Online florist Bloomex pays attention to online gripes

July 15 2008 by Ellen Roseman

Last February, I wrote a blog post about consumer protest groups on Facebook. And I mentioned Bloomex (among other companies) that has dissatisfied customers taking up battle in cyberspace against them.

Dimitri Lokhonia, the Ottawa-based founder of Bloomex, decided to respond online. He said some “unhappy customers” were actually small retail florists, whose business was threatened by a lower-priced national rival.

That comment opened the floodgates to many new complaints about Bloomex, usually angry, sometimes hysterical.

You could tell people were tired of calling and sending emails to a company that let them talk to customer service reps, but not escalate their issues. They were getting nowhere with requests for help or compensation, despite including order numbers as Lokhonia asked them to do.

I wrote a Toronto Star column in March that Bloomex didn’t like. It stayed online, despite threats of legal action. I watched the complaints continue coming in and wondered whether this online florist would wilt.

But things are perking up. Lokhonia met me at his Toronto production facility last week and we spent a couple of hours together, going through some of the online complaints. He told me about hiring a new public relations manager, Michelle Robitaille, who would review all of the complaints and explain what happened.

Robitaille has worked in customer service for more than a decade. She describes herself as being a tough customer, someone who questions corporate bafflegab and pushes for what she wants. While forced to deal with Bloomex policies, which I find quite restrictive, she’s willing to admit that this online florist can and does goof up.

Last May, the company put in new customer service and tracking systems, which are designed to improve overall performance. Bloomex’s new approach to customer service “will dramatically reduce hold times, eliminate the need for customers to repeat information after arriving at a live customer care representative and even allow customers to chat live with a service agent, resolving their issues faster and more conveniently,” says a press release.

Robitaille has now gone through 16 emails I sent. Here’s how things stand, in her words.

In 6 of the orders, we retained our original decision. Please bear in mind that some of these decisions were to refund the client, but no compensation was provided for dissatisfaction. Many of these cases were of people not wanting to follow company policies. They do not reflect errors or mistakes made on our part.

In 7 orders, people were refunded in full or partially. Again, this is a combination of both clients who were unsatisfied with our product where a refund was issued and a combination of errors made on our part, where a full refund was issued.

In 2 orders, we did a re-send of flowers to the client to compensate for our error, with the client’s agreement.

One person received a credit of $75 for our errors in his 2 orders.

Finally, I’m dealing not only with complaints you sent to me, but with other unhappy clients who posted on the web. I have done that on several different occasions if I am able to find the client in the system (via order # or last name).

I have issued 4 refunds for orders outside your blog site complaints, and issued 2 re-sends, and 2 credits in lieu of our new systems, to regain the trust and patronage of past clients.

I’ll try to post some of these complaints and company responses in the next few few days. Meanwhile, here’s how to get in touch with Robitaille. Write to publicrelations@bloomex.ca.

Category: Finance | 114 comments

114 comments

Will Ashworth

Jul 15 2008

Hi Ellen:

I’ve used these guys twice, once to send flowers to an Ottawa-area hospital and once to a home in Charlottetown. Both times the flowers arrived promptly and looking fantastic.

As someone who’s spent a lot of years in customer service, I find customers rarely think they’re wrong. While Bloomex may mishandle problems, often the problem is on the customer’s side of the ledger. Be nice and you get nice. Be a jerk and you get a jerk. Human relations 101.

True customer service is establishing systems that run smoothly, avoiding mishaps as much as possible. It makes it easier to handle problems when they’re not happening all the time.
meeka

Jul 16 2008

My problem is I started off being nice and they ignored me….now I have moved on to the not so nice and they ignore me. Really I am unable to win, I think.

I am still trying to get my orders straight from Fathers Day! One still hasn’t even been delivered!

I have nothing good to say about this company. I have even driven to their “head office” and still couldn’t see anyone…but they did manage to get someone on the phone. Again…didn’t work.

If ANYONE has an idea on how to get them to contact me…please help!
Kate

Jul 16 2008

I ordered flowers to be sent to my best friend on the one-year anniversary of her younger sister passing away. The flowers arrived a day late. At $9.99 plus tax for delivery, I expected they’d be delivered on the date written on my invoice sheet.

I sent an email to Bloomex twice, saying I had put the order in Sunday night and was emailed a confirmation that it would be delivered Monday, May 26th. However, my friend said she did not receive the flowers until Tuesday, May 27th.

I wanted to be compensated in some way for the delay in delivery.

Subtotal: $33.89
Shipping: $11.29
Tax Total: $5.20
Total: $45.18

I called their 1-888 number and was told to send an email with my complaint. So I sent an email May 27 and again June 2 and have not heard from them. I just left them a voice mail message asking them to phone me. Their voice mail message says they will reply via email within 24 hours.

It is so frustrating and sadly, it seems, there is not much that can be done.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 16 2008

In this case, the client ordered the flowers on the internet. She did not order them before the 1 pm cut-off time for same day delivery. She placed her order at 2:20 pm.

Our same day delivery policy is posted in numerous places on our website, as well as on a banner on top of the first page.

As well, she was sending this outside our local production area, making it even more impossible for us to have been able to deliver the same day.

The client received the follwoing message from management when she complained about late delivery:

Dear Kathleen:

As per our policies that were emailed to you with your order confirmation, if the delivery address is not local to our production, it will be sent with our courier for delivery on the next business day. Thank you Bloomex Mgmt.
JMS

Jul 16 2008

Michelle.

How come in my case Bloomex managed to mess up BOTH my orders? I could maybe understand one being wrong…but 2?

Both were asked to be sent on Father’s Day. I received an email stating that this could not be done. So I wrote back and asked them to be delivered on Saturday. Neither were.

On Tuesday, my father talked to me and said that he received an upside down broken orchid. Dad and I contacted you…he included pictures.

A few days later, a fruit basket was received…complete with apples on top of grapes. We were both baffled as no one had contacted me saying that fruit would be sent.

Your policy says that you can substitute a similar product of greater value, which I accept. However, my dispute was that a fruit and an orchid were 2 very different things and not even located in the same area of your website!

The point was that I had ordered something that would last a few months, at the very least.

After about 2 weeks of numerous phone calls (on my end) and live chat conversations, I finally went to “head office”. All I wanted to know was why a fruit basket was sent instead of a plant.

Head office turned out to be a flower store, but they were nice enough to phone someone…the first nice person I talked to! (If it was you, thank you, YOU were excellent at customer service).

The woman on the other end was baffled as to why a fruit basket was sent and assured me a new orchid would be sent (which it was, and only 2 flowers were broken!)

I have since dropped this problem. I am still very unhappy and embarrassed, but do not think that anything will be done about it…sigh.

Now…lets pause here for a moment.

Rewind to ordering flowers. At the same time, I ordered a basket for my brother for his very FIRST Father’s Day! My only nephew!

Anyways, the Tuesday after someone called me and said that no one answered. They wanted to know what to do. I emailed the next morning and stated that it could be delivered next door.

My brother arrived back and went next door and there was nothing.

Now let’s return to me talking to someone at the “head office”. I also mentioned to the woman that my brother’s order had never been delivered, but I wasn’t aware of it until a few days earlier.

She apologized and asked if I would like it redelivered. I said yes and left feeling very happy and satisfied. I got back to work and there was an email saying that it would not be sent because they couldn’t find someone to send it to. I was confused as you had delivered it earlier.

I have phoned countless times - no one has called me back.

I have emailed countless times, asking for someone to call me - no one has emailed me OR called me.

I have done the online “help” but I have either been ignored, hung up on, yelled at or not helped.

You decided to return my money for my brother’s order. I suppose I could thank you, but I don’t want to because I didn’t ask you to…I wanted the order placed.

I don’t understand why I’d be attempted delivery one week and then suddenly not have a distributor the next. It was a basket so it shouldn’t go rotten…it should just be there.

I have been asking and asking and asking for someone to contact me. Apparently, someone called me for my father’s order, but there was no answering machine message at work or at home, and no call display.

All I have been asking for is a phone call.

I tried to be nice and that didn’t work…I tried being not so nice and it still didn’t work. I really don’t know what to do .

I admit I have lost my cool on several occasions but will not give up. Just want to talk to someone on the phone…that is all.

orders 00819075 and 00819069
Jms

Jul 17 2008

I have since spoken to a representative of Bloomex but not Michelle herself as she states that:

Unfortunately I will not be contacting you. XXXXX has final authority over this matter, and she has gone into great depth explaining such.

Regards,

Michelle

Apparently, the problem was that they do not deliver to Whitehorse. (This is not stated on the website, nor was I ever contacted to be told that this was the case.) They:

“did attempt once to deliver it and had to have a contracted florist fill the order, as it was not within our production facilities. The contractor filled your order, and no one was available to receive it. We are not able to fulfill your order a second time, as it is not financially feasible to do so. ”

They HAVE refunded me. I am just upset, as I feel that they should have never taken this order if they could not fill it. I shouldn’t be getting this email 1 month after Father’s Day.

I was kind of hoping that they would offer me some sort of compensation…..perhaps an offer of a free delivery. Both my orders were messed up….I look like the bad daughter/sister who “forgot” Father’s Day.

I guess I just figured that they would try everything in their power to win me back as a customer.
Rhonda

Jul 17 2008

I just posted on a complaints board about Bloomex. I live 12 hours away from my mom. Every year, I order her Mother’s Day flowers to her place of employment in Armstrong, BC.

I phoned 2 days ahead of time to ensure her flowers would be delivered on the Friday before Mother’s Day weekend. And, just to be sure she received her flowers before going home from work on Friday, I paid EXTRA for a morning delivery. I chose the ‘Joyful and Thrilling’ bouquet.

Well, guess what? Nothing came. I felt horrible!! My poor mom received nothing for Mother’s Day!

And the story gets worse. I phoned and phoned and talked to countless customer service agents. I was given the runaround, my phone calls were never returned and I was literally hung up on countless times. I used the online customer service agent and was just disconnected. My emails were never answered.

Finally, one did return my call and the next week they sent flowers. The WRONG flowers came and they were DEAD!!

Once again, I was given the runaround, hung up on and no one returned emails or calls. I can’t even tell you how many phone calls or emails I have put in to the company. They make sure you can’t get hold of anyone and I think they hope people will just go away if they ignore them long enough.

Almost 1 month later, flowers were going to be resent in place of the ones for Mother’s Day. Well, they didn’t come on the day they said they were going to. Worse yet, they were once again the wrong flowers and dead! My Mom said they looked worse than the first batch!

I am a real person telling a real story here. Some people say some of these complaints are maybe the competition? Well, I am just a woman out $70 and I have a mother who received squat on Mother’s Day. (My order # was 809777 and I am happy to show anyone the transcript between myself and the employees.)

I take solace in the fact that my mom works in Armstrong at a plant (Colonial Farms) that employs just under 100 people. I know everyone has seen those flowers and knows the story behind a week late delivery which turned into a month, 2 wrong orders and 2 dead batches of flowers. You know what they say about bad service…one person tells 5 people and so on…This company just lost out on a lot of business!

I intend to write my story on every site I can, so no one else has to go through this. Not only am I out money, but the sentiment was ruined on a special day.

I emailed the company after my second dead batch came and they told me there was nothing they could do. They claim they did all they could to fix the problem and that my Visa would NOT be refunded.

My advice is order right from the store in the exact town you want them delivered to! It might seem like you are getting a deal online but believe me, there is no deal to be had! Go to the florist store yourself, or at least phone the store yourself. These big companies who supposedly give you deals just don’t exist. I wish I would have done my research. I know I sure got duped!
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

Hi Ellen, I have reviewed this case. The client HAS been refunded. The reasons and notes in our system state the following:

2008-06-10 13:10:09. Dear Rhonda, We have reviewed your order history for the 2 deliveries arriving dead. We send our orders out fresh, but unfortunately the location of the recepient is 3 days transit and our production company made the mistake of sending the orders instead of contracting them to a local florist. We have refunded your credit card and apologize for the inconvenience caused. Bloomex management.

Amount: $66.64
Dave

Jul 17 2008

I sent my mother a bouqet of flowers for Mother’s Day, like any good son away from home should. The flowers arrived half dead, nearly no petals, and the stems completely broken.

My mother called me completely distraught (a former floral worker, she is a little sensitive to poor arrangements) and suggested that I not pay for them. Too late, though the paying wasn’t done quite yet.

She proceeded to call Bloomex and after leaving several messages with their “complaint department” (an answering machine), she decided to speak online with one of the reps. This guy told her there is nothing he could do (nor would do without the purchase order number and a photo of the flowers) and hung up on her.

When I called with the information they wanted, I was laughed at and hung up on TWICE. I asked them to get someone on the phone who did more than nothing. Finally, a manager called me back after three days of bothering them and refunded my money (less the $9.95 pickup fee).

When I told her about the laughing and hanging up, she laughed at ME and told me the conversation was over. She said I would be paying the $9.95 fee for my refund and then hung up on me.

Then, I ordered from a local florist and for the same amount that I gave to Bloomex, my mother received a beautiful bouquet that was more what I wanted. 99.7% satisfaction rate, my butt.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

Hi Ellen,

In this situation, we took the client’s complaint and reminded him that in accordance with our policies, the bouquet would have to returned to us for a refund (minus the $9.99 delivery fee, as stated in our policies posted in multiple areas on our website, as well as included in the confirmation email he received with the details of his order).

He basically refused to pay the $9.99 return fee, and then finally accepted it.
Kevin

Jul 17 2008

I ordered flowers for my wife for Valentine’s day, paying more for AM delivery. Their website looked legit, they were ranked high on Google, so I thought everything seemed fine. I was planning to surprise my wife for Valentine’s day.

To make a long story short, I kept calling my wife on Valentine’s day to see if she had received her surprise. It was supposed to arrive between 9 am to noon. Nothing.

I called Bloomex right away, telling them of this. They told me not to worry, and it’s Valentine’s day, so they’re running behind. It would be there in the afternoon. She NEVER GOT THE FLOWERS.

I’ve been calling them and sending them emails since then, requesting a full refund, and they have yet to refund my money. I am out of options. They don’t return my emails and their customer service number yields no results either. Whatever you can do to help would be great.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

Unfortunately, his order was lost in the system. There were so many orders that went out for Valentine’s Day. His was one that fell through the cracks.

Our new systems will ensure situations like this do not repeat themselves.

He has been refunded in full.
Myra

Jul 17 2008

I ordered flowers for my mom on her birthday. I chose Bloomex because their website was easy to use, the pictures of the flowers and products are amazing and they advertise “FRESHEST FLOWER COMPANY” and “TRUSTED BY HUNDREDS OF CUSTOMERS AND BEST VALUE GUARANTEED.”

However, when my mom received the flowers, they were dead, smashed up, leaves were torn, soil was everywhere in the box that the deliveryman handed to her upside down!!!! My mom took some pictures and emailed it to me. The flowers looked nothing like what was shown in the website. It did not even look like flowers at all.

I contacted them and asked for a full refund. However, a “full refund” to them means I still have to pay a $9.99 fee for them to pick up the flowers. It is either that or they are going to send my mom new flowers. There is no point, though. Her birthday was over, what was supposedly a special gesture from me was ruined and there is no way I am conducting business with that company again.

I tried to dispute the fee because if I still have to pay, that is not a “full refund”. If they had to ask for a single penny, I would still dispute it. They do not deserve it. It’s not so much about the money but the principle. I am paying $9.99 for a birthday present that they ruined, which they will take back anyway.

I have to pay $9.99 for absolutely nothing, not to mention the stress that they caused. To make matters worse, the customer agents do not have customer service at all. No agent that I’ve talked to actually apologized. They cut me off and actually hung up on me!

One agent told me “you can dispute all you want but that’s the policy”. I have spoken with different customer agents and they all tell me the same thing. So I insisted I talk to a manager. They told me that it was not possible because they work from home and there is just no manager to contact me.

Finally, an agent told me he would leave a memo on my file and the manager would call me within 24 hours. I called back after 2 days because I never received any calls. I asked if there was a memo on my file for a manager to call me. He said yes and I asked why they haven’t done so. The agent asked if I had received an email. I did. The email message was for me “to pay $9.99 fee or my investigation will be closed”.

Because they have a stated return policy, they can just get away with it. Unsuspecting customers like me just fall for it.

As for the claim of Dimitri Lokhonia from Bloomex, well I am surely not a competitor. I am a real live, very unsatisfied customer.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

This client was refunded once the pick-up fee was approved by her.

I can understand her frustration, but our policies are stated both on our website and on the confirmation email she received. She had the opportunity to cancel the order upon review of her confirmation if she didn’t agree with the policies.

As well, our policies are standard with all other florists’ policies. This is an industry norm….we aren’t doing anything different than any other online florist.

In fact, other florists charge a higher delivery fee if the order is placed outside major metropolitan cities. We do not. Our delivery is a flat fee, no matter where the order is coming from or going to.

Most other online florists do not post their policies, procedures, guarantees or delivery information in as much detail, or as often, or even in a noticeable, easy to find place as we do. I have researched many of these to compare them to our policies. I believe that we are more open with this information than other companies.
Tara

Jul 17 2008

I placed an order shortly after 12 noon on Saturday to have flowers delivered in Toronto to the Glenn Gould Studio at CBC, 250 Front St., as the person I was sending flowers to was performing in a show that evening for one night only.

The flowers were never delivered on Saturday and Bloomex was closed Sunday. I called in Monday to see what had happened, and was advised that the weather had stopped the delivery for Saturday, which would have been fine, if someone called to tell me. I would have simply cancelled my order, seeing as she would not be there the next day, and ordered with another flower company.

They advised me that the flowers would be sent that day (Monday). When I again informed them that she was no longer at the delivery address, I provided another temporary address to deliver them – the house she was staying at.

I called back 20 minutes later to confirm that it was in fact a new bouquet to be delivered (not the one made on Saturday), and when I did so they did not have the new delivery address on file – so I gave it to them again and they ensured that a new bouquet would be delivered to that address, between 12-5pm on that day, Monday.

The person receiving the flowers contacted me today to let me know that the flowers were delivered to the Glenn Gould Studio at CBC – the address where she was no longer at and that I had stated multiple times was a one-time performance. She had to drive halfway across the city to get day-old flowers.

I am truly annoyed at the lack of customer service. When I called to complain, I was given the option of being refunded my money only if I returned the flowers, or continue to be charged and a new bouquet would be sent to the correct address – both options I find unfair.

I paid $60 for flowers on Saturday, to be delivered on Saturday. Not only were they three days late, they had been sent to the wrong address. I have spent more time on the phone with Bloomex than I ever care to do again.

She has already driven across the city to pick up the flowers, so they will not be returned. However, I think that I should be refunded anyhow for all the trouble. It is appalling that I have paid $60 for this awful service, and no one seems to be taking responsibility.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

The order, placed last March, could not be delivered because of a snowstorm. It is stated on our site, as well as on the email confirmation: “Note: We are not responsible for late deliveries caused by acts of God (weather conditions, storms, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc…) and no refunds will be issued for these reasons. The delivery will occur on the next possible delivery date.”

We do not deliver on Sundays, so the next available date would have been the Monday. If the client would have called with the new address, it would have been placed in the notes below.

The customer claimed she called in with the new address. But without notes in the order history, we are not responsible for delivery anywhere but the original address.
Karen

Jul 17 2008

On June 15, I ordered flowers with Bloomex.ca for my mother’s 75th birthday. I made a notation on the order: “Please deliver before noon June 16, otherwise please contact me.”

Had I been contacted as I requested, I would have picked an alternate delivery date for Thursday, June 19. My mother was travelling out of town that afternoon.

My credit card was charged promptly, including a premium delivery fee for 9 am to 12 pm. My elderly mother waited until 1:30 pm, with no word from Bloomex.

I tried to contact Bloomex through their chat line (no operator available), left numerous voice mails and emails. I live in California.

Out of desperation to contact a human being, I called the toll-free number and opted for 1 (the order line).

The agent was new and expressed her concern about the amount of complaints that had come through her line. She also was getting “no operator available” on the chat line. In addition, she sent an email complaint on my behalf informing Bloomex my mother was now out of town until Thursday.

One of my countless emails requested a refund. The email response was NO and my cancellation fee would be the same price as the order ($58.73).

Finally, after numerous requests to have someone call me, Kim in customer service (Ottawa) finally called me on Wednesday, June 17. She said there had been 3 delivery attempts. Bloomex had completely ignored all the messages and emails to advise them it was too late.

Upon my mother’s return, there were no phone messages, cards, notices of any kind, to indicate these delivery attempts had been made.

The resolution Kim offered was to do a resend on Monday, June 23 (one week later). A follow up email confirming this was to do the resend on Tuesday, June 24.

Again, I sent voicemail messages, emails, tried to get on a chat line with no success. The new emails I started to receive were that the matter was under investigation.

Nine days later, my mother had not received flowers from Bloomex, my credit card charge had not been refunded, and despite my repeated requests, there were no returned phone calls from Bloomex about my refund requests.

On Tuesday, June 24 (8 days after her birthday), I called a local florist in Orillia and ordered 12 long stem yellow roses (same as the Bloomex order).

Within 2 hours, my mother had a bouquet of 18 long stem yellow roses at her door (for less than what Bloomex charged).
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

The client ordered herself online at 12:43 AM and she wanted morning delivery (which we cannot do). This was emailed to her in her confirmation.

We sent her a message on June 24:

“We attempted to call you several times yesterday and today but could not reach you. I do apologize for this confusion. When an order is placed after 5 pm, we cannot do next day morning delivery. That is why your order did not go for that morning. It is listed on our website about delivery and about outside of our delivery area information, as was emailed to you. We cannot proceed with a refund at this point, because we did attempt to deliver flowers to your mother. If you want, we can resend or offer you your full credit on a future order. Please advise via bloomexpress.ca or call us at 1 888 912 5666. Thank you for your business, Bloomex Management.”

The charges on her credit card were reversed, but they shoudn’t have been. The policies are clear and she didn’t follow them.

Unfortunately, it’s cases like this one that harm the majority, because we had to foot the bill not only for the bouquet that was arranged by a professional florist and WAS delivered (but no one was home), but we also had to pay for the delivery charges.

We attempted on several occasions to contact the customer, as per her request. The cost of the bouquet and the delivery is why we have our policies in place, because of those that take advantage.

The policies may seem harsh to some, but as you can clearly see, they are needed. Otherwise, we might as well not be in business if we send out bouquets which are made, delivered but unpaid for.
MW

Jul 17 2008

I live in Ontario, but my Mom was visiting my sister in Vancouver. On Mother’s Day, I ordered a dozen red roses for my Mom. The next day, to my dismay, I was informed that the flowers had DIED.

Initially, my sister was trying to call Bloomex and have the flowers exchanged, since she did not want to hurt my feelings. Unfortunately, all numbers advertised on the website have the same automated message, which asks you to wait for the customer service representative and after a
long time, DISCONNECTS! The same ordeal happened to me THREE times.

Finally, I used my daughter’s Skype service to reach the Customer Service (sic!). At that time, I was informed that in order to exchange the flowers, my 80-year old Mother would have to take pictures of the dead arrangement and email them to Bloomex. Of course, this option was out of the question.

When I asked for a refund instead, I was instructed to PAY for the pick-up of dead flowers! And to add insult to injury, at
NO POINT in my four conversations with Bloomex representatives was I offered an apology.

Instead, Mr. Lokhonia threatened me with police, when I finally managed to reach him on the phone, using the information found at
http://whois.cira.ca/public?domaine=florist-ottawa.ca.

He offered me an email address to voice my disappointment (mb@bloomex.ca). Outcome was still the same - no refund, until I pay again.

Most people will not complain that they received sub-par flowers; they do not want to hurt the donor’s feelings. But even if they do, the calculation is simple - you send worthless flowers, you issue a refund but, at least, you can keep $9.99 for each transaction.

Only after my misadventure, I found more stories similar to mine. The Internet is full of them. Had I known that beforehand, I would have saved myself a huge disappointment, lots of time wasted and even more frustrations.

Not only did they spoil my Mother’s big day, they also made me extremely upset with the follow-up treatment.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

Hi Ellen,

In this case, the client was unsatisfied with the flowers. She refused to follow the policies. She didn’t want to send pictures or to send us back our product for a refund.

Again, I understand people’s frustration. However, these are our policies, and as I mentioned before, they are not in fine print somewhere on our website. They are clearly indicated, as well as reiterated on the confirmation email.

I want to share a personal story, which is very relevant to a lot of these situations where clients do not read their confirmation emails.

I got a call from my insurance company telling me that my payment for my insurance had been returned. I said that was not possible and I reconfirmed the amount with the operator. She told me the amount they attempted to withdraw was twice that amount!

I asked her why in the world they would take out twice as much. She replied that because it was my renewal, I had to pay first and last month’s payment in one lump sum on my payment day. I told the operator that I should have been notified of this. She said you were when you received your renewal policy in the mail.

I told her that I hadn’t opened it yet, and she flat out told me “Well, Miss Robitaille, do you suggest that we send someone from our office to your home and open your mail for you and read this to you?” I couldn’t believe she said that! But it made perfect sense. She said if you do not want to open your mail, it is not our responsibility to open it for you.

I understood where they were coming from. As much as it left a sour taste in my mounth, I had to pay them a returned item fee of $35, AS WELL as a returned item fee from my bank of $40 (which I disputed and got back).

We are all victims of our own ignorance at some point. It’s human nature to blame the other party, instead of realizing our mistakes and saying to ourselves “never again”.
Peter

Jul 17 2008

I had ordered from Bloomex before and the flowers were amazing. This time, not even close.

I tried to send an $80 bouquet of flowers for Mother’s Day to my restaurant where my mom would be. Ordered online, paid through Visa. Delivery date was set at May 11 (Mother’s Day) and all the proper info was clearly filled out, with instruction on when my mother would be at the restaurant.

Delivery comes 3 days early, and to top it off the flowers are already wilting and dying.

When my mom brought the bouquet home, I was shocked. Cost was close to $80 for the vase, flowers, card and delivery, and really it was nowhere near worth that price for the conditions that the flowers were in.

I emailed the company’s “we care” email and let them know the situation. No response. I called their automated voicemail and left all the details on how they could reach me. No response. I sent them another email, with little hope of getting an answer. You guessed it, no response.

This company did nothing to help rectify the problem. To not even get a response from them when they state on their automated VM that they return messages within 48 hours is appalling. I consider the matter closed, as even a full refund would not make me want to use them again. I’m hoping this review has kept at least 1 person from making the same mistake and ordering from http://www.bloomex.ca, as I’ve never had such a horrible experience ordering stuff online before this.

I will now do it the traditional way and go to a florist where I can see the product firsthand. I advise you all to do the same.

After posting this review on some of the web board forums I frequent, I got this reply:

——————————————————————————–

Hi,

My name is Jeff Godfrey and I am an employee at Bloomex. I apologize that no one has contacted you. Our customer service is usually very good at replying to customer complaints. If you could send me your order number, I will make sure someone replies.

I know forum messages are not the most secure nor official method of communication so I would ask you to email the order number and a brief description of the complaint to marketing@bloomex.ca so you know that I am indeed a Bloomex employee.

Once again, I am sorry for the inconvenience.

Sincerely,

Jeff Godfrey
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 17 2008

In response to this order, we admit that we made an error. Jeff from our marketing department sent the client an email saying he would look into this order and rectify the situation. A new fresh order was sent out to the recipient with our sincerest apologies.

It is situations like this that have enabled us to improve our customer service by introducing a new customer service system and tracking system, holding all employees of Bloomex accountable so that we can identify issues and resolve them more efficiently.

Message sent to client in regards to this order:

Dear Peter: Due to the high volume of orders at Mother’s Day, we have been having some delays in response. We apologize you are unsatisfied with your order and would like to send a FREE fresh order to your mother.

Please contact us at 1-888-912-5666 with a redelivery date and we will resend your order. Thank you Bloomex Management

Dear Peter: Thank you for your business with Bloomex. Your order was delivered. We sincerely thank you for your order and we will be pleased to serve you soon again, thanks, Maria, Bloomex.
JMS

Jul 17 2008

Im with Rhonda….anyone who will listen I will tell of my experience with Bloomex.

It makes me really sad….I remember when they first contacted me to tell me that they would not deliver on a Sunday something made me kinda go “hmmmm” I know that I have delivered to my mum on Mother’s day.

Unfortunately they have told me that they are done with me…so I don’t think that I will ever hear from them.

That being said, I still feel that I deserve some sort of compensation beyond the refund…especially considering both my orders were messed up…..

Sigh…..

It makes me sad…I take pride when I send orders out…
MP

Jul 18 2008

I’ll admit that I was absolutely furious after my initial dealings with Bloomex. However, after 4 months of fuming, I am open to a reasonable handling of the situation.

In my case, my wife was in Canada (from the US) for a conference the week of her birthday. I ordered flowers from Bloomex to be delivered on a specific date, assuming they would make it on time. I confirmed the order with an online operator.

Granted, I missed the website statement about the cutoff time. Nonetheless, despite the bonus time window in Bloomex policy, the flowers were still delivered late.

I explained the situation to several operators (over the phone, by email, online chat), asking for a refund, but I was either ignored or put on hold for 30 minutes plus.

The point of flowers is that they arrive on the day of a special occasion. The time component of the order is just as important as the flowers themselves.

Furthermore, there was absolutely no way for my wife to ‘return’ the flowers as she was only in Canada temporarily and had left the country by the time anything could really be done. Also, the quality of the flowers left much to be desired, but I’m willing to accept even that.

These flowers were ordered through the Florist Montreal website:

Order Number: 902638
Order Date: 30-Mar-2008:21:21
Order Status: Paid

Delivery Date: 30-03-2008
Actual Delivery Date: 02-04-2008
Lior

Jul 20 2008

Dear Bloomex:

While I only send flowers twice a year to relatives and friends, I have avoided Bloomex simply because of all the negative customer service complaints out there. And to be perfectly real, you’re not exactly doing a good job in convincing me that I should change my mind.

The simple reason is that while some customers were not aware of your policies and business practices and essentially went over the top in asking you to resolve their issue according to their expectations, with others, in particular those whose orders “fell through the cracks” or totally messed up through no fault of their own, you simply issued a refund to their account.

Sometimes a refund is not enough. Just giving someone back their money they paid in advance after no service was delivered does not make things right. Perhaps it does from your perspective, but not from mine.

Sometimes the feeling and joy that an elderly mother has receiving flowers from her family on a special occasion has no money value at all. Your refunding her family’s money for your screw up does not make things right and neither does re-sending orders that were supposed to arrive perfectly on a special day, but arrived damaged or, in some cases, didn’t arrive at all.
Denis L

Jul 21 2008

I have ordered flowers from this company before and haven’t had problems. I am happy to see that they are making an effort to resolve past problems, and even offer compensation in certain cases. Man!

Those of you complaining that they are just not doing enough, when’s the last time YOU have seen a company willing to take on customer complaints like this one has?? I can’t think of any, and I have read the whole Rogers/Bell thing, the Air Canada thing, the Best Buy policies, the Canadian Tire policies and never seen anyone from PR doing anything there!

I have been caught often in those situations where “it’s against our policies”. But Holy Cow, those of you purchasing things on the internet, giving out your credit card information and NOT reading company policies, it’s just ridiculous and precarious!

How can so many people blame a company for their policies that are stated on their site, but make a decision not to review them prior to purchases? I just do not understand how people can be that reckless!
Lior

Jul 21 2008

Denis L:

You said:

“Those of you complaining that they are just not doing enough, when’s the last time YOU have seen a company willing to take on customer complaints like this one has??”

The answer is simple: when the number of complaints is so high to the point where it is generating bad publicity for the company all over the place, any company not taking action will be out of business. Bloomex is a small company. It’s not Bell, which despite all the extremely negative publicity about their customer service, can still manage to survive (as sad as it is to say). Small businesses that don’t get their act together will be history very quickly.
JMS

Jul 22 2008

I agree….They gave me money back true ..but it was a month after the product was supposed to be delivered, and only after me sending 100 emails, leaving 5 or 6 phone messages a day, talking/being ignored by the online operators, and driving to the head office.

THey have made no attempt to win me back as a customer at all.

One of the things that they said that they prided themselves in was the fact that they were only an online company. Unfortunately, I think that there gets to a point that you need to deal with people.

They however have shut their doors to me.
Potato

Jul 23 2008

Jul 16 2008

“In this case, the client ordered the flowers on the internet. She did not order them before the 1 pm cut-off time for same day delivery.
…
Jul 17 2008
The client ordered herself online at 12:43 AM and she wanted morning delivery (which we cannot do)…. The charges on her credit card were reversed, but they shoudn’t have been. The policies are clear and she didn’t follow them.”

It sounds like Bloomex has a big software design problem. It may be legally correct to have a statement of policies about delivery cut-off times, and then take impossible orders anyway, but it would save everyone a lot of hassle and bad publicity if the website order form did a check of the requested delivery and the time submitted and didn’t allow customers to get their hopes up. This ordering-after-cutoff looks to be a big problem for Bloomex (and, frankly, I’m not surprised given how prominently they feature their “same day delivery” on the website), and after it’s been noticed to be a recurring problem a few times, it’s stupid that these orders continue to be allowed to be accepted by the software.

In the second case, that response is just downright snarky. She said in her complaint that she included a note to contact her if that delivery time wasn’t possible — it was a case of “well, this might be the policy, but it can’t hurt to try.” If it is against policy, the order should have been cancelled and refunded at that stage, not after pointless delivery attempts had been made. It’s your policy, so you follow it, and try to protect your customers.
Jamie

Jul 23 2008

“when’s the last time YOU have seen a company willing to take on customer complaints like this one has?”

This is similar to how Future Shop responded to the Boxing Day fiasco complaints after Ellen covered it. As long as it was a few isolated complaints, it was left to the normal call centre runaround. Once the media attention got too hot too handle, they couldn’t react fast enough to make things right.

Bloomex was on the way to oblivion with the coverage here and piles of easily googled complaints elsewhere. People fought with them for months and got nowhere. They finally must have realized business was threatened, although I highly doubt the responses from them here will change anyone’s mind.
serathe

Jul 23 2008

I’m sorry, but your current policies are ridiculous. I ordered before the 1 p.m. cutoff and the same-day delivery image did NOT list the same-day delivery production areas.

Your website poses as if it has a Kelowna, B.C. location, but it doesn’t, according to you guys. Heck, the online operator told me you had a place in Kelowna. It wasn’t even delivered the day you said it would be, but after! The delivery driver from Canpar didn’t even knock on the door (someone was home).

I was very dissatisfied and even more so trying to get a resolution! I was just shoved off to email with whoever “kl” is stating policies.

I don’t care what strides you guys take, I’m never dealing with you again. I was much much happier with real local florists that deliver when they say they will and offer top notch quality to boot! They didn’t even cost that much more.

Good luck on trying to get a good reputation.
serathe

Jul 23 2008

Wanted to add the following:

http://bloomex.ca/florist/kelowna/?gclid

“Bloomex Kelowna’s fresh cut flowers are shipped directly from our Kelowna flower distribution centre. Order flowers online 24 hours a day from a Kelowna florist. If you would like a same day delivery of flowers in Kelowna, please place an order before 1 pm the day of delivery.”

I ordered in time and you guys pointed out that it’s not in local production, per your policies!

That’s a flat-out lie somewhere there.
Karen

Jul 29 2008

One June 15, I ordered flowers online with Bloomex.ca for my mother’s 75th Birthday. I noted on the order “please deliver before noon June 16, otherwise please contact me.”

Had I been contacted as I requested, I would have picked an alternate delivery date for Thursday, June 19, since my mother was travelling out of town.

My credit card was charged promptly, including a premium delivery fee for 9 am to 12 pm. My elderly mother waited until 1:30 pm, with no word from Bloomex.

I tried to contact Bloomex through their chat line (no operator available), left numerous voice mails and emails.
Desperate to contact a human being, I called the toll-free number and opted for “1” (the order line).

The agent was new and expressed her concern about the amount of complaints that had come through her line. She also was getting “no operator available” on the chat line. She sent an email complaint on my behalf, informing Bloomex my mother was now out of town until Thursday.

One of my countless emails requested a refund. The email response was “NO” and my cancellation fee would be the same price as the order ($58.73).

Finally, after numerous requests to have someone call me, Kim in customer service (Ottawa) finally called me on Wednesday, June 17. She suggested that there had been three delivery attempts. Bloomex had completely ignored all my messages to advise them that it was too late.

Also, upon my mother’s return, there were no messages, cards, notices of any kind to indicate these delivery attempts had been made.

Kim offered to do a resend on Monday, June 23 (one week later). A follow-up email confirming this was to do the resend on Tuesday, June 24.

Again, I sent voicemail messages, emails, tried to get on a chat line with no success. The new emails I started to receive were that the matter is “under investigation”.

Nine days later, my mother had not received flowers from Bloomex, my credit card charge had not been refunded, and despite my repeated requests, there were no returned phone calls from Bloomex about my refund requests.

Since then, I’ve found the websites describing the unbelievable experiences other customers have had with this company. How can they stay in business??

On Tuesday, June 24 (eight days after her birthday), I called a local florist in Orillia and ordered 12 long stem yellow roses, same as the Bloomex order.

Within 2 hours, my mother had a bouquet of 18 long stem yellow roses at her door (for less than what Bloomex charged).
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Jul 29 2008

Karen ordered her flowers at 12.43 a.m. She wanted morning delivery, which we cannot do. This was emailed to her in her confirmation.

The charges on her credit card were reversed, but they shoudn’t have been. The policies are clear and she didn’t follow them.

Unfortunately, it’s cases like this one that harm the majority, because we had to foot the bill not only for the bouquet that was arranged by a professional florist and WAS delivered (but no one was home), but we also had to pay for the delivery charges.

We attempted on several occasions to contact the customer as per her request. The cost of the bouquet and the delivery is why we have our policies in place, because of those that take advantage.

Our policies may seem harsh to some, but as you can clearly see they are needed. Otherwise, we might as well not be in business if we send out bouquets which are made, delivered but unpaid for.
Karen’s response

Jul 29 2008

1) The notation on the order said, “please call if morning delivery is not possible.” They did not call me. I also paid the extra 9 am to noon delivery fee – why did I do so if they could not deliver on short notice?

2) Bloomex claims they made three delivery attempts. They did not. They left no notices at my mother’s, despite the fact there are instructions posted at the apartment building door to contact the building manager for deliveries.

3) Eight days after arguing with Bloomex, I gave up. Instead, I was able to have flowers delivered to my mother within 2 hours (from a phone call to her door)!

Why did I have to go through so much, all to order flowers from Bloomex????? Never again.
JMS’s response to Karen

Jul 29 2008

Same thing happened to me, Karen

They contacted me 2 days after the basket was supposed to be delivered and said that they tried to deliver it. I contacted them (as they requested) and asked to deliver it next door. I received a conformation email, stating that they would change the order.

Then they never delivered it.

My brother called them and they said that I had cancelled it!!!!

When I FINALLY got to speak to someone 4 weeks later… they told me that they don’t deliver to Whitehorse. This was something that was NEVER mentioned to me, nor is it listed on the website.

They told me I should have contacted a flower delivery company in the YT, which I had. When I googled flower delivery for Whitehorse, Bloomex came up.

When I mentioned this and said maybe they should fix it so they DON’T come up in that kind of search, the woman told me that one day they might deliver there, so there was no point.

REALLY???? OH THANK YOU!!!! That means ONE DAY you can screw over people in Whitehorse too. ..SWEEEEEET!
JMS’s response to Karen

Jul 29 2008

And for the record, Bloomex is NOT cheaper then other online flower shops. Other shops have free delivery. Other shops actually deliver the product. And other shops take pride in their service.
Vera

Aug 1 2008

Dear Ms. Robitaille,

My boyfriend placed an order with you Monday, July 28, for a surprise bouquet of flowers and chocolates to be sent to me by July 29.

Let’s just say the surprise was completely ruined and I now have the aggravation of trying to track down my flowers.

At 4:20 pm on July 29, I received a phone call from a man living two hours away from where I live in Kingston, Ont. He told me he had received a box from Bloomex with his name on it — but with my flowers, chocolate and card inside the box.

First off, a complete stranger should not have personal information, such as my phone number and address (although it was nice of him to let me know that I would not be receiving my flowers today and that he got them while he is in the hospital).

Secondly, I tried contacting customer service to explain what happened and I had someone online telling me that a manager would contact me straight away.

One hour later, no one had bothered to contact me, so I contacted them again and was told they needed to contact productions and then would contact me ASAP.

It is now FOUR hours later and I have not received a single email or phone call OR FLOWERS.

My order was supposed to have been received today and instead no one in your company seems to care about their customers.

I found your email address through angry Facebook groups. I would like immediate answers as to how this could have happened, why no one has informed me of what is going on and why a man in a hospital bed had to call me to tell me that there was a mistake in the order.

I also expect to have FRESH flowers and my chocolates sent to me (after 4:30 pm, which was stated in the original order) and I also expect a refund for my boyfriend. He paid full price for literally only wasted time on both our parts.

I have also cc’ed this email to Ellen Roseman, who is very familiar with all the complaints to your company and may be interested in your response.
Michelle Robitaille, Bloomex

Aug 1 2008

Dear Vera,

Thank you for your email. I have spoken with a Customer Service Manager about your order.

I sincerely apologize, but your order was missorted, and your order was received by a different party, and you received their order.

We have issued a re-send of your order right away. You may keep the bouquet that you mistakenly received. We have also sent you 12 roses and chocolates (for your original order).

As well, we have issued a full credit on the account for future use.

We are dedicated to providing the best possible service at the best possible price. We greatly value your business, and look forward to serving you again shortly.

Thank you,

Michelle
Barb

Aug 5 2008

Thank you, Bloomex, for removing my complaint from your web blog. I see that you screen the complaints and only leave good reviews. I will post again.

To everyone out there who can read this (even for just a short time), my experience with Bloomex was truly horrible. I ordered $70 worth of flowers. They were delivered 5 days late and were totally DEAD.

I spent the better part of June trying to get in touch with someone in their customer service department. I could only get an operator who works out of their home. I even asked the operator how she could work for such a terrible company. She had no response.

I sent Bloomex pictures of the DEAD flowers my friend (who was recovering from surgery) had to take. After a least a dozen emails and daily calls to any number I could find, I was informed that I would have to pay an additional $9.95 on top of the money that they already took from me for DEAD flowers so that they could send a driver to pick them up. Apparently they need their DEAD product back in order to issue a refund.

It took them 2 weeks to send someone to pick up the DEAD flowers, which by this time were so decayed that even CSI agents would have a hard time figuring out what the heck was in the rotten box that everyone had to trip over for 2 weeks! Great customer service, BLOOMEX. You should be ashamed of yourselves. May Karma bite you in the butt.

You can’t remove this blog. I am letting everyone I know (and their dog) how horribly I was treated by your company. Shame shame shame.
Anna

Aug 10 2008

Okay….I am getting married in small town Saskatchewan…am planning to order flowers from Calgary from Bloomex…is there anyone out there who has ordered through Calgary and had good results….I am picky about my flowers and will be ordering the flowers in bulk am making my own bouquets etc…or should i get another wholesale supplier indtead for my flowers…
Barb

Aug 12 2008

In response to Anna: Do a Google search on “Bloomex Complaints”. That will give you your answer….
JMS’s response to Anna

Aug 12 2008

DO NOT ORDER FROM BLOOMEX.

I know there is a story somewhere about a wedding and Bloomex and the catastrophe that it caused. It isn’t worth it. Too many people don’t even get their order on the correct day or find half of the flowers are dead…..

Enjoy your wedding day and have it stress-free by going elsewhere!
Diana Rich

Aug 15 2008

OMG, how can you sleep at night, Michelle?

I’ve ordered from them twice, thinking I’d give them a second chance. BIG mistake.

I just sent my son a Fruit/Chocolate basket. Chocolate seems to be out of season! There wasn’t one chocolate in the basket. A LIKE item Fish (oysters) was sent instead of rice crackers, tea, anything but chocolate.

I’ll live in Canada all my life and know I can go to any corner store and pick up some chocolates. But that’s not the icing on the cake. The pears in the basket were rotten — and I do mean rotten.

How can you defend this company? You know you’ll have to answer to a higher power some day. Six million people can’t be wrong!!!

I’m out $52, but I can sleep knowing I didn’t scam anyone today. I can look in the mirror and know that I’m honest and won’t be a low life like this company is. So if it takes me awhile to get over my losses, so be it.

I know after reading complaints after complaints about this company, I’ll never see the money. When my son opened the gift basket and fruit flies flew out (and yes, I have pictures which have been sent to BBB), he knew I’d been had.

I think that everyone who places a complaint should get together (we all have pictures to prove it) and take the company to court. I’m sure that at least one person has sent a lawyer or judge a rotten basket or dead flowers, but this company should be put out of business. So Michelle, please don’t reply to this with any more BS. We’ve heard enough from you.
Jacob

Aug 19 2008

EVERYONE PLEASE READ THIS! EVERYONE PLEASE READ THIS!

If you have a bad experience with Bloomex, this will get things resolved 100%.

I suggest the following:

Contact your credit card company and do a chargeback. Let your credit card company deal with this madness.

By going to your credit card company, you will 100% get your MONEY back. Do it as soon as possible. ANY incorrect/unsatisfactory deliveries are entitled to a chargeback. (THIS IS IMPORTANT.)

They gave you dead flowers? CHARGE BACK!

This company purposely ignores/wastes your time in hopes you will drop the request for a refund. They will not refund anything.

Anything their service reps tell you is to get you off the phone, full of empty promises. All they will do is try to delay the 30-day grace period you have with your credit card.

I love how they say Customer Service Manager or the fact Management is hard to reach. It is obvious this is a small time shop.

Customer Service Manager Michelle is the only person processing returns. Don’t know how a supposedly big organization took so long to even have a CS Manager!?!?
serathe

Aug 19 2008

Agree with Jacob. That’s the only way I got any satisfaction.

I think most CC companies will help you — though you need to at least attempt to resolve it yourself — when you can’t get staisfaction. Should be easy.
Angel Oh

Aug 21 2008

In all fairness, Michelle is quite good in returning emails and responding to customer needs.

Here’s what happened to me.

A week ago, my boyfriend ordered 12-long stemmed roses for me for our 3rd anniversary. I was impressed that the package was delivered on time, but I was very disappointed when I got a poorly arranged gift basket of chocolates and coffee.

Apparently, they had emailed my boyfriend saying they had a shortage of roses that day and a replacement would be made.

I was upset when I opened the box because I don’t eat chocolates for health reasons! And I feel it was very unfair to my boyfriend. Had he known the replacement would be chocolates and coffee, for sure he would’ve cancelled his order.

So I decided to research Bloomex and came across Ellen’s site. I found Michelle’s email address and told her about my disastrous Bloomex order. She replied to me 2 days after and I found a bouquet of 12-long stemmed roses that day on my front door.

I was happy to see this and was quite impressed with how Michelle has redeemed Bloomex’s reputation.
Michelle

Aug 28 2008

Thanks JACOB!

Everyone..do a Chargeback from your CREDIT CARD. IT hits them where it hurts (profit) and Bloomex can not do anything about it.

Big deal Michelle is good at answering emails..!? She is the only person that does. Michelle stop pretending you talked to Management or Senior Advisor etc.. we all know there is no such department or staff in your company. IF you guys were so well organizied it would not hav e taken so long for you to get hired. Add to the fact that your CEO makes the most ignorant statements about complaints from customers. You work @ home and Bloomex is small, less then 3 employees who sub-contract the deliveries. All your sub-contracters have no business ethics and neither do u.

Everyone jsut do a CHARGEBACK on your credit card. It will get back all your money and very soon with every additional chargeback VISA will yank their merchant licence.
Hillary

Aug 28 2008

I ordered Mother’s Day flowers 5 days in advance. They did not arrive on Mother’s Day or the day after or the day after that.

Tried the useless online ‘customer service’ several times & they couldn’t provide me with an explanation & I never received a ‘call back’ with an update as advised.

After contacting the courier company, I finally found out that the arrangement had been sent via courier 500 km from the production site to the destination & spent an entire weekend in an unrefrigerated warehouse.

Thankfully, my great aunt refused delivery 8 days later because the flowers would have been more like potpourri than a fresh cut arrangement!

DO NOT ACCECPT DELIVERY AFTER THE SCHEDULED DATE OR BLOOMEX WILL CHARGE YOU A PICK UP FEE!

After contacting my credit card company, the charge has been reversed. I’m not sure how this company stays in business.
Steven

Aug 29 2008

Where is MIchelle at BLOOMEX? She quit already?

Ah, such a basement president employee of 1 operation.
Expert

Sep 16 2008

Hi guys, I’m such an expert in this industry that I would like to let you know a couple of things to avoid misunderstanding of Bloomex business.

1. Bloomex has more than 1 employee, much more. They really have production facilities in all major Canadian cities with head office in Ottawa. So they have at least 15-20 employees.

2. Bloomex has the cheapest prices on the market. At least it looks like they do. Because if you add a price for the vase they provide, you will not really be far from regular price which you can get from any flower shop.

3. To make their arrangement so cheap, they buying the cheapest flowers possible. Cheapest flowers means Lowest quality flowers. And this is one of the reasons why they have so many complaints. But what is true is that they’re really buying flowers directly from flower growers.

4. Bloomex’s marketing positioning is that they are for cheap customers. Cheap customer means lots of reasonable and unreasonable complaints. That’s why they have so unfriendly Policy.

There are much more things to say about but just would like to summarize:

Buying flowers from guys like Bloomex is a kind of gambling. You can win and lose. You can save some money when everything works good or receive mouldy flowers 1 month later and have a case with horrible customer service.

I personally am never gonna use Bloomex. Just because I’m worried about the impression which I will create with flowers. I better pay $10 and receive a guaranteed result.
Joan

Sep 24 2008

I ordered flowers for my daughter’s birthday this past August. I must say that the rep was super pleasant to deal with. We had a great chat while I picked out my bouquet. Heck, I even questioned the rep about job opportunities and working conditions at Bloomex!

The flowers arrived on time, the photos my daughter sent looked wonderful, but most importantly she was pleased.

I didn’t even think to check their reputation before ordering. After reading the comments above, I consider myself lucky! Someone was certainly looking out for me that day. I won’t be applying at Bloomex.
Jay

Oct 12 2008

Chargeback is key. This company is trying to do damage control to the point where they have signed up on an Ottawa forum trying to defend why they don’t deal with the BBB and how they are now “under legal dispute” with Ellen (which is how I found this page) over the article, which was most likely the truth.

I placed an order at 11 AM and confirmed delivery as per their own policy for delivery before 5 PM. Confirmed not once but twice.

When the flowers weren’t delivered, I asked that they be canceled. The very next day, they replied to my email asking to cancel saying the order was out for delivery!

They had the nerve to say that they would need to charge me 9.99$ to go pick up the flowers and quoted their return policy! They can’t even meet their own delivery policy and they have the nerve to link me to that.

I have all emails. It’s infuriating.

I filed with the BBB and all I wanted was a written applogy and an explanation, I guess that was too much to ask.
Jay

Oct 12 2008

Another thing: it’s a sham to see these people signing up to post positive comments. Think about it.
Why would they be asking about working conditions and if they can work there!? What a joke!

Do an IP check, I’ll bet 9.99$ it leads to their basement.
Jay

Oct 16 2008

Thank you, Angela from Bloomex, for contacting me and finally apologizing for the mishandling of my order.

This is all I was looking for and I think you will find that the orders that do fall through the cracks, such as mine, need this kind of personal touch so things do not escalate to this level.
Chris

Oct 31 2008

Bloomex was completely indifferent to my requests for service and for an answer to my fundamental question of: “Do you intend to deliver the flowers I ordered and paid for?”

I had to badger them for a “I’ll get back to you” response on at least three occasions. Weeks passed… no answer or action and clearly no interest in refunding my $52 that they had promptly processed the day after my order. They do that well!

No excuses for Bloomex. Order from them at your peril.

I had to dispute the charge through my credit card company to get my money back. I did.

Bad. Really bad.
Carol Hama Chang

Nov 23 2008

Several of the complaints I read were a result of the customer ordering a day too late and/or not respecting Bloomex’s limited delivery service. Also, there have been several cases of deliveries gone wrong because of the poor delivery service. It’s losing them a lot of business.

I, on the other hand, ordered flowers for my mother’s birthday 1 week in advance. She received dead and rotting flowers, because the driver negligently left the flowers in the truck over the entire weekend because he couldn’t deliver them on Friday at the prescribed time! PLUS they were the wrong flowers. I had ordered and paid for roses, but she received rotting tulips.

With foresight, she took digital photos of these rotting flowers. Armed with an order number and time/date of this rotten mess, we called Bloomex and emailed several times. But we got no responce until I posted this on the internet.

The flowers were eventually replaced with another box of beautiful tulips… not roses. But this time, we figured we’d take what we could get because Bloomex was not going to issue a refund. In fact, they were trying to stiff me with an extra delivery fee for re-sending flowers.

When I posted my complaint on the internet, I also said there appeared to be a delivery problem. I suggested a few things:

1) The Bloomex delivery area SHOULD be clearly posted on the site so we know WHERE the Bloomex boundaries are for each city for next day delivery! Perhaps the person taking the order should check the delivery address and inform the customer whether it is within the next day boundary, mention this and also restate it in the confirming email.

Also, the order clerk should get an alternative delivery option, say with a neighbour who will defintely be home (get a confirmation from customer) or a postponed delivery date. Perhaps the clerk can call the recipient when the order is taken to warn them they would like to make a delivery on a particular date within a 2-3 hour range and ask them if they will be home or ask for a better time to catch them at home.

If flowers are left with neighbour, have the driver leave a note in the customer’s mailbox or attached to the door knob that the flowers have been delivered to a neighbour….also PHONE them to advise them of the rerouted delivery in case they enter through the garage instead of the front door.

In this way, the delivery failures will be reduced. All this costs money. Bloomex will have to pay someone as an appointment clerk and extra time will be required to route the drivers. This is where I suspect Bloomex is cutting corners. Clearly it is NOT working.

Due to the time sensitivity of floral deliveries and the fragility of the product, their drivers should use cellphones to confirm the next proposed delivery and confirm that recipients are home! If not they can re-route without wasting time, but I think the best solution is to have the tracking system available to the customer.

2) WRONG ORDERS should be acknowledged promptly and at full Bloomex expense (wrong products/wrong dates). Failing this, Bloomex will lose customers.

They’ve lost me and I order flowers frequently! I will gladly pay a few bucks more and be PROUD that I sent those beautiful flowers, instead of being ashamed to have sent rotten flowers late! I, my family and friends will not use Bloomex! Had Bloomex leaned over backwards to please me after that last gaffe, then I would have gladly gone back to them…..but not when their customer service is so bad and they have the nerve to claim that the complaints were bogus and planted there by competitors! Too bad. I was really pulling for a Canadian company to make good! Was disappointed!

With their new customer care rep, perhaps Bloomex can pull out of this bad reputation and thrive instead of going under in today’s economy. They will just have to charge a few dollars more to make this systematic improvement. We, as customers want what we paid for. We all know how expensive flowers are!
Jenny

Dec 23 2008

For all who may be interested, I also had a very awful experience with Bloomex - (it mimics many of your stories - rude, hangups, no callbacks, and late if any delivery…).

A few things I found out that may help you:

1) the PR Manager who this article directs you to email is Michelle Robataille - if you do not get a response from the ‘customer service department’ I have found her office # :

MICHELLE ROBATAILLE: 1-866-690-8425 - this is the number for their ‘wholesale department, aka Head Office’ but Michelle works in this office. They will tell you she is not in, or only works on weddings, but being the person who is in charge of PR and self listed as the person to forward complaints to - I feel this # is an important one.

2) Call Canpar, which is the service that delivers the flowers on behalf of Bloomex. (Bloomex order takers can give you a ‘tracking number’ and ‘account number’ with this information.) Canpar can give you a different Bloomex contact number for the place that your flowers are prepared - these people
a) answer the phone
b) can tell you what is going on with your order.

Hope this helped someone …
J
I

Dec 24 2008

Another complaint…

I used them once in September. Delivery was late and the flowers had seen better days… Sent pics to them but according to them the quality was ‘acceptable’. No refund given…

In December, I decided to try them again, hoping my previous experience was a one off… and I was wrong.

Used the same day guranteed delivery. It’s 3 days later and the flowers still haven’t been delivered.

Customer service gave me the same reply 3 times - “we will check with our production department and get back to you.” Needless to say, they haven’t got back to me.

I found the whole situation unacceptable. How can they advertise same day guaranteed delivery and charge for it, yet have not sent the order out 3 days later?

VERY FRUSTRATED .. I won’t be using them again
Thao

Jan 17 2009

Yes! Another complaint about Bloomex .

I had placed an order online for my partner’s birthday as well as our anniversary on Jan 13th, 09 and to be delivered on Jan 14th, 09. Received order confirmation and another email indicating my order status is “confirmed”. Fast forward to Jan 14th after 5pm (according to their delivery procedure for $9.99 guarantee delivery from 12pm-5pm) my order still has not arrived. I went online to seek help via live chat on Bloomex website at approx. 5:10 pm on Jan 14th and waited for 45 minutes before a screen popped up and said “”Sorry no operators are currently online to provide live support.”. I proceeded to call customer service and left a message asking for someone to call me back with the status of my order. Although I was very disappointed I was still hoping that it will arrive the next day. Next morning Jan 15th I called back and left another voicemail. This time a representative was kind enough to call me back, however; they have no record of my order no. She asked me “are you sure you order with Bloomex?. I thought I was crazy for a second. I replied “would you like me to forward a copy of my confirmation email from Bloomex?” Then she said someone from customer service will call me back. On the same day, I also sent an email to customer service explaining my situation and asking for someone to call me back with the status of my order and if they are not going to delivery my order and then please don’t charge me for it.

In summary, as of now on January 17th my order still has not arrived, Bloomex had already charged my credit card for the total of my order, no live help online via chat window, rude and incompetence customer service representative, no reply to my email, no phone callbacks. I STILL DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPEN TO MY ORDER 4 DAYS LATER. THIS IS AN UNACCEPTABLE WAY TO DO BUSINESS ANYWHERE.

EXTREMELY FRUSTATED…I must thank Bloomex for being extremely unreliable, wasting my time and most importantly ruining our special day. I must ensure that no one in my social/professional circle will ever order with Bloomex.
Roxanne

Jan 22 2009

I think this company is now known for its incompetence. Even after saying that they have implemented a new customer service system, they are still so unreliable and unhelpful.

My situation is almost the exact same as everyone else’s, so no point in being redundant.

They must learn that, after some time, the disappointed will be letting their friends and family know and word of mouth spreads very quickly, especially when it is negative.
Brook

Jan 23 2009

Bloomex cannot deliver! They have no support telephone number. It just tells you to go to the website. They are rude, unhelpful, unprofessional. I cannot believe they are still in business.

How can we stop this business?
Dude

Jan 24 2009

Worst business ever.

They did not deliver the flowers within the guranteed time frame and yet they refuse to refund me and have the nerve to charge $25 to cancel.

It’s too bad there’s nothing more the public can do in order to shut down terrible companies like Bloomex.
Jennifer

Jan 26 2009

All I can say that my first experience with Bloomex was far from positive. 1st they got the address wrong so the flowers did not get delivered on time, and when the flowers did get delivered they were frozen. Their solution (for a refund) was for the person that we had the flowers delivered to get in her car and return the flowers or we could pay $9.99 for them too pick up their mistake. I’m still waiting from some from Bloomex to explain how that is customer service.
Faye

Feb 1 2009

Bloomex is a company whose policies first and foremost serve Bloomex. These policies are in place to ensure that once they receive a customer’s money, they hang onto it, regardless of delivery of product or not.

Their policy of ’substituting items of a higher value when ordered items are unavailable’ is one that appears to be implemented without actual consideration of ‘the higher value’ part.

I ordered a gourmet food basket ($148 value) to send to my in-laws for Xmas. I received an email saying it had been delivered on the 24th. It had not.

I spent an entire week attempting to make contact. Eventually was told my basket would be re-sent. My in-laws received a tiny basket of cheap/stale chocolate and cookies….a basket that was so far from the one I had ordered in value it was ridiculous.

After sending in a photo, I was promised that the original basket ordered would be sent and I’d receive a credit as well, because of all I had endured.

Once again, my in-laws received another cheap little basket of chocolate and cookies…none of the gourmet cheeses or other savory items that were to be included.

I demanded a refund of the difference in price on the baskets… and was denied.

When I went to use my credit, I orderd the same basket to be sent to my Dad for his birthday. I specifically asked if all items were available and would be in the basket. I was assured they would be.

Once again, a cheap basket of cookies and chocolates were sent. Many of the items appeared to be ’samples’… they were that tiny. Everything appeared very cheap and in some cases ‘old’.

I was told the basket would be picked up this week and my credit re-instated. However, I’ve heard nothing from Bloomex about this pick-up.

I’ve spoken several times with Michelle Robitaille by email. She is generally prompt with her responses and, I must say, dealing with her was a breath of fresh air compared to attempting to communicate with operators and such. (This was mostly impossible, and when possible, I got nowhere). However, Michelle is, as a Bloomex employee would be expected to be, a staunch supporter of these infamous ‘policies’.

The thing that bothers me the most is the idea that I spent $148 for a food basket to be delivered as an Xmas Gift. Not only did it arrive 1 week late, but it was a pathetic version and a mere fraction of the value of what I had actually ordered… AND PAID FOR.

The fact that it then happened 3 more times indicates that Bloomex likely makes a regular habit of this practice of ‘bait and switch’….doesn’t this constitute fraud?

If my in-laws had not been so kind as to describe their basket to me, I’d have never been the wiser. I suspect that many a Bloomex customer has paid for an expensive item, only to have the recipient receive one of far less value.

When you combine this with all their other policies created to make it almost impossible to achieve customer satisfaction, it’s quite clear this is not a company that is out for anything other than lining its own pockets. Customer satisfaction is of little importance.
Michelle Robitaille

Feb 2 2009

My name is Michelle Robitaille and I am the Public Relations Manager for Bloomex Inc.

I wanted to address a few things that have been posted here. My intentions are to clarify some things, as well as offer further help to those looking for resolution of issues.

I would like to apologize to those who have not had a successful experience with our company; we do try our absolute best to provide the best service and the best products. Like any company, we will have issues and concerns, but our goal is to rectify those issues as quickly and efficaciously as possible.

1- MY CONTACT information is as follows, please disregard any information posted by others as it is inaccurate (PS - there is more than 1 Michelle that works at Bloomex). My email is publicrelations@bloomex.ca. I can also be reached at 613-963-0484; I am not always in the office, so often I may not answer. I ALWAYS answer my emails promptly.

2- FEEDBACK@BLOOMEX.CA is another email address that is handled by the Quality Assurance Team. They handle issues quickly, and communicate back with the customer immediately. If any one here wants satisfaction to an issue, the Quality Assurance Team would be more than pleased to assist. Please email feedback@bloomex.ca, and include your order number and brief details of your concerns.

Now I wanted to address some of the issues that appear to be re-occurring, and causing great disappointment among our customers.

1) We are an online company. I cannot stress enough that people NEED to take the time to read policies. They are in plain view in various locations on the website; they are placed there to eliminate false expectations, and clarify what will happen if problems arise.

If you do not agree with these policies, then you have the option of ordering from another company, but for people to state after the fact, that Bloomex policies are in place to protect Bloomex is inaccurate and unfounded. The policies are available for your viewing pleasure prior to you placing an order. The policies are sent directly to you in your email confirmation as well, which states:

“Please note that below listed policy is the same for everyone. By receiving this email you confirm, that you have agreed to our terms and conditions as well as all additional charges that arise in redelivering, cancellation, incorrect delivery address and requests for refund.”

2) CUSTOMER SERVICE- The “leaving a message” is a big issue for some people, but let me explain it this way: we ask that you leave a message, so that you are not stuck on hold, and so that our CS reps can look into the details of your order, investigate it if necessary and then communicate back with you as soon as possible.

On average, our CS reps spend approximately 25 minutes on the phone with a customer, some calls can last as long as 90 minutes. Do you want to stay on hold for that time? Don’t forget it goes in order of priority, so there can be other customers on hold ahead of you.

Our customer service reps work really hard. They work diligently to get back to clients ASAP, but there are times when they must investigate your concerns. Our production facilities send out the orders, and customer service must ask where the order is. It can take time for them to respond. Our reps are not rude; they answer your questions as best as possible. On live chat they are restricted on time, so their answers are short and to the point. Our reps become rude when customers use profanity or become aggressive or threatening.

3) LIVE CHAT- Remember what I stated above: We are an online company; our preferred method of communication is online. The live chat agents are there to help, so customers can keep the reps on a chat for 45 minutes, it depends on their issues. The live chat reps try and help everyone as fast and effectively as possible. There will be times that agents are busy helping other customers and cannot assist you right away.

4) DELIVERY POLICY- again, I cannot stress enough to read the delivery policies! Especially if your gift is time sensitive! Our same day delivery is for locations within our production area. Our website states:

“Our production facilities are serving for same day delivery Greater Toronto, Ottawa, Greater Montreal, Calgary, Halifax, Winnipeg and Greater Vancouver. We are using overnight courier to deliver your order to locations outside of above areas.”

We are in the process of revamping our website delivery system, because customers just WON’T read the delivery policies and then they are angry and shocked when they are told why their order was not delivered that day. These policies are not in fine print, or hidden, they are in plain view listed on 3 independent pages.

5) COURIER COMPANY DELIVERIES- As mentioned, we use courier companies to deliver outside our production facility. Courier drivers are paid, regardless of the condition of the arrival of your flowers. They do NOT care, because they do not provide protection for the flowers. If flowers are damaged during delivery, they do not have any accountability (they state they don’t guarantee flowers).

So when your flowers arrive frozen, broken, wilted, it’s because the drivers do not care. When your flowers arrive late, like 3 days late, it is not Bloomex that sent them late; it is the courier company that finally decided to deliver your flowers. It’s not just one courier company; all of them have the same attitude, from our experiences. However, we do care about how your gift is received, and we have avenues in place for restitution.

6) SUBSTITUTIONS/WRONG ORDERS- Yes, substitutions happen. It is unfortunate; we try to make sure they do not happen often, as we do our best to fulfill orders for the items that are requested. Our substitution policy is listed on our website, we state this so that you have the knowledge firsthand BEFORE placing your order. If you do not agree with the policy, you do NOT have to order from us.

No other online florist lists their ENTIRE policies on their site, normally they list some policies and after you have placed your order and given them money, they email you the rest to protect themselves. We do not; we give fair opportunity to view the policies before we “take” your money.

7) CANCELLATIONS- Cancellation policy is VERY simple.

- You cancel your order within 1 hour of placing it = no cancellation fee
- You want to cancel your order after the 1 hour time frame, and the flowers have NOT been arranged yet = $25 cancellation fee
- You want to cancel your order, but the flowers are in transit or on the way to being delivered = full cost of flowers

You may not agree with this policy, but again it is listed on our site in plain view for you to see before placing your order. The cancellation policy is also in your email confirmation, which states if you do not agree with our policies below, call and cancel your order right away to not incur a cancellation fee.

DEAD/FROZEN/WILTED/BROWNED FLOWERS- We stand behind our product 100%. We ask that you send pics of what you received, so that we are constantly holding our production facilities accountable for what they are sending out. If you cannot send a pic, we often waive this as a gesture of goodwill to our patrons. We want to keep our customers happy, and will resend the bouquet right away.

For deliveries outside our production area, we use courier services to deliver. They are NOT as diligent as we are, so they will take their time delivering the flowers, and often not put much care in the handling of them, resulting in damaged flowers. We apologize for this sincerely; this is why we resend the flowers right away.

9) REQUEST FOR FULL REFUNDS- We offer refunds if this is what you choose. Please note, we do not offer a resend of your order AND a refund. We offer one or the other. If you choose a resend, no refund will be given.

To qualify for a refund, our product MUST be returned to us! Our refund policy is listed on our website, in plain view, as well as your email confirmation. There is a non-refundable $9.99, plus taxes, delivery/return fee.

Our drivers will go and pick up your order for a refund, but it is a $9.99 fee. This fee is NOT paid up front; it is deducted from your refund total. So if you spend $50, then you will be refunded $50 minus $9.99 plus taxes = difference.

I can understand that mistakes are made, and sometimes we may make those mistakes, i.e. flowers arriving dead. However, we do our best to resend an upgraded bouquet to make up for this, as often they were delivered by courier.

I can understand that customers do not agree with the $9.99 charge. In fact, I DON’T always agree with it, but it is stated in our policies and this is ALWAYS enforced.

Parallel this situation: I ordered fine wine glasses from a company online in the US. The glasses arrived chipped/broken. I contacted the company, they said I had to mail back the broken glasses and they would send me new ones. I went to the post office and paid $27.50 to return the broken glasses to the company!! I was pissed, but that was their policy. I don’t always agree with it, but it is the way it is.

10) EMAIL CONFIRMATIONS- We send you these for a reason. PLEASE take the time to review it. Make sure all the delivery information is correct. We do not have telepathic skills and we cannot tell when an address is inputted wrong.

In closing, I have tried to help customers as much as I can. I myself am a tough customer and I know how I would like to be treated. I spent 10 hours trying to convince Bell Canada that they charged me $341 too much on my bill. It took 3 months to finally resolve this issue.

I know that I will deal with a company that has strong customer centricity. Mistakes happen, fine, but how you deal with them is what will keep me a loyal patron. I implement this in the way I resolve customer issues.

I cannot always rectify the situation to your complete satisfaction, but I will try, and I will try in a way that every customer service rep at Bloomex tries.

Faye above I could not satisfy. I sent her 2 baskets, which she got to enjoy, as well as issued a full credit on her Bloomex account (because she didn’t take the refund as she didn’t return the original basket to us). She used the credit for another gift basket, and the basket didn’t arrive to her satisfaction. I offered to pick up the basket and keep the credit on her account for a future use. She didn’t want that, she wanted a refund on her credit card, a request that couldn’t be done, as our product was not returned to us. As a gesture of my appreciation for her situation, I sent her flowers personally. I sincerely wished that I could satisfy her completely, but I was not able to.

If anyone here feels that they did not receive the best product and services from us, please contact me at publicrelations@bloomex.ca or feedback@bloomex.ca and we will look into the details and try to rectify it.
Linda

Feb 2 2009

I ordered a food basket on Dec. 22 for delivery next day in Red Deer, Alberta, for my family for Christmas. I asked them to be home, as Bloomex promised Tuesday delivery, but the basket did not get delivered until Dec. 30.

I tried to talk to customer service, which asked me to email my complaint. They offered me a 15% discount on my next order. I asked them why would I order from them again.

I emailed them every day for two weeks and left my number. No one would answer my complaint live.

I have now written to them, but after reading all other complaints I see they care for nothing but the cash. How can they say they care about their customers? They need to go out of business the sooner the better.
Wayne

Feb 13 2009

I ordered flowers last night to be delivered to my wife’s work today for Valentines. I paid the extra fee to have them delivered between 9 and 12, but it is now 2:45 pm and still no sign of the flowers.

I called Bloomex Customer Service, but got the voice mail, and left them an email as well, but I really do not expect a response.

I did Google the company (after the fact) and if I had known last night what I know now, believe me I would have stayed clear of them.

I am taking the advice of the few that suggested the chargeback route, but I am not waiting weeks to do this. I am initiating it today.

I would just like to point something out to Michelle. I work in IT and have the responsibility of providing Customer Service to end users. If I had provided this kind of service on so many occasions as Bloomex provided, I would have been fired from my position a very long time ago.

I suggest that maybe it is time your management review your position, as well as the service manager (if there really is one), and replace you with someone that is capable of providing the service that we as customers are paying for.

Even better, why not order something from Bloomex for a loved one so you can experience the frustration that so many of us have?
Wayne

Feb 13 2009

It’s me again. I left a comment earlier today and would like to say that although I am still not impressed with the Customer Service response to my query, the flowers were delivered (later than I had paid for) and my wife is quite happy with them.

I have to say thanks to Bloomex, but I still suggest that they read what other customers are saying and pay close to attention to their needs.
JMS’s response to Michelle

Mar 23 2009

I find it funny that you wrote all this.

Yes, you can email the feedback address (which I did) and no one responded to me. Even after numerous calls.

Yes, you can do the online live chat, but unfortunately you are at the beck and call of someone who probably doesn’t know anything about flowers and is just reading from a sheet.

I talked online EVERY DAY for about 3 weeks and got the same answers that were obviously copied and pasted.

You blame the drivers for bad flowers. But aren’t you the ones who pack them?

I know the plant that I ordered arrived upside down. I couldn’t blame the driver because there was a “this way up” arrow on the box on the bottom and a “this way up” arrow on the upside down box on the top. How was he to know which box was actually the correct way up?

If you are, in fact, going to blame the delivery company, maybe you should think about hiring a different company.

For the order for my brother who lived in Whitehorse, you should have contacted me within 24 hours to say…oops I am sorry, we can’t deliver here, rather then letting me fight with you for a month.

For all of you who deal with Bloomex, I hope you live in Ottawa, or know someone in Ottawa, because the only way I got something done was when I went to the head office on Anteres (oh, and by head office, I mean 2 desks and a fridge).

I found that if you refuse to leave without talking to someone, they will call someone for you.
Laurie

Mar 27 2009

My parents were thrilled with the gift basket. Delivered on the right day at the right time, even with a foot of snow on the ground! Well done and many thanks.
Wayne

Mar 27 2009

When I spoke to my Aunt and asked her about the flowers she told me that they were beautiful 
Jo-Ann

Apr 9 2009

With regards to my order, I have received notice from the recipient - Uxbridge receiver of the floral arrangement who tells me she was absolutely overwhelmed with the beautiful arrangement you prepared. I thank you so much. This was my first order with Bloomex and definitely not my last, your staff were extremely helpful, and courteous and the confirmation of delivery is very reassuring. Thank you again, Jo-Ann
Celeste

Apr 14 2009

Let me begin by saying there was a death in the family. I decided to send an arrangement of flowers to my mother to console her.

I placed the order at noon yesterday. was guaranteed on a recorded call that the residential delivery (that I paid extra for) would be delievered by 5 pm the same day.

I needed this guarantee because the recepient wasn’t going to be available after 5 pm.

At 5 pm, I was forced to call my mother and ask if she received the flowers, at which point she indicated she did not.

I called the toll free # and was directed to press option 2 to speak to a representative about my concerns. No one answered and I left a message for a call back.

I was not satisfied with the customer service, so I went to the online site for Bloomex and had a live chat and spoke to a Micheline, who said that residential deliveries are until 6 pm, not 5 pm (as i was guaranteed on a recorded call).

She basically treated me as if I owed them money and they have done nothing wrong.

It’s now 9 pm. My mother had to cancel her plans of meeting with family to grieve their loss in order to stay and wait for flowers. They never came.

This morning, I called again and left 2 messages for a call back. I haven’t received a call.

I spoke to an online rep who advisd me now that Barrie is out of their route and sometimes takes 2 days, but they promise to have it delivered today.

First of all, my mother will be at work. The address is now different. Second of all, I don’t think the staff at Bloomex is even aware of their own policies.

I have documentation and recorded calls that show and prove that I was guaranteed a delivery between 12 -5 pm yesterday. And then I was told 6 pm, shown in transcripts from my first online conversation.

I’ve had to tell my mother to expect flowers and wait for them. I’ve had to take time from my work to address these issues, which have not been properly addressed by Bloomex.

I now would like to cancel my order, but no one will call me back to do so.

I am completely dissatisfied with the customer service that this online flower delievery has provided. I will never use this service again.
Andrea

Apr 15 2009

Wow, that’s quite a list of complaints above. I’ve been in customer service for about 20 years myself and I know most customers are wrong, but ours is a pretty clearcut case, I think.

My mother, Helen, paid Bloomex to send two sets of flowers to Alberta for her cousin’s husband’s funeral.

She later found out they were never delivered, period. Bloomex has refused to refund her because my mother only made the complaint over a week after they were to be delivered. Does that even make sense? I’m scratching my head here.

They then sent her this silly email:

The Status of your Order No. 866130 has been changed.
>
> Comments on your Order:
> Dear Helen,
>
> Thank you for your order. We have investigated your request, and our records indicate your order was delivered on Feb. 10th. At this point, there is nothing further we can do in regards to this order. We thank you, Bloomex Management MR

Great scam. Claim to deliver, but don’t bother. Fantastic way to make money, until enough people catch on, I guess?

Anyway, hope something can still be done to right this ridiculous wrong, otherwise it’s off to the Better Business Bureau for these guys.

Thanks,
Andrea
SUSAN

Apr 30 2009

I RECEIVED A CRAPPY DOZEN DEAD ROSES ON THE DAY AFTER MY BIRTHDAY, MY BF PAID $160… WHERE IS THE TEDDY BEAR, THE BOX OF CHOCOLATES AND THE 2 DOZEN ROSES?

I HATE BLOOMEX. THEY’RE STUPID AND I WILL NEVER ORDER FROM THEM AND I WILL ALWAYS TELL EVERYONE HOW BAD THEY ARE… THIEVES!
LYNDA

May 3 2009

April 23/09—ordered flowers totaling $133+ (Nana’s 90th BD).

April 24—By 7 pm, I was leaving numerous messages, chat messages, e-mails to cancel this order–no replies.

April 27—-UPS e-mails a shipping notification. Also one from BLOOMEX stating they received my e- mail and are “investigating matter without production”.

April 28—-tiny package arrives on my porch. Delivery person did not knock, just left it! NO WAY could that package be holding the flowers pictured on their website!!

The package is still sitting where it was left. Am doing a charge back on my credit card. BUYER BEWARE!!!!
LYNDA

May 3 2009

Note in above comment–flowers were ordered on 23rd for delivery on 24th. When they didn’t show up on time, I gave them an extra 2 hours before i started TRYING to cancel.

Anyone else charged the incorrect PROVINCIAL TAXES?

In Alberta we only have GST- and NO sales tax. I was charged the Ontario rate-13%

I called about this and it was the only time a message was returned!!

Check your receipts or “PURCHASE ORDER” e-mails- This may be the weak link in their chain that could bring GOVT. ACTION !!!!!!!
Kumar

May 6 2009

I went to the website and ordered some flowers for Mother’s Day. The price on the site was $29.99 plus $9.99 shipping.
When I got the invoice, it listed the product @ $37.99 + tax + $16.93 (shipping) + tax.

They tried to explain that $16.93 shipping was because it was Mother’s Day but I said this was not listed on their website. Also, why is there a double tax?

I tried to cancel using the Live Chat, but whenever I typed “please cancel order,” I would get a message “Session closed”.

I left two voice mails to cancel and they have not called back to confirm. Very wrong information listed on their website and their customer service really stinks.
EP

May 11 2009

I found your name online attached to an article involving consumer affairs and Bloomex. I thought that you would be interested in the letter I just sent to Bloomex employees Dimitri Lokhonia, Michelle Robitalle and Angela Malik, as well as the Canadian Cancer Society. Please see below.

Thank you for your time.

————————————————————

I ordered a bouquet of Calla Lilies to go to my grandmother’s house on Friday morning, 8/5/2009.

I paid extra for the morning delivery and was not notified that there would be any problem with delivery on this date. I was sending the flowers for my grandfather’s funeral on Friday. I explained this to the ‘operator’ on the other end of the line and NO MENTION OF A DELIVERY DELAY WAS BROUGHT TO MY ATTENTION.

When I attempted to track and confirm my order, I was blown off by your voice mail and “online operator” spewing recorded Mother’s Day information that was irrelevant to my issue.

I finally called the order number and was told “too bad” by the operator. When I asked who I could speak to in customer service, I was told “I don’t know who is there right now.”

When I asked why I was not told of the delay in delivery, I was told “the girl that took your order didn’t know that there was going to be a holdup.” To which I replied: “Are you giving me the ‘I don’t know I only work here’ speech?”

I find it incomprehensible that the people taking the orders at Bloomex, taking the money at Bloomex and promising the services at Bloomex have no idea if they can follow through on the promises they are making.

Now I have a late delivery to my Grandmother’s house, arriving on the doorstep of an 80+ year old woman at who knows what time, possibly at a bad moment for her. This is what I was trying to avoid in the first place by paying the extra money.

The worst thing is: No matter what you do now, the flowers will not arrive at the right time. No matter how long it takes for you to give me a full refund and deliver the flowers, WHICH YOU WILL, the moment has passed and nothing can truly make up for that.

My Grandfather (or Opa as we say in Dutch), a WW II political prisoner and survivor of a Nazi concentration camp, died of cancer. The Canadian Cancer Society will receive a copy of this letter urging them to cease all contact with your company.

I would be remiss in my duties as a granddaughter and good citizen if I did not work to stop even one family with cancer victims from using Bloomex, thereby adding to their burden of grief.

In addition, if your operator had simply told me that they could not guarantee delivery today, I would have simply found another flower shop who could, thinking to myself “How refreshingly honest! A company that actually cares about the consumer.”

I would have definitely used your company in the future, so impressed with its ethics, instead of believing that I have been wasting my time and money speaking to a room full of faceless incompetents banging away on their computers like so many monkeys.
aron

May 12 2009

I paid extra for Sunday delivery. No one said there would be a problem. It is now Tuesday and, to my knowledge, nothing has still been delivered.

Go Mother’s Day!

I will never use this company again. Ever. I don’t need excuses, which is all I have gotten so far.

I have the money they want, and if they won’t work for it, there are lots of companies that will.
Natalie

May 13 2009

I am still waiting for my mother’s flowers to be delivered for Mother’s Day. It is very difficult as we just lost my dad and this is the first Mother’s Day she is alone.

Unfortuately, I chose Bloomex to deliver flowers. They still have not arrived. It is Wed. May 13th, and I have no idea of when this will happen. I cannot get anyone to call me back.

They are probably one of the worst companies I have ever seen. I am not sure what they mean when they say guaranteed delivery. I want my money back.
jay

May 15 2009

I ordered flowers last May 13 and they were supposed to be delivered on May 14 from 12 pm-5 pm. It didn’t happen.

This was supposed to be a surprise for my friend, but it was already 4 pm by that time and she already had to leave, so I decided to tell her about the \surprise\. She patiently waited until the building closed around 6 pm.

The reason why I sent her flowers was she’s not feeling well, so she stayed til 6 pm, not feeling well, and nothing arrived.

Now I’m trying to contact every means to reach them. I really don’t recommend this BLOOMEX company.
Amit

May 18 2009

It was the day of my Mother’s birthday and neither did I or my siblings had gotten anything for our mother, so I decided to do the last minute thing and hop on the internet. I found Bloomex and on their website it stated they offer same day delivery.

It was roughly 9-10 am that I made the order and believe it or not it was sitting in my Mother’s kitchen by 1-2 pm. Now that was amazing and best of all it cost me nothing extra.

I am not one to praise a company however in this case I was impressed. Amit
Eva

May 23 2009

I ordered 5 funeral arrangements from Bloomex.ca for my grandmother’s funeral. Four arrived and the largest arrangement never made it.

The four that did arrive consisted of six roses and some white flowers that had to be put into a vase. I ordered four funeral baskets to measure 48″ x 48″ and got six flowers in a vase. I really feel ripped off, with Bloomex’s “bait and switch” scam.

Bloomex finally replied to my complaint with the explanation that “the arrangements were too large to ship” so they substituted a “bouquet” (six roses and some white flowers).

I paid over $400 for these bouquets. A company that cheats the public like this should be out of business. The profits from their “bait and switch” scam must be huge.

Any company that cheats the public like this is probably cheating on their taxes also. Canada Revenue Agency should look at them. The CRA Informant line is 1-866-809-6841 and fax is 905 984-4829. Yes… I am really mad and just beginning. I am out some money, and I have learned a lesson.
Paula

May 28 2009

Very pleased with the Bloomex service and the price. Really like that you prices include delivery.
Mark

Jun 1 2009

Tried to send roses to fiancee on Valentine’s Day. Nothing arrived. Visa got my money back for me.

Will never use Bloomex again, and I send flowers regularly.
Karl

Jun 11 2009

I highly recommend that you publish an update to the misleading information on this article. The title states their improvements too positively. Yes, Bloomex is creating the appearance of improvements, but they still provide abysmal service. I have been treated rudely over their live chat system and I have recorded the transcripts if they are of interest to you. You can extract my email address from your commenting system or find it on my website.

I did not receive what I requested: flowers delivered on my wife’s birthday in reasonable condition. The flowers arrived a day late, not in water, and almost wilted. I presume that they were out of water for at least 24 hours given that the delivery was more than 24 hours late. Yes, they will reverse the charge, but they will still be charging me $10 for their inconvenience.

What kind of message am I sending to my wife when I give her wilted flowers the day after her birthday? Why should I be charged $10 for this experience?
Karl

Jun 11 2009

I understand that you do careful research and that you have written new articles about Bloomex. These articles point to the horrible experiences that people still have with Bloomex. However, this entry is still the top Google hit when I search for Bloomex on this site and, in my opinion, it presents an overly positive view.

I highly recommend that you add a note at the end of the title and at the top of the article to clarify that Bloomex has not changed their ways. Otherwise, I believe that you are unintentionally spreading a falsely positive view.
Karl

Jun 11 2009

Hi Ellen,

Thank you for responding to my post and taking my suggestions into account.

By some miracle, I have managed to get through to a supervisor. They will be waiving the $9.99 fee.

I had exceedingly bad service from Micheline, a Live Chat operator. I am hoping that some change might happen.

I recorded (copy-pasted) the Live Chats that I had with Micheline and sent them to the supervisor, who appears to be doing everything she can to improve the future performance of Micheline.

I am hoping that it makes some difference, but the company appears to be deeply dysfunctional.

Micheline has been working for Bloomex since at least February (I found that online). It should not take until mid-June to find a problem like this.

The supervisor was very helpful and even gave me her email address and phone number, so that I can follow up on the situation later.

So, it’s not all bad, but I should not have to go through so much torture to get a reasonable response.

Cheers,
Karl
Jim Gruen

Jul 6 2009

Hi Ellen,

I ordered flowers for my fiancee, as she had a hard day and was feeling down. I ordered before 1 pm in order to take advantage of the guaranteed 5 pm delivery. Flowers were never delivered. My order number was 898828.

Received an email from Bloomex stating non-delivery was due to “technical difficulty”. I could NEVER get anyone when calling customer service - always got “no agent is available” and was told to go to the website and click on the flashing “operator is online” button.

I only had one request. I wanted Bloomex to contact my fiancee and apologize to her for not sending the flowers. I chatted online with Julie, Karen, Dancan, and Crystal. Not one called my fiancee with an apology (yet 2 told me they would).

I was told by one that they were only operators and not customer service and was told by another that “all would be resolved after investigation” - whatever that means.

I asked about the “guaranteed delivery if ordered by 1 pm”. Received no answer. I am very, very, very disapointed. Customer service is a worthless joke.
b000099

Jul 23 2009

Good Morning,

I just wanted to say thank you to your staff and the florist in High River, Alberta that did our order (#00896058). It was for my mom’s birthday and she was very pleased with the flowers. They were delivered right away on the Monday morning and it was really a beautiful arrangement for sure. So thanks again for a job well done.
Valentine Rozenta

Jul 26 2009

Dear Bloomex Customer Support Team,

I’ve talked with my cousin recently, she’s got flowers eventually.
She sad that bunch of roses was amazing and she is happy a lot!

I got email from Bloomex support that you hadn’t pink roses as I asked and send red roses.
It’s OK by me and I have not complains about. My cousin loved red roses too.

I want to THANK Customer Support for effort you made to complete my order!
Mistakes may happens and a difference is how we fix them.

I’m satisfied customer after all and will make order through Bloomex for my friends and family next time too.

Thank you and special THANKS AND RESPECT for Customer Support!
Have a great day and holidays!

Sincerely,
Valentine Rozenta
Mary Ruscillo

Sep 30 2009

I think Bloomex should not be in the flower business or in any business whatsoever. A warning should be posted on the internet whenever anyone is searching for an online florist.
Obviously they lack business ethics, professionalism and integrity.

After having written to them several times about my case, they avoided writing anything back but asked one of their people to call me and make promises that they were not intending to keep. Please see below my correspondence to them.

Thank you for the forum you are providing. Voicing one’s frustration regarding one’s victimization by faceless dishonest business practices provides some relief.

From: Mary Ruscillo
To: publicrelations@bloomex.ca.
Subject: Order no. 906568
Date sent: Tue, 22 Sep 2009 14:19:34 -0400

Hello Bloomex people,
On the 1st of September I wrote to you a second
time (see message below) regarding order no.
906568.
A couple of days later your representative called
me and discussed the case with me and said that in
lieu of reversing the charges, (that could not be done
as the product was not returned to you!), she was
going to send me, via e-mail, a voucher for the full
amount that I could use toward a future order.
Three weeks have gone by and I have not, as yet,
received such a credit voucher, even though I had
your reassurance that that was going to be done in an
expeditious manner. Could you please see that this is
finally done?
Thanks you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely
Mary Ruscillo

——- Forwarded message follows ——-
From: Mary Ruscillo

To: publicrelations@bloomex.ca.
Subject: Order no. 906568
Date sent: Tue, 01 Sep 2009 09:29:37 -0400

Hello Bloomex people.

On August 20th I wrote to you to complain about the
above order through your “wecare” webmail address.
I have not heard anything from you as yet.
Basically my complaint was that the “flowers” were
sent a day before I indicated and they were really
dead on arrival, sadly more dead than the person they
were intended for. The arrangement was truly pitiful.
Something a total amateur or a child would have put
together, loose, limp and dead. The Funeral Home did
not bring it in the reception room out of concern for
me, and I am grateful to them for it. I was so
embarrassed that I drove to the nearest florist shop;
bought another arrangement and delivered it myself to
the funeral home.
I am seeking full compensation and the reversal of
charges for going through the embarrassment, frustration and
waste of my time.
Thank you for your attention in this matter.
Hoping to hear from you soon.
Mary Ruscillo
Kim Green

Oct 6 2009

Hi Ellen, I tried to order flowers for my mother’s birthday. I was out of town at the time and my daughter got me this number for Bloomex.

I ordered the flowers on Sept. 29th at noon. I asked if it was possible to have same day delivery and the lady who took my order said yes, but it will be an extra $14.95 charge and I agreed.

When I got back home 4 days later and called my mother, she still hadn’t received the flowers. I called the number again and all I got was a voice recording to leave a message. No one called back, so I recalled the order number and cancelled the order.

I checked my email and there was a message stating the order was placed after the cutoff and would be delivered the next day, which should have been Sept. 30th. This was already Oct. 2nd and no flowers.

I replied to this email and said to cancel the order. They replied and asked if I would like to upgrade the order FREE of charge (for the upgrade, not the original order) or get a refund. They provided a phone number. I called, as well as replied to the email, and said cancel the order.

By Oct. 4th, they emailed and said they needed my correct phone number, which I had already given them. So again I replied with the same message.

When I arrived home from work on Oct. 5th (now 7 days since my nightmare began), my daughter said her grandmother had called and the flowers had arrived. She had tried to refuse the flowers four times, but the flower company in her home town said they had just received the memo that morning to send a belated birthday bouqet.

Once again, I got on the phone and emailed about this order. FINALLY an actual person called me back. She tried to tell me that I had confirmed the order and if I wanted to get my money back, they needed their product back.

I could not believe this. After 7 days, they finally sent flowers which I HAD CANCELLED THREE DAYS EARLIER and changed the message to belated birthday. They screwed up but weren’t willing to refund me yet.

I told them to get their flowers, since they had my mother’s name and address. She proceeded to tell me that I had to arrange for the pickup and contact them, but they wouldn’t charge me the $9.95 pick up fee (how gracious of them).

So here it is Oct. 6th and I am still waiting for my refund and they still haven’t picked up the flowers.

I have worked in retail for almost 12 years and sometimes mistakes do happen. But as a retailer, we usually do what we can to rectify a situaition if it is our fault.

This company could not care less. All they want is your money. Their slogan is false advertising and I will never use this company again and will tell everyone I know not to as well.
Christopher

Oct 19 2009

I tried to have flowers sent to my wife on the day she found out some bad news and they failed to deliver the flowers when they said they would, despite charging me extra for same day delivery.

I called twice that day (one hour after the time they said the flowers would be delivered and again 2 1/2 hours after they were supposed to be there). Both times, I was assured they were ‘just running a little late’.

It has now been 3 days since they were supposed to be delivered and they STILL haven’t delivered the flowers. I called again and was treated rudely by a rep named Anka, who hung up on me after I said I wouldn’t pay their money nor the cancellation fee they were trying to gouge me for.

Finally, I received an email again today trying to extort my money from me for a package they admitted they didn’t deliver or even send out on the day I ordered it!!!!

This is completely outrageous and I think a class action lawsuit (or another one) should be started against them. If they are this rude to one person, they are definitely rude to others.
Debbie

Oct 20 2009

In August, I ordered a $150 Premium basket with 3 balloons - what arrived was a small fruit with a 1 not blown up balloon and 1 rotten peach.

A week later and after a lot of emails, they sent a small basket of about 25% of what was to be in the Premium.

Two months later, I phone and get an answering maching and nobody calls back. Live chat too busy but can send a message. They do e-mail me and say have sent another order in September.

I am so fed up with this company with lack of response to my order #907944. They keep emailing back WE SENT another order. THEY STILL SENT THE WRONG ONE AND IN TOTAL FAR LESS THAN I HAD PAID FOR THE ORIGINAL…………..
Tammy K

Oct 20 2009

I would like to tell you about my very upsetting experience with Bloomex. Order 918256‏

1. I placed an order to have flowers delivered to a funeral home.

2. The order was placed on Saturday Oct 17, 2009 requesting to have flowers delivered for a funeral service on Sunday Oct 18th, 2009

3. I was informed by phone that deliveries could not be made on Sundays but they would deliver them Sat evening to the funeral home. I was even told they would verify that someone was there between 6-9pm to ensure delivery. There was no mention of the cut off ordering time for same day delivery applying to this order.

4. I received confirmation of my order.

5. Sunday (next morning and day of the funeral) I received an email indicating that the order status had been changed due to same day service order received after the cut-off ordering time. The delivery would be made Monday. I was to contact Bloomex for delivery details.

5. There were no flowers as promised for the funeral on SUNDAY.

6. When I called Bloomex on Sunday, I was informed that your company tried to place the order with a partner company in the area of delivery but were unable to place this order. Why was I not informed of this the day before at the time this process was attempted? I should have been informed at this time, that the flowers could not be delivered as promised (on the day promised). I should have been given the opportunity to order flowers elsewhere. Oh, I get it now….then Bloomex would not have my money!!

7. When I attempted to cancel the order on Sunday Oct 18th and to ask for a refund, I was informed that this could be done Monday morning by the accounting department and I would receive confirmation of this via e-mail.

8. I received an e-mail rejecting the refund unless I paid a $25 cancellation fee. They suggested that I credit my next order. I am so upset. The flowers were needed for the funeral.

9. A funeral is a very emotional event, flowers are intended to ease some of that difficult emotion; not complicate it!

10. I have recently been sent an e-mail confirming the $25 cancellation charge deducted from the $109.41 flower cost. I will watch my visa account for this money, but am still very dissatisfied.

Bottom line: I spent $25 for no flowers and absolutely no customer service. Not to mention assumed grave embarrassment with the “no show” of flowers at the funeral.
Cristino

Jan 7 2010

Well, this is a nice and helpful blog and contains good information. I recently purchased flowers at a different online florist and was happy with the service.
Rufat

Mar 8 2010

I placed on-line order for morning delivery. However it’s not delivered. Emailed couple times to Customer Service in order to obtain information and got no response. Called and left a message; no luck either.

As per this blog, I see that I’m not alone. I’m going to ask my credit card company to reverse charges.

No more business with Bloomex.
Rufat

Mar 9 2010

Flowers were delivered by 4 P.M., instead of morning delivery, which I paid for. No refund is offered for late delivery.

Roses weren’t long stem and didn’t look good.

I don’t understand why this people don’t respect their own business so much. No more dealing with them.
Eric

Mar 11 2010

2 march a places a order for a basket , my auth never received the flowers….
Anthony Richards

Mar 22 2010

I placed an order for morning delivery for Monday, 9 am to 12 pm. The item still has not been delivered to the person and it’s 4 pm.

I’m going to ask for a refund and get my money back. This is the worst service i have received in my life.
Suzan

Mar 25 2010

Don’t ever order a GOURMET BASKET from Bloomex. Everything in the basket will be substituted with a DOLLAR SHOP quality products, some of which still had dollar shop labels on them — for example, Wagon Wheels, Nestle’s Hot Chocolate, Kraft Singles cheese, Quaker Oat meal to Go, Quaker Crispy Minis butter popcorn, Jerky Chew, etc.

They will not come to pick up the basket when you complain. They hide the address to return. The credit company will not give you a chargeback because you still have the products.

I filed a complaint with the BBB. A month later, BBB closed the case saying “Bloomex did not respond.”

There is no protection for consumers from business like Bloomex. But few questions remain:

How can a florist handle fruits and chocolates? Don’t they have to pass a Health inspection if they handle food products? One of the package included in the gourmet basket I ordered included an expired cashew nuts…I’m concerned.

Who files the tax return? The gourmet basket was shipped by a FANCY GLASSWARE COMPANY in Vancouver, which is owned by Bloomex. Their catalogue only contains glasswares. Why are they handling cheese, biscuits, and canned goods?

In closing, I would like to list below a response from BBB. I hope this will help victims like us.

“Should you wish to pursue this matter, you may perhaps contact the Ministry of Government Services as it is our understanding that they mediate complaints between consumers and businesses. The Ministry has an online complaint form at http://www.mgs.gov.on.ca; however if you are unsure whether your complaint falls within the Ministry’s consumer protection legislation, you can contact a member of their staff @ 1-800-889-9768 (Ontario residents only) or 416-326-8800 Monday to Friday from 8:30am to 5:00pm.

“We regret that we cannot be of further assistance to you at this time but thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.”
Dispute Resolution Supervisor
http://www.ottawa.bbb.org
Dave Slater

May 8 2010

Order two dozen long stem boxed roses for mothers day. Two separate orders, two separate deliveries (#1003749, #1003757).

First order I paid extra for next day before noon delivery as my wife was going out of town that afternoon. They did not arrive before my wife left work and she finally got a call at 4pm from her receptionist to let her know they just arrived. They were also supposed to be 12 long stemmed boxed and they ended up being 12 regular roses wrapped in cellophane.

Second order was to arrive the day after ordering before 5pm. They did not arrive until 2pm the day after they were supposed to and again, not boxed as requested and confirmed by Bloomex.

The cards were printed text from a computer on a piece of paper that had more Bloomex advertizing. How impersonal can they be.

Called their order desk as they don’t attend their customer service line. Order desk could not help me but put a note on my file and assured me someone would call me back - probably within the hour. I never received a call back but did receive an automated email informing me that my cancelled order would not be refunded as it was already delivered - huh???

How do these guys stay in business?
Charlene

May 20 2010

I purchased flowers for my mother for Mother’s Day and paid for a morning delivery for 5 days before that day. They were not delivered in the morning.

When she got them, they were moldy, stems were broken, some flowers didn’t even have any petals. The rest of the flowers were brown and crumpled.

When I complained, they told me in an email “you cannot be satisfied. You will not be refunded. This case is closed”….um…who in their right mind would be satisfied paying for moldy, broken and petal-less flowers to be delivered to their mother? Honestly?

It’s the florist that they use in Toronto, Ontario, that sends these horrible flowers. On 2 previous orders, they were poor quality and I, being nice, declined a refund for both and opted for them to be re-sent.

Now I want my money back. The third time is ridiculous. I hope I can get ym full refund….I was told they don’t refund….but clearly on their site it says they will refund if the flowers are sent back…fine by me!
Amanda S

Jun 9 2010

I wish I had seen this site before ordering Mother’s Day flowers from this company. I ordered orchids in a planter. My mother received rainbow colored roses in a box.

I called several times, no answer, no voicemail initially and sent emails. It took several days to get someone to return my email.

The response was since I was such a valued customer, they would send a second order with orchids. Valued customer? How about I ordered and paid for orchids and that is not anything close to what was received?

Over a week goes by and my mother receives nothing. Yet another email asking for status and then told, orchids are back ordered a few days. I ask for my money back…I gave you a chance to correct it even though you never acknowledged a mistake…and after several weeks when you can’t, you won’t refund my money.

Still no orchids…more emails telling me since the order “was received”, only a credit or orchids when they come in (4 weeks later, no orchids….did they ever plan to have or send orchids?).

Today I received an email answering my question about how they consider the order received when we never received the flowers I ordered.

I was told that they have a policy somewhere stating they can substitute products if necessary. Potted orchids for rainbow roses in a box, is that reasonable? Maybe to someone from outer space.

I hope the next time someone from BloomEx orders something, they receive a “comparable” item like I did. I’m sure it would meet their expectations since they’re such reasonable people.

And to add insult to injury, I asked to be unsubscribed from their email mailing list that I can’t recall ever subscribing to…yet I continue to get ongoing emails for discounts and assorted other great offers.

I’m pretty sure that there’s a timeframe to implement requests for unsubscribe removals that has passed, but BloomEx will point to some fine print that absolves them from that law too.

I have never seen experienced such a lack of accountability, poor customer service or unacceptable problem resolution, ever. I hope this helps at least one person avoid the same mistake.

There are plenty of good online florists who deliver what is ordered, communicate when they can’t and take accountability when a problem occurs.

Shame on you, BloomEx.
Bonnie

Jun 16 2010

I ordered flowers and chocolates for my sister on May 6th for delivery May 7th. I paid extra money to have the delivery between 9 am and noon on the 7th.

My sister never received the flowers or the chocolates. I have been trying to get in contact with this company since 12:10 pm, May 7th, and still nothing.

I have called and left messages, no return phone call. I’ve emailed 3 times and nothing. I tried their online live chat, it doesn’t work.

I am at my wit’s end here. The flowers and chocolate were supposed to be a surprise for my sister to lift her spirits. She had a major car accident earlier this week and is a very lucky lady. I didn’t want to have to bring this to her attention as, again, it was supposed to be a surprise.

I will never deal with this company again, and if you are smart you will read all the other complaints and believe them. The unfortunate part is I didn’t investigate them first.

We have an online business and would never dream of treating our customers so badly. I have to wait until the charges are posted to my Visa before they can do anything. Once this happens, they are going to reverse the charges for me.

I STRONGLY RECOMMEND STAYING AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY! THEY HAVE THE WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!!!
Jpower

Jul 15 2010

Terrible company. That’s why there was an episode done on CBC Marketplace about Bloomex.

My flowers arrived a day early and looked like nothing in the picture. Terrible service for not a very cheap price — $70 to pay for a bouquet and a delivery is not cheap. It’s about average.

Never ever will I recommend or use Bloomex again.
naama

Aug 17 2010

I made an order at Bloomex Vancouver for flowers to be delivered to Vancouver for my mom’s birthday.

The order was made on 13th of Aug 2010 and today 17th of Aug 2010 still hasn’t been delivered. The money was of course taken.

I get many sorry excuses from Bloomex, but no delivery or compensation. So if you’re reading this stay away from that business. They are thieves with no service.
Fabien Sanglard

Aug 28 2010

Same here: Horrible experience.

The website checkout form clearly say 4pm cut-out, see the screenshot:
http://fd.fabiensanglard.net/bloomex.png

But when the flowers did not arrive I was told cut-out was 1pm ?

Why is the website even allowing to order it is not doable ?

I do not recommend bloomex. And will certainely not use their service again.
Vaneet Singla

Sep 2 2010

I ordered a special bouquet for my girlfriend to be delivered today by noon. She had a very special presentation that she was gonna present today at 1 and I wanted to wish her “All the Best” for her important presentation.

I told the lady (Kelly) while placing the order to make sure it’s delivered by 12 p.m., as it won’t mean anything if it was delayed.

The service was extremely unprofessional as a baby was crying when I called and the lady didn’t have much information as she repeatedly went to the website to check things.

Anyway, long story short, I paid an extra delivery charge for it to be delivered at 12 and the order was placed almost 48 hours ago so they had enough time to process the order. It’s 4:47 p.m. now while I’m typing this complaint and my girlfriend still hasn’t received the flowers.

I called them 5-6 times and every time I was asked to leave a message (as their agents were busy, wonder why?) and somebody will call me back.

I also spoke to Karen through their online chat and she said the difference between standard delivery and special morning delivery will be refunded to me, but they can’t cancel the order.

I had to tell my girlfriend about this and ruin the surprise just because of this ridiculous, extremely unprofessional customer service.

This service was referred to me by one of my colleagues and I will not recommend this service to anybody. They are a bunch of scammers and nobody should ever deal with them. I will be contacting my credit card company tomorrow to report this.

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