FTD: Failure To Deliver

I promised a blog about FTD awhile ago and am just now getting around to it. Unfortunately, I've had time to cool off so the burn I was dying to throw their way has waned just a little.

That being said, I would HIGHLY recommend NOT using FTD for any floral/basket delivering needs and here's why:


The Dad of one of my co-workers recently passed away. He had been out of work off and on for about two weeks leading up to his Dad's passing, and we didn't get information about a memorial service until just a couple of days before it was to take place.

Now, this co-worker is one of our guys that sometimes can have one of those "the world is against me" kind of attitudes -- especially toward the workplace. (This coworker is none other than "George" from the Can-Can blog, if you read that one.) With that in mind, he is definitely a co-worker we wanted to make sure we took care of since no one from our Richmond office was going to be able to make the memorial service (it was in the middle of the day during a very hectic week and the service was 2 hours away).

As the person responsible for sending an arrangement on behalf of our company, and knowing how George is, I thought it would be nice to send an arrangement to the Church where the memorial service was going to be held and send a basket of goodies to George's home here in Richmond. My go-to flower delivery company is 1-800-flowers, but they changed their website since the last time I had been on it and now have a separate basket site and it just seemed like they didn't have 2 of the things I wanted. So then I tried ProFlowers (my next choice) and couldn't find what I wanted there either. As a last resort, I went to FTD, hearing good things about them in the past.

With their site, I found immediate success. They had the arrangement I wanted, fairly priced, and a sympathy "tin" of scrumptious cookies that I knew he would appreciate that I could send to his house. When I added my items to my cart and clicked on "check out" a pop up would appear that said I had no items in my cart.

I tried putting the 2 items in my cart 3 TIMES. Then I decided to "sign up" for an account on FTD, sign into the account, and try adding the items to my cart again. Again, no luck. The site was temporarily bugged. At this point it was Wednesday morning, the memorial service was on Friday and I was getting desperate.

I should have gone back to one of the other sites and found something else. But I was sold on FTD's sympathy tin because I just knew George would love those damn cookies. So I called the 800# to order the items over the phone.

My customer rep was actually very helpful and courteous. After about 30 minutes (we were dealing with a slight language barrier getting the two items ordered -- they were being shipped to 2 different addresses so it took us awhile making sure the order was correct, not to mention the fact that it took him awhile to get the card message right since the 2 items I ordered had different messages attached to them.) But, after 30 minutes, all seemed good.

The email confirmation of my order came in within minutes of getting off the phone with the rep. I had to chuckle a little because instead of "St. Francis of Assisi" he put "Saint of Francis Assisi" (I thought it was funny), and the message he fumbled a little on the cookies, but it wasn't enough of a big deal to get upset over (although I did spend 30 minutes making sure these things were correct and he and I repeated EVERYTHING at least 3 times to ensure accuracy.)

The cookies were to be delivered on Thursday to George's house and the floral arrangement was to be delivered to the Church on Thursday as well. I knew George would be in Richmond to accept the cookies, but wouldn't be home on Friday because the service was two hours away. Because the service was starting at 11 a.m., I wanted to make sure the arrangement was delivered on Thursday so it was there in time.

I received an email confirmation on Thursday afternoon letting me know the cookies had been delivered to George. Great!

I didn't receive anything referencing the arrangement to the Church, but didn't panic because it was still early. By 4 p.m. I decided to email a customer inquiry on the status of the delivery (they have a specific email for this). I didn't receive anything back.

Friday morning at 10:50 AM (10 MINUTES BEFORE THE START OF THE SERVICE) I get a call at the office from FTD. The female rep calling is letting me know that the florist near the Church was unable to deliver the arrangement THURSDAY and they want to know if it is okay if they deliver today.

Now, I tried to stay calm, and at first, I was successful at this. I explained to the rep that the service was starting in 10 minutes and it would only be okay for them to deliver that day if they could deliver the arrangement within the next 10 minutes. She said she would need to call the florist and call me back.

She called me back 10 minutes later to let me know that it would not be possible for the florist to deliver the flowers before the start of the service because the florist was over 30 minutes away from the Church.

Now, keep in mind that the flowers were $45.99 and shipping was $16.99 for the flowers. (The cookies were 19.99 and the shipping was $23.99 -- ridiculous, right??) But as they were both planned for "next day" delivery, I didn't complain about the shipping prices.

When I told the rep that it was completely unacceptable for them to have not notified me the day before that the flowers couldn't be delivered the day as promised, she offered a refund on the item price (keep in mind, she didn't offer a refund on shipping). I explained to her as nicely as I could that a refund was not a good solution to the problem. I now have a coworker and his entire family who think the people at his job are a-holes. Not only did NO ONE from the company go to the service, but we didn't even send flowers?? Do you think it's easy to explain to a co-worker after he comes back to work that we had good intentions but the flower company didn't come through? A guy who thinks the world is against him anyway?? I was getting more upset by the second.

After explaining all of this to the rep (yes, I did tell her all of that), I asked her what her next solution was since refunding my money and not delivering the flowers at all would create an even bigger issue.

She then offered to deliver the flowers to George on Saturday. And ACTED LIKE SHE WAS DOING ME A FAVOR BY NOT CHARGING FOR A SATURDAY DELIVERY. I politely expressed my annoyance that I had paid for next day delivery, they were supposed to be delivered to the church on Thursday, now the flowers were arriving at his home two days late, they weren't there for the service, and FTD isn't going to offer anything to make me happier about this scenario??

She then gave me a scripted line that she could offer 10% off the item price. Okay. I asked if she meant 10% off from the $45.99 or 10% off the total price of the flowers + shipping, and she said 10% off the item price. Since she seemed reluctant to do the math, I did it for her. Here's a breakdown of our conversation:

Me: "You mean, these flowers are being delivered 2 days later than promised, not there for the service, and you are seriously offering to only refund me $4.60 from my $62.98 cost?"

Rep: "Yes ma'am."

Me: "Well, that doesn't work for me. You're going to have to try again because that's a joke. The shipping alone is $16.99. Why am I paying $16.99 for next day delivery when the flowers are being delivered 2 days late???"

Rep: "Well, ma'am, we could deliver the flowers to the recipient's address today, we just can't get the flowers to the Church before the service."

Me: "Since I've already explained to you that the service is 2 hours away from where my co-worker lives, and he'll be at the service, who is going to be at his home to accept a delivery today? They can't be delivered today at his home, no one will be there! Not to mention, even if they would have been delivered today, it's still a day later than promised, and I paid for next day delivery when I ordered on Wednesday!"

Rep: "Yes ma'am. I understand. That is why we are offering to deliver the flowers to his residence on Saturday, at no extra charge at a 10% discount from the item price for you."

Me: "10% off the item price is only $4.60!! That does not work for me when I paid over $60 to have flowers delivered to the Church, YESTERDAY."

Rep: "Ma'am, yes I understand your frustration, please hold."

[On hold for approx 3 minutes.]

Rep: "Ma'am, I do understand your concern and that is why we can offer you 20% off your item price for your inconvenience, what address can we deliver the flowers to on Saturday?"

(Nice try lady)

Me: "Let me get this straight. I just got put on hold for 3 minutes so you can come back with an offer of knocking $9.20 off my bill? The shipping charge alone was $16.99, I don't understand why you aren't offering to at least remove the shipping charge since the flowers were not shipped as promised."

Rep: "Yes ma'am, I understand but at this time we can only offer 20% off the item price, if you let me know what address we can ship the flowers to, we can get those delivered for you on Saturday."

(What, is she a robot? And if she says she understands ONE MORE TIME I'm going to stab something...)

Me: "That does NOT work for me. Let me repeat this. I should NOT be charged for next day delivery when the item was NOT delivered next day. I don't understand what is so difficult. If you can't offer me a discount that covers the shipping charge then I want to speak to someone that can."

Rep: "Please hold"

[This time I'm on hold for a solid 7 minutes, and I'm being generous here because I had the call on speaker and it felt more like 20 minutes.]

Rep: "Ma'am, we can offer you 30% off the item price and $2.00 off the shipping price, and that is the most we can discount your purchase unless you'd prefer to have a full refund and we can cancel the order."

(Now she's just pissing me off.)

Me: "Okay. Let me get this straight. You are offering 30% which is $13.80 plus $2.00 off the shipping, making it a total discount of $15.80. The shipping charge was $16.99. This is not a discount that satisfies me as I'm still paying for shipping that didn't happen as promised. A full refund and order cancellation is not a workable solution for me because since your company waited until Friday to call me and tell me the flowers could not get delivered as promised, I'm unable to use another company that can have flowers delivered to him at a comparable - and at this point reasonable - price before he gets back to work on Monday and comes in to work thinking we are all a bunch of jackasses. By waiting until Friday to notify me about this issue you've effectively removed any option I had in using another company to fix this."

Rep: (Getting testier by the minute with her tone) "YES ma'am. I UNDERSTAND. But we are offering you 30% off the item price, delivering the flowers on Saturday, and offering $2.00 off the shipping charge. If this doesn't work for you, we can offer a full refund and cancel the order."

Me: "Please wait a minute."

(I hurry up and bring 1-800-flowers up on the screen to check and see if they can deliver an arrangement on Saturday - the Peace Lily I picked out is not available for Saturday, next day delivery, so I can't use another company to get him flowers before Monday.)

Me: "I'm not satisfied with either option. Again, your company by waiting until today to call me about the flowers not getting delivered has stripped me from any chance of getting another company to fix YOUR mistake. I understand that it was the local florist that made the error, but that isn't my problem. You are just notifying me today that a delivery that was supposed to happen yesterday afternoon didn't happen and that you are unable to deliver today."

Rep: "MA'AM, as I've explained before, we CAN deliver the flowers today, but not to the Church for the service."

Me: "And as I've explained, if you couldn't deliver the flowers to the Church by 11 a.m. today then we are done talking about delivering the flowers today since there are ZERO options of having someone present in his Richmond home to accept the delivery. Do you understand that the Southside of Richmond and the service in Triangle, VA are almost 2 hours apart? I get that you are not from here, but I need to make sure you understand that no one will be at his home in Richmond today."

Rep: "Yes, I do understand, which is why we can offer a Saturday delivery. There is nothing else I can do. We are already discounting both the item price and the shipping cost as you requested."

Me: "But not enough to actually cover the shipping cost!"

Rep: "No ma'am. I'm sorry but that is the final offer."

Me: "If you are incapable or unauthorized to offer me a discount that covers at the MINIMUM my shipping cost, then I want to speak to someone that can."

Rep: "Ma'am, the 30% and $2 discount is the best we can offer -- "

(Cutting her off)

Me: "I want to speak to your supervisor. Now."

Rep: "Please hold"

[On hold for a brisk 4 minutes this time]

New Rep: "Ma'am, I'm truly sorry for the inconvenience you are experiencing. Let me assure you this is not the normal customer experience. I can offer you a 40% discount from your item price, Saturday delivery, a $10 coupon on your next purchase, and I will personally call the recipient to let him know that we failed to deliver the arrangement as scheduled so he understands the fault is not with you."

(Nearly shocked into silence....)

Me: "THANK YOU. Yes, the 40% discount is reasonable since now the shipping is essentially free - as it should be. You can keep the coupon because I'll never use FTD again, but here is the recipient's name and number, and a phone call would be outstanding to explain to him what happened with his delivery."

New Rep: "Yes ma'am, I'll call him personally. We'd still like to send you the coupon, but we'll get the discount applied to your charge right away. You will be emailed with a delivery confirmation, now can you give me the details of the new delivery address and contact information?"

Me: "Keep the coupon, here's the information..."

FINALLY!!!! Now, if FTD had led with that last offer when they FIRST called, I wouldn't have felt the need to write this blog. But, as my assistant can corroborate, this entire FTD exchange took FORTY NINE MINUTES. That doesn't include the first call letting me know the flowers hadn't been delivered and my wait time as she called the florist and then called me back.

Whew. That was a long story. Turns out, I'm still pretty fired up about the whole experience.

My point is this: If you are a company that boasts 100% customer satisfaction GUARANTEED on your website, and in your delivery/shipping small print do NOT mention anything about the possibility of an item actually NOT arriving as promised.... then you should be providing your best offer at the start of the call in order to minimize irreversible customer dissatisfaction. ESPECIALLY when you already know that the arrangement is for a time-sensitive memorial service that you are MISSING completely.

On a side note, after the fact - turns out that the B*tch of a "New Rep" did NOT make any calls to my co-worker. In fact, the icing on the cake: the only call he received from FTD was from the local florist on Friday very rudely asking him where she can deliver the arrangement - and she called in the middle of the memorial service (he didn't answer but had a voicemail from her.)

Unbelievable. Was I wrong? Did I get heated over nothing?

I don't think so....