# Bad Adorama Experience.



## 651stp (Nov 9, 2012)

Just wanted to share my exp. that i had placing an order with adorama.

I called Adorama on the 5th of Nov. to check if they are back in business after the horrible hurricane. The lady that i talked to assured me that everything is back to normal and items are in stock and are shipping the same day again. Well i was glad to hear that because i needed a few things for an upcoming shoot. I went ahead and ordered about 6 items and placed them all on next day air shipping. Well it is to my surprise that even though i ordered on Nov. 6th my order is still pending today considering what the customer service lady said. I talked to her a day prior to me calling in today and she said "i promise this order will ship out today and i promise you will get your items on Friday the Nov 9th." , i said sure no problem even though its late, ok. I received an email today from the Warehouse department explaining that due to the hurricane they have major delays and the couriers aren't even shipping at times which is what i had expected in the first place. The problem here is, im not upset i didnt get my items yet, im upset that the customer service obviously has no idea whats going on in the warehouse department and are just feeding lies to customers. /endrant


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## manicmike (Nov 9, 2012)

It's not necessarily that they're lying. More often than not there is no communication from one department to the next. At least that's my experience from working in retail.


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## ceejtank (Nov 9, 2012)

I disagree.  If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.


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## pixmedic (Nov 9, 2012)

the customer only knows what the sales staff tells them. so its important for the sales people to know whats going on. whether they call the warehouse, or the warehouse calls the store when there are issues. when a customer places an order and is assured it will ship on time, you should be able to assume its accurate.  poor form on the stores part. no matter which end the fault lies on, its the customer that pays the price. not to mention he paid for next day air, which he obviously didnt get. I would be interested in seeing how Adorama handles this. we usually order from KeH. ive heard a few issues lately concerning Adorama, which has kept us from placing any pricier orders with them.


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## 2WheelPhoto (Nov 9, 2012)

99.9% of the time Adorama and BHPHOTO are beyond great.  Let's allow  a few human mistakes for .1 per cent of the time?








I mean let's asume you dealt with bestbuy....nevermind I wouldn't curse you like that LoL


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## unpopular (Nov 9, 2012)

OP is kinda derp.


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## manicmike (Nov 9, 2012)

ceejtank said:


> I disagree.  If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.



How do you disagree? You just validated my point by saying they should communicate.


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## 2WheelPhoto (Nov 9, 2012)

unpopular said:


> OP is kinda derp.



+1.

Hurricane Sandy tears through America, a little miscommunication is to be expected.


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## Overread (Nov 9, 2012)

It could well be that, at the time of your call, there were no problems what so ever being reported to the Adorama rep. However after your call further information or new events might have arisen outside of the normal scope of operations which has resulted in the increased delays. 

Generally a major retailer like Adorama gets it right more times than not, but sometimes things go wrong. In a situation like this there are a lot of things that might go wrong or that might simply slow down - the courier companies might be operating understaffed/facilitated and might even just be having increased bulk orders overwhelming their services.

Sadly disasters like this tend to put everything into a bit of a chaotic situation, even for the big companies.


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## MLeeK (Nov 9, 2012)

This would be my GUESS based on what you said:
ADORAMA is back up and running in fine fashion, however somewhere in there you said that the couriers aren't even shipping at times... Totally out of Adorama's control. 
I am sure our resident Adorama rep will pop in sooner or later to let you know for sure.


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## mjhoward (Nov 9, 2012)

unpopular said:


> OP is kinda derp.


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## PlanetStarbucks (Nov 9, 2012)

Eh...use the mix up to get yourself free shipping on your next few orders.  I know this has been a PITA, but I (speaking personally) wouldn't stop ordering from them after all the years of otherwise good experiences I've had.


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## 651stp (Nov 10, 2012)

ceejtank said:


> I disagree.  If someone specifically asks a question like that, you should do 15 seconds of research and call the warehouse to check.


Exactly, when a question like that is asked and its answered by "i promise" you'd probably think that they did call and check. "i'll monitor your order to make sure its shipped", yeah right.



pixmedic said:


> the customer only knows what the sales staff tells them. so its important for the sales people to know whats going on. whether they call the warehouse, or the warehouse calls the store when there are issues. when a customer places an order and is assured it will ship on time, you should be able to assume its accurate.  poor form on the stores part. no matter which end the fault lies on, its the customer that pays the price. not to mention he paid for next day air, which he obviously didnt get. I would be interested in seeing how Adorama handles this. we usually order from KeH. ive heard a few issues lately concerning Adorama, which has kept us from placing any pricier orders with them.


Adorama DIDNT handle it at all. They just said want a refund? i was like, wow... and yes, this was a pricey order.



Overread said:


> It could well be that, at the time of your call, there were no problems what so ever being reported to the Adorama rep. However after your call further information or new events might have arisen outside of the normal scope of operations which has resulted in the increased delays.
> 
> Generally a major retailer like Adorama gets it right more times than not, but sometimes things go wrong. In a situation like this there are a lot of things that might go wrong or that might simply slow down - the courier companies might be operating understaffed/facilitated and might even just be having increased bulk orders overwhelming their services.
> 
> Sadly disasters like this tend to put everything into a bit of a chaotic situation, even for the big companies.


i called on seperate occasions that i didnt explain in the OP to save reading time. Every time i called they guaranteed everything to be a green light. About the courier thing, i believe that wasn't the issue and let me explain. If you've order from Adorama before they tell you what pending means, heres the example:
*Pending* - order has been submitted and is being imported to our database
*On Hold* - order is being verified or has payment issues
*Ready* - order is ready to be processed 
*Picked* - order is currently being picked in the shipping department
*Invoiced* - order has been finalized and ready to be packed 
*Shipped* - order has been shipped and is in transit
*Backorder* - one or more of the items in your order are out of stock; we are waiting for the item(s) to become available
*Canceled* - the order is canceled.

As you can see, for 3 days my order wasnt even in the Ready categorie yet, therefore they havent even processed it yet.
Im sure they get orders right, but im just stating that in this case, they were terribly wrong all things considered.



PlanetStarbucks said:


> Eh...use the mix up to get yourself free shipping on your next few orders.  I know this has been a PITA, but I (speaking personally) wouldn't stop ordering from them after all the years of otherwise good experiences I've had.


That wont happen, the only thing the lady said to me was "want a refund?" the end. and i said gimme my money back.


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## 651stp (Nov 10, 2012)

unpopular said:


> OP is kinda derp.


well thanks! your so kind.


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## unpopular (Nov 10, 2012)

lol. I meant the post itself, not so much you. it's just kind of a "who cares" sort of thing.


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## HelenOster (Nov 12, 2012)

651stp said:


> I called Adorama on the 5th of Nov. to check if they are back in business after the horrible hurricane. The lady that i talked to assured me that everything is back to normal and items are in stock and are shipping the same day again. ......The problem here is, im not upset i didnt get my items yet, im upset that the customer service obviously has no idea whats going on in the warehouse department and are just feeding lies to customers. /endrant



Firstly, please accept my deepest apologies for your frustration and disappointment. I cannot identify your order from your posting, but if you are able to email me directly with your order number, I can certainly look into this.

  A couple of things to note; the CS rep you spoke to is probably not based out of the New   York office. If she had been she would have known that we were NOT back to normal by last Monday........anything but! Full mains electricity was only restored that day, and our telephone lines had suffered severe damage from the storm, which hadn't been repaired. 
  All day Monday, calls were dropping off as the engineers tried to get us back to full service. Even now, there are unresolved issues. Could you please email me with details of who you spoke to in CS along with your order number? Helen@adorama.com

I don't fully understand how you could have been sent an email by anyone in the Distribution Center, as they don't as a rule email with customers; can you please forward that email to me, as well?

  It can happen that everything has gone through smoothly as it should; orders are picked and packed and loaded onto the UPS trailers, and then UPS dont send sufficient drivers & tractor units to hitch the trailers onto.

  It can also be that the tractors come for the trailers, but due to congestion at the UPS hub, packages dont get scanned so it appears that they havent actually left our DC at all!

  All that being said, Im going to need more information in order to be able to clarify exactly what happened in this case. All I can do for now is apologize again, and look forward to hearing back from you.

  Helen Oster
Adorama Camera Customer Service Ambassador


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