Cole Furniture Over Promised, Undelivered, Poor Customer Service Mt. Orab, Ohio

It is amazing to me how they are replying to this ripoff report and they never called us and gave us updates while we waited for months for furniture.  When we called in, the sales people told us the furniture came from overseas.  So, if it isn't true, maybe they should tell their sales people.  Having a delivery delayed is one thing, not communicating is another.  So, we had two issues.  We will never buy from Cole's again, because they don't care about their customers.  

First, I will address the legitamate complaint, then I will point out the apparent wild speculation that was presented as fact.

We tell customers that most orders come in between 3 and 6 weeks and the range of possibility is between 1 and 12 weeks. When I say "most," I mean well beyond half / 50% of the orders we place arrive from the manufacturer to our store within 3 to 6 weeks. Moreover, all but a handfull fall within the range of 2 to 8 weeks. We realize that if you are one of the small handfull of customers whose order takes longer than 8 weeks, knowing that almost everyone else gets their order in half the time that you got yours isn't comforting. For that we are sorry, and assure you that if there is anything we can do to get your order sooner we do everything within our power to get your order as soon as possible.

We do not base our estimates on Ashley's projected stock status report because it can change at any time. We are more careful than that allows. The report only projects up to 6 weeks out. That is because almost everything from Ashley ships within 6 weeks, including back ordered items. However, despite what your experience in the industry or industries that you have experience with, our furniture vendors do not make promises or give absolute ship dates.

Nevertheless, we like to play it safe. That is why we over estimate delivery times. We base our estimates on the historical trends that we have seen with all of our past orders. It is extremely, extremely rare for orders to take longer than 12 weeks. That is why we give estimates up to 12 weeks. We also inform customers that we can only give estimates and cannot make promises because shipping times are completely out of our control and furniture vendors do not give firm ship dates or even firm estimated ship dates.

The bright side is that if you order from us, you are more likely than not to have your funiture delivered within 4 weeks. If you are among the half of customers that do not get their furniture within 4 weeks, you will have about a 99% chance of getting your furniture delivered within 8 weeks. We appologize to the approxiamate 1% of customers whose orders take beyond 8 weeks.

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Everything quoted from the original complaint below is absolutely untrue and presumably pure wild speculation, yet was presented as fact...

"What happens is after you pay for the furniture, they order it overseas.  It is then shipped to the store.  However, when it comes in, aggressive sales people sell your furniture.  They have no system of saving the furniture you bought.  Cole Furniture is only concerns with the sale today and not servicing customers that have already paid. "

We do not order anything from overseas. Although we do sell some imported items, we order from stock in a US warehouse. If the furniture was ordered directly from overseas, shipping would probably take 6 months or more.

No, we do not sell furniture ordered for one customer and sell it to another. Let me say clearly... we do not do that.

We do have a "system of saving the furniture you bought." When it comes in, we call the customer to set up a delivery or customer pick up, depending on what the customer selected. Until it is delivered or picked up, it sits in the warehouse, with the customer's name on it.
 
Yes, we care about the customers that have already paid and have thousands of happy customers from our 35 years of serving happy customers to prove it.

Nevertheless, I understand that if you are one of the small handfull of customers whose order has taken more than 8 weeks to arrive, you are probably not a happy customer. But, we will gladly take care of you too. But, why make stuff up. Isn't it enough to complain that you don't like being one of the handfull of customers that had to wait longer than you wanted to for your new furniture?

Did you know that the number one complaint for ANY furniture store is most likely that shipping took too long. That has been a complaint of the whole furniture industry for decades. Ironically, our main vendor has one of the shortest average shipping times in the whole industry. However, they don't bat a thousand. Even though shipping is completely out of our control, we are sorry.