Delivery & Installation

[jgirvin]

I am seriously frustrated at the moment.  We purchased a home earlier this year and toyed with the idea of remodeling the kitchen right away, in light of all of the delays with appliances and trouble in general throughout the home improvement industry due to COVID.  While we were exploring the options, I went around to every appliance dealer in our area and ended up meeting a Senior Appliance Consultant at one of our local Best Buy locations.  He explained that the challenges in the industry can be severe however, Thermador is a "built to order" brand and if we ordered through them, our chances of having any issues would be very slim.  Due to his rank, and the confidence that he displayed, we opted to move forward with a very large order (for us) and have our kitchen updated. 

Initially, the order had an estimated delivery window at the end of July to early August. This was a bit earlier than we needed but we were fine to accept the appliances and have them on hand for when the kitchen was completed.  However, the estimated delivery shifted a couple weeks so I called John and he explained that the initial anticipated delivery was internal to Best Buy only and is simply an "estimated" time frame.  He further explained that once we are able to go in and schedule a delivery appointment, we would be good to go, as these windows are only opened when they receive confirmation from Thermador that the appliances will be delivered before the available delivery dates that show as available.  Well, our kitchen is wrapping up this week and our order was scheduled to be delivered this weekend in Best Buy's online delivery system.  I received a voicemail from someone who wanted to confirm the delivery this week.  Then, the day after, I received an email that stated the items are not available yet.  I then called John to confirm what the issue is and he explained that Thermador is not very communicative and that the oven is now needing to be re-ordered (as he is not able to confirm the location of it and says that this is the best way to get one sooner than later) and the rest of the items are expected by early to mid October.  The oven was never an issue until all of sudden now!!!  

I decided to research this matter and came acrossed this portal yesterday.  Now that I am reading through these issues, and seeing the experiences that others have endured, I am extremely frustrated and feel that we have been lied to all along!  This was a massive purchase for us, that we chose to go with due to the confidence we had with our sales representative.  We felt that he was knowledgable and that he turned us to the Thermador option (we originally thinking Kitchenaid) due to their excellent service.  We were extremely excited to get this done and now it appears that we were duped into believing this and, we now have a kitchen that has no appliances!  

[jgirvin]

Additionally, I am not certain about the ordering system but, I find it hard to believe that there is not any way to track the progress of an order.  For instance, if you order a car, once it assigned a VIN it can be provided and tracked throughout the order and delivery process.  I understand that there may be delays etc. but, if the Thermador products are "built to order" then a serial number should be assigned to this order to provide tracking information.  It seems that there are ways that could be provided to make this process more transparent.

[Sarah-BBY Social Media Specialist]

Hello, jgirvin,

Thank you for reaching out. It is always a pleasure to welcome a new member to our online community. While I wish your first posts had been related to a positive experience, I would like to thank you for sharing your feedback on this process. My husband and I have done many renovations on our home, and I know the kitchen tends to be one of the most major projects. Due to the pandemic, many manufacturers have experienced delays in production. While there are some models that would be considered “built-to-order,” there could be unexpected delays in obtaining the necessary parts, despite all efforts that are made. I’m sorry that is something you’ve experienced.

I would be happy to review the order details, in effort to determine if I may have any additional information to provide you with. To get started, please send a Private Message, so I can complete the verification process. To the right of my signature, you should see a “Private Message” icon. I look forward to hearing from you. 

Best,