Argos Rant!

Had yet another blip with Argos yesterday, why do I continue to shop there? I'll try to keep this short and I am sorry if I have ranted about this before.


We finally decided in October last year (2011) that we needed to get a 'proper' family table instead of the pine one that is hidden in the corner of the dining room. We decided on a drop leaf but couldn't find one we like anywhere so we decided on a nice wooden 4-seater one which was dark wood with nice cream covered seats. All was well until around the end of November when hubby sat on one of the chairs and it collapsed beneath him (hurting his back in the process). Now don't get me wrong Mike is not a small guy but he isn't a hefer either and doesn't normally go around flattening chairs!


We contacted Argos and complained who asked us to collapse the table and chairs and take it back, problem is it took 2 hours to put up so they were asking us to pack it away, bring it back to store and have it replaced? All we wanted was  a replacement chair - apparently it is easier to circumnavigate the globe in a hot air balloon than it is to get a replacement chair! As emails were going back and forth we noticed that another chair was starting to split so a complete replacement did seem to be the best option.


Have I yet to mention that Argos have the worse customer service ever? In store, via telephone, via email and on Twitter? I emailed their customer service to see if there was any chance they'd collect and replace, no luck. I email their directors office, I was told they would not deal with my complaint as not in line with the escalation process, Twitter - pretended to help outwardly but nothing ever came of it. I finally emailed the customer service MD direct (raye.summers@argos.co.uk - just in case you ever need it) and finally started to get some response, might I add by this time it was about 1 week before Xmas, which is not the best time to be tableless as by this point we only had 2 usable chairs for a family of 3 along with about 10 people coming for a boxing day lunch. Luckily I finally had contact with a helpful gentleman in the directors office and he arranged for a table to be delivered by taxi from one of their stores and the faulty one was collected.


What the gentleman at the directors office wouldn't have known was that we were sent a second, it was scratched to hell all over the table top. The seat cushions were stained with wood stain and all in all just a bad manufacturing job all round.  Contacted directors again and after more emails it was agreed they would exchange or refund and offer me a pittance compensation (£40).


Cut to this weekend.- We dismantled the second table took it to Argos and had to explain to 2 different customer service representatives the whole story from start to finish as they were obviously not happy to replace the item, I then had to show her my phone with the email on from the directors to prove they were allowing the exchange. I was asked how much I paid for the table which I couldn't remember as the item was first purchased over 5 and a half months ago so I gave the customer service lady my Argos card  to which she replied was not helpful because if I purchased anything else that month it would not be able to be determined how much I paid. This is not my issue, this is an issue at Argos. She called the card services customer service department, came back and more or less stated I was a liar as my card had no transactions between June and November 2011. How was I to know that two Argos cards on the same account do not show the same transactions? (which as they are for the same account surely they should?). Luckily my husband was with me and he handed over his card which turned out to be the card we used. I advised that I no longer wanted a replacement of the same table (due to already having two that were sub-standard) and wanted the a different one they had on offer which shows as being in stock for home delivery on the Argos website   - I advised her of this, I got a dirty look and a comment of if I continued to check out then it would say it was out of stock, apparently another Argos blip.

At this point I became frustrated so just advised that I'll just have a refund. To which her response was yes as long I have brought back everything including the chairs, was she having a laugh? why would I keep the chairs??? She had no idea to do a refund might I add and two customer service agents had to help her to add I received no please, thank yous, apologies or even a smile while I was in store - I was treated like a complete nobody, shocking customer service! I checked when I got home and she was indeed right, the Argos website lets you go all the way to checkout until it tells you there is no stock, interesting that Argos have no stock when it is being offered at half price don't you think?

The situation I now find myself in after 5 and a half months of trying simply to buy a table and sort all the errors out is no dining table whatsoever for myself and my family (eating dinner at the coffee table is neither comfortable or appropriate) and I am 23 days from the birth of our second child!

We now desperately require a table to fill the gap we have in our dining room which not only do we use for our meals I also recently use to work from home off of, so it is quite difficult and inconvenient to say the least! 

I have now asked that they get the table that I want, to me ASAP, however I won't hold my breath because I think dying from asphyxiation would be unpleasant!

What do think my chances are, I think bugger all but maybe if I got Watchdog involved it may help? We'll see.

So frustrating

Firstly I'd like to say hello to my first follower Lorna, Mike doesn't count as he is the hubby :-)

I said I wasn't going to hold my breath but apparently for once I was being listened to. Went in on Monday and I  was more or less in a meeting all day with my boss with the first part discussing my working day. It has been agreed that I am going to be working from home for most of the time now (yay). Looking at my rota now I only have to work for 4 more days actually in the office and I did one of those yesterday so 3 to go! I do have to go in briefly on one afternoon to do an exit interview for one of the staff but thats no big hassle.  On one of the days I am interviewing all day and another I am doing my staffs opening yearly reviews so not much time will be spent actually at my desk which suits me down to the ground.

Want to know some major TMI? My lady bits are causing me some jip, according to my off and on best mate (Google) its perfectly normal during pregnancy but I do feel like someone has booted me in the crotch, laughed, walked off and left me to deal with the aftermath. When I get up/walk I feel like the inside is all bruised, as I said I am sure its normal and I can't say that I am concerned, I have the MW on Monday so I'll mention it to her then.

This part is the reason for the title. All week in the morning Oliver has been requesting big boy pants so we thought, awesome he is ready to try potty training again, hmmmm. So the weekend comes and the first thing I did this morning was put him in big boy pants and I had a little chat with him about the potty which he seemed to understand (he's 2 years 7 months). Whats the first thing he does once we get downstairs? Wet himself, what does he do 10 mins later? Wet himself! For 456! I talked to him about it (calmly) and he says he doesn't want to use the potty, make your mind up dude! Helllllpppppp!

Baby news - I only have 24 days left, I go from excited to freaking out completely, about everything!. As far as I am aware baby is still head down but Midwife, I'm sure, will tell me on Monday, baby is still having some kind of disco party in there, which apart from a couple of painful manoeuvres I actually love the feeling.  My new fear is that the baby will get stuck! I know I am having a small one like with Oliver (who was 6lb 9oz) however the woman on One Born Every Minute the other day only had a 10 pounder and it got stuck, it was touch and go for a couple of minutes and they had to butcher the poor girl to get the baby out!  I am still really hoping that all I need is the pool and gas and air but if I really need it I'll have the epidural - eek!

Maternity and Billy Connolly

Well the decision was made. It was decided that I would make my last day at work 23rd Feb. All was planned out - official letter written to employer etc...

Anyway, I gets to work on the Thursday and I pull aside the other manager on the team to let her know my plan before I tell the boss however it turns out she had already spoke to the boss for me and suggested I work from home for the rest of my maternity - nice one. I ask my boss myself if that was an option for me and she said she will look into it and call me back.

I hear nothing all day Thurs or Friday so my decision was made and I felt fine with it. I called the boss on Friday afternoon to tell her 'the plan' but she jumps in first with risk assessments and that she'll come in on Monday and do the assessment then potentially go home early Monday and only come in when I am needed. I'm not holding my breath and I'm more than happy to leave on 23rd Feb. I have plenty of Jeremy Kyle and Eastenders to catch up on!

Went to see Billy Connolly last night, I'd bought the tix as a Xmas prezzie for the hubby and I wasn't looking forward to it for 2 reasons. 1) Front row centre to see a comedian (am I crazy!) and 2) Not really my cup of tea. There turned out to be a 3rd reason. We get to the theatre and we heard and announcement that I nearly had a heart attack from hearing "at the request of the artist there will be no interval". Ahhh, No interval + 8 months preggers + front row centre + comedian = not a good mix! As you can imagine I decided not to drink at all before or during the performance and had 2 wees in half an hour beforehand.

I was pleasantly surprised, after about 45 mins I really got into it and he was on for 2hr 45mins. Baby was bouncing around all over the place for nearly the whole time and towards the end of the show my bladder was starting to protest but I made it. Not that I'd have moved anyway as I'm not having a comedian take the p out of me (excuse the pun) for going for a wee.

Gutted he didn't he didn't ask me if I wanted a rich godfather for my unborn child though! :-)

I think the time has come

For me to leave work.

Went to Midwife on Monday who was a bit of a dingbat to be honest. It had snowed very heavily over the weekend so after walking nearly an hour in the snow dropping off my son at nursery then going to the clinic you'd expect my blood pressure to be slightly raised and it was. She said it was on the high side but not to the point where she would worry but said she would check it again before I left.

So I go on to tell her I had a speck of blood on a tissue (tmi) on Saturday which I was 99% sure came from my urethra but as I am rhesus negative I have to be safe so she took some bloods to check if I need the Anti-D injection. Anyway she said she wasn't from round here and wasn't exactly sure which blood bottles to use but had taken an educated guess! She took my blood and listened to baby (forgot to measure baby, so I reminded her!) and I left, blood pressure not taken.

No call received by 4pm with my blood results so I called her, she called the blood banks and it turned out they couldn't test my blood as she labelled the blood wrong and as the next day was 72 hours since the bleed I had to go into hospital to have them re-taken.  Luckily I was only in hospital for about 2 hours and they couldn't get the blood back that night so gave me the Anti-D anyway and told me to call the next day for the results.

I called for the results the next day and guess what? They've lost my blood! Was told doesn't matter anyway as I've had the Anti-D now!

Had to work from home Tuesday as Oliver had a pretty bad cold and hubby couldn't do it as he was at a conference. He took today off to stay at home with him.

When I woke this morning I just got a silly worry that my BP wasn't taken, I also had a stiff neck which you can get with pre-eclampsia so I called MW to see if I could drop in to have my BP taken. Instead I was told to leave work so I am home for 12:30 (luckily I have a very good employer/manager) which I did. MW arrived at 1pm, BP is normal so all is well.

All this though has totally spooked hubby and worried me so I may make next week my last. We'll see.

Snow and lots of it!

Started snowing at about 2pm yesterday and didn't stop until the early hours. Woke up to a complete white out. At least 5 inches of snow, probably more and my recommendation would be for you not to walk out in it in slip on shoes!

Had a kiddies party to go to today so went to Toys R Us and bought the prezzie, came home, wrapped it the hubby and I took Oliver along to the party. It was nice, an indoor affair (luckily) and it had a nice soft play area and bouncy castle. Food was provided for the kiddies and after a few moments Oliver was playing with all the other kids so it was nice for him to do something different on a Sunday afternoon.

What I haven't yet mentioned is our little guy is poorly at the moment, he woke up with a cold which seems to have got gradually worse throughout the day. He has now got to the stage where his nose and eyes are constantly streaming, bless him. He's a good boy though and just gets on with it, mummy and daddy get more cuddles too! We were hoping to take him out and build a snowman but want to keep him all nice and warm indoors today.

Luckily I am working from home tomorrow so if he is still poorly tomorrow I may keep him home with me. I have a midwife appointment so we'll need to go out for that but apart from that he can snuggle up on the sofa watching cartoons while mummy does her work.

On the other hand though he may be better off at nursery as it may keep his mind off things, I'll just see what tomorrow brings. We'll have a nice hot bath later together later and give him some calpol (as he has a little temp) and hope that he can get a good nights sleep.

Happy

Yay, got my new phone. loving it and whats even better is that there are so many apps for children. Most of Saturday was spent downloading apps for Oli bear to playing like the talking Tom Cat (repeats what he says and there is a Spongebon app too). Must admit its scary letting a 30 month old play with an expensive phone! Oliver is currently talking to the cat, he's obsessed, at least it is encouraging him to talk as he is quiet. I think baby likes it too as he is jiggling around all over the place.

On another note I am now 34 weeks pregnant, only 6 weeks to go, can't believe how fast its going! Only 4 full weeks left at work then utter bliss (as in really bad day time tv) until baby comes. Taking Oliver to a theme park for little uns on March 2nd though as want him to have one last day just the 3 of us before baby comes as even though I think he knows baby is coming it'll still be a huge shock.

I feel like I am the most unprepared person ever. I have not yet packed a bag and I've hardly bought anything that we need. We've got nappies and wipes, a few vests and baby grows but no nursery furniture like wardrobes and drawers. I know baby will be in our room in his moses basket for the first few months but we should at least be attempting to set the nursery up, I guess its just less of a worry the second time around? Think I'll clear out a drawer in our room for the babys clothes and worry about the nursery later.

Still scared of labour :-(