Name: Gardening Express
Address: Gardening Express, Chelmsford, Essex
Rating: 1.16

“I ordered a lot of plants from this company at the start of lockdown. After they took my money, nothing happened for 10 weeks ... then they delivered several boxes of dead and nearly dead plants. I raised a support ticket on their website (all plants are guaranteed) and received a reply apologising and letting me know tier 2 support would be in touch shortly (raising a ticket is the only way to contact support - no telephone number, no email). A month passed and nothing! In frustration I went onto their Facebook page and began posting details of my experience. I was surprised to then receive a series of messages via Facebook Messenger reassuring me that someone from management would resolve the issues I had faced very shortly. Nothing after a week except the same platitudes and promises. They claim they cannot locate my original support ticket on their system even though I can and have sent them a screen shot of their website showing it and their initial response! Worst company I have ever dealt with. Only gave one star because none is not an option. SCAMMERS - please beware. As others have pointed out, ALL the positive reviews on Trustpilot are "INVITED REVIEWS" meaning they were actively sought by Gardening Express after they knew they had delivered what they were obliged to.”

Gardening Express 1 star review on 8th August 2020

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Posted 5 years ago

“Wish I'd read the reviews before buying. Missing plants from order, sent loads of emails. Still no refund. Avoid Avoid Avoid! You have been warned.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Do not use this company. I ordered plants in May and it’s now August and I still haven’t received them. Have repeatedly asked for a refund. Nobody responds to e mails. I just want a refund.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Hi I have been waiting nearly 4 weeks now for 2 Planters. I find these companies take the payments straight away but take too long for delivery. Once they have your money they don't care. I have had the same problems with Gardensite paid £650 4 weeks ago promised delivery Monday 3, August and no show. Customer service were terrible, rude. They can't fulfil the order now after this length of time. Still waiting for a full refund disgusting. Can I recommend The Greenhouse people. Brilliant customer service, Management and Delivery driver all as promised and on time. Garden Express and Gardensite or something else, Halls do not order from them. Garden Express rubbish Garden Site/Halls rubbish The Greenhouse People Brilliant and well done to them. By the way if could get a refund from Garden Express would of bought similar from a local store that day.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“I ordered plants on 19/4/20. They advised after 2 weeks that there would be a delay, totally understood with lockdown etc. What I didn’t understand was why they took until 3/7/20 to arrive. There was no way to cancel or to contact apart from leaving emails that were mostly ignored. When the plants eventually arrived they were tiny and can only have been seeds in April! If they can’t supply orders they shouldn’t accept them. I returned the plants and they eventually refunded but I paid over £10 Postage all in all. Very disappointing.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“One the worse outline shopping experiences I have ever had. I ordered a Japanese Acer (£89 with postage) the plant was supposed to be around 150cm and according to the picture a lush deep golden red colour. After waiting for 3 weeks and receiving some passive aggressive emails that said if I enquired where my order was this would delay my order...! What arrived was a 90cm scrawny damaged plant that had clearly not been watered or cared for in any way. Whatever you do not use Gardening Express to order any plants”

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Posted 5 years ago

“It's a Scam. I bought plants in April. I accepted Covid explanations. However, I'm still waiting delivery. I asked for a refund but noone bothers to respond to the emails. I just want my money back”

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Posted 5 years ago

“It's my fault for not reading the reviews on this dreadful company. As a result I have the same experiences, long delays, no proper communications, very poor quality plants, no response to complaint. Forget their guarantee promise, complete waste of time.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“AWFUL!!!!! I spent over £100 on plants. 3 were virtually dead on arrival and many of the others were on very poor condition, e.g. snapped stems, damaged leaves. I was issued a 'ticket', whatever that might be, as an acknowledgement of my complaint and have been waiting in a queue, if one exists, for a proper response for over 2 weeks. That to me is appalling customer service. The automatic update on my ticket sites Covid for the delay. What nonsense, other companies are managing very much better. Please do not waste your money on buying from here. I shall be taking this further at: https://www.coronavirus-business-complaint.service.gov.uk/ Am also leaving as many negative reviews as possible to warn people not to make the same mistake.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“It’s a scam. Dead plants arrived on two occasions. Sent tickets for refund absolutely no response whatsoever. Wasted my money. Continued to take people’s orders though despite delays in people receiving there products. On arrival all dead . failed to respond to people’s complaints etc. I’ve now involved the bank and will be taking it to trading standards. Company should be made to cease trading. Total scam don’t waste your money”

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Posted 5 years ago

“SCAM SCAM SCAM! Shame on you Gardening Express Bought two climbing plants. Order no. 600635988. One week later received automated e-mail saying no stock and to wait indefinitely. Desperate for refund but no contact details on website. Raised ticket. Got standard automated reply with lame excuses, shamelessly blaming everything on covid19, and just blatantly refusing to refund. Feel like being conned, scammed and bullied by big corporation hiding behind company policy. I have a feeling this company put all their resources on online selling and writing fake review all day but put very little effort to actually delivering the plants. Do not use this company. It is giving a bad reputation to other honest online garden centre website. I have ordered plants from other website during covid19 which arrived within a week.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“SCAM SCAM SCAM! Shame on you Gardening Express Bought two climbing plants. Order no. 600635988. One week later received automated e-mail saying no stock and to wait indefinitely. Desperate for refund but no contact details on website. Raised ticket. Got standard automated reply with lame excuses, shamelessly blaming everything on covid19, and just blatantly refusing to refund. Feel like being conned, scammed and bullied by big corporation hiding behind company policy. I have a feeling this company put all their resources on online selling and writing fake review all day but put very little effort to actually delivering the plants. Do not use this company. It is giving a bad reputation to other honest online garden centre website. I have ordered plants from other website during covid19 which arrived within a week.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“This is what I received when ordering a hebe. Totally unsatisfactory. Do not order from this company.”

Gardening Express 1 star review on 5th August 2020

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Posted 5 years ago

“Gardening Express sent me the wrong plant which was genetically mutated and not what I ordered. The plant arrived with 2 out of 3 branches broken and within 2 days the leaves therefore dried out. When I asked for an exchange sending images to them, they declared they wouldn't be able to see any damage and congratulated me to the plant. They refuse to offer an exchange for the plant, and refuse to pay the money back, this after I waited 2,5 months (!!) for the plant to arrive from date of order. Gardening Express are serious tricksters which the correspondence proves. Don't ever buy from them - they send dodgy damaged plants out that they can't sell to Garden Centres hoping that they get away with it online when no one can check the quality of the plants before they charge you. Reading the other reviews with so many other people making exactly the same or similar experience, I'd say they trick people consciously on a large scale.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Received my order late May. One of the trees arrived with the top of the main stem broken off. Twice contacted the company who escalated my complaint to 'tier 2', but I am still awaiting a reply. Dreadful customer service. I will not use this company again and suggest everyone steer clear.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Abuse of Covid situation This company has totally used the Covid situation to profit, buying up dying plants from nurseries impacted by Covid and selling them on, almost dead, with 3 months to deliver, and not giving refunds, refusing to communicate, switching off all comms and hiding, still taking money on orders they cannot deliver, thousands of complaints, still operating, trading standards and watchdog contacted by masses of people, still trading today and taking money immediately, no refunds, no delivery, also faking five star reviews. All you get is an auto 'because of Covid...' response. The gov has set up a site where you can report companies like this for exploiting Covid, Search coronavirus-business-complaint.service - this will take you to the gov website where you can send details and evidence if enough people report this scam of a company it may be closed, it's what it deserves. I hope they can sleep at night (with all that stolen money)”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Absolutely atrocious company to deal with. Ordered a Japanese Acer in early May and received no communication until I contacted them several times both by Email and Ticket. After several attempts at blaming Covid, suggesting I’d ‘missed it’ in a multi delivery parcel ( I only ordered the Acer), they then changed tack and blamed Hermes for losing the parcel!! 3 weeks on they have still not come back to me in spite of several attempts in my part to extract a response.”

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Posted 5 years ago

“They gave the courier an incomplete address which led to my order being delivered to someone else. When I contacted them I received no response for weeks, so I filed a chargeback and to my surprised they fought against it. They only make any contact in the event of chargeback, it seems they have a team specifically for this due to so many angry customers. Gardening Express, why not invest your money in actually fulfilling your orders instead of a chargeback team?”

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Posted 5 years ago

“Adverts extremely mid leading, twigs sent not blooms? Terrible service”

Gardening Express 1 star review on 4th August 2020

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Posted 5 years ago

“Worst company I have ever had the misfortune to deal with. waited a month for delivery they are using covid as excuse for non or late delivery. Plants arrived diseased covered in black spots with tiny flies crawling all over them, as per their previous response to emails "ticket raised" that's all you get from them no concern of the awful condition or any suggestion of refund or replacement. As at today I have still received no contact fromgardening express so my action is now :- Contact your bank or credit card company and get a chargeback done fill out form send pics and get your money back this is the only way to stop this sort of company from trading in this way. I have posted this on other website so ope it helps other people in my situation.”

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Posted 5 years ago

Shipping & Delivery
Delivery Methods	Courier
Average Delivery Time	Over A Month
On-time Delivery	Greater than 16%
Accurate And Undamaged Orders	Greater than 30%
Customer Service
Communication Channels	Email, Live Chat, Telephone
Queries Resolved In	Over A Week
Customer Service	1.1 out of 5
Returns & Refunds
Refunds Process	Difficult
Returns Process	Could Be Better

Gardening Express Reviews