Mr. Nash sent us a the following letters:

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Letter dated 11th April 2004 to the Customer Services Department of MFI

I write to express my disappointment and severe dissatisfaction in the matter of my recent purchase from MFI of a Schreiber Argyle Fitted Kitchen. 

By way of background, my wife and I selected and paid a deposit of £744.00 on the kitchen at the Perth MFI Branch on 23 February 2004.  We were very happy with the service given by the sales consultant, Mr Danny McKinnon who was extremely helpful and who gave us confidence in our decision to purchase. 

The balance of £2150.00 was paid on 25 Mar 2004 giving a total purchase price of  £2894.00.  We were informed that the kitchen would be delivered on 8 April 2004.  This date was agreed upon as it coincided with Easter holidays and with my wife's leave from work.  We arranged a joiner accordingly to commence work on the expected date of arrival.  The delivery firm contacted me 2 days before delivery to confirm the date as 8th April and to check house details. 

To prepare for the arrival of the kitchen, I took leave from work and arranged for my wife and daughter to visit friends from the 6th to the 10th April during the course of the course of the old kitchen removal, room preparation and new kitchen installation. 

It was my reasonable expectation to have the new kitchen installed by the time of my wife and daughter's return. 

The delivery duly arrived on the afternoon of 8th April.  It was then that I learned from the delivery record that neither the Smeg Fy/int dishwasher nor 2 Argyle 500 open wall frames were present.   This was the first indication of this (we had received no prior advice of and I was surprised as the service had been good up until this time.) 

I then contacted the customer service department who advised that there had been a computer glitch stemming from the installation of a new computer system and that the missing items would not be delivered until 29 April 2004, 3 weeks after the initial delivery. 

I had agreed with my joiner that I would fix legs and carry out simple tasks before the more intricate work.  I then discovered that there were nine legs missing and that the fixing screws (no. 30 in the Schreiber kitchen installation manual) were also absent.  I then discovered that the plastic carousel corner unit was also missing.  This was a major setback, as I knew that the installation had to start with the corner unit.

I then contacted the Perth Branch who in fairness expressed concern and genuinely seemed (and continue to seem) keen to rectify the problem.  They advised that the carousel unit could not be located before Tuesday 13th April but that they would do all they could to expedite matters.  They undertook to supply me with the missing 8 legs and additional screws and fixings.  I collected the legs from Perth on Friday 9th April, a round trip of 40 miles. 

Realising that it would now be impossible to carry out the installation I stood down the joiner who was awaiting my instruction to commence work.  Having by now severe doubts about the quality of my purchase, I carried out more checks of the delivery and found that more items were missing including a spice drawer for a wall unit and wood dowels 

It is now Easter Sunday 11th April.  As I write,  my wife and daughter have returned to a home without a kitchen and we must now use our bathroom for domestic water for cooking and for drinking. With uncertainty about when the kitchen installation can be completed, we face up to 3 weeks of this situation, including the school holidays.  Hopefully this will not be the case. 

My wife and I are extremely unhappy and disappointed.  No one should expect to pay for goods and to receive an incomplete delivery without any prior notification and discussion.  An incomplete product is useless to us (would a car be delivered without a steering wheel?  - an extreme analogy perhaps but nevertheless pertinent). 

Regrettably the initial good customer service of your staff in Perth has been completely degraded by the product delivery. 

The uncertainty about when the products will be delivered leaves me unable to book a joiner (as you will no doubt be aware, good joiners are in short supply) to complete the work.  In addition, I will also need to compensate my joiner for 2 days wasted time. 

My confidence in the quality of your overall product delivery has been badly dented.   I have paid for goods that have not been delivered, and my family and I are now severely inconvenienced. 

As a businessman myself, I am well aware that sometimes things go wrong in service delivery and I offer MFI the chance to make some realistic and significant effort to rectify matters and to compensate my family and me for the inconvenience and stress this matter is causing. 

Please believe that I am not over-dramatising the issue - it is only the continued customer care from your staff in Perth that leads me to write and to offer MFI the chance to put matters right. 

Do not hesitate to contact me by telephone if it helps you to expedite matters.  I look forward to an early resolution and to your quick and meaningful response. 

I write to express how badly my wife, family and I have been let down in the matter of our recent purchase of an MFI kitchen. 

The enclosed letter sent to your Customer Services Manager on 11 April 2004 outlines the background to the situation.  I regret to inform you, but feel that you should be aware that we have had no formal response to this letter to date (despite the "aim to ensure that all enquiries will receive formal responses within 48 hours") 

Our repeated telephone calls to your customer service centre asking for assistance in what has become a stressful and totally unfair situation have been fruitless.  Your staff have been polite, but absolutely insistent that MFI will not take any steps to rectify its actions. 

You will note from the attached letter that the kitchen arrived in an incomplete state and that this completely thwarted our plans to have the kitchen fitted, (indeed I cannot see how MFI joiners could have carried out the fitting in this incomplete state).  No progress was being made and we elected with regret to have the kitchen uplifted and our payment refunded. 

We are still coping without any kitchen and with the MFI equipment being stored in our house.  The earliest that MFI have advised us that the equipment will be uplifted is 29 April (11 days from now and 21 days since the delivery). 

Both my wife and I took leave from work to oversee the installation and repeatedly advised your staff that such a delay in uplift caused us severe problems.  Faced with complete refusal to assist, we offered to hire a van ourselves and deliver the equipment it to an MFI location.  We were advised unconditionally that this would not be acceptable and that we would have to wait until 29 April.  In addition our money would not be refunded until after this time. 

My wife and I both work and will not be in the house on this date.  Had MFI attempted to help us with this stressful situation it could have been done last week when we were both on leave. Unless the collection takes place at the weekend or during the evening, from now on we will have to employ someone to meet your uplift/collection personnel. 

I believe that it would help your organisation to be made aware of the following.  I was informed that MFI would not carry out an "earlier" collection because this would mean that MFI would have to help all of its customers in this fashion.  I believe that this is unacceptable - surely there must be flexibility I responding to customers' needs, particularly when the customer has been greatly inconvenienced by a company's failure in service delivery.   My wife was also advised that  "only 1% of your customers are dissatisfied".  As a businessman myself I would be alarmed at this - if correct this would entail thousands of customers. 

I hope that you will recognise how unfairly we have been treated. In addition to the gross inconvenience and stress, we have paid in good faith for goods which have not been delivered, have had to pay a joiner for wasted time, and spent hours in, until now, fruitless correspondence. 

Please accept my assurance that I write out respect for your position and in good faith that despite the failure in service to date, MFI really values its customers.   It is my sincere hope that action will be taken to rectify this situation and so compensate in some way for the stress and inconvenience that has been no fault of our own. 

I can be contacted at any time and please do not hesitate to get in touch if you require any further information.

 

The state of play now is that the goods were uplifted on the 29th but we have not received a refund as MFI are now stating that all goods were not returned - the fact is that the delivery was incomplete in the first place.  So, still as shambolic and distressing.