The Popcorn Factory Holiday Disappointment

This past holiday season, I like many others decided to use the online service to order some holiday gifts. One of the company's I chose to order from was the PopCorn Factory. I placed an order with them in the early afternoon (about 1:00pm) for a gift basket to be sent to my superior shortly after Christmas. I paid for express shipping (3 days) and received confirmation of the order placed. On Friday, December 31, 1999 at 2:00pm I was sent an email message to inform me that my package was permanently out of stock and that my order was not completed. I had expected it to have been delivered 2-3 days ago and I was just finding out now that is was not even available. I called their customer service representative and was told their computers were down and that someone would get back to me later that day. The gentleman, Phil, took all of my information and assured me that he was not ignoring me but that his hands were tied right now without his computer. I said that was fine and hung up. Today, January 4, 2000, 8:00pm I am still awaiting that call back. I again called Customer Service to inquire about my package and the woman whom I spoke with said I was lucky my response was that quickly, usually it takes 2-3 weeks to find out that something is out of stock.

I assure you that this consumer will never again shop from this company who provides such inadequate service. I feel that others need to be aware of the pending situation and hopefully can divert their embarrassment by having a gift go received and a holiday ruined in an employee's eye to their employer.

I do believe that if a company cannot adequately use the internet to their customers advantage then such a company should not be using the internet to sell their goods at all!