Where has good customer service disappeared to?

I’m going to surprise you now – I write in praise of Tesco.

We use it more often for our regular shop than other superstores simply because we know where everything is, we know what quality we will get and the café does a tremendous value-for-money breakfast.

But all that aside, the real reason I mention the supermarket in dispatches is because of its customer service.

As my reader will know, I’m the first to moan about poor service, so I now endow praise where praise is due.

We enjoy the occasional tipple and have bought 3-litre wine boxes since the mid-1980s, when we first came across them in Dubai. And very handy there were then for our weekend wadi trips.

More recently we have particularly enjoyed a particular Tesco-own brand of Spanish red. Two weeks ago we noticed that the packaging had changed but purchased the rouge nectar anyway.

Bad mistake. The "new” wine was awful – insipid, weak and quite stale. So last Monday I emailed Tesco customer service, a polite, but firm, missive, stating our view of the product.

I had a response later that day and by Wednesday had received an apology and was told a refund, in the form of a card, was winging its way to us. So, sorted in three days.

I wish I could say the same about Lidl. We bought a power washer from the local store back in May and the hose gave up the ghost last weekend, having developed a leak. German technology letting you down after just four months I hear you say.

I managed to find the literature that came with the purchase and was pleased to see the washer had a three-year guarantee.

I emailed the Lidl address given on the guarantee card. I did get a reply within a couple of days but only asking if I’d give them permission to pass my details on to the supplier. Data protection, it seems. Of course I said yes. Since then nothing.

I don’t mind the lack of further news but it annoys me that the business is passing the buck to the supplier. I bought the item from Lidl and expect them to sort it.

While on the subject of customer service, another example of the good and the bad from the charity shop sector. SWMBO has sorted out her father’s clothes. He died in May 2015 but it has been too emotional and difficult until this week to undertake the task.

We ended up with six plastic bags of clothes and shoes, nearly all in very good condition. Enough goods, we felt, to make a tidy sum for a charity.

The first local charity shop we rang weren’t interested, telling SWMBO they had loads of stock at present “as lots of people have died recently”.

The second shop said they would be delighted to accept the items.

They have probably got loads of stock as well, if so many people have died recently, but staff there clearly have great customer service training.