We purchased two couches in early August totaling about 2600$. We knew that COVID was going to delay things and were OK with that - we didn't NEED the couches immediately and they were upfront about it. We were supposed to receive COUCH-1 in mid-September, and COUCH-2 in mid-October.
September comes and goes with no update - via phone or email. I contact Customer Service in early October to get an update. They were running their old chat system then so it took over an hour and a half to talk to someone, which is actually longer than the browser timeout. So it took about 5 hours to talk to someone - the chat queue would reset every time the browser timed out. This was not a good start.
After, finally, getting someone to talk to, we were informed that it would be over a month until we received either of our couches. COUCH-1 would arrive in early November, COUCH-2 more around Thanksgiving. We were, understandably, frustrated. Not only because it took SO LONG to actually get in contact with a person, but also because they weren't upfront with us when the delivery dates changed.
Not trusting that this wouldn't happen again, I chatted in three weeks later to confirm that those dates were still the same. They were not. Now COUCH-1 would come in mid-November and COUCH-2 in early December. Again, we hadn't received any communication from them with an update until I asked directly.
At this point I chatted in every week. And every week the dates for COUCH-2 were pushed back with no communication from Bob's outside of communication instigated by me.
We received COUCH-1 in mid-November (right before I went in for major surgery) and were told we would be able to receive all of our couch December 22nd or later. However, they don't schedule deliveries that far out so they couldn't save our spot. I had to chat back (again, they didn't contact us) in closer to the delivery window, which I did from the ICU.
Starting in December they installed their new chat bot, which definitely works much better, though there is no time estimate or queue position reference. I also started receiving text and email updates that were a nice change of pace but far too late to recover the trust that was broken.
I was informed in mid-December that one of our couch pieces was going to be available on the 27th of December instead of the 22nd. We were bummed but ultimately just glad we were told. We kept our initial delivery on the 22nd, with a second delivery on the 27th. We were looking forward to having our couch for Christmas.
Of course a few days before the 22nd we received a good bit of snow, which was a surprise for December but not out of the ordinary for New England. The streets had big snow banks but were clear within 12 hours.
We throw out one of our two crappy couches on the morning of the 22nd with the plan to throw out the second after we actually receive the new couch. We didn't actually trust we would get it, which was, of course, the case. The delivery people came in a smaller truck than the first time and circled the block six times. Apparently there was "too much snow" in front of the house for them to feel comfortable double parking. We live in a house on a corner and the cross street had plenty of room to park the truck - however, apparently that extra 10 feet was "too far" for them to carry the couch pieces (or use a furniture dolly?). I argued with the dispatcher, she said she would see what she can do. They ended up just driving away and I didn't hear back from the dispatcher.
I called into Customer Service and got in contact with a wonderful woman who actually wrote the dispatcher up on my behalf and rescheduled everything for the 27th. Apparently this was not the first time this had happened. We did not have our couch for Christmas.
The delivery on the 22nd thankfully went pretty flawlessly. They parked around the corner (further than we actually suggested the first time around) and were in an out in 20 minutes. They didn't hook up one of the pieces of the couch correctly, but that's fine. We fixed it.
I chatted back in to follow up on the refund we were promised on the 3rd or 4th? conversation we had with Customer Service. They offered me a 75$ gift card, which is less than 3% of what I spent. I told them straight up that I wanted that money directly applied to our finance account because we were NEVER purchasing from them again - after some back and forth they did end up agreeing.
The whole experience was a nightmare and we will never purchase or recommend anyone purchase anything from Bob's Furniture. read more