UKNM: ecommerce Xmas wet dream or nightmare?

[Sam Michel]

So, I want to order a laptop (forgetting about the fact that it's coming up

to Xmas - far too much to do to worry about presents until the week before

Xmas), I do it online from Dell UK.


Reliable outfit, I think, good record of build-to-order machines and my

friends who have their kit tell me they work well. I order, cough up the

dough and sit back and wait. After 5 days I think, hmmm...I'll see whether

it's built yet, their online order system will tell me.


Gong! 'fraid not. According to their helpful support staff, they're

experiencing "a bit of a glitch". OK, fair enough so how long will it be?

They tell me a couple more days...


So, 5 days later I call them up, I have to leave a message but they kindly

return my call, which to my chagrin I miss, to tell me it'll be another 7

days before the machine arrives. When I do finally speak to a warm (I

assume) blooded being on the other end of the phone, they tell me "we've had

too many orders"...


Now, I narked, it's taken 3 weeks...so much for the convenience of online

ordering...victims of their own success?


What really gets me though is that this is Dell, in terms of ecommerce

ordering and fulfilment, they're old hands, they've done this a million

(probably) times before. If they can't get it right and I assume they have

invested heavily in infrastructure, what chance to do the myriad of

start-ups with little or no (or outsourced) fulfilment services have?


I suspect the New Year is going to be a fairly uncomfortable time for all

those companies who advertised like crazy to boost pre-Xmas sales...won't be

much fun for the credit card companies either...maybe I just need to lie

down for a while...


Toodle Pip


Sam 



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