Another Amazon issue... asking ME to contact the police

leamspaceman

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So... I ordered a pretty expensive item from Amazon. It was £1000.

It was ordered Saturday and supposed to come yesterday... Sunday.

The item didn't show so I went onto chat only to be told that my bank wouldn't authorise the amount.

I called my credit card company and they said no request had been made?

So I called Amazon and was told it wasn't anything to do with payment. I was told that it was an anti-fraud measure to ensure it was a legitimate order. I was told that the checks necessary could now be done over the phone.

So after all this the item was delivered today. I took the parcel from the driver and signed.

Half an hour later I opened the box only to find a bottle of water inside with some brown paper padding. Upon inspecting the box I now noticed the box had been opened previously and re-sealed with clear tape.

I took photos.

I immediately went onto chat.

I explained the situation and was passed onto someone who was an 'expert.'

Once again I explained.

The 'expert' immediately sent what is obviously a pre-written script. It basically said that Amazon have conducted a detailed investigation and can confirm the item was delivered, signed for. They said the driver confirmed that the box was not damaged.

It then went on to tell me that NO refund or replacement will be issued and it is MY responsibility to report this to the police.

So I asked Amazon to call me.

A different guy called me back and said to ignore all I'd been told and that a replacement would be arriving tomorrow.

I did explain that how can Amazon claim to have carried out a 'detailed' investigation during a 5-minute online chat? They hadn't even asked to see the photo's I took.

The agent was VERY apologetic and told me the previous agent would have to be re-trained.

What is happening with Amazon?

Do they hope customers will just accept liability for an item that has obviously been stolen?

All quite stress inducing
 
I ordered a £500 watch over the summer from Amazon when it arrived the box just contained some alcohol wipes! Got straight onto Amazon and, to be fair, they sorted it immediately with a refund and to keep the wipes!

Very odd.
 
ordered a £500 watch over the summer from Amazon when it arrived the box just contained some alcohol wipes! Got straight onto Amazon and, to be fair, they sorted it immediately with a refund and to keep the wipes!

Very odd.

They have a hole in their system they need to plug, but it's easier to blame the customer. Some will give up and claim through their CC
 
Yes, I'd imagine your blood pressure would be a tad high

I'm still expecting some kind of reversal of the decision to send a replacement. And/or a freeze on my account.
 
They have a hole in their system they need to plug, but it's easier to blame the customer. Some will give up and claim through their CC

Working for a business who sell on Amazon, I can tell you that they side with the customer in nearly all cases. Businesses lose 100's of pounds due to fraudulent A-Z Guarantee claims.

A few sellers have decided to take customers to court due to them keeping an item that they claimed was faulty, and kept, and got a refund from Amazon.

 
edit: From Amazon - "You are welcome to contact the buyer directly to make return arrangements for this merchandise. While they are not obligated to return the order, they may be willing to do so if they are compensated for the return shipping costs."



Don't understand, why aren't they obligated to return the item?
 
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Working for a business who sell on Amazon, I can tell you that they side with the customer in nearly all cases. Businesses lose 100's of pounds due to fraudulent A-Z Guarantee claims.

A few sellers have decided to take customers to court due to them keeping an item that they claimed was faulty, and kept, and got a refund from Amazon.



I posted a while back about some dog collars I bought that ended up developing faults.

The seller never responded to my claim.

Amazon told me I would get a full refund due to the seller not responding. This never happened.

When the seller DID respond I was expected to pay for postage.

Amazon then told me to get in touch with the manufacturer of the items. All I had to go on was a 'Made in Vietnam' label.

I no longer buy from third-party sellers.

Imagine if the issue I've had in this thread had been with a third-party. Hard enough dealing with Amazon themselves.

The problem is that Amazon have become such a massive corporation that they (and others) make up their own policies that do not comply with UK law. By doing so they put the responsibility back onto the customer.

No way should I have been told that the issue I had was my responsibility and it was up to me to go to the police.
 
edit: From Amazon - "You are welcome to contact the buyer directly to make return arrangements for this merchandise. While they are not obligated to return the order, they may be willing to do so if they are compensated for the return shipping costs."



Don't understand, why are they obligated to return the item?

Exactly, as a third party seller you can have a customer claim an item is faulty, get a refund from Amazon and keep the "faulty" item.

The A-Z guarantee is fine for sellers that don't respond and who are not actively seeking to solve the situation. But as a seller you can give all the evidence that you have asked the customer to return the item and they will not listen and will refund them regardless.

Personally as a consumer, I don't use Amazon. I buy maybe 3-5 low cost items from them a year, if that.
 
I ordered a £500 watch over the summer from Amazon when it arrived the box just contained some alcohol wipes! Got straight onto Amazon and, to be fair, they sorted it immediately with a refund and to keep the wipes!

Very odd.
Not really odd...their delivery drivers are stealing the goods.
 
With the busy Christmas period approaching, Amazon warehouse in Peterborough is reaching out to several 'partner' employment agencies to fill the roles.
Trouble is, Peterborough is right in the middle of the area that migrant workers inhabit due to seasonal agricultural work.
 
With the busy Christmas period approaching, Amazon warehouse in Peterborough is reaching out to several 'partner' employment agencies to fill the roles.
Trouble is, Peterborough is right in the middle of the area that migrant workers inhabit due to seasonal agricultural work.

Are you suggesting that migrant workers are stealing items... and that British workers would never dream of doing such a thing?

This is purely a question I am asking you and apologise in advance if I am misunderstanding you.
 
I've had a couple like this in the last 6 months.

The first was a £500 item. When I opened the box, there was a completely different item in there, worth all of £5, There was no evidence it had been opened in this case so I expected fraud at the warehouse.

They asked me to send back the cheap item, but then refused to refund the purchase price! I eventually got it back through sheer persistence.

A few months later, I plucked up the courage to order a high value item again. This time it was a £1,000 item and it was delivered to completely the wrong address. A lot of arguing ensued and again I got the money back, but it came along with a warning that I have had too many items reported as not received and therefore will not get any more refunds for items that go missing in the future!

I'll close the account and open a new one for small purchases, but I'll never buy anything of high value from them again.

The part that was frightening was that my credit card company refused to open a dispute because Amazon had an illegible POD from a completely different address!

I hope your replacement arrives ok tomorrow.
 
Are you suggesting that migrant workers are stealing items... and that British workers would never dream of doing such a thing?

This is purely a question I am asking you and apologise in advance if I am misunderstanding you.
There's good and bad in all groups.
Various factors make it less likely local 'bad' employees will be taken on compared to non-locals.
 
I've had a couple like this in the last 6 months.

The first was a £500 item. When I opened the box, there was a completely different item in there, worth all of £5, There was no evidence it had been opened in this case so I expected fraud at the warehouse.

They asked me to send back the cheap item, but then refused to refund the purchase price! I eventually got it back through sheer persistence.

A few months later, I plucked up the courage to order a high value item again. This time it was a £1,000 item and it was delivered to completely the wrong address. A lot of arguing ensued and again I got the money back, but it came along with a warning that I have had too many items reported as not received and therefore will not get any more refunds for items that go missing in the future!

I'll close the account and open a new one for small purchases, but I'll never buy anything of high value from them again.

The part that was frightening was that my credit card company refused to open a dispute because Amazon had an illegible POD from a completely different address!

I hope your replacement arrives ok tomorrow.

Shocking...!!!

A few years ago they emailed me (and lots of other people) to say I was under investigation because of too many refunds. They threatened closure of my account. Funny thing was that most of the refunds were initiated by Amazon.

I have now asked them to cancel the replacement and give me a refund. I think I'll shop elsewhere for this.

I can see the replacement is cancelled but no email about the refund!!!
 
There's good and bad in all groups.
Various factors make it less likely local 'bad' employees will be taken on compared to non-locals.

All our drivers come from the Banbury depot. They are almost always East European. They haven't nicked anything ever. So I'm also unclear what you are saying.
 
There's good and bad in all groups.
Various factors make it less likely local 'bad' employees will be taken on compared to non-locals.

What 'factors' are they?

All our drivers come from the Banbury depot. They are almost always East European. They haven't nicked anything ever. So I'm also unclear what you are saying.

Same here... almost all my deliveries come from Banbury and almost always Eastern European.

Having worked in Banbury in the past, I'm not sure I'd trust the 'locals' to be honest.
 
That's drivers.
Amazon warehouse is order pickers/packers.
It's easier to reject a UK citizen with a checkable criminal history, and employ an Eastern European with unknown history instead.
 
Shocking...!!!

A few years ago they emailed me (and lots of other people) to say I was under investigation because of too many refunds. They threatened closure of my account. Funny thing was that most of the refunds were initiated by Amazon.
The problem is that Amazon have made themselves fairly essential to a lot of people with impossibly good deals, but it appears they are now trying to finance that in part by making the customer responsible when things go wrong.

For example, just today I ordered a proven excellent 3 metre HDMI cable at midday and it will (should!) be here tonight before 10pm for £5.19.

Nowhere else can come close to that. It will take a lot of those purchases to make me forgive them for the stress of chasing the larger amounts that went missing due to failures somewhere in their system, but if I’m realistic I can’t expect the prices and delivery speed I an generally getting to be backed up with excellent service.

I don’t expect to be basically accused of theft, though, which is why I’ll only use them for small purchases in the future.

I have now asked them to cancel the replacement and give me a refund. I think I'll shop elsewhere for this.

I can see the replacement is cancelled but no email about the refund!!!


Hopefully you should be ok. The order page for my item that got lost a week ago, still says ‘Delivered. Parcel handed to resident.’ even though I have had the refund for a few days.

Always request an email confirming your conversation and get straight back to them if it differs.
Good luck with it.
 
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The system is fudgeed! I play mid week football and our latest recruit is an Amazon driver, naturally everyone has been asking him about how the systems work and the entire operation is set up to fail. These casual drivers operate on a self employed basis (Amazon Flex) They recieve no training and are expected to hit the road running after watching around 10 videos linked to an app on their phone (which also doubles as a shift finder/sat nav and parcel scanner)

They park up at the depot and have a trolly brought to their vehicle, they then have to scan the trolly which in turn tells them the days route, they then scan each parcel and at the end, they should have the same amount of parcels scanned as was on the job list BUT, when Amazon are really busy, the trolleys are brought to the cars without the first step meaning they simply scan the items and load their vehicle. On days like this, the guys who are dodgy can have a field day, IF for example they failed to scan an item but placed it in their car and it was to go missing, Amazon would class the item as 'lost in warehouse' meaning the courier will get away with it.

I've heard that on occassions, he will be delivering packages that are so light, he wonders if there is anything actually in the box, this is where warehouse theft happens, someone will steal the item or replace it with something unrelated then box it. On occassions like this, the drivers are usually blamed, he has weekly reports which list discrepancies, he is an honest guy and at times cannot understand when he has negative numbers for customer satisfaction, when Amazon are questioned about this, they always say they cannot reveal the customers details meaning he cannot defend himself even though he knows he has done the job properly.

It really sounds like a mess!

On the flip side, I don't think I've ever experienced this first hand although I've heard other accounts.
 
The system is fudgeed! I play mid week football and our latest recruit is an Amazon driver, naturally everyone has been asking him about how the systems work and the entire operation is set up to fail. These casual drivers operate on a self employed basis (Amazon Flex) They recieve no training and are expected to hit the road running after watching around 10 videos linked to an app on their phone (which also doubles as a shift finder/sat nav and parcel scanner)

They park up at the depot and have a trolly brought to their vehicle, they then have to scan the trolly which in turn tells them the days route, they then scan each parcel and at the end, they should have the same amount of parcels scanned as was on the job list BUT, when Amazon are really busy, the trolleys are brought to the cars without the first step meaning they simply scan the items and load their vehicle. On days like this, the guys who are dodgy can have a field day, IF for example they failed to scan an item but placed it in their car and it was to go missing, Amazon would class the item as 'lost in warehouse' meaning the courier will get away with it.

I've heard that on occassions, he will be delivering packages that are so light, he wonders if there is anything actually in the box, this is where warehouse theft happens, someone will steal the item or replace it with something unrelated then box it. On occassions like this, the drivers are usually blamed, he has weekly reports which list discrepancies, he is an honest guy and at times cannot understand when he has negative numbers for customer satisfaction, when Amazon are questioned about this, they always say they cannot reveal the customers details meaning he cannot defend himself even though he knows he has done the job properly.

It really sounds like a mess!

On the flip side, I don't think I've ever experienced this first hand although I've heard other accounts.

That's interesting stuff. I've also heard that some of the drivers are incentivised on first time drops. That makes sense as if an item comes back to the warehouse it must drive up costs for Amazon, but what it seems to do is make them deliver items which require a signature to the doorstep/neighbour/anyone they can find.

I guess they have calculated that they lose less money when things go wrong than they would if the operated a more reliable system, and then they seem to blame both the driver and the customer when it goes wrong.
 
That's drivers.
Amazon warehouse is order pickers/packers.
It's easier to reject a UK citizen with a checkable criminal history, and employ an Eastern European with unknown history instead.
Is the switchover/stealing done at the warehouse by the pickers/packers?

With all the news reports about the working conditions in the warehouses, I wouldn’t have thought it would be possible.
Aren’t the exact movements of the pickers in the warehouse constantly tracked, & they have to pick an item like every 30 seconds? They then get reprimanded/docked pay if they fall behind.

Don’t see how it would be possible for them to open up an item, get another item of suitable size, replace it in the box, reseal the box with incorrect item, hide the stolen item somewhere it won’t be seen, whilst walking at a brisk pace to pick up their next item, all within 30 secs?

Surely the weak link is the delivery/driver side?
 
That's drivers.
Amazon warehouse is order pickers/packers.
It's easier to reject a UK citizen with a checkable criminal history, and employ an Eastern European with unknown history instead.

Whilst watching the England football match on the TV, it's amazing to me the amount of racism that goes on in day to day life.
 
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I think this is natural behaviour from Amazon, when they were new to the scene they had to sell this brand new way of shopping to people, they had to be different. They ensured that customer service was the best you would find anywhere, you could always talk to a helpful customer service assistant knowing that by the end of the conversation, you'd be happy.

Years of this kind of service and the ability to undercut traditional brick and mortar business steered the high street into a steep decline, the only reason you'd end up using high street businesses was the possibility you could get the item you want on the same day, so, along came Prime same day and now Prime 2 hour which has further pushed the nail into the high street, no need to even buy a parking ticket!

So, now the high street is on the decline, their customer service has matched it, they no longer have to provide sterling service as you either use them or nobody, I'd bet that prices will also increase to match this trend.

Sucks, but what can you do.
 

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