registry frustration

This post may be incredibly boring to some of you, but may serve as a warning or source of help for others...

When we registered for this baby it was our 3rd time registering for a big event. First was our wedding, second was when we were expecting Malakai. This has by far been the most frustrating of all 3 experiences. We decided to register at Target (also for a 3rd time) whether or not someone threw a baby shower or anyone got us gifts in order to take advantage of the completion discount after the due date passed. This also meant we registered for a lot more items than we would have otherwise.

The process started out normal, scanning items in excitement as we envisioned our new baby using them. It took us much longer than we anticipated, which has been the experience just about every time. I experience the usual frustration of things going out of stock or becoming out of season, but just added replacement items as necessary.

Then Target decided to "update" their website. Unfortunately this update made their website basically impossible to use. Every other link would result in an "oops" message and most items on my registry weren't showing up. They did send a discount code as an apology to all who had this issue. Unfortunately, the website wasn't fixed so using the code (online only) became a new challenge.

After over half a dozen phone calls to their customer service reps and being transferred all over the place for about a week I finally got some resolution. It involved placing my order, calling in with the number, and getting my discount applied over the phone. Just placing my order online took several days because of the items I wanted not always being visible.

Another week has passed, part of my order is here, but one of the items is wrong and I haven't heard back after contacting customer service about the mix-up 5 business days ago.

Then came the in-store discount. I only ordered items online that were eligible for free-shipping. So there were some things in-store that we used the 10% completion discount to purchase. The frustration only mounted here. Like I mentioned I added a lot of items to make sure that our shopping experience would go smoothly. I was quite familiar with what items were on my registry and what their prices should be after over a month of trying to sort things out.

When we went through check out several items did not get discounted because according to their system they weren't on the registry. We went over to customer service to figure out the issue. For some things I had scanned a pack of white baby hangers but purchased a set of blue ones which apparently doesn't work with their computers. You have to get the exact item you scanned or added online. When I asked the cashier about adding things to my registry that weren't showing up for some reason, she told me that's not really the purpose of the discount as it's meant to be used to "complete" what is already on the registry. I asked her what the difference between adding them now and having added items online from home or in store the day or even hours before. She didn't have a good answer but was determined to be as rude as possible to not only myself but her co-workers. I nearly requested a manager but Ben kept me patient and we worked through it.

The main issue wasn't even that we had purchased items that were slightly different than what we scanned but that they had recently "reset" the baby section so that numbers had changed. For example, I scanned a dresser-top diaper organizer and purchased the exact one I had scanned but the item numbers had changed in the past month so it wasn't "technically" on my registry any more. This is obviously a huge flaw in their system. So the customer service gal added this item to our registry, returned it and let us repurchase with the discount, but wouldn't do this for the other items so we returned them as they weren't absolutely necessary and we weren't willing to pay full price for them and I was tired of dealing with her attitude. Plus, Kai was getting quite antsy after what was already a long shopping trip.

Now, I have a set of blankets from Target.com that are a completely different print from what I ordered. I'm hoping that the store has the one I want so I can easily exchange them. As for the rest of our items we have over a dozen that were shipped 10 days ago but the tracking status hasn't been updated since they shipped out. I'm excited for them to arrive, but slightly dreading how many more mistakes I'll find.

I know I'm not the only one to have issues with registries and especially with Target's recent issues, but it's almost unbelievable how many separate issues we've had just trying to prepare for little brother's impending arrival. Should we decide to have more children and register again in the future we will NOT make Target our main source if we can help it.