Customer Service is negligible; postage is slow & expensive.

I live in Australia, and have only ever purchased Cath Kidston online. I have had some issues. Firstly, I once received an item that had been very poorly packaged and was badly damaged. I sent numerous emails which did not receive a reply. Ultimately I phoned them and the situation was resolved satisfactorily, however I have emailed them at other times about various things and I believe they simply do not answer online enquiries, which is very poor for an online shop.

My other complain is that international shipping is extortionately high. I once purchased a dress for over £50, so the shipping was £35. It's a lot of money, but I assumed I was paying for the item to be Fed-Exed or otherwise priority-shipped. In fact it was posted standard Air Mail, and the dress was folded in a small plastic bag. The whole package weighed less than 500gm. The postage was displayed on the bag, and it came to something like £4.50, which means Cath Kidston had made a profit of £30+ on my postage.

I find this dishonest, and I'm not sure how they devised their international shipping prices. I emailed the company with my complaint and didn't hear back, so I wrote and posted them a letter outlining my complaint. I did get a reply then (via email, so they do have email accounts) and they acknowledged the postage issue and said they would take it into consideration. Over a year later, the postage costs are the same, and I haven't made a purchase with Cath Kidston since. The poor customer service and extortionate shipping rates have soured the Cath Kidston brand in my mind. I can't help feeling Cath Kidston isn't very interested in its customers, and that what you're paying for is the name itself, and not quality items and reasonable customer care.