At this moment I am sitting here waiting for a delivery of timber from Duffields Timber. I’ve actually been waiting over a week now!

Last Wednesday I drove up to Duffields Timber yard at Melmerby near Ripon and selected wood for the next few courses and for some students on my evening classes. As usual the timber was of good quality and the yard man, Jamie, very patient and obliging, the service was excellent. I was unable to fit the whole load into my vehicle so decided to take what I needed for immediate use and ask Duffields to deliver the rest, mistake!

When I paid I was told the delivery would be at “the beginning of next week”. So I was expecting a visit on Monday or Tuesday, some of the load was for students on my Tuesday evening class. I rang on Tuesday morning to be told that delivery was scheduled for Thursday. This has cocked up my plans for this week and I have had to disappoint my students.

Now I’m not a big fan of next day delivery, I find this vying of companies to give ever quicker delivery times a sign of our “must have it now” society. But I do think an eight day wait is excessive. Eight days to pick up the pre-selected boards  put them on a lorry and transport them the 37 miles to Ilkey.

I would suggest that to show good customer care a company should commit to informing a customer of the true delivery date soon after purchase. It doesn’t have to be same day or even next day, but the customer should be kept in the loop