Coles shoppers fume over 'painful' online order issue
A Coles service that's supposed to make the lives of shoppers easier seems to be doing the exact opposite according to a large volume of online complaints from unhappy customers.
Consumers have in the past few months become increasingly fed up by the Coles website over ongoing problems they claim have interfered with their ability to place grocery orders and have them delivered.
Frustrated shoppers have been pleading with the supermarket to "fix" its online portal, which was updated late last year, complaining about it "failing" either while selecting items or trying to pay for them.
Coles told Yahoo News Australia that there have been no widespread issues with the website, but staff would follow up on a number of individual complaints.
Customers slam 'regular' online shopping problem
Annoyed shopper Catherine, from the Hills District in western Sydney, told Yahoo News Australia issues with the Coles website had become a "regular thing".
"Every order I place there is an issue with the website making it a pain in the ass. If it wasn’t for Flybuys I wouldn’t bother with Coles anymore," Catherine, who only wanted to share her first name, said.
"I only order online with Coles every week or so and I mainly order the bulky stuff with a decent shelf life because buying fresh from Coles online is a massive waste of money - they send very poor quality fruit and veg and meat that’s close to expiry."
After raising her concerns with the supermarket on Facebook, she was told to close the site, delete her internet browsing history and clear her browser's cache.
The response almost left her more peeved than the website issue, arguing that ordering groceries should be a simple process.
"It really pissed me off their response to the problem I was having... I shouldn’t have to do anything on my end to be a paying customer. Just fix your website and take my money," she said.
Her experience was far from unique, with several others making similar complaints in fiery post to the Coles page.
Coles website 'crashes all the time'
On shopper wrote their "head was about to explode" over frustration caused by the website issues.
"This is why I never try and order from you because your website is horrible. Crashes all the time. Get it together. I wasted time meal planning and hours adding things to the list only for this to happen," one shopper wrote, sharing a photo of the website displaying a "something went wrong" message.
Another wrote this week she had been trying to place an order for "hours" and asked Coles when the issue would be resolved.
Someone else reported the same issue last week, saying she had been getting a "please try again later" error message for more than an hour.
Yet another shopper who experienced the same issue said the Coles website "has to be one of the most painful experiences ever".
The site was described as "so clunky" by another customer, who said she received an "unable to process" message every time she tried to add something to her order.
"When I do manage to add it, it doesn't save. It's so slow. So frustrating," she wrote.
The website wouldn't let another shopper add anything to her order and told her no products were available.
She said she tried logging out and back in again, but nothing seemed to solve the problem.
Coles responds to website backlash
When Yahoo News Australia asked if Coles had experienced broad-scale breakdowns with its online ordering system, it said there had been no recent outages.
"Coles Online has not been impacted by any outages recently, however we were concerned to hear a small number of customers had difficulty placing their orders," a spokesperson told Yahoo News Australia.
"We will follow up with them directly to understand what went wrong.”
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