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In Germany, I would still use Amazon over the local companies that have no idea what customer support is. Until they learn to care more about customers you real

by dsnr 5y ago

In Germany, I would still use Amazon over the local companies that have no idea what customer support is. Until they learn to care more about customers you really have no choice. I’ve banned German retailers in my household for that reason.

gryzzly 5y ago
Can you be more specific about your experiences? I live here for 10 years and never had a bad experience with an online shop that sells items per delivery. The law makes it equal for everyone – you can return the stuff, you can get stuff replaced if it’s broken and anything else. What type of bad experience you had with other online retailers?
- mschuster91 5y ago
  > What type of bad experience you had with other online retailers? Shipping, shipping, shipping. Amazon ditches shipping providers that provide low quality, with web shops you as the customer have to pray that the shop isn't using <insert name of logistics company that has a particularly moronic local agent here>. Many German shops ship with DHL which is expensive but has somewhat consistent quality, a wide net of post offices and Packstation lockers where you can pick up stuff yourself and (at least to my knowledge) does not engage much in using shoddy contractors. Others however... are cheap for a reason and the reason is usually underpaid to outright enslaved staff, pressured so hard by ridiculous delivery quota that they count a "not at home" delivery within 5 seconds of ringing the bell and no one answering. Friends of mine lived in a new constructed area and they had a hard time of getting packages from anyone but DHL for months because the other services always returned packages with "unable to find address". DHL has the advantage that they are connected with the national post service which means the cities and counties provide them with always fresh information about construction works, whereas the competition is stuck on sometimes months old data.
  - MattGaiser 5y ago
    A lot of the success of Walmart and Amazon is just them not tolerating mediocrity.
    - mschuster91 5y ago
      It would be great if Amazon would extend the same non-tolerance towards scammers on the seller side though. Fake products, co-mingling and "we give you 10€ gift card for 5 star review" is way too common.
  - gryzzly 5y ago
    My experience with Amazon delivery is comparably bad – the fact that Russia has figured out "drop boxes" and Germany hasn’t (very slowly it’s being rolled out now) is extremely strange to me. The need to "Accept" delivery instead of placing it in a locker is just stupid and requires so much unneeded energy spent by the delivery people and the receiving side it’s very strange.
  - gryzzly 5y ago
    Exactly same story about new building applied for 2-3 months to a friend and Amazon would simply refund him instead of making any attempts at figuring out how to deliver. It’s the same contractors who have no incentive to really deliver anything.
durnygbur 5y ago
While in Germany simply use extensively the unconditional right to return within 14 days. Dealing with condenscending asshole customer support so prevalent there is not worth picking up the phone even, I agree.
edding4500 5y ago
I can highly recommend otto.de and their customer service - up until now, every time I called the customer service, everyone was extremely nice AND helpful. Delivery of even heavy household articles such as washing machines is extremely easy. Just a great service overall.

by dsnr 5y ago

gryzzly 5y ago

Can you be more specific about your experiences? I live here for 10 years and never had a bad experience with an online shop that sells items per delivery. The law makes it equal for everyone – you can return the stuff, you can get stuff replaced if it’s broken and anything else. What type of bad experience you had with other online retailers?

mschuster91 5y ago
> What type of bad experience you had with other online retailers? Shipping, shipping, shipping. Amazon ditches shipping providers that provide low quality, with web shops you as the customer have to pray that the shop isn't using <insert name of logistics company that has a particularly moronic local agent here>. Many German shops ship with DHL which is expensive but has somewhat consistent quality, a wide net of post offices and Packstation lockers where you can pick up stuff yourself and (at least to my knowledge) does not engage much in using shoddy contractors. Others however... are cheap for a reason and the reason is usually underpaid to outright enslaved staff, pressured so hard by ridiculous delivery quota that they count a "not at home" delivery within 5 seconds of ringing the bell and no one answering. Friends of mine lived in a new constructed area and they had a hard time of getting packages from anyone but DHL for months because the other services always returned packages with "unable to find address". DHL has the advantage that they are connected with the national post service which means the cities and counties provide them with always fresh information about construction works, whereas the competition is stuck on sometimes months old data.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  A lot of the success of Walmart and Amazon is just them not tolerating mediocrity.
  - mschuster91 5y ago
    It would be great if Amazon would extend the same non-tolerance towards scammers on the seller side though. Fake products, co-mingling and "we give you 10€ gift card for 5 star review" is way too common.
- gryzzly 5y ago
  My experience with Amazon delivery is comparably bad – the fact that Russia has figured out "drop boxes" and Germany hasn’t (very slowly it’s being rolled out now) is extremely strange to me. The need to "Accept" delivery instead of placing it in a locker is just stupid and requires so much unneeded energy spent by the delivery people and the receiving side it’s very strange.
- gryzzly 5y ago
  Exactly same story about new building applied for 2-3 months to a friend and Amazon would simply refund him instead of making any attempts at figuring out how to deliver. It’s the same contractors who have no incentive to really deliver anything.

durnygbur 5y ago

While in Germany simply use extensively the unconditional right to return within 14 days. Dealing with condenscending asshole customer support so prevalent there is not worth picking up the phone even, I agree.

edding4500 5y ago

I can highly recommend otto.de and their customer service - up until now, every time I called the customer service, everyone was extremely nice AND helpful. Delivery of even heavy household articles such as washing machines is extremely easy. Just a great service overall.