Sad to say our experience with the German Bakery was anything but pleasant…read more
As I'm German, my wife very thoughtfully wanted to order some German food for Christmas. Little did she know that this almost led to us eating perished food from the German Bakery, being shouted at aggressively and hung up at when we raised this.
To give a bit of background, we ordered fresh sausages and ham for online delivery, assuming of course that the food would be delivered in a safe and sanitary, i.e. refrigereated manner.
Rather than in a refrigerated state, the meat arrived in a usual parcel with UK Mail. We later tracked the order, and noticed that it had been in transit for more than 24 hours.
Rather than delivering the fresh meat in a refrigerated condition, it was simply wrapped in a plastic bag, together with a small cooling gel pack. Given that it had been in transit for more than 24 hours without refrigeration, it had naturally warmed, rendering the meat unsafe to eat. This is aggravated by the fact that the meat was not delivered directly to us, but actually dumped in the neighbour's garden (without having it signed for by the neighbour). Before we discovered the parcel by chance, it had been laying in the garden (un-refrigerated, naturally) for another four hours.
When we raised a complaint with the German Bakery, we were right away told that this was usual practice, and that the temperature was maintained through the cooling pack (which of course was warm by the time it arrived), and that the temperature of the mean was always lower than 12 to 14 degrees Celsius (?).
To our question how they could possibly claim that it was at a certain temperature (given that it was shipped from depots, delivery vans, our neighbours garden etc.), we were first told this was usual practice "and nobody ever complained". When we told them that according to the Foods Standards Authority, perishable food like fresh meat has to be refrigerated continuously below 8 degrees, the lady we spoke to got angry.
She clearly experienced that before, as she quickly employed a tactic that I (sadly) have experienced in Germany before. She just yelled at me so loud I had to take the phone away from my ears, and would not stop. After I had asked her about ten times politely to let me finish my sentence, she just hung up on me.
The last thing I remember was she yelled at me that they were not responsible for their delivery, as they subcontract the delivery. A firm claiming they are not responsible because they are subcontracting is legally wrong, and morally ludicrous. That of course tells you everything you need to know about their lack of professionalism.
Surely, even if we and the Food Standards Authority had been wrong about our concerns, surely nobody deserves to be treated like this.
So a fair warning to other potential customer: In this business it is clearly usual practice to deliver fresh meat in an un-refrigerated, unsafe and unsanitary condition. On top of that, raising a concern gets you dismissed, aggressively yelled at, and hung up.
Sad to see this - a good German food business would certainly be great thing. Not the German Bakery though.
