So now I'm Cross

It's goodbye Little Lu and a big hello from Lady Cross. So after two and half years of planning and preparation, Little Lu got married to Mr Cross on Saturday 8 August at St Gregory's Church in sunny Stratford upon Avon (yes - we were lucky with the weather, and Alveston Manor hosted a fantastic reception. The guests were charming, the wedding breakfast was delicious, the music was beautiful, the flowers were gorgeous, the cake of cheese and mice bride and groom were delightful, and I am a very lucky lady. Huge thanks to the two families for all their hard work and special mentions should go to the two mothers, my bestest friend and my sister (Big Lu) and brother Lu's girlfriend, Carren.

We went to Santorini for the honeymoon where we gained and maintained lovely tans, ate far too well, went swimming an awful lot, and somehow managed to watch a great deal of English Premiership football. Ah, how nothing changes. You can take the boy out of England, but...

So here is the part where Lu gets Cross. There was me, little Mrs Cross thinking that all the stress and strain of planning a wedding was over and I would arrive home to our lovely new house, to enjoy unwrapping all the John Lewis (JL) gift list presents. How wrong I was. And just how very wrong I was, I could not ever have possibly imagined.

To put it very bluntly, I would honestly say that this was the worst experience I have ever had as a consumer, albeit surprisingly, given their standing as a pillar of British society.

Big Lu had kindly bought us the fridge as our wedding gift and we were looking forward to receiving it, having been fridgeless since we moved into our new abode. The first fridge was dented and the delivery men immediately offered us 25% off. The alarm bells started ringing. We wondered if this was ex-display model or possibly a customer return. Big Lu requested we order collection of el dento and JL could deliver another.

Second time round, even the delivery men commented that the replacement was far worse than the original! They took away both fridges, so again, Mr and Mrs Cross were left sans frigo.

On the third attempt (you might wonder if their advertising slogan should be "third time lucky"), JL managed to cancel the courier who should have delivered our "goodwill gesture" upgraded fridge. The worst of it was that the communication between departments was so poor that they did not know we were still waiting for our fridge, because our order had got mixed up with someone else's. Had I not decided to "phone up and nag", doubtless to say, we would still be fridgeless as I write/moan/sigh.

I was consoled by JL ustomer services that I had been one of the unlucky ones. What a consolation! I would hate to think this is how their best customers are treated. Two goodwill attempts to apologise for the first mistake went wrong - and horribly wrong. I just fail to understand how things can go so wrong, so many times, over what appears to be a simple collection and delivery. And it's a fridge. It's not space science.

But it's just not that simple. It never is. I'm not going to put this down as some cheesy character building exercise, developing my strengths, and all that malarkey, and turning the other cheek. It's an absolute scandal! And Lu-turned-Cross is not going to let this one slide, by any stretch of the imagination.

No, what I will do is go into lawyer-negotiation mode over the compensation. And I've already pre-agreed with JL that I will receive cold hard cash for the anxiety and stress the gift list has inflicted on me. I haven't properly explained every single little detail of how having JL as our gift list provider was probably the worst decision of our lives, but suffice to say that the once sparkling reputation of this store has been flung into the deepest cesspit of that firey underworld in the depths of hell.

Well, I think that will do nicely for now. Next time, Lady Cross will rant about something else, as a "getting this off my chest" exercise. Or possibly reveal more intricate details about the JL saga. It's good for me, and it's good for you too. Mutually beneficial. Plus I'm sure you are dying to know how I manage in taking on JL in the big compensation fight. Let's just say, there will be no prisoners. In the meantime, take care and see you soon.