25th August 2008

Living in the middle of nowhere can be uplifting, surrounded as we are by all those golden fields and sheep, but sometimes I feel the lack of good shopping facilities (such as we were used to in the UK). I therefore decided to make use of the internet. I remembered those shops that were particularly good for my size(!), so looked up sites like Evans and M&S. Him indoors, not to be outdone, sometimes looks up sites like Draper Tools etc. However, what we have discovered is that these stores still seem to be living in the dark ages. Yes, someone has produced a snappy website for them, but they still talk about such things as 'freight' and 'shipping' as if we were a big company about to move our whole house abroad. One store replied: '...we don't deliver to France...'. I carefully explained that what I wanted was not 'freight', it didn't need to be 'shipped' and that all they needed to do was to pop my desired item into a sealed bag and mail it to me by standard mail. But no! Did they think I wanted it delivered by special van with a driver in a peaked cap? So, what did I do? I went to the place that is number one for customer service: the USA. Stores such as LL Bean in Maine and JC Penney said to me 'no problem'. Their websites had a special international site and they mailed items to me in a sealed bag, sent by airmail. Voila! Please take note, M&S and Evans. It's about time you brought your services into the 21st century.