Von's Grocery Delivery question...

[Catgyrl]

For those of you grocery delivery experts:


Okay, I went ahead and created my Von's online account so I'll have that ready for my DLR visit in October. I figured out (eventually, after entering my Hawaii Zip Code and being told "We do not deliver to that zip code" - haha) that I had to "fake" my address as Disneyland Hotel for it to accept my account. However, when I entered the address as "1150 Magic Way", for some reason Von's changed it to "1150 W. Magic Way". Since I don't live in Anaheim, I don't know if this makes a big difference, or not. I tried changing the address back to the way I originally typed it, but it keeps defaulting back to "W. Magic Way". Was I inputting the wrong address?

I was thinking of calling them, but wanted to check to see if faking the address is "illegal" in any way. If it's not, then I'll chance calling them.

TIA!!

 

[Catgyrl]

bump...

Anyone... Bueller... anyone??

 

[Sherry E]

For those of you grocery delivery experts:


Okay, I went ahead and created my Von's online account so I'll have that ready for my DLR visit in October. I figured out (eventually, after entering my Hawaii Zip Code and being told "We do not deliver to that zip code" - haha) that I had to "fake" my address as Disneyland Hotel for it to accept my account. However, when I entered the address as "1150 Magic Way", for some reason Von's changed it to "1150 W. Magic Way". Since I don't live in Anaheim, I don't know if this makes a big difference, or not. I tried changing the address back to the way I originally typed it, but it keeps defaulting back to "W. Magic Way". Was I inputting the wrong address?

I was thinking of calling them, but wanted to check to see if faking the address is "illegal" in any way. If it's not, then I'll chance calling them.

TIA!!

Yes, call them and explain. I live in Southern California and I also am a regular Vons online customer. I have been using them for years. First of all, I don't know for certain, but I am failry positive that the 'W.' being added does not make any difference. I think it is the official address that the Post Office recognizes and Vons probably keeps that in their database so it is likely defaulted to that. The Vons Customer Service folks are pretty helpful so if you have any doubts, I would give them a call and explain the situation. Apparently, they do deliver to guests at the Disney hotels or other nearby hotels so they are probably used to the drill. Do you have the customer service phone number? If not, I can give it to you. I just ordered from them the other day. If you have any trouble with them, you can also try Albertsons online delivery, which sometimes offers better service than Vons. Keep in mind that up until the last few months, I ordered from Vons out of necessity but I almost ALWAYS had trouble with their deliveries. Something was always missing and they usually do not replace items and re-deliver ordinarily so you are out of luck if that happens. Or they would charge me for something they didn't bring. Or they would bring me someone else's order. Or they were out of stock on half of the things I ordered. And Customer Service would only credit you back for the items they did not deliver but they really did not compensate for the inconvenience. Sometimes they will offer a credit on the delivery charge but not always. Recently, they have improved their service a huge deal. But I still got some ice cream recently that was totally melted and all I got was a credit for the price of the ice cream, not any 'inconvenience' comps or anything.

Albertsons often has better service. But Vons is more available, I think. I would say, plan your delivery time for early in the day. Vons tends to run out of stuff the more the day progresses!

 

[Catgyrl]

Sherry-

Thank you SO MUCH for the quick reply and all the tips. I think I have the Customer Service number, but if I can't find it, I'll definitely let you know. The info about Von's doesn't sound too promising, though. I'd read that Albertson's charges $9.95 for delivery, with no minimum order - is this true? I'll have to gauge what's more important - the service or the cost; I would probably choose the service.

 

[Sherry E]

Sherry-

Thank you SO MUCH for the quick reply and all the tips. I think I have the Customer Service number, but if I can't find it, I'll definitely let you know. The info about Von's doesn't sound too promising, though. I'd read that Albertson's charges $9.95 for delivery, with no minimum order - is this true? I'll have to gauge what's more important - the service or the cost; I would probably choose the service.

Well, Alberstons charges the same delivery fee as Vons. I have always ordered more than $50 worth of items from Albertsons, so I think I ASSUMED that that was their minimum, like Vons has a $50 minimum order. But I would not at all be surprised to learn that Alberstons does not have a minimum because they are trying to compete with Vons. For a while, Vons was starting to charge $12.95 for delivery but I see they stopped that nonsense. They DO charge you a 'fuel surcharge' now, which is new as of like 6 months ago or so, I think. Sometimes, if Vons charges you for items that they do not deliver, they will redeliver to you only IF the total of the missing items is $30 or more, but if they charge you for a bottle of ketchup that they leave out, you are out of luck and have to get your ketchup elsewhere. Again, they will credit you back for that, of course, but they don't repay you for the inconvenience. What if you were really counting on that bottle of ketchup for a meal that night and have no time to run out and get it?

Dealing with the aftermath of a Vons delivery gone wrong can be exhausting. I have also had situations with Vons where they showed up as much as 2 hours late, which is rare, but if you are waiting on them and can't go out, it is a problem. One time I ordered a bottle of Motrin and it arrived covered in peach juice that had leaked out of the Dole Fruit Bowls package I bought! I asked for a refund and the idiot on the phone only wanted to refund me for the Dole item. I reminded him that my Motrin bottle was soaked in sugary peach juice and I demanded a refund of the price AND the tax. The guy on the phone actually argued with me about it and insisted I go and open up the Motrin bottle and check to see if the peach juice has gotten inside the seal and if not, then the bottle was fine and I didn't need a refund. I reminded him that this was MEDICINE we were talking about, and you don't want to do anything to mess with that and risk a lawsuit, and I could not believe he was arguing with me about a refund on a peach-soaked Motrin bottle that I would not have bought in the store if I had seen it that way! I think he ended up getting fired, by the way! But Alberstons would not have questioned it.

Vons has improved their service substantially in the last few months and they make fewer errors now (except for the melted ice cream I got a while back), but be wary. I had too many bad experiences with them for too long and I still don't trust them even though they seem to be getting better now. I am forced to order from them. They sometimes have deals where if you spend $150 and order specific items, they will give you free delivery but that is alot to spend. Alberstons usually does not have such promos but they are more dependable overall. I will have to look into whether or not they have a minimum order amount because if they do NOT, I might switch all my orders over to Albertsons.

 

[JadeDarkstar]

i had heard there were free delivery codes and 50dollers or more got free delivery on vons before.
man i hope we dont have bad time with them

 

[Sherry E]

i had heard there were free delivery codes and 50dollers or more got free delivery on vons before.
man i hope we dont have bad time with them

Yes, occasionally Vons will have promos at first order, and then other promos when you are an established customer, but you usually have to order $150 - not $50 - of groceries, unless you get a first-time customer special deal, and usually you have to also order a certain number of specific items involved in these promos to meet the qualififcations. So you end up buying items you might not have otherwise bought just to get free delivery. It is just that they won't deliver to you at all if you don't order at least $50 of groceries. Vons will usually take $3.00 off delivery if you order $150 and choose the 2-hour window delivery time but you don't get any breaks if you pick the 4-hour window. As I said earlier, I could not believe it when they started charging $12.95 for delivery AND a fuel surchage (which seems to range from $1.48 to $2.48 for my orders). Someone must have complained because they quickly went back down to $9.95. BUT they used to let the 4-hour window people get deliveries for $7.95 and that is no longer the case. That is $9.95. It is a lot to figure out. If Albertsons does NOT have a $50 minimum for delivery, that would be great because I don't always need $50 worth of things. Sometimes I do and sometimes I only need four cases of water delivered. Yes there is still the delivery fee regardless of how much I order but if they will at least come out here for less than $50, then I might order from them more often. It just seems that Vons seems to have more of the things I like on sale more often than Alberstons, BUT sometimes Albertsons has some really good sales, so that is why I go back and forth between the two.

 

[Sherry E]

Sherry-

Thank you SO MUCH for the quick reply and all the tips. I think I have the Customer Service number, but if I can't find it, I'll definitely let you know. The info about Von's doesn't sound too promising, though. I'd read that Albertson's charges $9.95 for delivery, with no minimum order - is this true? I'll have to gauge what's more important - the service or the cost; I would probably choose the service.

All this talk of grocery delivery made me realize I needed to order just a few items. So I checked with Albertsons and you are right - they do NOT make you order a minimum of $50. They didn't specify a minimum at all, which is great for me because I really only needed a few things which would not amount to $50. Also, they do not tax you or charge the fuel surcharge, if I recall (unless they have started to and I don't know). With Vons $50 order, you actually end up paying closer to $63 after delivery and fuel surcharge, and more than that if you have taxable items or water. So, I am beginning to like Alberstons more all the time! They need to do something to compete with Vons, and this might be the way to go. Plus, they were having a good Buy One, Get One Free ice cream sale today - and it is HOT! I need all the Dreyer's I can get! Yum!

If you need any additional Vons or Albertsons info, let me know.

 

[JadeDarkstar]

maybe we will look at aalbersons our selfs

 

[Sherry E]

maybe we will look at aalbersons our selfs

It might not hurt! It could be that just my area has bad luck with Vons. Maybe other areas have better service and yours might be totally fine. These are only my experiences. But they have been improving. Vons just seems to somehow get away with adding extra charges for making more mistakes. But I do switch between Vons and Albertsons, depending on what is on sale at which store and how much I need to get. Sometimes I DO need $150 of groceries and soemtimes I might need only $30, and I never liked feeling forced to have to order a minimum in order to get delivery, so now I don't at Albertsons, but the Vons sales are often better. There are pros and cons to each! One GOOD thing about both places is that you DO NOT HAVE TO TIP the driver. In fact, they do not want you to tip, so don't even take out your wallet. They don't accept tips for delivery at either Alberstons or Vons.

 

[JadeDarkstar]

well ty i will take your accounts in to account. i may ask others later before i leave how they had been lately. lol but might just go with albersons to save chance then messing up. im one those types some times one thing could ruine my trip tho lately ive been good and let the bad roll off and go with the good

maybe its only with my mom or sis i freak from things

 

[bumbershoot]

For those of you grocery delivery experts:


Okay, I went ahead and created my Von's online account so I'll have that ready for my DLR visit in October. I figured out (eventually, after entering my Hawaii Zip Code and being told "We do not deliver to that zip code" - haha) that I had to "fake" my address as Disneyland Hotel for it to accept my account. However, when I entered the address as "1150 Magic Way", for some reason Von's changed it to "1150 W. Magic Way". Since I don't live in Anaheim, I don't know if this makes a big difference, or not. I tried changing the address back to the way I originally typed it, but it keeps defaulting back to "W. Magic Way". Was I inputting the wrong address?

I was thinking of calling them, but wanted to check to see if faking the address is "illegal" in any way. If it's not, then I'll chance calling them.

TIA!!

I did a store locator check, and I see that SAFEWAY is in Hawaii (at least Honolulu). Safeway and Vons are the same company, and I've been able to be logged into my regular safeway.com account and shop around on vons.com.

Have you tried that, so that perhaps you don't have to do strange things with your billing address?



Jade, it was only when I was brand new that I got the free shipping deals for anything less than $125 orders.

And the only time a safeway.com order for us has been late was when it had snowed, and the snow had melted enough that people *could* get out, but people who weren't perfect in the snow and had the intelligence to know that about themselves would just order. It was a crazy-busy delivery day, he was running late, things were icing back up, and he did call us to let him know an ETA.

 

[avalon451]

I usually shop at Safeway (aka Vons) around here, but Albertson's was a more easy-to-use and intuitive website, I thought. And I have membership cards for both of them, so I was getting the sale prices regardless. Also they had 1 hour and 15 minute intervals for delivery (hmm or maybe it was 1 hr. 30 mins). Either way, they delivered our groceries promptly, right before we arrived at the hotel, and everything was packed closely in a box so even the cold stuff like yogurt and milk was still quite cold and fresh. We had a very good experience with them. We paid the $9.95 delivery fee, but it was worth it not to have to worry about running around looking for someplace to buy water and groceries. (I hated the tap water in Anaheim! Yuck!)

BTW, don't worry about it being a "false address," they're accustomed to delivering to hotels, offices, etc. I believe when you pay, you put in your billing address anyway. They don't care if it's different from the delivery address. Except that it has to be a U.S. address; they won't accept a credit card from a Canadian address, for some reason.

 

[bumbershoot]

I just wanted to mention why we only think of safeway/vons. The Albertsons here is just cruddy, and even though I've seen good products there, we almost never go there. We like Safeways here and know their products. We use their O Organics line of products as exclusively as possible, and we're comfy shopping there and looking online. So that's why I never really talk about Albertsons; we just don't go there and don't know their products (and I find their website even more awful than safeway/von's, but I'm a website snob, LOL).