Horrible first time experience - faulty product *********** staff being given the run around

I sent the same query on the browns website so here is a copy of it. I will take this review down if my problem is addressed promptly.

Copy of query sent to browns.

This is an urgent complaint about a major issue we are having with a branch of Browns Diamonds in Westfield White City in London UK. Unit 1174, Westfield Shopping Centre, Ariel Way, Shepherd's Bush, London W12 7GD. We have had an absolute horrible experience at this branch and it is ongoing with no help from them.

We purchased a mens wedding ring from browns in January. We were dealt by with an employee named Grant who at first was very talkative and we visited the store twice to speak to him about the ring. We told him that our flight for the wedding was January 24th 2018 and he told us that the ring would be delivered on the 20th January 2018. My sister picked up the ring from the store on the 20th and on seeing it at home i noticed that it was the wrong colour/design. The ring we purchased was a gold ring with 3 colours of rose, white and normal gold. Whereas the ring delivered was only gold and white gold stripes i.e. the wrong design. I called up the store and a girl picked up the phone. I'm not sure of her name but it starts with M and she has a black spot above her lip for identification.

On calling the store I got no apology about the mishap. I was told that a new ring would take 2-3 weeks to deliver. This was a huge problem for me because I would have to travel without a ring in 4 days time. She told us that you can take the wrong ring, have the ceremony with it and then on your return we will replace it for the correct ring. I told her that it is not custom for us to take the ring off after the ceremony but she kept insisting that a new ring will take 2-3 weeks and this is what they can do. Having no choice we agreed to travel with this ring and as per her advice we agreed that even though we shouldn't, we will make the exception and exchange the ring later.

All this time the seller Grant had not called us to check how the ring was even though he promised to do so when informing us of the delivery.

We had the ceremony on the 5th of February 2018. The next day I noticed that the plating of the ring on the outside had been horribly scratched in just one day. This is within 24 hours of just wearing the ring which is supposed to last years. The plating on the outside is of extremely poor quality and the ring is defective. At this point we are still out of the country and cannot visit the store to sort this out. I instantly took the ring off and placed it in a box for safekeeping.

We returned to London and visited the store on Monday 12th of February 2018. I showed the ring to the same girl who i spoke on the phone and she acknowledged that she spoke to me. She admitted that the ring was faulty and that this is not how the ring should have been. She admitted that her colleague "Grant" had messed up. At this point we told her that we do not want the replacement "correct" ring either because of the poor quality of the product. We were put in a situation where we had to travel with the ring and if we had known better we would not have done that. We put trust in the company and the product but both had let us down.

She told us then to leave the ring and her manager Gavin would assess the damage and give us a call on Wednesday 15th of February. Come wednesday we didn't get a call from the manager but from the employee "Grant" again who told us that because it was not within the 14 day period they cannot refund the ring and that "We" had damaged the ring. He had the audacity to tell us that if the ring was wrong, why did we go ahead with the ceremony? Clearly an attempt to cover the damage that this person has caused in the first place. I told him that the fault here is the product and it was done with extremely poor quality that if you wanted you could even scratch if with your fingernail. I told him that i did not want to speak to him but the store manager, however the manager has still not called us regarding the matter. If we were in the country, we would have come back the next day, but we were told by Browns staff to travel with the ring and the product showed problems within a day. Even if you assume that the damage was from the day the ring was picked up, that still is a case for an extremely poor quality product because the time between the 20th of January and the 12th of February is not even a month.

I would like to escalate this matter to the highest level possible within the company. If it was up to this branch we would not have a ring at the wedding in the first place. So A) Grant got our critical order wrong and never called to check it. He claimed that he called us while we were out of the country. Great!!! Thanks for that ??????? B) The other female employee told us to travel with the ring and complete the ceremony C) The ring is defective with extremely poor work done on the plating such that it can be scratched by a baby

The ring cost around £700 and we expect a full refund of our money. Grant called us and said we can have anything else in the store for the same value but we do not want that. The least that the store can do at this point is to accept responsibility for ruining our one time celebration. We've just completed a wedding and do not have extra money to buy another ring. What should be an easy refund is being complicated by extremely *********** staff. At the moment, I personally have no ring on my hand.

At this point I expect someone senior to step in and sort this situation out. Otherwise from here onwards, I have no option but to post this review on social media and sites all across UK, Europe and South Africa to make as much noise and awareness and also get in touch with UK trading bodies over this behaviour.

Because of this what has resulted in for us is a "broken" ring ceremony, we have to repeat the same process again in December for which we have to travel out of the country again. So not only is the critical nature of the ceremony destroyed, but a major time and financial inconvenience has been caused. We have already visted the store 4 times in relation to the purchase and return of this ring. I expect this matter to be handled urgently. We are leaving the country again on the 21st of February and expect a message from the store confirming our full refund or I will have no choice but to escalate this matter even further and as much as possible.