Angel Yarns Knitting Forums UK

My rant is not so much about the yarn but the attitude of Debbie Bliss's people and her distributor. I brought the Donegal Tweed DK book and ordered the 12 balls it recommended from my local yarn shop. However, I ran out and i thought I had done something wrong, I took it back to my LYS who checked it over with me and assured me that I hadn't done anything wrong, apologised and gave me an extra ball of donegal tweed FOC to finish it. I was really happy and took the ball to finish, to find to my dismay it still wasnt enough. You can imagine how naffed off I was, so had to trek back again. The lady in the shop was pretty naffed off as well not with me hasten to add but with the company, as she felt it was a designer brand asking for top money therefore its patterns should be correct. Again she gave me another ball FOC plus a voucher for all my trouble and hoped I would still shop with her,(Obviously I will), and she would address the problem with the distributor.

I popped back in today to show her the finished product which overall I am pleased with. However to my dismay she showed me the email she had received back from the distributor, who basically said that Debbie Bliss's tech pattern designers say it is not the pattern quantity at fault, it however could be the yarn, as it may have been a faulty batch, and the yardage shorter on the balls. Ok you say, but in the last comments the wholesaler also said that as the customers only paid roughly 40p per DB pattern (as there are roughly 16 patterns in a book), then it should be acceptable to be mistakes and could expect more from a £2.00 single pattern. So all in all I paid £54.35 for the book (with supposedly acceptable faults in) and 12 balls of faulty yarn, if my LYS hadnt given me the extra 2 balls FOC i would have had to pay another £8.00. Thanks to my LYS I do have a really nice garment, however would certainly have resevations of buying Debbie Bliss's yarn again. It has made me realise that in many cases your after sales follow up rests solely on the good will and professionalisim of your LYS rather than big name manufacturers.

That's disgraceful!

You are actually covered by the Sale of Goods Act with this one. Your statutory rights cover the following.

Goods have to be - As Described
Goods have to be - Of Merchantable Quality
Goods have to be - Fit for the purpose intended.

It would appear that at least 2 of those have been breached here as the yarn/pattern are certainly not fit for purpose or as described!

Take it to your local Trading Standards and see what they have to say about it. I don't think they'll be very impressed with Debbie Bliss's "explanation". Give 'em hell.

Three cheers to your lovely LYS big BOO to Debbie Bliss. Can't believe they have the nerve to put that in writing! Any chance of piccies of the finished garment though?

A similar problem arose with Simply Knitting magazine. There were some errors in a pattern that one of the forum members knitted, and their response was that the magazine staff were all terribly busy people trying their very best to put together a magazine. They assumed that as they were 'working terribly hard' that it was acceptable to print erroneous materials. When challenged about this they got rather passive-aggressive.

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Thanks for your thoughts guys. I have been looking at the rest of the rants on these pages and it is quite concerning to note that most of our rants are about the so called designer brands. Maybe we should all just stick to the faithful favourites like Wendy, Sirdar & Patons as they dont ask for so much money and seem to deliver what it says on the pattern.

I'm amazed they said that about only 40p a pattern so mistakes are acceptable!

Personally I resent being forced to buy an entire book of patterns when I usually only want to knit one thing in the book. Especially DB books which, to my eye, seem to endlessly recycle the same dozen designs. (I'm not a fan)

I'd much rather pay £2 and have an error free pattern - am I on my own here??

If it was a faulty batch of yarn and it was short - shouldn't the "weights and measures" people be interested?? Selling things short is a crime....

That is just a shocking reply! Imagine if you couldn't get any more yarn in the dyelot and then you've spent £54 odd for something that you can't finish. I'm sure that if the person who wrote the email was in your position they'd feel very differently!

Disgusting.

I too can't believe they put in writing what amounts to civil offences. I have also come across several instances of top-end designer patterns being short, one customer came in recently saying she'd probably need about another four balls! (although to be fair, I didn't see her work so she may have been way off gauge for all I know)

Also to be fair, you mentioned that the email came from the DB distributor, not from her or her representatives. The distributors are a particularly unreliable bunch so it's possible or even probable that DB doesn't know about or endorse the comments they made.

That is a good point, maybe a copy to DB themselves so they know what exactly is being said.

I have had two short yardage experiences with Debbie Bliss in the last couple of months. First with Pure Cashmere - 2 skeins to knit a pattern in the Pure Cashmere book. My tension was spot on yet I ran out on a hat before I'd even started the decreases to shape it. I actually unpicked and measured the skeins - neither was 37m long yet the ball band states 45m

Then I was finishing up knitting a cardigan with Debbie Bliss Merino DK last week, the pattern is a Debbie Bliss pattern and calls for 10 balls- exactly what I have - my tension again is spot on yet here I am with just one ball left and one sleeve and a collar left to knit (the first sleeve took 2 balls)

I again measured the ball and it came up as 99m (and that was being generous) when the ball band states 110m - so on 10 balls I'd be short 110m or one ball which seems about right.

I've been trying to contact Designer Yarns since February and they don't even acknowledge my emails and the phone is never answered, just a message telling me the lines are busy try back later.

I finally got a friend who sells yarn on eBay and stocks Debbie Bliss to try her contact and eventually got an email from them last Thursday telling me they'd be looking into it......I've emailed them every day since then and again not even an acknowledgement.

I would love to contact Debbie Bliss and tell her the total lack of customer service I'm experiencing but there are no contact details on her website - and come to think of it about 18 months ago I had a really bad time trying to join their online club. I paid my dues and then never got the welcome gift, I contacted them and they told me at least 5 times that they had resent the package. One going missing I could believe, two maybe - but 5!!!! Come on! Then trying to get my subscription refunded turned out to be a nightmare.

Needless to say - I don't think I'll be buying ANYTHING from Debbie Bliss ever again.

Unfortunately, this thread is now venturing into naming and shaming. From the forum rules:



So it's being locked.