Retailer hits out at ‘awful’ service levels from news supplier

Judy Evans, who runs Williams of Audlem in South Cheshire, and spends £2,000 a week with Smiths News, says she is now considering switching suppliers because of the problems the business has been experiencing.

“It is not just a case of awful service and no loyalty. They have also excelled in dire communication skills and misinformation, added to which is their lack of response to any complaints I’ve made over the past few weeks.

“There is also a lack of any restitution for the very real costs that I have incurred paying overtime to get my papers put together and distributed. It may be worth mentioning the effect on my mental health at this point too.

“In short, a total lack of respect for our business, bordering on contempt. It appears that loyalty and commitment to the trade counts for nothing these days.”

The community store has been in business for around 160 years and has been supplied by Smiths News (and its predecessors) “since time began”.

Since making her complaint, Judy has been contacted by the chief executive of Smiths News, Jon Bunting. Judy said: “I am very pleased to report that he contacted me personally and reacted almost immediately.

“He has assigned someone to investigate and resolve the situation. Needless to say, I am much more optimistic that the situation may get swiftly dealt with in an appropriate manner.”

The sorry saga began on Sunday 8 August when Smiths News claimed it was having “driver issues” with the result that papers were delivered over two hours late.

“It caused substantial disruption and additional costs to our business – with the added bonus of paying staff to drink coffee on £12 an hour while they waited for supplies to arrive.”

The problems continued the following weekdays with deliveries running up to 1.5 hours late. “Luckily for our sanity, the school holidays meant that our paper delivery rounds were not too badly affected.

“However, that still left my staff having a well-paid, leisurely, early morning tea break at my expense – plus the loss of trade from early customers.”

The poor service was surpassed on Saturday 14 August when no papers or supplements were delivered until almost 9am.

“As if this wasn’t bad enough, I was practically incandescent to witness that a newspaper delivery was made by the same van driver to the Co-op opposite our store earlier that morning.

“It’s not just the fact they are a competitor, but this store does not open until 7am, has no paper rounds, and takes a small proportion of the number of newspapers we sell.

“So why were they a priority over us? I think we all know why. The driver then proceeded to deliver to other stores in the area before returning to the depot to pick up our supplies.

“The following day we counted ourselves ‘lucky’ that our delivery arrived only a mere 1.5 hours late again.”

After weeks of business disruption, she sums up her current predicament. “I’m lucky enough to have a stand-alone retail business that does not rely solely on the newstrade – but I’ve never been closer to telling Smiths News where they can shove their weekly order.”

A spokesperson for Smiths News said: “We pride ourselves on providing the very best service for customers of every size, so we’re very sorry to hear that this customer is unhappy with the service they’ve received from us.

“Our operations manager has been in touch with them to apologise and to discuss the issues they’ve been experiencing.

“We have now put a plan in place to ensure that moving forward they will receive the first-rate service we always strive for.”