and promised to call us back ASAP. The delivery guy took back the 3-seater and the dirty old loan sofa, did i mention? It was frustrating..

4 hours later, a lady called us back. She started off by asking what was the problem? As she didn't see any flaw to the sofa. Eventually she admitted that we must use a certain wax to clean up the patches. Duh!

Then hubby conveyed the message on how unhappy we were with their services. We've made the purchase for 2 months plus and up til now we haven't got to enjoy the products. She mentioned that as her staff cleaned up the sofa, they realised that the back of the sofa was torn. I was surprised that a brand new sofa would be so dusty and was torn! "Therefore, I cant send it to you now." she replied. "When then?" my hubby asked "I dun know! was her reply.

Why is your new sofa so dusty and your new leather is torn?

She flared up and started accusing us for being too picky. Picky about their products. Talk about consumer rights! Hubby was pissed and asked to speak to her manager. Guess what she shouted,"I'm the boss! Too bad, u can't complain to anyone else!" How rude and unprofessional was that!! She hang up!

That was the last time we heard from st. louis. Up til this very moment, no one has actually called us up to apologize or follow up on my outstanding 3 seater.

In a country that highlights tip top quality services, actually exists a poor-attitude, sleazy-management like them! So people, I'm warning everyone to think twice before making any purchase from st. louis.

I regretted big time..

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Walaooo~~~SUCKS leh!!! I will tell my friends not to buy their product!!! I hate the rude services!!!

PRIMA said...

Thank u babe! Let's hope i'll get my refund soon!

Anonymous said...

OMG! that is horrible...and 600 dollars if toooo much.

Anonymous said...

we didnt know about all this and end up in a similar situation. i think we spoke to the same lady also.

PRIMA said...

oh dear. this is really bad. why can't they do anything to close this shop! did u file a complaint? we went to the Small Claim Tribunal but nothing favoured us too. sigh...

http://primadaily.blogspot.com/2008/03/expensive-lesson.html

Anonymous said...

we have filed one with furniture assoc first and hope that they will do some mediation. SCT is probably our last resort. anyway, amazed at the people who treat their customers like that.
how much was your sofa for ? Just wondering how the $600 was arrived at...

PRIMA said...

Glad u came back again! We paid around 2.3K for that stupid sofa. Really painful lesson for us. Must go around and tell everyone to boycott this furniture shop really.

Hope you get your problem fixed. Do update! Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Looks like we are going to pay some schooling fees. Effectively pay some money to get out of one item and buy another item at an elevated price.
The crux of the matter is, we know nothing much about them and the actual goods n services when we enter into an agreement with them to buy furniture. Given the asymetry of information regd the quality of goods and service, we, the customers, are very likely going to be at an disadvantage when buying from such people.
Lets see how much we can minimize our losses to now.