This review is about my whole purchasing experience with Old Navy, not particularly this one store.
I purchased a pair of jeans online as the store in Langley did not have my size.
The online store was easy to use and they offer free shipping over $50. I placed my order on Oct 2nd and received the order on Oct 8th, not bad at all. I was very happy up until this point.
I tried the pants on and unfortunately they still did not fit to my satisfaction, so I made the decision to go into the Langley store and return the jeans (as stated in their policy on their website and in the email confirmation I received). There were a couple ways to return product: 1) Call in to get a return shipping label and drop off at post office, or 2) Bring it into a store with the email provided. I chose option 2.
I get to the store in Langley and the female at the front counter was very pleasant to deal with. She asked me for the email so she could scan the bar code and commence the return. This is where the issue started:
She was able to bring up one of my pairs of jeans to return, but the other wasn’t recognized in their system. So she refunded the one pair of jeans and then went to get help from the Assistant Manager - I was thinking to override the issue. The AM does the same thing the original employee tried doing and also got the same error. The AM stated To me that the item I purchased was “an old item,” and it was actually a “clearance item,” therefore, she could give me back “$2.00” for the item I paid full price for or call into the online service (it was actually on sale but much more than $2.00). *Also to note, I never received a clearance price, just a sale price that all the other “current” jeans were selling for.
I told the AM that there was nothing that I did wrong when I made my purchase and unfortunately Old Navy was experiencing an inventory issue but I should not be penalized by not being able to return the item in store. I wanted my money back as stated in their policy that I was entitled to.
The AM said there was nothing she could do and I wasn’t happy with that answer. I asked her if she could take a “current” product and refund me that price (same price as I paid) opposed to making me run around to get my money back. She said no. However, she did offer to call the online returns for me, which is what we did in store.
So she called online returns and explained the issue and they came back saying they would email me the return label to bring into a post office. This was the only way for me to get my money back, again, despite it being in their policy for me to return it in store. And again, I never purchased it in store because they never had my size! I was forced to purchase it online.
Now I need to find somewhere to print out the return label as I do not own a printer - we live in a digital world. Then once printed I need to locate a box to package it up and bring it into the post office. Hopefully after 1 week of it being returned I should have my money back.
As a consumer, this is so backwards. In today’s World of trying to curve the spread of covid-19, I should not be asked to do the leg work for a company when it’s in their policy to provide their consumers a convenient way to return a product.
This experience was terrible, and not specifically because of the Langley location. I just hope Old Navy can fix an issue that seems so easy to overcome.
-C