We have hard time with the Covid-19 pandemy and a lot of people relied all this time on the delivery services done by some of the supermarkets chains that serve the people in the country where we live. Considering my recent experience in online shopping I decided to share what I found and I don't like about Sainsbury delivery.
Sainsbury is one of the largest supermarkets in England with a very big number of shops across the country, from small to very big markets.
While needed to quarantine or isolate, people done a lot of online shopping on their online website. I am one of them, forced to auto-isolate for 2 weeks after a trip in a different country.
While doing online shopping I realised a few things:
For people who do not know, Sainsbury delivery slots are available many times in a few days only. If you realised you run out of milk for you kids, they will have to wait. I am sure this is not only a Sainsbury delivery problem and every supermarket doing delivery is probably in the same situation.
Is a lot better now than into the first months with lockdown when Covid-19 striked hard and found people unprepared - when we had to wait weeks for a delivery. The sistem was not prepared for that and is understandable.
You don't always get what you buy. When your shopping bags are filled in, if a product you paid for is not available it will be replaced with a different similar product (which I found normal, but...).
I experienced buying some sausages that I think are a lot more healthier than the ones I got (which I throwed in the bin straight away).
When the delivery truck is loaded, you get an email saying
"Some products you asked for are unavailable, we're sorry about that."
Sainsbury's email
and you expect you will get something similar instead or something of a better quality as they pretend they will do on the bellow quote. A funny thing is that on the same email is explained what is happening if your wanted product is substituted with an available product and the price is bigger
"Eeek… my substitute is more expensive
Sainsbury's email
Here's the good bit.
If your substitute is more expensive, and is covered by our Substitution Promise we'll give you a voucher for the difference to use on your next online shop.
For example; you've ordered a can of by Sainsbury's tomatoes for 35p, we've replaced them with a can of Taste the Difference tomatoes for 80p, you'll get a voucher for 45p.
So you won't be out of pocket."
What they don't mention is what you might think if the substitute product is cheaper. A lot of people do not care about a few penny more or less on a product but they care to eat healthier.
Sainsbury do not care what you eat! Most of the time a cheaper product will be of a worst quality as the substitute sausages I received.
Do I trust Sainsbury delivery? No, I don't trust and I don't like Sainsbury at all. Not only that I will not have the sausages I expected, but I lost the money I paid for them and I will have to wait a few more days to get a delivery from a different online shop. What marketing strategy is this?
So, you done your shopping and is time to Checkout and choose a Sainsbury delivery slot on their online website.
When looking over the Sainsbury delivery slots table you will see different slots having different delivery prices depending on the value of your basket. Fare enough! But, if you buy for less than £40, the table with the delivery slots is not updating with a value of £7 on all the slots and it stays with the variation of the delivery prices it had initial. You know that little hidden lines specially positioned in a a way that are not available to the view straight away?
Many people will not even realise that they choose a cheep delivery slot, but they will pay in the end £7 when they probably just need to buy some more products for a few more pounds and reach £40 and pay £0.5, £2.5 or whatever delivery slot they choose.
Next time when you will need food, I hope you will be able to do it yourself and avoid the need to look for a home Sainsbury delivery slot time or get products substitute with something that you usually avoid buying yourself.