Problems with Customer Service
Even though I chose a beautiful Matthew Christopher gown at Pearl, I feel it is important to share my difficult experience with the customer service at this boutique. Reading through other reviews, I am surprised to read about similar experiences, and I wish that I had read them before choosing to shop here. First, the positives - Brandon our sales person was delightful, very helpful and enthusiastic. Anna the seamstress was lovely and worked hard to complete my gown perfectly. However, I had a very difficult time with the communication practices of this boutique. My final fittings were scheduled within one week of my wedding, and when I had a scheduling conflict I was completely unable to get a response or an answer to any of my emails or phone calls until the day before the (conflicted) date/time they had given me (this amounted to 4 days with no response). Finally I decided to cancel the conflict (a pre-wedding dinner being held for us) in order to make the fitting time work, which was the last available time on a Saturday. When we arrived, we were asked to wait for half an hour, but the only other customer in the boutique was a bride who was trying dresses on for the first time, and had not purchased a gown yet (this was easy to overhear). In other words, though I had asked for an earlier time that day to accommodate my event, I was bumped to the end of the day not for another bride in need of alterations, but for a potential new customer. At that fitting, there were numerous issues and the dress was nowhere near ready, yet my wedding was 6 days away, and I had long beforehand communicated to the boutique that if the gown could not be finished that weekend, I could only next come in for a final fitting the day before my wedding (given my work schedule in Toronto, commute time to Mississauga and the boutique’s hours). I had my final fitting the day before my wedding, and after an hour and a half, taking the dress on and off 4 times, my dress was finally ready - barely in time for me to drive back down town and check into my hotel room. The net of all of this was a tremendous amount of stress for me that I believe was unnecessary. I feel this boutique has a problem in dealing with their customers in a timely and compassionate manner. Not returning phone calls or messages from your paying customers, when there is such an important deadline looming should be absolutely unacceptable. I sincerely hope that future brides will benefit from reading this review, and I also hope the boutique owners will consider revising their policies and practices when communicating with customers who have spent a lot of money and, more importantly, are so emotionally invested in such an important purchase.