Peeved at RT, seeking second opinions

Considering the circumstances described:

  • Get Over It: Six Days after the Requested Delivery Date seems Reasonable

    Votes: 29 96.7%
  • WTF RT???: Six Days after the Requested Delivery Date is Unreasonable

    Votes: 1 3.3%

  • Total voters
    30

HomersBBBQ

Member
Messages
6
Grill(s) owned
  1. Bull
Hey fellow RT owners / aficionados,

I'm a little peeved at Rec Tec over a current order, and I wanted to bounce this scenario off the minds of the folks of this forum to see if my expectations are reasonable or not.

I placed a $360+ order on the night of September 23rd just before I went on vacation. All items ordered were said to be in stock. In the comments field, I requested to have the parcel delivered on Tuesday October 8th, which was the day after I arrived home. I did also mention that I did not want the parcel delivered prior to Oct 8th (didn't want this sitting on my porch for a prolonged period of time).

Other than the automated order confirmation email, I didn't receive any communication from RT. I finally decided to email support on Saturday Oct 5th, and they said the order would be shipped out on Monday Oct 7th. The parcel did ship via UPS Ground that day and is now scheduled to be delivered on Oct 14th.

I sent an email to RT indicating that I was disappointed with the delay of this delivery, and they called me yesterday to explain that they didn't know how long the parcel would take to ship to my state (WA), so they waited as long as possible to fulfill the order.

Am I being unreasonable for expecting that RT should be able to do better than 6 days late on an order placed over two weeks in advance? I could understand a day or two late in order to avoid early delivery, but six days seems excessive and frankly negligent to me.

Also, I decided to make a poll. I've never made a poll before here or in any other forum, so pretty much just wanted to make a poll for the sake of making a poll.
 
Honestly man, I get being upset that you ordered something and it didn't come when expected. However, if you order something and give them a vague description like that and it's late, I think that's on you. I would recommend calling and speaking with someone on an order like that so you can speak to someone and arrange delivery on the date you want.
 
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Although I understand your side of it, and I'm not sure of how they wouldn't know approximate delivery time to your area, I'm still going to say that I'm not sure all of it is in RT's control. I guess personally I'd weigh the difference in if it had been delivered too earlier compared to your current situation. Maybe it will be delivered earlier than scheduled now that you have a date?...goodluck.
 
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Honestly man, I get being upset that you ordered something and it didn't come when expected. However, if you order something and give them a vague description like that and it's late, I think that's on you. I would recommend calling and speaking with someone on an order like that so you can speak to someone and arrange delivery on the date you want.
Thanks for your reply. Not sure what you mean by 'vague description' though, can you elaborate? My thought was that 'please deliver on date XYZ, and not before' was pretty un-vague.
 
You asked, so here goes...……...
As I read your summary of the activities/requests/desires I could see the reasonableness of your headline question (and kudos to you for not going straight to the negative and only blasting RT). But as the details unfolded I could also see the dilemma from the RT side. Were I in their shoes I would have likely done what they did and review your requested terms in the context of what can and cannot be controlled. Protecting your shipment from porch pirates was/is the first and most significant goal. By holding shipment they accommodated you very well. As for projecting an actual delivery date, the realities of transportation in today's world are that they have absolutely no control over the routing decisions a carrier makes and would be fools to attempt to unilaterally define such. Now, they could have written you back and told you what they could realistically do for your desires, and what they couldn't and why, and then put the decision making back in your hand. Your request to delay shipment though is waaayyyyy more unusual than the norm so likely they have little to no mechanism in place to trigger a reply like that. You could have been more realistic and they could have expanded their communication with you.

Actually running a business is much more difficult that many realize.
 
In the comments field, I requested to have the parcel delivered on Tuesday October 8th, which was the day after I arrived home. I did also mention that I did not want the parcel delivered prior to Oct 8th (didn't want this sitting on my porch for a prolonged period of time).
Asking to deliver on the 8th but not before the 8th, they're just thinking ok don't get it there before the 8th. Regardless, a phone call would have been better.
 
I have done things like this many times, granted not with RT but with several others. The one slight difference is i took the responsibility in calling them and speaking to someone. I place order, called in with order number and gave them a ship date. "Hi i am going to be out of town, I just placed order xyz, i need it delivered on oct 8th. If you ship it on say the 4th do you think that timing will be good?"

Everytime i have gone this path i have never had an issue with any company. Putting myself in their shoes, unless they somehow time it perfectly your going to be upset. If its a day early you not happy. Granted your happy its their but i know you get it. If its early and it gets stolen, rained on, otherwise mucked with your unhappy. We all get this, as reasonable as it seems to expect a clearly written action on an order form to be followed. More times than not, it doesnt happen as desired. I too have experienced this to many times to not have learned my lesson and the core reason i order (notate if i can) then call regardless to verify expectations are understood. Being upset is part of life, its how we deal with that upset that sets us all apart :).
 
Am I being unreasonable for expecting that RT should be able to do better than 6 days late on an order placed over two weeks in advance? I could understand a day or two late in order to avoid early delivery, but six days seems excessive and frankly negligent to me.
I don't think this is a Rec Tec thing. In fact they did as much as they could to try to accommodate your request in NOT having it shipped right away (which most anyone else would want).

They waited, per your request and shipped via UPS Ground. At this point it taking 6 days isn't Rec Tec but UPS.

I can understanding being frustrated about the delay, but the frustration in my opinion is toward the wrong place.
 
Thanks all for the thoughts, definitely several good perspectives. For clarification, I'm not disappointed that the shipment is late; I'm disappointed at the magnitude of the lateness coupled with lack of communication from RT. I think if RT had taken a moment to consider whether or not a six day lateness was congruent with their reputation, then they would have come to a quick conclusion and would have intervened with a call or email.

Multiple folks have mentioned this here and they're totally right: this is a unique situation and I'm sure RT rarely gets an order requesting a delayed shipment. However, it's a unique situation that I would have expected RT to execute better than it did. If this expectation was inaccurate (as the general consensus seems to be so far), then I can live with that and modify my future expectations.

Authoring this thread was also intended to be for the benefit of those who read it and maybe find themselves in a similar situation in the future (whether it be going on vacation, leading up to a birthday or holiday, etc.). My takeaway is that RT is not as well equipped to handle this type of unique order / exception as I had hoped, and that an order from RT like this (as ifican detailed well) unfortunately takes an added degree or two of attentiveness.
 
I will say that their communication could be better. When I ordered my Stampede the grill mats showed as being in stock but when the grill came I got a printed piece of paper that said that the mat was back ordered. My invoice however showed that the order was complete. The piece of paper included with the order is the only indication that I ever got that they still owed me the mat and it wasn't stated in any of the order confirmation or shipping notifications. I waited about a week and there was no mat but on their web site showed the item in stock. I emailed them and they told me that it was still back ordered. I waited about a month and then contacted them again at which time they told me that they still didn't have them in and hopefully it would ship the next week.

Communication
1 - Show on my invoice that the order isn't complete.
2 - Give some kind of expected date other than soon.
3 - if the expected date comes up and the item hasn't shipped let someone know that they aren't lost in the system some where.
 
As your poll says ... Get over it. If you wanted it delivered on a particular day, I'm sure RecTec could have arranged for express delivery (at additional cost, of course), but to expect delivery on a specific date using standard shipping is a bit of a stretch.
 
To me, seems like a lot of to do over nothing. Why didn't you just wait and order after your trip? Or have someone retrieve the package for you? I can't think of a single time that I gave a vendor instructions like that. I would have very low expectations if I did, most places aren't good at handling exceptions.
 
I would've called instead of adding shipping instructions as I am not sure how such requests are handled.
 
My smart ass reply. Its Trumps fault, if business was not so good, the poor delivery folks would not be so overworked and late....Much ado about nothing........The Rule of 6 P's..
Hope you enjoy your order....
 
IMHO, RT bent over backwards to try and meet your request. You don't seem to appreciate their efforts one bit to try and please you.
 
Dude.

They did what you asked. GA to WA can be tricky on shipping. If I’m in your shoes I’d be happy it is late and not early. If it was the former you’d be on here yelling it got there early and was subject to theft.

Quite candidly, you sound entitled. You asked they took every precaution. Sounds like great customer service to me.
 

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