Never going back there again.
I ordered three bundles of five balloons from a prepackaged bundle online. I asked for them to be inflated as price of helium was included in the price. I asked for pick up in store and the pop up showed me which store had the inventory on hand. I picked this store because it was closest to my house and I've known this store for years.
Skip ahead two hours and I received the confirmation email saying my order was filled and ready for pick up. I go to pick it up and don't see my order. There's about 15 balloons in my order so I would have seen it if it had been filled. I go up to the checkout and two employees are too busy deflating balloons to pay attention to a customer. Finally one of them looks up at me and asks if I'm ready to check out. I told her I had an online balloon order to pick up. She asks my name and when I tell her she looks at me like she has no idea what I just said. She then goes to the fulfilled orders and checked for mine. Apparently, the manager had not filled the balloons and had put them in a bag ready for me to pick up. When the employee looked at the order she didn't understand why the balloons hadn't been filled and checked the order. Seeing half of my order was missing, she called for a manager. This is where everything begins.
The manager walks across the store, to the employee who is shouting across the way to her about my order. The manager doesn't greet me, looks at my order and let's me know "you didn't request them to be filled so I didn't fill them." I told her I did ask for them to be filled and she argued with me saying "if you had, there would be another part to this receipt I received online and since there isn't, you didn't do it right."
I then told her I requested they be filled online and if that didn't carry over that's fine, but I need them filled.
She came back with "I didn't have the inventory on hand so I cancelled six of your balloons and you didn't ask for them to be filled online."
I asked her what she meant and she repeated "I didn't have the inventory for the pink stars or the thank you balloons you requested so I filled what I had and cancelled your other balloon orders."
I asked her why she didn't call me to let me know she couldn't fill my bundle as requested and she said "that's on me but you aren't going to be charged".
I let her know this is a company card and it's already been charged and reversed. My finance team will need to see proof of it being reversed and I will still need the balloons as ordered for an event tomorrow.
She let me know that because she cancelled the order I wouldn't be charged. I again let her know as much as I understand she cancelled the order I would still need proof because it will show up as it already had on my card. She then said "well all I have are these smaller thank you balloons and I could get you pink circles. But you're going to have to pay for them since I cancelled your order already."
By then I was done with her attitude and the situation. I told her "you cancelled my order without letting me know. You didn't call me to tell me the bundle that includes helium I requested from online wasn't filled because you didn't have the inventory and now you want me to pay for something else? No, I ordered the balloon bundle online that stated it included helium in the price, and you cancelled it. That's on you. I need this filled so fill it with whatever you have on hand but I'm not paying for it."
She huffed and rolled her eyes saying "fine I can do that."
I also asked for an itemized receipt for the new amount. And her answer was as follows.
"I can't print it out here. It will come to your email."
After if was filled, I took my order and she said to her employee "I need a break" and her employee said "yeah I understand that was bad." And the manager walks out of the store to "take a break".
If this is how Party City has their managers treat their customers, I can understand why it's so slow and business isn't good. But this manager needs a lesson in customer service. It would have been easy to call me, as my number was on the order, and let me know they didn't have the inventory but another store did and have them fill it. Instead, I'm greeted with an argumentative manager and gossiping staff. Poorly done, Party City. I will not be going back to that location again. read more