GCash | A Not So Good Experience with GLife's Puregold

Convenience is what I am always after in everything I do.

I thought this one will be added to my list that you might consider using as well.

But based on my experience, I will not use this a second time and will not recommend it to anyone.

That is: buying groceries via Puregold online within GLife.

Last April, I was made aware of GCash’s new addition within the app: GLife.

As per GCash’s article, GLife is a super app feature that integrates mini apps from multiple brands inside the GCash dashboard.

It has a wide range of partner merchants.

Auntie Anne’s, Beep, Classic Savory, Data Blitz, Fully Booked, Goldilocks, Lazada, and Puregold to name a few.

What caught my attention is Puregold.

With their prices cheaper than other grocery stores, I was hoping I could use this to buy our essentials regularly and will keep us from going directly to the store.

So I tried it last April 13.

As per their “Terms and Conditions on Delivery of Orders”, standard ordering time is from 6:00 AM up to 7:00 PM on a daily basis.

If orders are placed from 6:00 AM to 2:00 PM, Puregold’s courier will do same day delivery.

Beyond the 2:00 PM cut off, orders will be delivered the next day.

Their partner courier is “Ninjavan”.

They have two (2) modes of payment:

1. Online Payment (Gcash, Credit card and Debit card) through Paynamics

2. Cash on Delivery (COD)

Their delivery service can only accommodate an order within the following conditions:

- Maximum of Php 5,000 worth of purchase

- Can fit the courier’s travel bag with the length, height and width of 19” x 19” x 19”

- All items should not exceed the maximum weight of 25kg

The delivery fee is fixed at Php 175 within the covered cities in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.

Compared to LazMart’s fixed Php 250 delivery fee, this sounds promising, right? No?

Nevertheless, I placed my order on April 13 at 11:08 AM.

With the TOCs mentioned above, you could expect it to be delivered in the afternoon.

But I am not expecting it to happen due to the number of items I have ordered.

The total of my order is Php 2,520.05.

It did not get deducted from my GCash balance upon placing my order.

Maybe it will be charged once the items are delivered?

Aside from the email confirmation, I did not receive further update within the day.

Come next day, I received a text message in the morning with a list of items from my order that were out of stock.

Nothing else was mentioned, no instructions on what to do, so I thought they were just informing me of what will be removed from my order.

The following day, another text message was received with the same context as yesterday so I replied to them asking what should I do so that they can deliver whatever is still available from my order.

The Puregold staff called me afterwards.

So the reason they were sending me the list of the out of stock items is to give me the option to replace it with something else.

I asked them if they could send me a list of other options, say for example, if the powdered milk I was buying is out of stock, what are the other brands of powdered milk they have on stock?

That would save us time from exchanging messages if what I replace afterwards were out of stock too.

At least if they could give me a list of what they have, I could just choose from it.

But she said it will take them time to list down the other options.

So I just told them to deliver whatever is available and just remove those that they don’t have.

She then sent me an update that they got some of the previously out of stock items. Great!

After they have finalized my order, the total amount I had to pay went down to Php 2,014.05.

I paid via GCash and will now have to wait for the delivery.

It was delivered the following day, April 16.

Since I have work during the day, I was only able to check the items after I logged off.

And viola!

Damaged items, ladies and gentlemen. 😅

The box itself was not that good. Yupi yupi.

And the items inside were loosely packed.

Very far from my experience from LazMart which was packed perfectly.

Dito talaga nag-aapply yung “you get what you pay for”.

Well, lesson learned. I would now prefer to order with the Php250 delivery with proper packing and handling of items.

But I won’t let them get off the hook.

I sent them a message the next day with the list of damaged items.

Since they were not replying to my messages anymore after the above, I had my aunt call them [pasensiya na, walang pang-call, poorita kasi 😆]

After all the calls and follow ups we made for more than a week, they finally delivered the replacement of the damaged items and we handed the courier the damaged items.

Actually ang dami pa nilang drama habang kausap si auntie, kesyo ibabawas daw kasi iyon sa cashier nila na nagpunch ng order namin. Blah blah.

But as what auntie explained to them, we would have let it pass kung mga gamit lang yung may konting sira, but iba ito dahil food items na butas butas yung binigay.

It is unbelievable na hindi man lang ito nakita ng cashier or kahit nung bagger.

Yung powdered milk nga, pagka-angat pa lang ay kitang kita na agad na lumalabas yung laman mula sa butas.

At yung Grahams, friends... 

Kung yung butas lang sa sandwich spread, ang una lang naming naisip ay baka nabutas lang sa pagkakapack or sa delivery. 

Pero, man, yung sa Grahams, imposibleng sa delivery lang iyon.

Mukhang daga ang bumutas doon, mga kaibigan.

Yung sandwich spread, siguro maiisip ko na carelessness lang nila at may chance na hindi talaga mapansin.

Pero yung powdered milk at Grahams, parang nagbulag-bulagan na lang sila sa pagpupunch at pagpapack makabenta lang.

Siguro ang mabuting experience na lang dito ay napalitan naman nila yung items kalaunan, pero kahit iyon ay napaka-inconvenient din. 

Kinailangan pang kulitin ni auntie dahil kung hindi sila magfofollow up ng magfofollow up, baka magkunwari na lang ang mga iyon na parang walang nangyari at magmove on na lang.

So yeah.

That, my friends, is my first and last experience with Puregold online.

I would rather pay a higher cost but with good items, packing and handling experience than being disrespected like this.

Ekis iyang Puregold online sa akin.

But nonetheless, I would still continue using GCash of course.

I just have to be careful on which partner merchants I will do my transactions with.

~~~~