Recently I had a terrible encounter with Ferns and Petals, a brand I swore by in the past and recommended to all my folks. But not any more!
The difference is that while earlier I had always bought flowers from their outlets myself, this time I wanted to get the flowers delivered. It was my Mom- Dad’s 30th Anniversary and I could not be home. So I planned for sending a nice bouquet and cake combo.
I placed my order well in advance and so began my ordeal with Ferns and Petals!
Here it goes-
1) Their website claims - u can avail credit card offers etc etc. but, surprisingly their payment gateway(All banks) is mostly non functional.(I have faced this situation on three different days I tried to place the order.) Once you have placed the order online and proceed to the checkout and try to make the payment, you get a call in no time from sum one at F n P Vasant kunj. She would then mail you the F n P ICICI bank acc details and ask you to go through the hassle of first adding them to your ICICI payee list, wait for the unique confirmation number, confirming them and making the payment as against the swift online payment.
2) Till when you have not made the payment they would be so active in calling you and receiving your calls, but the moment the payment is made, trust me its close to impossible to get in touch with this person! She refuses to take any calls!
3) Once you have made the payment and if u have the patience to not give up and keep trying her number, chances are 1/25 calls u may get to speak with her and request her for a mail on the order details and finally you receive a mail stating the order details.
In my case they gave the order details with a wrong address! They gave me a Chandigarh address as against a Kanpur address I had specified!
I mailed her back immediately though I wasn’t sure how well the mail communication wud work with them, so I also called her up and finally 15-20 trials later got to speak wid her. Cleared the address issue and asked for a mail again which I never recd. Though she confirmed the correct address over the phone.
4) Now finally on the d day of delivery, I waited patiently. It was 2 in the afternoon and my order had still not reached. With the kind of experience I had been through with them so far I thought of giving them a reminder call. Finally around 2 pm I placed a call to these guys, n to my surprise I found that their delivery boy had been roaming around the streets of Chandi garh with a half kanpur half chandi garh address! I mean seriously!
N instead of solving the issue at their end, they gave me the Kanpur shop contact to follow up with, n in my ordeal I finally found the only person who was of sum help was the Kanpur shop girl who finally got the flowers n cake delivered by 5:30ish n saved the day.
I can’t believe that a company which deals in such a sensitive area-can afford to be so ruthless and unprofessional!