We reveal the nation’s top shops – is yours on the list?

It’s interesting that the advent of internet shopping has not really caused enough of the big high street shops to pull their finger out and offer a decent service. Those at the bottom of the pile deserve our condemnation and if they go pop, I don’t think anyone will miss them. As for the top dogs, good luck to them.

There is no need for high street shops to offer a decent service unless we can be sure that online suppliers are better. Generally Internet prices are lower but many of us could tell tales of poor service or unresolved complaints when buying via the Internet.

It is human nature to want good service and lowest possible prices, but that is difficult to achieve. It is good that some shops do consistently better than others. That deserves publicity and their employees deserve praise.

I’m not surprised about the comment about WH Smith, I stopped using them over 25 years ago when I perceived they were expensive and that was before the internet took off in the way it has.

I’ve also heard good things about Richer Sounds, although I’ve yet to experience it myself.

Any company that realises that the customer should be king and not seen as a cash cow is going to be a winner, shame they’ll be so few and fair between.

My local W H Smith in Broad Street, Reading is total carnage. I stopped going in and buying stuff years ago. Overcrowded shelves and a highly irritating snake around the sweets to the counters.
Should have gone years ago with an attitude like that.
Surprisingly, they did have enlightened days some years ago when you could pick up a newspaper and throw your money in a ‘bucket’. That didn’t seem to survive for long.

Apologies if I am in the wrong forum but are we in the minority in thinking that the Co-op needs to seriously raise its game in their small food stores? They have taken over a grocery store in the town centre of a small market town in West Dorset. It is the only general grocery in the town centre but Co-op head office refuses to acknowledge that it is anything more than their designation of a ‘convenience store’, i.e., what you would expect to find as a corner shop in a suburban housing estate. We want a store that stocks what we want to buy, not what Manchester’s H.O. tells us we should be buying. Not only is the product range limited but, because we are seen as being a town with above average affluence, we get charged 20-50p more per item than the Co-op in nearby towns! Many of us vote with our feet, and wheels, and shop in the nearby towns which is not good for our town, fuel consumption, or saving the planet which Co-op frequently claims to be doing…..!

I have written to Head Office twice, directly to the Chairman, Mr. Len Wardle, but am I still banging my head against a brick wall or can I hope to change their blinkered policies?

WH Smith in S Shields A newsagent thats closed on a sunday.So no sunday papers.Posters in the window promoting products they dont stock.

I don’t know why John Lewis’s still rank so highly. Their goods may be of good quality and competitively priced but their service has gone downhill recently. We ordered some very expensive blinds in November. A man turned up to fit them at the beginning of December, fitted two but declared the third to be defective and in need of replacement. He disappeared with our blind which was eventually returned to the makers just in time for them to close for 2 weeks. When the factory re-opened we found ourselves at the back of the queue for our replacements which were not fitted until the end of January. The attitude of the staff was dreadful. Their view was that it was perfectly ok to take our money and leave us without our goods for over a month. We then made the mistake of ordering a washing machine and paid for fitting. Two men turned up with it, took one look at where we wanted it fitting and made it clear they were only able to fit to a set of pipes adjacent to the back of the machine, while we needed extension pipes fitted. No mention of this when we ordered the machine. Net result, we made them take it back and ordered another machine from Curry’s. As for finding staff in the Oxford street store, don’t get me started. Just let me say that we think their motto is ‘never knowingly over-staffed’.

Normally I love John Lewis, but feeling very let down by the online store. Of course its only John Lewis in name now having been outsourced to Capita. Delivery date missed, dropped calls, their system down so can’t see order, can’t even complain to JL, even that goes to Capita.

I’ve had a dreadful experience with the Capita help desk for John Lewis too.

Wishing I hadn’t bought from JL now.

Tempted to pay the cost if return just to be able to reject it and cause them a fraction of the hassle they have caused me.

Does outsourcing ever really work?