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Is Amazon.com the new Dell (Hell)?

Posted by: Flemming Madsen  •   Tuesday, December 05, 2006   •   Category:   •  
I have always been a fan of Amazon.com. Great inventory and (formerly) great (no, fantastic) customer service: easy to reach, fast problem solving and resolving issues over and above my expectations.

I have been an evangelist for them. I cannot even count the number of times I have told the story about how their great customer service solved an issue for me in the most elegant way.

Not so anymore. I get about 8-10 deliveries per year from them and it used to work as a clockwork. However, for my last 2 orders I have noticed some changes.

They can’t find my address anymore (even that I have received 15 deliveries where I live) and you can’t call them and talk to a person.

From what I can see their problems have coincided with outsourcing their UK deliveries to a company called “Home Delivery Network”. A new company specialising in (as it says) home deliveries.

They have a tracking capability so I can follow the progress of the parcels. The tracking states: “Unable to deliver, address not found”, so naturally I try calling “Home Delivery Network” to guide them to my address. (Those who delivered for Amazon before them never had any problems finding it). However – they don’t have a phone service so you can’t call them.

Trying to call Amazon is not easier. You can’t call them anymore. They have a call-back service, but all that happens is that you get connected to a voice operated tracking system where you can input your order number to get the status (which is wrong incidentally).

I also mailed Amazon last week about the issue. Logged in and used the appropriate form to do so. No response yet.

Here at Onalytica we have written extensively about Dell Hell and their customer service problems. Some of the Dell Hell problems started when they outsourced their customer service and didn’t do it right.

I wonder if Amazon has taken their eye off so much of their core business that they are the next Dell (Hell)?

Anyone else had problems with Amazon or Home Delivery Network lately?
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Comments  23

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    IF ANY OF YOU HAVE ANY PROBLEMS WHATSOEVER WITH BEEHIVE MILL OR HOME DELIVERY NETWORK PLEASE CALL 0161 333 3631 OR 0161 333 3640 THIS IS A DIREST LINE THROUGH TO THERE TRANSPORT OFFICE

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    I am also having issues with HDNL where the item is marked as delivered although I was at home de whole day and haven't seen anybody. Then it's a pain to get refund from the shop. if you go to www.saynoto0870.com you get the phone numbers for most depots as well as the national number. Your depot name can be find on your track page.

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    The new number for HDNL is 08448111816....!

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    OMG John Lewis will not be running for much longer now that HDNL are delivering for them. Directors at John Lewis you must not have read all the stuff that has been put up for HDNL ?

    argos claimed £2 million last year for stolen / missing items last year.

    the sunday times wine club had £125.000 claims last year for dammaged or lost wine.

    Littlewoods has lost in the regions of £2.1 million pounds since merging as HDNL.

    virgin wines has also claimed £125.0000 last year from HDNL for lost or stolen items also.

    HDNL Putting the customers items in your pocket..... Poor company

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    "yeh ulot no alot i work at there call centre so we must not have a number u idiots"

    And a truckload of good its doing may i add.

    Such a Neanderthal is exactly the type of person i would like in charge of expensive products being delivered. Congratulations HDNL.

  • tim 22 Feb

    I bought a Dell today and the hard drive failed on the first boot up. Called there tech support and got a person that only gave canned responces. After 30 min. on the phone the guy tell me he could not help me and gave me another number to call . I called and they said it was maybe the hard drive. I needed to buy a hard drive and have it there when the tech got to my home. I told them I just bought the Dell to hours ago many times. After repeating myself 5 times they said I need to return it to Best Buy were I bought it and go right to the geek squad desk for repair. Hell I bought a new machine and you would think it would at least boot one time. After that I got on there chat and was told more or less the same thing. I told the chat guy It was there problem and not Best Buy's . I was told that Best Buys told me about a contract between the two about tech support . My only comment was and I repeated myself was I bought a Dell new and they need to replace it or come to my house and fix it free since I would have to drive over a hundred miles for repair......Tim from Ohio In Dell Hell

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    I can't believe how rude the comments from the Home Delivery Network drivers are! -If some of your customers have had such big problems it comes across as petty and childish to then insult them.

    I have recently got back from a business trip and during that time my Amazon delivery was supposed to arrive. I assumed I would have to go collect my parcel from the local post office which would be fine, but when I got back I had a leaflet through my door from Home Delivery Network saying as I was out when they tried to deliver they left my parcel. ~The driver had written on the card the package was left 'by gate door'. I could not believe this was the real answer as the gate in question leads to a back garden, is not covered and clearly has no shelter, consequently when I looked outside I found the parcel had been chucked over the gate into a puddle and as it had obviously been raining all day the cardboard packaging was completely sodden and disintegrating in my hands. I do not know how long the books were out there as the delivery company did not fill out the date field on their leaflet, but the books are completely ruined and the pages are all stuck together and it has warped the spine!

    I cannot believe anybody would so stupid to leave a parcel that clearly contains books outside in the middle of January! aggghhh!

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    yeh ulot no alot i work at there call centre so we must not have a number u idiots

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    Hdnl depot 1.3miles from my home 3 minutes by car the day after tomorrow beyond christmas after the new year monday beyond the weekend...

    HDNL.. Craaaaaaaaap. retailer dabs what a tragedy. I said next day please.

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    AAAGGGHHH - I hve ben waiting for 5 days every day someone at HDNL promise it will arrive, but nothing.
    if we all contact postwatch it might help:

    If you have already complained to your postal operator, but are dissatisfied with the response, you should get in touch with Postwatch, the independent watchdog for consumer services in the postal sector. You can contact Postwatch:

    by post: FREEPOST Postwatch
    by telephone: 08456 013265
    by email: info@postwatch.co.uk
    via its website: www.postwatch.co.uk (external website)

  • boblangdon40 22 Feb

    bob said...
    I agree with ever word you wrote.Talk about going round in ever decreasing circles getting nowhere.Amazon are going to lose a great amount of business if the situation with HDNL is not resolved soon.

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    what about the hundreds of thousands of parcels delivered problem free every day give credit where it is due

    HDNL 7.5 TONNE DRIVERS MATE

    BEEHIVE MILL BOLTON

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    The attitude and comment from the HDNL driver speaks for itself. Whats your name then mate?

    You can tell what type of company HDNL is if they do not publish where your local depot is on the website nor on the 'cards'.

    The website is a waste of time as they do not record dates correctly or even number of drops or even have the customer service number.

    The number on these cards is not free and no one is ever available.

    The depot is shut after working hours.

    The worst the service gets means that Amazon will switch to another carrier. I suppose the MD of Home Delivery Network does not care!

    'Putting the Customer' first at dissapointment!

    BAD BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE!!! SACK THEM!!!

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    Hi I work for HDNL and have been there for 14 years,all of our drivers delivery and collect up to 200 parcels aday, when the drivers go to these address and the customers say the driver has just put a card throught the letterbox and not knocked the door its a lie, why would they put a card through and not knock the door they don't get paid for carded parcels, we have more thank you letters that come into the depot everyday for the drivers than complaints so we must be doing somthing right

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    I am a driver for HDNL and deliver thousands of parcels each year very well, including amazon packages, Amazon send out millions of items each year and currently 99.97% are delivered correctly, it therefore shows that you lot are a bunch of whinging prats and i am sure your lack of future business will not be noticed. Go and get a new hobby you odd bunch.

  • JVC 22 Feb

    I signed the petition (details of my complaints there), having had numerous difficulties with HDNL. After Googling them, I discovered that they used to be WHITE ARROW. Like me, I'm sure that many people won't be surprised by this. I'd previously experienced plenty of problems when they were the courier for The Softback Preview book club.

    P.S. the title of this post should include "Amazon.co.uk".

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    Please sign this petition to stop Amazon using HDNL

    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/nohdnl/

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    Putting the customer first???!?!

    I work at a large University - our building has a reception desk that is open from 8am until 5pm every weekday.

    *Every* single delivery by HDNL has either been 'refused' (odd seeing as our receptionist is not in the habit of turning couriers away), 'carded' (not sure why they would need to leave a card in a building with a reception desk that is staffed all day and in any case we've never seen any of these mysterious cards) or just stuck in the depot (sometimes the wrong one) for days.

    I have checked our building CCTV at the times the drivers have allegedly either been refused delivery or left cards and guess what - no HDNL vans or drivers are anywhere to be seen!

    I've got to say that any company that cannot manage to deliver to a building that is 100 yards from the main entrance to the University (the nice security guard on the gate will even point out the building to you as you enter), a building that has a staffed reception desk open all day (including lunch time cover) and that consistently lies about refused deliveries or cards being left really shouldn't be in this business.

    We have 10 to 15 deliveries every week and in 8 years have probably had a total of 3 or 4 problems in total with deliveries from DHL, ParcelForce, CityLink, FedEx or any of the other companies that we deal with (all of which were resolved quickly, efficiently and politely). We have had a 100% failure rate with HDNL. I know every company can't get it right 100% of the time, but I think these facts speak for themselves.

    We now many it a condition of any company with which we have a purchasing contract that we will not deal with them unless the guarantee not to ship with HDNL. With a purchasing power of over £100 million per annum, we have this luxury. I can only sympathise with individuals who are forced to endure the excruciatingly bad service from this joke of a company.

    It is absolutely clear from posts on other blogs that the delivery drivers are under enormous pressure and are paid based on the number of deliveries made rather than for the job they do. I would imagine that they have to hit daily targets and at the end of the day and it's more cost effective for them to log a failed or 'carded' delivery even though they have never been near the premises.

    Anyway, I've wasted quite enough of my life writing about this complete sham that purports to be a company putting customers first. saynoto0870.com is useful for finding depot phone numbers (not that they are very helpful when you get through to them...)

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    I've had the same experiences with HDN. Amazon has been delivering products to our office for years, but just recently they could no longer find us. I can't understand why the delivery driver doesn't just call me and ask for directions, after all they have my details.

    But I did find the Amazon customer service very good. The call back service was smooth and I got to speak to a REAL person fairly quickly. The problem it seems is Home Delivery. Amazon, please please kick them out, they are simply rubbish.

  • Tim 22 Feb

    I just phoned HDN (using the number helpfully posted by a previous commenter — thanks!) regarding an attempted delivery (that wasn't attempted) and a card that was supposedly left (unsurprisingly, a card wasn't left). The person on the end of the phone at HDN was apologetic, but unable to help because I didn't have the card (that wasn't left). Argh!

    HDN said the procedure is to contact Amazon and get Amazon to "escalate" the issue (with themselves) on my behalf. This extra step gives me the shivers. Why HDN can't liaise directly with me to re-arrange a re-delivery is bewildering.

    A very frustrating experience so far.

  • Hector 22 Feb

    I'm too am in the hell that has become delivery from Amazon via Home Delivery Network. The phone number for Home Delivery Network Ltd is 0870 1545400 (they don't publish it on their very broken website), but calling them is an exercise in futility. Up until now I have been complaining via Amazon, who have been trying to contact HDNL on my behalf. When I eventually spoke to HDNL they said Amazon customer service were 'liars' (I kid you not) and would never call them. HDNL say they will only help you if they have attempted delivery and left a card.

    Anyone got a phone number or email address for the boss of Amazon?

  • Anonymous 22 Feb

    Ooh have I ever, there have been so many problems that I asked Amazon if I could specify that they do not use HDNL to ehich they responded that they used them because of their excellent service and no I could not specify. Now I (and others) are not going to be using Amazon, which is a shame but I'm sure there are many other sites about that offer the same prices.

  • Phil Tebble 09 Jun

    After reading all the comments on here i was rather concerned as I had just ordered a £580 laptop computer from Amazon.  However, it all went well.  Picked up from Amazon at 3:15pm on Tuesday and delivered to me at 12 noon on Wednesday.  The delivery driver was a rather scruffy individual but he was polite and the outer wrapping of the parcel was completely undamaged. 
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