Pets At Home. Do I Take My Complaint Further.

[Miller2009]

I recently bought some platys from pets @ home and surly enough they've all died within days.

So I took to twitter to inform them of my displeasure of my visit them told me they'd get the local store manager to contact me regarding my situation to what I'm still waiting. The frustrating thing not only do they seem to put the live stock second we seem to be exactly the same.

The question is do I make a personal visit to the store demanding a explanation to this or just let it go?

 

[Noahsfish]

I'd just let it go, and in the future buy from local stores only, or online businesses. They seem much more reliable for the most part, just learn from my mistakes and never use USPS.

 

[Blondielovesfish]

 Platies
 
It's up to you really. If you think it's important, then make a visit. If you don't think its important enough, learn from your mistakes and move on.
 
It is always devastating when a new arrival dies, you just have to remember that you didn't do anything wrong and you provided the best home you could for them for their last few days.

 

[TallTree01]

I'd just let it go, and in the future buy from local stores only, or online businesses. They seem much more reliable for the most part, just learn from my mistakes and never use USPS.

+1
Cept for the bit about never using chain stores, there's a cracker one near me. I love it.

 

[Zante]

Hmm... why not emailing them instead of going through twitter? You might have gotten a response then.

 

[Miller2009]

I got a response they called me but still nothing from from the local manager.

 

[the_lock_man]

I have edited the thread title, to keep it within the bounds of acceptability.

 

[dgwebster]

Respond to your tweet. Head offices get their knickers in a right twist over bad social media, especially when it comes down to something like the manager not getting in touch.

Years ago I was sold fish with hidden ich from p@h, took them back the next day when the white spots were showing. The store to their credit provided me with all the tank treatments I needed to resolve the ich. It still got a few of my fish, but I cannot fault their response to take responsibility.

 

[MBOU]

Why wouldn't you call or visit the store you bought the fish from? They are the ones that you need to talk to.. just call their numbers and say "can I please speak to the store manager" or "May I please know what your policy is on livestock refunds?".
 
Generally, they are time limited (so if you have left it days before contacting tem, they probably wont do anything...) and many places require a water sample from the tank to test before they refund or replace as if you have poor water quality, they wont be responsible for the death of the fish.
 
Always contact the store you got the fish from asap, if they have someone tell them they have sick fish, they can act and take the fish off sale before they sell many more. By reporting it to them at the least, you might save several other people a lot of grief as well!

 

[Sophie]

Well, being a colleague of the Pets at Home company I see this a lot - especially as I try to float around the fish section as much as possible.
In the companies defense they are one of the best "chain" stores as they actually provide training for their staff, this training may be basic but it covers the main starter areas of fish keeping, along with small animals, dogs, cats etc.
It is down to the individual colleague to then take it upon themselves to learn more about the section if they so desire. If that colleague has no interest in fish, they will not waste their time in doing so (unlike myself who has a genuine interest and couldn't care less about the small fluffy things). Along with daily cleaning of the rabbits, guinea pigs, reptiles etc there are hundreds of other tasks that require doing and the fish normally don't get enough attention because there just is no time.
It's down to you as a customer to realise this - I personally would rather visit a purely aquatic shop where they have genuine interest rather than somewhere that does everything.
 
Now I work my backside off (not now as on maternity) in my fish department, fighting against a variety of higher authorities on not selling fish for particular reasons so yes, as stated above, please do not make this a general over view of the company as a whole.
 
I suggest you take your white fish receipt form you were given when you purchased your fish back to the store, if possible, bring a water sample for them to test and even better, pictures of the loss of fish. Pets at Home are more relaxed than most on their refund policy and I'm sure if you speak to the manager there will be no problem as long as your tank is fully cycled and adequately sized for the stock.
 
The white fish paper work is your proof that they should have gone through the basic questions and made sure your tank was suitable. There is also a "health" box on there where the colleague must check the stocking before selling it to you.
 
Anything else you need to know, please do ask.

 

[dgwebster]

Oddly an important aspect I have discovered in recent research in my current work, customers in the UK are changing quickly and dramatically in how we want customer services. Historically we would shrug off problems, or take it to the shop/call the company.

This is now seen as an inconvenience to us. Instead we prefer to use what is in our hand to notify the company of an issue and expect them to contact us back about it, increasing our efficiency. This is a very effecfive way for the companies to work too: you can schedule the workload to manage that call back. This is extremely true of contact centres where you can avoid huge call queues and further customer disatisfaction. However, there is a limit here: you cant wait a week. Within 24 hours is the best response. For some though, a message to say it will take 2/3 days is fine, for others it is not. We are still balancing ourselves on this medium of communication but it all says the same thing: i have been inconvenienced by your company and I dont want that interference with my life continuing. Its also why people get peeved off so much with missed deliveries that THEY then have to chase up. Surely the company should know if its delivered or not?

Some free insight for anyone running a business in the UK out there i normally charge a half arm and a bit of leg for advice like that!

 

[Miller2009]

Well I finally got it sorted. 6 new fish and a tub of fish flakes

 

[Sophie]

Sounds about right.

 

[Foxcsentertainment]

The last time we had our 180 ltr tank set up and we got the fish from the local PAH, most of them only lasted days or a couple of weeks? Even though the water was spot on. We were forever taking dead fish back with the receipts.
In the end we bought the fish from other fish stores and all was fine.
PAH near us had a make over, all new tanks and all new stock so we thought we'd give them another try.
They gave us bad advice and being new to fish keeping we listened (big mistake) we bought new fish and they had some disease and killed the whole tank.
They gave us a credit note for £300
They had a couple of new lads start and they were brilliant. We started from scratch and everything went well.
We had to close our tank down later on but gave all the fish to a friend and years later most are still going strong