Shocking Sales Experience at Harvey Norman

kaleidoscope on 28/12/2020 - 23:42
Last edited 29/12/2020 - 00:18 by 1 other user

Hey all,
Just thought of sharing one of my recent experience with HN while shopping for some furniture.

First of all, I’ve had pretty decent experience with them up until this incident and I do believe not all HN staff / sales are like this.

So, I happened to be at a HN at a distant suburb that I don’t normally go but happened to be around there for other reason. Talked to a sales rep and he showed some options in our budget for furniture we were after. He then showed a discounted item which he said is a great price (we weren’t aware of its RRP, but just the current discounted price which was in our budget)

Two weeks gone by, decision time and rang the HN where the discount was on and they said it’s still on and will be till end of year. So I drove to a HN which is near to where I live for a price match and to place the order. Sales guy said it doesn’t show up on their system and talked to manager. She (manager) says same thing and I kindly asked her to call the first HN to confirm (which I personally did before coming in).

15 minutes go by the manager comes back to say, the discounted priced was an error and she has asked other HN to take it off from the floor pricing and therefore can’t do any price match. I was simply disappointed at this point with she’d done as this wasn’t an online pricing error on a web page but rather floor pricing been there for weeks and the sales at first HN even said it’s there till end of year…

In the end I walked out and went to Nick Scali and placed an order which was the 2nd shortlisted item on our list for this piece of furniture and saved some $ even ☺️.

Thanks for reading the long post. The purpose of this post was to share some sales experience which I believe could have been handled much better by the manager of the second HN I went to place the order.

Cheers,

Home & Garden

Related Stores

Harvey Norman
Harvey Norman

closed Comments

  • SF3 on 28/12/2020 - 23:47
    +1

    Another HN deal post in one night…

  • avoidfullprice on 28/12/2020 - 23:56
    +12

    15 minutes go by the manager comes back to say, the discounted priced was an error and she has asked other HN to take it off from the floor pricing and therefore can’t do any price match.

    Is that the shocking experience?

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 03:58

      Is that the shocking experience?

      naah i was getting zapped from all the esd 😏

  • [Deactivated] on 28/12/2020 - 23:59
    +29

    Shocking Sales Experience at HN

    Not as shocking as an OzBargainer shopping at Harvey Norman.

  • garetz on 29/12/2020 - 00:17
    +9

    Harvey norman's business model is basically to overcharge so when they do a discount it looks comparatively cheap, however if you do your research you will almost always find a better deal elsewhere. They basically target stupid people who do no research and go in ready to buy.

    • subywagon on 29/12/2020 - 01:59

      i.e boomers.

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 04:01

      For electronics yes. for things like furniture you wont always find the same kind elsewhere right?

      • foxmulder on 29/12/2020 - 07:27
        -2

        Ikea?

      • This Guy on 29/12/2020 - 09:45

        Most of their Australian suppliers have their own stores. Some of those will sell their products, direct to the public, for half of what HN charges.

  • spackbace on 29/12/2020 - 00:22
    +58

    So, you didn't care about the original salesperson, who would've spent time with you showing you multiple options, and would've got the commission etc for the sale, and instead went local when you knew the exact thing you wanted and would've spent seconds with the new salesperson.

    Hell, you even called that first store before walking into the local one, further wasting the first salesperson's time.

    I always reward good customer service when I get it, however I can.

    Speaking from a sales point of view, karma is a bitch…

    • plmko on 29/12/2020 - 01:31
      +3

      ^This

      • Muzeeb on 29/12/2020 - 07:06
        +2

        ^This

        Honor the source

    • bloom on 29/12/2020 - 07:20
      +1

      He should of told the original HN salesman to come to the more convenient store to explain himself lol

    • This Guy on 29/12/2020 - 10:05

      Original sales person sold on price, not on service. The original sales person lost the sale.

      But this isn't the original sales person's fault, it's the franchisee for not investing in their sales people and training them properly.

      What would your boss do if you walked them a client over to an executive used 'demo', told the client the price then walked away? What would your boss do if a fortnight later they got a call from another sales manager asking about your stupidly priced executive used 'demo' that you couldn't close?

      Obviously that wouldn't happen with you, but that's what OP experienced. It was poor service. OP did nothing wrong.

      • Ughhh on 29/12/2020 - 10:26

        I went to the local HN as it would be easier to pick up when the order is ready.

        Op gave the sales based on location, not lack of service. Unless the original sales guy offered free delivery (which is probably out of his control since op isn't spending $$$) , op was never going to give it to them.

        • This Guy on 29/12/2020 - 14:05

          You'd think.

          I have seen people buy from a small, regional shop for delivery into a major city. People will make what look like dumb choices to you when they have received excellent service and feel like they have a relationship with their sales person.

          OP's salesperson tried to close the sale with a fantastic price, without priming the customer first with their service or how steep the discount is.

          • spackbace on 29/12/2020 - 15:29

            @This Guy:

            OP's salesperson tried to close the sale with a fantastic price, without priming the customer first with their service or how steep the discount is.

            Biggggg assumption there.

            OP asked for a quote. How many times have I heard that lol

            They've said a few times it was "day 1 of looking".

            OP isn't one to care about service, it's clear they were going for what was best for them. 100km away didn't suit them. And it came back to bite them in the ass

            • This Guy on 29/12/2020 - 17:26

              @spackbace:

              Biggggg assumption there.

              OP stated they didn't know the RRP until they went in to buy.

              How many people have you sold a car to on 'day 1 of looking'? How do you over come that? Qualify, qualify, qualify.

              OP originally said distant suburb. Sydney is only 80km east to west. It's not unusual to have furniture delivered across that city. That said, as HN franchises their stores I am not sure if the sales person could delivery out of their PMA or sell stock out of another store like many of the other large chains can.

              • Ughhh on 29/12/2020 - 20:30

                @This Guy:

                Like I said it was a distant HN the first one. If I’d purchased it there would have to go about 100km for pick up :-)

                https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/9882015/redir

                Op is picking up. If it was free delivery, it wouldn't matter if it was delivered 100000km away. Op never had the intention of giving the original store the sale.

                • This Guy on 29/12/2020 - 21:21

                  @Ughhh: Yes. That is why stores hire sales people. To overcome the limitations that a customer perceives to close the sale at as high a price as possible.

  • Boioioioi on 29/12/2020 - 00:29

    Have not had a good experience at harvey norman that I can remember.

    Asked them if they'd price match amazon. Guy says yes, looks up the item, finds the most expensive one listed on amazon then starts arguing with me about it????

    Got angry at me for no reason, I would have happily just walked out without the hassle.

  • Yummy on 29/12/2020 - 01:46
    +1

    Hi OP, welcome to 1999 (or earlier).

  • Jugganautx on 29/12/2020 - 02:48
    +2

    How low did your jaw drop?

  • kyle on 29/12/2020 - 05:38
    +3

    You do realise they are franchises, right?

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 05:51
      -2

      They are, but their price match works for non clearance items atleast from my past experiences.

  • Hithere on 29/12/2020 - 09:24
    +2

    Shocking Sales Experience

    Battery terminals on the genitals is a shocking experience, shopping at Hardly Normal is just a bad experience.

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 09:29

      😁

    • WreckTangle on 29/12/2020 - 09:49
      +1

      Whoa! What did you get for Christmas…?

  • CyberMurning on 29/12/2020 - 09:25

    human made mistakes
    im shocked that people are shocked about this fact.

  • Frank Murphy on 29/12/2020 - 09:56
    +3

    Shocking Sales Experience

    Do you usually have a tendency to be prone to exaggeration? Because when it starts in the title, I'll take the rest of the story with a grain of salt.

    could have been handled much better by the manager of the second HN

    How so? By giving you the discount that she told you was an error?

    • resubaehtgnolhcs on 29/12/2020 - 10:22

      Yes, give OP what they want …. before they pull "the customer is always right" card!

    • Ughhh on 29/12/2020 - 10:30

      Everything is poor service unless you do whatever the customer wants.

      If customer wants free money or product, not giving is poor service!!! 1 star yelp review!

      /s

  • Ryanek on 29/12/2020 - 10:26

    I don't understand your gripe mate. You want a store to match the sale of another franchise store? I mean, they're not obligated to, especially with floor stock.

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 10:53

      They’re not obligated to, yes certainly. My gripe is with sales manager of local HN telling distant HN to take their discount figures off the floor.

      That wasnt floor stock btw. furniture I was after is made to order with 12 week wait time.

      • Frank Murphy on 29/12/2020 - 11:21
        +1

        My gripe is with sales manager of local HN telling distant HN to take their discount figures off the floor.

        She let them know that their discount pricing was a mistake - and this is your gripe? Who's to say the original HN wouldn't have noticed the error in their system if you placed your order at the time, and told you that it wasn't actually available for that price?

        Mate, you rolled the dice and lost. Move on.

  • elgrande on 29/12/2020 - 10:29
    +1

    Shocking Sales Experience at Harvey Norman

    This is horrible, I hope 2021 is better for you.. stay strong..

  • shangoz on 29/12/2020 - 11:12
    -4

    Wow, 10 years they never change, truely remember when DS opening sale 30%0ff of notebook, write the price down, went to HW see exac the same module and spec, ask for price match, end up the salesman ring DS complain for price too low, force them to change price and refuse to sell it to me and tell me is price error, when I went back to DS, ask the salesman, the salesman took the price out and say it's error, only the much higher price Notebook get discount, end up no purchase, Three monthes later, sale again from DS, even cheaper then purchased, but, from that time, never purchase even one thing from HN for more then $50 items, no point to feed them.

    • Frank Murphy on 29/12/2020 - 11:29
      +2

      For a number of reasons, this is one of the dumbest and hilarious things I've ever read. Why didn't you just buy from DS in the first place?

  • Melb69 on 29/12/2020 - 12:49

    The staff are very much aligned with what comes up on the computer. OP why didn't you just get it at the store you found the deal at? Some stores are franchises, so have their own pricing rules from what I can gather. Don't think I ever buy from HN unless I absolutely have to.

    • kaleidoscope on 29/12/2020 - 13:10

      Like I said it was a distant HN the first one. If I’d purchased it there would have to go about 100km for pick up :-)

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