A Tesco employee has voiced her exasperation over a common customer complaint she insists staff have "no control" over. The worker, posting on Reddit's dedicated Tesco community, highlighted her "pet peeve" concerning the supermarket giant's 'Whoosh' service for internet shoppers.
Employee's frustration with date requests
"My biggest pet peeve is 'LONGEST DATE' on every single item in their tray like we aren't already e-trained to the teeth to pick the best dates," she remarked. "Or if they request a certain range 'must be 7+ days' as if we have control over the date range in the shop. Best I can give you is two days for strawberries, pal."
Tesco Whoosh is a swift delivery service available in selected areas that enables customers to order thousands of everyday essentials straight to their doorstep in as little as 20 minutes.
Tesco's guidance on pricing and freshness
"When you make an online order, we show your basket total as a guide price," Tesco informs its customer base online. "This is because certain products may vary in price, like pre-packed, weighted products, such as meat, poultry and cheese."
The woman subsequently acknowledged that her frustration was probably down to her "ADHD brain" and the training she'd been given at her specific store, although her irritation remained valid regardless. "I also don't deal with home deliveries, only collect-from-store orders," she concluded.
Other employees share perspectives
This sparked other employees to share their perspectives on how complaints arise. "If Tesco is anything like Asda, that could be due to managers' priorities changing on a weekly basis," one Reddit user replied. "One week they tell us to make sure products are 4+ days at least. The next week they'll tell us the only thing that matters is availability, and to avoid substituting or marking products as unavailable at any cost - even if it means giving products with today/tomorrow's date."
Another person suggested: "To be honest this is going to happen with the company constantly pushing up KPIs higher and higher that no one has time to look at labels/dates and would rather deal with a customer complaint."
A third commented: "I work at a different supermarket that uses Uber/Just Eat/Deliveroo and we aren't even told to check dates on picking, we just grab the first item off the shelf regardless."
While a fourth Reddit user highlighted: "If the only option is the next day's date, then that's what you'll likely get unfortunately. Some stores don't like sending nothing (unless there's a substitute) as it makes the availability figures look bad."
Tesco's freshness guarantee
Tesco explains its "freshness guarantee" on its website. "We pick the freshest products with the longest use by dates - but if you're not happy with an item, just hand it back for a refund," they advise. The supermarket adds: "Just hand it back to your delivery driver or Click+Collect colleague and we'll arrange a refund to your payment card."
"Our colleagues aim to pick the freshest items with the longest expiry dates, but if you're not happy with the quality of your fresh food or flowers, our Freshness Guarantee means you can hand it back to your delivery driver or Click+Collect colleague."
