[Closed] Grrrrrr.... Planet X

Seems like they are in a constant state of 'sorting out comms'

'picking issues in the warehouse' just sounds like a load of old bollocks to me.

According to the email I got yesterday, it's their new warehouse system at fault. Don't know if that includes "picking issues"...?

[i]Dear ,[/i] <--- nice personal touch there... 😆

[i]Thank you for choosing to order with Planet X, we really value your business.

We have recently invested in a fantastic new warehousing system to make ordering from us a much smoother and quicker service. As with most new systems, we?re experiencing a few teething problems which are affecting the release of our orders; meaning some despatches are being delayed. We are working hard to quickly resolve this and you will receive your despatch confirmation email along with your tracking number as soon as possible.[/i]

Annoying to some, maybe, but there are worse things happening in the world.

I got the above email as well, I ordered the flat bar road bike for my commute to work, I knew the blue was out of stock so wasn't expecting an email.

Worth a quick check of your property and maybe the surrounding streets

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Annoying to some, maybe, but there are worse things happening in the world.

Brilliant. You're completely right, I feel much better now you've put it in perspective.

Cloudnine - please tell me that's real!?!?!?!?!

Personally I wouldn't order anything from PX at the moment purely on the basis of all the negative threads we've had this year. (Unless there was a deal truly too stonking to miss; even then I wouldn't bother if I needed it any time soon).

Hopefully they will manage to sort themselves out.

I'm in exactly the same boat. Ordered a week ago, no communication from Planet-X other than a confirmation of order. They took the money pretty sharpish though.

I've spent most of my career working in logistics and a lot of that working in the IT side of things. It's great that businesses invest in new systems to improve their efficiency and service. It's utter pants when those businesses don't invest in business continuity or manage change effectively. That's when they develop reputations that are very hard to shake off.
I do hope Planet X get through it. They do seem to want to do the right thing.

Wordnumb - 100% genuine. They sent the delivery driver back with a ladder to get it down.

If I really wanted to go out at the weekend I'd just ask for a refund and go to the local LBS to get the parts.

They've been having back end IT / warehouse problems for around the last 8-12 months, so nothing new there!!! If you are willing to accept the lottery it seems to be when you order, then go for it. If not order from a company with a decent reputation, who actually know what is in their warehouse.

Always a gamble when you order online that things will go wrong and the order won't arrive. FWIW I've never had a problem with Planet X. If you need something asap you go to a bike shop and pay the price.

In a similar vein TooTall. I've been part of two distribution companies whose P.P.P resulted in redundancies because anarchic stock control led to the loss of massive orders and failure to satisfy the slightest increase in demand.

Somewhere, an inventory manager is wet with fear, probably every single morning 'cause it's all going to shit around them. Hopefully. Otherwise it's one of the sort that don't actually care about accuracy and ruin it for everyone.

It is sad that On One and Planet X have the problems ther are experiencing. If they don't sort out their act sharpish they will become the new Dave Hinde. 🙁

If they don't sort out their act sharpish they will become the new Dave Hinde

Whoooahhh there - I'm pretty sure they won't, unless they start being massively rude, arrogant and so on. They have a problem with their warehouse. Thats fine - sh1t happens. They didn't tell me about it - not so fine.

The parts I need are fairly niche and as such I'd have to order them in at the LBS which could take days. Therefore why pay a premium to an LBS that has to order them in, than go on line when at the time I thought I had ample time. Additionally, I don't have time to go to the LBS during the week so online sadly is the only way.

I ordered some Red Level Leg Warmers for the Mrs from PlanetX and it wasn't until a few weeks later she first used them and they wouldn't stay put, I thought she'd put a few pounds on but it's best left unmentioned then it dawned on me that they were actually arm warmers that they'd sent. Shipping was quick though!

I've also have the misfortune to have an order pending with Planet X. Mine recently changed its status from 'ready to pick' (or something like that) to 'in picking' which I'm guessing from this thread is something akin to 'in a black hole'

This is the first time I've ordered anything from them / on one for about 10 years ish, after they totally messed up an order for a set of wheels which wasn't sorted out for over a month.

There seams to be a lot of threads from the turn of the year around there sale time suggesting big problems, the bike radar thread even had some comment from somebody call Dave, who sounded like the owner trying to explain but nothing more recently.

The really worrying part is that my frame hasn't even made it into the hands of yodel yet, which was where I was expecting my problems to start.

I think the liking to Dave Hinde is about right.

Guys, apologies for this. One of the warehouse guys dumped all the quarantined orders into the system by mistake last Sunday. We are doing our best to separate those 'possible' orders from the 'impossible' ones, but it's a lot of bits.

Stick with us, there's a new system in place and it should run much smoother once this FU is cleaned up.

'impossible' ones

Have you considered not selling stuff you dont have?

That's the thing though - I don't think they know they haven't got it.

Planet X are what they are. They can often offer great value, and they know about and care about cycling as a sport. But in my experience they've always been a bit "Del Boy", especially for products other than bikes. I think they care a lot about sourcing, merchandising and product development (the fun stuff) but have never really cracked the retail experience.

I still use them, though. All bike shops have their foibles. Spa Cycles in Harrogate can be chaotic as hell, but they retain my loyalty because they have gone out of their way to help me on a number of occasions. Similarly Ribble.

Wiggle have set a new standard for slick service, and as they've grown and their buying power has increased, they've become better value too, with their DHB clothing range etc. However Planet X still has something that Wiggle doesn't have, though: a carbon bike with Ultegra for a grand. That's what PX are good at.

I own a PX bike and I'm very happy with it, but for clothing and accessories I'd use Wiggle.

Junkyard, by 'impossible' I just mean orders that currently contain out of stock items. RT-58 frames for example, they are due through in a day or two, there's probably 100 people waiting for builds of these into bikes.

We've consolidated warehousing into one facility this year, this involved checking out and back in again every single item in the warehouse. We've just implemented a new scan-per-pick system that means every part on an order is bar coded and tagged from the second it comes in the door until it goes out, it should eliminate miss-picks. Were it not for all those orders being mixed up on the system this week I think we'd be pretty well sorted out.

I have only ever had one issue with Planet X / On One in terms of not receiving an order. I stupidly ordered the last eight inner tubes that it said were in stock. To be honest, I doubt CRC have a good enough stockfile so that things as low ticket and numerous as inner tubes are exact, so I was not particularly concerned.

But the sheer weight of stuff I see on here makes me think they have serious problems. I don't know what the cause is but, surprise surprise, appointing some new top management with 'retail experience' doesn't seem to have fixed the problems. This was about a year ago, I seem to remember.

The thing I can't understand is this. Why can't they just shut the whole thing down for a weekend and do a full stock take, get their stockfile corrected, and re-open on a Monday in the knowledge that any further issues must be 'new' and then they could take the appropriate action quickly. If their stock system is shit, they may want to implement a new system at the time of the full stock count. You can still run two stock systems concurrently for a bit.

I have experience of FTSE 100 retail companies and their stockfiles. I just can't get my head around how massive companies can operate within 1-2% inaccuracies on stock, whilst a smaller company cannot get its act together. From the various threads on here it would seem that taking payment for items that the warehouse subsequently cannot find is at the root cause of a lot of their problems. I just cannot understand what would be wrong with a two day shut down, message on the site saying orders will take two days longer, and a full stocktake. I doubt they'd lose much business by being up front about it. Even the overtime wouldn't be that expensive(?)

So I can only assume the will isn't there to sort it out. It is a relatively cheap and easy thing to do. A lot cheaper than appointing new top management and losing loads of custom as a result of piss poor customer service.

I ordered a pair of gloves and received a pair of winter socks,same as you flange I spoke to someone who blamed the warehouse staff quite bluntly,then I was told to go onto the website to look at the return policy and then print off a postage label so I can send it back,can't be arsed sending it back really,they will probably get it wrong again or it will never arrive like so many people on here are complaining about,won't be shopping there again.

Danny, I suspect that we are actually closer to 1% than 2% as regards order errors, I can only base this on the couple of hundred that come to the store as click and collect each week.

In reality by far the largest number of errors fall into the 'specification' category where either customer or customer service adviser select a part based on the 'best information' at hand and it turns out to be incorrect either because it has been written up incorrectly, the customer doesn't know their arse from their elbow or both parties agreed just to try it out hoping it was the right bit.

Gloves instead of socks is inexcusable, even a monkey knows the difference.

Sending stuff back to planet x/ on one is pretty easy given you can do it free via collect+

In my personal experience Planet X / on one of old were a shower of incompetent idiots. It seems not much has changed.

sq225917 I was largely being sarcastic.

i think we all know what we get with Planet X on one which is , IMHO, cheap for a reason.
Dont get me wrong i use you and will again but I would expect erratic service as part of the deal

sq225917 - Member
Danny, I suspect that we are actually closer to 1% than 2% as regards order errors, I can only base this on the couple of hundred that come to the store as click and collect each week.

In reality by far the largest number of errors fall into the 'specification' category where either customer or customer service adviser select a part based on the 'best information' at hand and it turns out to be incorrect either because it has been written up incorrectly, the customer doesn't know their arse from their elbow or both parties agreed just to try it out hoping it was the right bit.

Gloves instead of socks is inexcusable, even a monkey knows the difference.

POSTED 22 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

It's nice to get a reply from the horse's mouth so to speak. If it's not commercially sensitive information, when did you guys last do a full stocktake and what was the error % you found (in units not value)?

The fact that you seem to be quite focused on order errors, where there was a cock up on ordering an item that was correctly showing as 'in stock', might mean you are concerned about something too far up the chain. Most of the guys I know who have had issues with Planet X will have known exactly what they were after, used your site and no personal communication would have been involved.

You can implement all the flashiest systems and processes you like, but if you don't know what stock you have to start with, you will obviously be chasing your tails for a long time. With really good procedures, corrupt stockfiles can sort themselves out. For example, if enough people order 'in stock' items that then aren't really there on picking, then your pickers should record 'no stock' and the file gets corrected. But each one of these is a pissed off customer!

There is only one way to really know............

What used to happen at a major retailer I worked for was:

Pickers bonuses and targeted on speed. Pickers quickly worked out that if they 'no stocked' items that were in a location a long way away, they would be able to work quicker and be paid more. Of course this ****ed the stockfile, so we then had to start recording the number of 'no stocks' each picker made that subsequently turned out to be false. This is just one of the things that 'went on'.

I'm not saying you are not trying or your workers are frigging the system, but something is up and if the root cause is a corrupt stockfile, there is only one way you can fix it.

I do hope you turn it around because you guys were a pleasure to deal with when yodel damaged my frame in transit. I did decide to drive up to Rotherham to avoid the 'post back to us' thing, but I was back on my way within half an hour and managed to finish my bike build that day. I managed to make the pre-arranged ride the next day as a a result, so I was sorted!

Sq225917 it was socks instead of gloves not gloves instead of socks......

Sq225917 it was socks instead of gloves not gloves instead of socks......

Evidently, gloves and socks are interchangeable terms at PX HQ 8)

The Flying Ox - Member

According to the email I got yesterday, it's their new warehouse system at fault.

And it's so troublesome, that the shockwaves travelled back in time and caused them to have the exact same issues for the last several years 😆

And it's so troublesome, that the shockwaves travelled back in time and caused them to have the exact same issues for the last several years

Which makes one suspect that the root cause of the problem has not been addressed. Junk in, junk out.

[quote=Jamie said]Sq225917 it was socks instead of gloves not gloves instead of socks......
Evidently, gloves and socks are interchangeable terms at PX HQ

Sock it to them Jamie

You glove it!

Danny, As I said I doubt if there's any incorrect 'locations' left in the warehouse that cause picking issues, and bonus culture certainly isn't queering the pitch. It's a new warehouse, last couple of months, so everything has been out and back in and no doubt a new audit was done, or is in process, since the switch to the new barcode system as opposed to the previous 'pick and tick'.

There should be some daylight appearing soon, then!

Hope so, because your prices are competitive and I really like the styling on a lot of your clothing.

Best of luck.

sq225917, I ordered a jacket on the evening of the 12th order: SO0657507 not heard a peep since. Is that normal? I appreciate weekend etc.

I ordered a jacket and hat from on one last autumn and they both arrived no hassle and pretty speedily.

Ordered and paid on the 6th of August, nothing yet apart from my phonecall to you where you said you have no idea when I'll recieve the goods.

I'll be ringing today for a refund and I won't be shopping with you again. As per my original post and point, the issue here isn't you having warehouse difficulties - everyone has problems and stuff gets delayed. Its the complete lack of comms about what's going on. Two weekends missed now and still no word on when I'm getting my stuff...

I may be stupid, but I've placed an order with On-One / Planet X today(!)

Let's see if this goes smoothly - I really do like the duck egg blue cardies...........

I really do like the duck egg blue cardies

I hope for your sake that Jim doesn't see this comment.

In reality by far the largest number of errors fall into the 'specification' category where either customer or customer service adviser select a part based on the 'best information' at hand and it turns out to be incorrect either because it has been written up incorrectly, the customer doesn't know their arse from their elbow or both parties agreed just to try it out hoping it was the right bit.

Y'know, I just don't see this.

"Customer doesn't know arse from elbow", "both parties agreed to try it". Of the problems that appear on internet forums, it's not those reasons are all; it's just that people have ordered stuff and PX haven't sent it.

But the "customer doesn't know arse from elbow" defence perhaps is indicative of a culture at PX that prevents them from ever really getting to grips with their "customer experience" problems.

A culture of "customer is king", rather than "we've had a problem in the warehouse so you'll get it when you get it" would be a big help.

HAHA, Jim *has* see this comment Danny. You like the blue duck-egg cardies because you're a pre-vert