DogFoodDirect - A Warning!

Pythia

Hi all,

I'm just writing a bit of a warning for people considering ordering from DogFoodDirect.ie.

Recently, my partner and I placed an order for a bag of RC Maxi Junior from DFD. The order was made early on a Monday morning and their site says that if an order is placed before 1pm, it should arrive the next day.

Tuesday came and there was no sign of the order or contact from the company. I rang them in the late afternoon on the mobile number(!!!)/only number provided on their website and was greeted with "Hello?", giving no inclination that it was a company I was on to. I enquired as to the status of the order we had placed only to be told that the delivery had went to the courier the previous afternoon (Monday). This obviously lead to some concern. The man we dealt with let us know he had no idea which courier he'd given our delivery to and gave us the number of one that he thought it could be.

I rang the courier company he suggested it could be in order to get an update on the delivery only to be told they didn't have our delivery. We left it at that for Tuesday.

On Wednesday, we called DogFoodDirect again to let them know first of all that our delivery still wasn't here and secondly that they had given us the wrong courier company the day before. The same person (the only person involved in the business ?!) gave us another courier company to call then. We called them and unsurprisingly, they had delivered the food to the wrong address.

Not only had they delivered it to the wrong address, they left it at the side gate in the rain where it had then stayed for 24 hours. We never received so much as a call from the courier during the whole debacle, and now they had left a paper bag of dry dog food worth €65 in the rain overnight.

The courier company then brought this bag to our address upon which my partner inspected it and rejected it on account of it being soaking wet and the expected destruction of the now wet food inside the bag. Within minutes, the same person from DogFoodDirect called my partner in an attempt to persuade him to take the delivery. When we refused to budge, he then claimed he was out of stock and wouldn't be able to get us another bag for days. Upon being asked for a refund, he asked my partner was he sure and that the same bag would be €72 in a pet shop and "sure if you just feed him the stuff from the bottom first it'll be grand". The refund was requested and we ordered from Zooplus.ie immediately afterwards.

A week later, with the order from Zooplus having arrived €10 cheaper than DFD with a free toy from RC, yet there was no sign of the refund. I called DogFoodDirect in order to find out what had gone on. Firstly he insisted that he had issued the refund, then he smugly told us how he had sold on the bag we rejected and that the people who bought it hadn't complained, belittling our decision to reject the damaged delivery. He then checked his "system" and realised that he had issued the refund to the wrong customer.

At no stage in this debacle was an apology issued. My partner put a comment on DogFoodDirect's facebook page, outlining what had happened for other customers and complaining about the level of service received and it was subsequently deleted and my partner blocked from commenting on the page any further.

Do not order from this company. It is without a doubt the worst customer service we've received from an Irish company and with the plethora of competition available, there is absolutely no excuse to support this farce.

Hopefully this helps at least one person going forward!

RubyGirl

And the fact that he may you "the customer " ring the courier. Why did'nt he follow up with the courier and get back to you.

My sister uses them, I must see how she get's on?

Oscars Mum

I ordered 1 delivery of food and it took 1 week for the delivery.... Definitley no next day delivery...

Pythia

This thread is re-instated and discussion on the matter has been approved by the site going forward.

Thanks to the mods here.

Pythia

RubyGirl wrote: »

And the fact that he may you "the customer " ring the courier. Why did'nt he follow up with the courier and get back to you.

My sister uses them, I must see how she get's on?

This was definitely one of the more surprising elements of the debacle. To be sure, it felt more as though we were just a massive inconvenience to them than a valued customer which is quite amusing considering the sheer level of competition the company has.

meoklmrk91

I ordered from them before, 2 bags of champion premium plus, not even halfway through the first bag the food grew mould on it so I was left with 1 and a half bags of mouldy food. Rang the company and after much questioning about how I store my food, I offered to send a picture. He said it was fine he believed me as a friend of his rang the other day and said the same thibg had appened to their food, so what? had his friend not rang he wouldn't have believed me? I was offered 1 bag, I took it, the dog who will usually plow through anything you put in front of him, wouldn't eat it, I didn't blame as there was a bad smell of must off the food. It ended up going in the bin and we switched, not a good experience at all. Wouldn't recommended to anyone.

Also he is a horribly abrupt man on the phone,he doesn't seem to have the first clue regarding customer service or even just basic manners.

Inexile

Let me say at the outset that I have absolutely no personal connection with the company.

I have ordered from Dogsfooddirect on a number of occasions and have had no problems. The food has been delivered by a courier company who ring me, usually before 9.00am the day after ordering, to say that they have the delivery and will drop it out that day If Im working that day I usually arrange with the courier to drop it to my work address rather than my home address which is no problem. All food supplied has been the expected quality, including the champion range.

If I have any queries I usually email the company and get a fairly quick response - even at the weekends.

Sorry to hear that others havent had the same level of service that I have had and am hoping its not the norm.

Pythia

meoklmrk91 wrote: »

I ordered from them before, 2 bags of champion premium plus, not even halfway through the first bag the food grew mould on it so I was left with 1 and a half bags of mouldy food. Rang the company and after much questioning about how I store my food, I offered to send a picture. He said it was fine he believed me as a friend of his rang the other day and said the same thibg had appened to their food, so what? had his friend not rang he wouldn't have believed me? I was offered 1 bag, I took it, the dog who will usually plow through anything you put in front of him, wouldn't eat it, I didn't blame as there was a bad smell of must off the food. It ended up going in the bin and we switched, not a good experience at all. Wouldn't recommended to anyone.

Also he is a horribly abrupt man on the phone,he doesn't seem to have the first clue regarding customer service or even just basic manners.

That's very odd and the presence of mould would raise several questions in itself. He did have the gall to rub it in our noses that he had taken the bag that we rejected, on account of it being soaked at the bottom, and sold it on to some other unsuspecting customer. I personally wouldn't have thought such a bag was fit to sell on but apparently not at DFD...

His idea of customer service is absolutely bizarre also, as you experienced. He appears to take the route that HE is always right and that his paying customers are merely an inconvenience to his day.

You're absolutely right with regards to customer service and manners. Excluding all the errors that were made, his attitude and lack of manners alone makes it easily the worst customer service we've experienced here. I've never had a company make so many mistakes and not mention the word "sorry" once.

Mistakes happen, things go wrong and the true measure of the company and their staff lies in how they deal with mistakes or errors when they do happen.

Inexile wrote: »

Let me say at the outset that I have absolutely no personal connection with the company.

I have ordered from Dogsfooddirect on a number of occasions and have had no problems. The food has been delivered by a courier company who ring me, usually before 9.00am the day after ordering, to say that they have the delivery and will drop it out that day If Im working that day I usually arrange with the courier to drop it to my work address rather than my home address which is no problem. All food supplied has been the expected quality, including the champion range.

If I have any queries I usually email the company and get a fairly quick response - even at the weekends.

Sorry to hear that others havent had the same level of service that I have had and am hoping its not the norm.

That's great that you've had good service from them although a lot of it seems to have been the quality of the courier company as opposed to DFD itself?

I was pretty stunned that a courier company would not only not bother to give us a call or text to arrange the delivery before actually bringing it out, but then when they arrived to what was actually the wrong house they didn't bother ringing then and decided to leave a non-waterproof bag of dry dog food at the side passage in the rain.

The guy in DFD didn't speak very highly of the courier in question throughout the experience which, while firstly being horrendously unprofessional (as was everything else, to be fair), begs the question of why he would use them in the first place.

IrishHomer

OP,
You should order in bulk and be better prepared its silly ordering online and expecting instant delivery of one bag. Nice carbon footprint for delivery of just of bag.

Any time couriers deliver my dog food it was always well wrapped in plastic so rain would not have mattered.

d9oiu2wk07blr5

It's news to me that Michael who is the owner of this company employed couriers to deliver his products ! This company (CRO No:498560) was only incorporated in 2011, and funny enough his van no longer has vehicle signs to promote dogfooddirect.ie on it anymore...take from that as you may.

Pythia

IrishHomer wrote: »

OP,
You should order in bulk and be better prepared its silly ordering online and expecting instant delivery of one bag. Nice carbon footprint for delivery of just of bag.

Firstly, no I absolutely should not order in bulk. It's a 15kg bag of food that does over a month so I have absolutely no need to have more than one bag of it sitting around.

Secondly, from the DogFoodDirect website:
"We offer FREE nationwide delivery. All orders made before 1:00pm should be delivered next day anywhere in the Country."

So you're wrong on both counts.

Any time couriers deliver my dog food it was always well wrapped in plastic so rain would not have mattered.

Yes and if they had then there would be less of an issue, but they didn't.

mosi

I ordered off them once, and although I made the order in time, come 5.30 the next day there was still no sign of it. I rang them and they said it had gone with the courier that day. Within 20 minutes, the food had arrived, albeit with a slight tear in the bag. I put it down to a glitch...I didn't realise that there seem to be quite a few issues with them.
Anyway, I haven't ordered from them since but that is mostly due to the fact that I can order the same food cheaper from zooplus.co.uk.

Inexile

Miriam Flaky Nitrogen wrote: »

It's news to me that Michael who is the owner of this company employed couriers to deliver his products ! This company (CRO No:498560) was only incorporated in 2011, and funny enough his van no longer has vehicle signs to promote dogfooddirect.ie on it anymore...take from that as you may.

Whattow - are you surprised that the company uses couriers. My experience is that a lot of online companies use couriers for delivery.

OP one thing that strikes me as odd re the courier company that delivered the stuff to the wrong address is did they not require a signature on delivery? I have previousl asked the courier company to just leave it at the side of the house and was told they couldnt do that as they have to have a signature. Also in your original post you appear to question that the company just had a mobile number. From what I gather nowdays that a lot of companies are doing this as it reduces the overheads and if you are on the road whats the point of a landline?

As you say maybe the problem is with the courier company but I do agree that dogsdirect should be active in sorting them out.

d9oiu2wk07blr5

Inexile wrote: »

Whattow - are you surprised that the company uses couriers. My experience is that a lot of online companies use couriers for delivery.

OP one thing that strikes me as odd re the courier company that delivered the stuff to the wrong address is did they not require a signature on delivery? I have previousl asked the courier company to just leave it at the side of the house and was told they couldnt do that as they have to have a signature. Also in your original post you appear to question that the company just had a mobile number. From what I gather nowdays that a lot of companies are doing this as it reduces the overheads and if you are on the road whats the point of a landline?

As you say maybe the problem is with the courier company but I do agree that dogsdirect should be active in sorting them out.

No, I am not surprised because I've bought a lot of stuff online from long standing established companies. But if you're a newly established company, it doesn't quite make sense why you would increase your operational overheads by using a courier company at the outset .

I wouldn't see anything unusual about using mobile numbers. However, I would always suggest doing a background search on any company or business that you are not familiar with through the CRO.

Pythia

Inexile wrote: »

Whattow - are you surprised that the company uses couriers. My experience is that a lot of online companies use couriers for delivery.

OP one thing that strikes me as odd re the courier company that delivered the stuff to the wrong address is did they not require a signature on delivery? I have previousl asked the courier company to just leave it at the side of the house and was told they couldnt do that as they have to have a signature. Also in your original post you appear to question that the company just had a mobile number. From what I gather nowdays that a lot of companies are doing this as it reduces the overheads and if you are on the road whats the point of a landline?

As you say maybe the problem is with the courier company but I do agree that dogsdirect should be active in sorting them out.

Even when the guy eventually brought the (damaged) bag to the right address, he never sought a signature. Perhaps, in his desperate attempt to get my partner to accept the damaged goods, he forgot about it but it certainly wasn't mentioned at any time. When they delivered it to the wrong address initially, the guy told us afterward that he'd left a note on the door and just left the bag at the side gate which is absolutely unacceptable.

The big problem here, more than anything else, is the desperate level of customer service, manners and professionalism provided by DFD. I dealt with DFD, not the courier, and was continually disgraced at the attitude on display from them (DFD) and this thread has shown that I'm not alone in that. Then, after all was said and done, they moved to censor negative feedback and silence those providing it. They're a disgrace.

With regards to the mobile number - there's two issues there. Firstly it is not standard for a company to use a mobile number and a quick look at other small pet suppliers alone would confirm this. Secondly, if they have to use just a mobile number then that number should be used as their professional business line and treated as such. On ringing, the greetings I received were "Hello?" and worse, "How are ye?". They're not bad in themselves but solidify the belief that the guy running the business hasn't an iota of an idea how to treat customers.

snollup

Had much the same issues with DFD's delivery. After many phone calls had to go collect the food myself. In fairness Michael did knock €5 off the price & through in a few bags of treats. That said, havent ordered from him since.

d9oiu2wk07blr5

Pythia wrote: »

Even when the guy eventually brought the (damaged) bag to the right address, he never sought a signature. Perhaps, in his desperate attempt to get my partner to accept the damaged goods, he forgot about it but it certainly wasn't mentioned at any time. When they delivered it to the wrong address initially, the guy told us afterward that he'd left a note on the door and just left the bag at the side gate which is absolutely unacceptable.

The big problem here, more than anything else, is the desperate level of customer service, manners and professionalism provided by DFD. I dealt with DFD, not the courier, and was continually disgraced at the attitude on display from them (DFD) and this thread has shown that I'm not alone in that. Then, after all was said and done, they moved to censor negative feedback and silence those providing it. They're a disgrace.

With regards to the mobile number - there's two issues there. Firstly it is not standard for a company to use a mobile number and a quick look at other small pet suppliers alone would confirm this. Secondly, if they have to use just a mobile number then that number should be used as their professional business line and treated as such. On ringing, the greetings I received were "Hello?" and worse, "How are ye?". They're not bad in themselves but solidify the belief that the guy running the business hasn't an iota of an idea how to treat customers.

Unless he's using the mobile for more than one business. Do you know if DFD and the courier are one of the same?

Inexile

Miriam Flaky Nitrogen wrote: »

No, I am not surprised because I've bought a lot of stuff online from long standing established companies. But if you're a newly established company, it doesn't quite make sense why you would increase your operational overheads by using a courier company at the outset .
.

A business would use a courier company as it would be cheaper than employing a fleet of vans to cover the country. DFD is based in Dublin I live in Kerry should it be a poor use of resources to send someone down to me with an order.

I have also dealt with another newly established online pet supply company and again they used a courier company.

borderlinemeath

I've used them in the past and had no problems. Last time I ordered from them was maybe 6-8 months ago though. I've had orders delivered to my workplace and home address and no problems. Always covered in good heavyweight plastic overbags as well.

d9oiu2wk07blr5

Inexile wrote: »

A business would use a courier company as it would be cheaper than employing a fleet of vans to cover the country. DFD is based in Dublin I live in Kerry should it be a poor use of resources to send someone down to me with an order.

I have also dealt with another newly established online pet supply company and again they used a courier company.

Unless you own a transport company as well.

Inexile

Miriam Flaky Nitrogen wrote: »

Unless you own a transport company as well.

True! I get you now.

On a side issue. I was recently in contact with yet another online pet food company. The person I spoke to said that as the boss owned a delivery company they used them for deliveries or another courier. Dont think these were in anyway connected with DFD - delivery times were vastly different. But it makes me wonder if the dog food business is the new way for delivery companies to expand.

d9oiu2wk07blr5

Inexile wrote: »

True! I get you now.

On a side issue. I was recently in contact with yet another online pet food company. The person I spoke to said that as the boss owned a delivery company they used them for deliveries or another courier. Dont think these were in anyway connected with DFD - delivery times were vastly different. But it makes me wonder if the dog food business is the new way for delivery companies to expand.

Tbh, I don't know....but I'd say there's a lot of companies diversifying in this current climate.

Cutie18Ireland

Have used dogfooddirect for over a year now, never had any problems.
Latest orders have arrived the next morning around 8am. Ordered vet bedding and he only had 2 left of the 8 I ordered so he threw in the more expensive option instead. Couldn't ask for better customer service than that!
Have ordered numerous bags of champion food and have never had a problem with quality and all my dogs loved it.

paultf

IrishHomer wrote: »

You should order in bulk and be better prepared its silly ordering online and expecting instant delivery of one bag. Nice carbon footprint for delivery of just of bag.

With ordering in bulk it obviously works out better if you have a few dogs.

What happens if you order in bulk and your dog becomes intolerant to the food? Especially if you only have 1 dog.

Happened to my dog recently. So it could be possible that you are left with 2 x 15kg bags of food costing around 100 euro and your dog won't eat it.

Plus some people don't have the space to store more than 1 bag.

(BTW, I have a few dogs so it works out better for me to order 2 bags at a time.)

I think the OP got some really bad customer service. If DFD say next day delivery, then they have to provide that service. I am sure that statement attracted alot of people to buy from their site.

OP, if you are looking for very good customer service Amazon provide the best. I got a bag of food from them recently, there was a small hole in the bag, they allowed me keep the bag of food and sent me a new bag free of charge. All it toke was one email.

Dirk Gently

Just want to put out a positive story about dogfood direct as I think it's a great service and never had any problems with them myself.

I've been using them for the best part of a year now and never had any issue, in fact I think it's a fantastic service. My order is always delivered by Mick himself, never by a courier. Perhaps that's where the difference in service comes in. I always get a call from Mick or a message on facebook asking when is best to deliver it, sometimes same day as order, sometimes next day or when ever I ask for really. He sometimes throws a little something in with the order, like tennis ball slings or like last week when he gave me a free 15kg dog food container.

I know he uses couriers for country orders and delivers himself where practical around Dublin so I can't say how good the courier service is but for me I've found dog food direct to be excellent. His prices are always great and delivery is always when i ask for it, whether morning noon or late in the evening. I was disappointed to see this thread because I know how much Mick puts into the business and how tight the margins are. He works hard and I always thought him calling or keeping in touch through facebook added a great personal touch to the business.

I hope most people have had positive experiences with him and that the OP was an isolated or rare incident. Like I said, it's disappointing to see a negative thread about someone I feel pulls out all the stops and puts in a hard days graft every day.

IrishHomer

Pythia wrote: »

Firstly, no I absolutely should not order in bulk. It's a 15kg bag of food that does over a month so I have absolutely no need to have more than one bag of it sitting around.

Secondly, from the DogFoodDirect website:
"We offer FREE nationwide delivery. All orders made before 1:00pm should be delivered next day anywhere in the Country."

So you're wrong on both counts.



Yes and if they had then there would be less of an issue, but they didn't.

If you store our dog food in a large air tight plastic container it will stay fresh for several months

Pythia

Dirk Gently wrote: »

I hope most people have had positive experiences with him and that the OP was an isolated or rare incident. Like I said, it's disappointing to see a negative thread about someone I feel pulls out all the stops and puts in a hard days graft every day.

He certainly pulled out the stops to get the message deleted from his Facebook and block my partner from posting again. Things can go wrong but it's underhand to delete any negative criticism of the company and block some one from making further comments.