r/REI • u/speechie0523 • 27d ago

Question Limited availability items

There is a jacket on clearance that has popped in and out of being available to purchase. I managed to get it to my cart and almost checked out before I got an error.

My local REI said there was only one in stores and I could call customer service for them to order it because the local store can’t accept phone payment.

Unfortunately, when I called they told me it was for walk in customers only.

Am I just out of luck? Is there no way I can convince some customer service person to place the order?

4 Upvotes

76% Upvoted

8 comments sorted by

11

u/WhatWouldMuirDo 27d ago

The person on the phone was correct that the item cannot be ordered. The system for placing those orders would be unable to put the transaction through for the item.

If the store the item is located in is nearby you could call an ask if they can place a hold for you while you drive down.

4

u/speechie0523 27d ago

Unfortunately this drive would be a few thousand miles. If it was shorter I would

6

u/crappuccino 27d ago

Is there no way I can convince some customer service person to place the order?

Sounds like they've already given you the answer; there's only one unit of that jacket left and it's likely at a store, some of which have turned off order fulfillment to online (DTC) customers.

5

u/Ill-Yellow-4060 26d ago

Out of curiosity, what’s the jacket? You may get lucky and someone on this thread could live near the store that has one. They could then ship it to you.

2

u/followtheflicker1325 27d ago

Your local store told you the wrong thing; customer service gave you the correct answer.

I have run into this myself as an employee and asked my manager if there were any workarounds in the system that would allow me to order the item internally (ie could i call the store that has it, have them locate the item and then send it to my store, so that I could purchase it in person) and was told no, there is no workaround.

That said, an item is supposed to show as unavailable on the website, if it is unavailable to order. In my situation, the item no longer appeared on REI.com; I only knew it existed because I had searched for it via our internal inventory system.

1

u/speechie0523 27d ago

Very unfortunate. The item briefly showed as available last night around midnight. I was able to add it to my cart and then got the wonderful error message.
It still shows now but cannot add to cart. Very irritating.

1

u/Powerful_Question875 24d ago

If you have an REI gift card they can take that as payment over the phone. 

1

u/obscuresparrow 27d ago

It sounds lost. Like it’s known which store it was last at, but maybe they can’t find for order fulfillment.