FTD Flowers

Full review
I tried calling immediately that day, got through to a holding que, where I was advised average hold times would be around 60 minutes. Wow, I was at work, and unable to wait. I guess it was three days later, Carrie (girlfriend) and I we're on our Valentine's Day road trip to Austin and Fredericksburg, TX, which I'll get to in another review sometime.

Early in the goings that Friday, she mentioned the flowers had already wilted badly, and we're most likely dead by the time she would be back in the office on Monday. This made the whole experience worthy of ANY HOLD time. I guess it was just this last Tuesday (a week later), I finally withstood about thirty minutes of more hold time, waiting to advise them the flowers were not only delivered early, but had died very quickly as well. The female agent I spoke to, of whom I can't remember her name unfortunately, was very sympathetic towards the situation. Though she had some coldness about it, as she was very seasoned in how she pawned off the reason for the poor service on DHL, she still managed to view the whole debacle as a consumer and not Customer Service representative. She offered to have the flowers redelivered, or 40% refunded to the account charged. Now ordinarily I would have said redeliver em, things were tight, and I know my girlfriend's answer should I ask her. "Take the money we need to save". Besides, I personally had brought flowers to her work numerous times already this year. Since she's not starving for 'em, and there's plenty more days ahead to deliver more. I took the forty percent back, and although it didn't sound right, the agent advised me of a refund around $33 and some change. This morning I checked my account and $17.10 was in my back account. More disappointed they tried to slip something past me, I braved the hold time again. This time I summarized the whole experience and took some notes while on hold;


-Flowers delivered one day early of the most important day of the year for the company
-10 minute hold
hour long holds last week...
-10 minute hold for supervisor
-3 day old flowers
-Trying to deposit less into my bank account than advised

So that brings us back to where I started...Today's agent James gave me some lame story about how it was supposed to be $25 in total refund, and that the $33 in change was misquoted by the agent previously due to the rebate I received for ordering the flowers early. While James was trying to get the $8 difference set up for refund, we were both quiet, lot's of dead air, and I said to him; 'James, when a friend tries to slip something sneaky past you, how does that feel?' He said "No, it doesn't feel nice..." I then of course -kindly mannered- let out more frustration, about how I didn't think his response to TWO mistakes in a little more than one week was consumer friendly enough. I stated, not only should my flowers be redelivered again, but any of those customer's whose flowers were delivered prematurely to the scheduled date be redelivered as well. He kinda goffed at that... At the end of my softly spoken rant, I advised him I'd like to speak with a supervisor. You saw the stat there... After waiting ten more hold time minutes, I was advised a supervisor was not available, but James finished that sentence with "I do however have the ability to resend those flowers myself". Why didn't you do that in the first place James? 'Cause you don't have that authority, but your supervisor who is too lazy or busy to talk to me just granted you that authority. O you just felt like bluffing me for ten minutes. Bottom line, you played games... He wound setting em up for redelivery this Tuesday.

After reading that article on yahoo.com news. Allegedly roses and other common consumer flowers are chemically induced plants more frequently than ever, I'm now further sickened by the whole consumerism of flowers. They're supposed to be natural, and last like an earth's creation. Not wilt, and die three days after coming out of the tacky box I'm told it was delivered in. Yes, I have respect for a company that has so much to do in one day, but I also have some advice for that very same company. Don't take orders you can't fill.

As for the website itself, it's very easily navigated, my order was confirmed within an easy self-explanatory process. Simple explorer tools, made for a very quick and painless purchase. Here's a breakdown;

Step 1:
type in your browser ftd.com

Step 2:
In my case, the dozen red roses and a box of chocalates were featured on the front page. But the site has a panel along the left that will let you product, occasion, price and other gift ideas. Once you've found your product, you'll be given your pre-tax total and a space to enter the zip code in which the product will be delivered. If you don't know the zip code, there is a locator. Click on add to cart after you've typed in the zip code.

Step 3: You'll be given a notice the product has been added to cart. On the top right hand side of the page -just above your product shopping cart is an option to continue shopping or checkout now

Provided you click "check out now"

Step 4: you'll be asked to continue as a guest or log in as a registered user.

Step 5: You'll be asked to fill out info like your delivery date, card message/signature, Recipient's info.

Step 6: After that you will enter all important billing info.

Step 7: The final step you will review and make sure everything is set as you prefer. Click the order/submit button, and you're good to go.

Overall, while the ordering process was simple, I found the customer service and delivery tactics to be less than tactful. I'll be searching for a new flower delivery service.


Note to Epinions crew-I had to vote for very late on the delivery grading, cause there was not an option for too early, lol.

****All apologies to my love for releasing the price of your flowers, it was imperative information to provide when reviewing this service. I hope you enjoyed the new flowers*****

I could complain about hold times and how they could possibly affect my T-Mobile bill, since toll free numbers are billed up as well, but thats another review altogether