January 6, 2005 I Need to Vent!

Editorial Rating:

Reader Rating: ( 0 votes)

I don’t know if you already know about our dilemma with Ikea already, but here’s the run-down. We are purchasing our kitchen and bath items from Ikea as well as lighting and wardrobes along with other misc. fixtures. A few months ago, we met with the Ikea home furnishing consultant who took our floor plan, a list of items that we needed and a budget amount. In return, she was going to complete our space planning and choose all of the items for our house. We set a date at the end of November for the items to be selected. She was quite friendly and had great ideas for our house. However, we were never contacted in November, even after I left 4 or 5 messages for her on her voice mail. So, I decided to put the Ikea shopping list together myself and in the end, I had fun doing it.

You can also read this Ikea related Blog Entry and Other Blog Entry if you’d like to read more about our Ikea woes.

The only problem with organizing this large purchase ourselves, is that it is nearly impossible to meet Ikea’s acceptable payment terms with our loan terms. Our lender is aware that our household fixtures are going to be purchased at Ikea and installed on site. They are planning to cut a cashier’s check for the store. The problem is that Ikea needs an exact amount. If you’ve ever shopped at Ikea, you’ll know how hard this would be. Usually, Ikea has about 75% of your intended purchase in stock, and with our 300+ items there’s bound to be some hit-and-miss. Logically, Ikea could give us store credit until all of our items arrive, or let us pay for them in advance, but that’s not their policy. Or, we could pay for the items ourselves and have our lender reimburse us, but the FDIC does not allow the lender to cut a check in the borrower’s name. So, it’s a bit of a pickle.

This weekend David and I took a trip to Ikea for some household items. On our way out we spoke with the cash manager about our situation. She told us that she has never encountered a situation like ours and that most people have such a frustrating experience shopping at Ikea that no one would ever endeavor to purchase so many items for a new construction project. She told us that our best bet was to get in touch with the home furnishing consultant and make sure that she calls us back. She assured us that she had never heard anyone complain about her and that we should give her another chance. So I called yesterday and left a message. I didn’t receive a return phone call so I decided to call again today, but I discovered that I misplaced her business card with her extension on it. Anyway, I though it would be simple enough to call the Burbank store and have them connect me. Boy, was I wrong.

Here’s the phone call:

“Hello, thanks for calling Ikea Burbank, may I have your name?”

“Yes, I am trying to get hold of the home furnishing consultant and I misplaced her business card with her extension number, can you connect me please?”

“Hello, thanks for calling Ikea Burbank, may I have your name?”

At this time, I thought that he didn’t hear me the first time, so I repeated

“Yes, I am trying to get hold of the home furnishing consultant and I misplaced her business card with her extension number, can you connect me please?” (Or something to that effect.)

His answer, “May I have your name?”

“Sara”

“What is this regarding?”

“I misplaced the home furnishing consultant’s extension number and I am trying to get through to her about our project.”

Again… “What is this regarding?” He said indignantly.

At this point I was really pissed and sick of playing this game with the operator so I snapped at him and said, “Are you f***ing serious?”

“What did you just tell me?” He said in a raised voice

“I said, ‘are you f***ing serious?’ I just told you what this was regarding and I asked you twice to connect me and you haven’t yet. I misplaced Sandra’s extension; otherwise I would have connected with her directly. Can you please connect me or tell her that I am holding on the line for her?”

“I’m trying to find out if this something I can help you with.”

“I don’t think so, this is for a large purchase for a new home. She has my file and I’ve had dialogue with her. Can you please connect me or give me her extension number?”

“Is this for a kitchen purchase or office purchase?”

“It’s a kitchen and some other things.”

This went on for some time. He asked me a question then repeated it (because he wasn’t listening) until he was finally convinced that he could not help me and had some other woman connect me to the home furnishing consultant. I guess he couldn’t figure out how the phone worked…

I should know better than to curse at someone who takes phone calls at Ikea all day but I just could not help myself from losing my temper and using the "F" word. What did he expect me to say? “Oh, pretty, pretty please omnipotent Ikea telephone operator, I need to buy a Flarke slipcover and even though I know you could help me with this, I’d like to speak with the home furnishing consultant because I’m too important to talk to you.” What did he think? That I was trying to pull a fast one on him and sneak past his guard and talk to the Blessed Home Furnishing Consultant to ask her what kind of spoons she recommends? How hard would it have been for him to say, “Is there something I can help you with?” at the beginning of the phone call?

I was finally connected to Sandra’s voice mail and while I was leaving my message, I was cut off (of course). I was quite surprised to get a return call only a few minutes after I left the message, even though I didn’t get to leave my number. Maybe they heard about my argument with the operator? I’m always the troublemaker.

Sandra’s assistant just called me (while I was writing this) and was really helpful and requested that I fax our list of items to her so she can check if they’re in stock. From there, she’ll have a better idea of how she can facilitate our purchase. I hope it works out without too much fanfare. Most of all, I am happy that I finally got hold of someone at the store!