SephoraReviews 554

Sephora is the makeup lovers dream. However when they decided to launch their subscription boxes called Play they failed. It was first tested in a few select cities. It invited everyone else interested in subscribing to sign up. Many received the message that no open spots were available but we would be put on a waiting list. Well many received emails saying that a spot was open we could now sign up. I added a notification thru my email provider that sent my phone and alert as soon as any Sephora emails arrived. The email arrived at 12:53 I followed the link and reached the sign up page and entered my email as instructed I hit the enter key at 12:54. Immediately received the same message I had months ago when I tried to sign up. All the spots were full however I would be notified when one was available. Now if I go back to the email there is a count down timer with the days/hours/minutes/seconds that the invite is valid. Sephora sent no other emails telling us that the spots were full. From day 1 this whole campaign and their intro into the world of subscription boxes failed miserably.
Im shocked that upper management does not feel the need to do any type of damage control. Instead they are using this to create exclusivity. There thinking is that this how to create and keep the Play box at the top of the most wanted must have list. In fact it's the complete opposite customers don't like gimmicks. Either run the subscription box the fair way or get out of the game. They should ask Birchbox or even ipsy how to properly operate a subscription boxes service.

I ordered a week ago from sephora and they cancelled my order because they were unable to confirm your payment information. I asked them about the time for refund and they told me it will takes one business day. I ordered again and I waited for 3 days and they did not refund the amount. I called the customer service and the lady answered my told my it will took 7 days i asked her to check the previous call and what they told me. Then she said she can't check that call and she closed the line in impolite way. She was rude with me, so I cancelled the second order. Company with staffs like her does not deserve the money we spend.

Placed an order only to realize the item wasn't the full kit for the curling iron but rather the wand to attach. It wasn't clear in the description for the item that I read and re-read. Called customer service to cancel that one item from the order within a couple minutes of placing the order, only to be placed on hold for 15 minutes to be connected to someone in India who couldn't speak English clearly. Then I was told the item can't be removed from the order because it already went to the warehouse and if I called sooner, they could have removed it. So, I explained I did call sooner and was on hold for 15 minutes... She said sorry about that graciously but still couldn't do anything, which is understandable since she's merely following protocol. Of every online retailer I've ever shopped at, I've had the time to make adjustments to the order prior to shipping. This policy is ridiculous. Now I have to wait until the item arrives, then return it using the return shipping label, and wait 30 days for a refund. Slackness! I will never shop online or at Sephora again. The salespeople in the stores have no customer service manners and are typically rude, so given the in store experience sucks and the online experience sucks... Ulta here I come!

I called on the same day I placed an order to cancel that order. The rep said he took care of it and will give me a refund when the delivery company sends it back. I called within 2 hours of placing the order. I don't believe they even processed it yet, especially when their website kept saying that they are having delivery delays due to the volume of business. Well, it wasn't cancelled - the package was delivered to me 3 days later. I 'll have to return it myself.

Part of the fun of shopping sephora.com is getting fun samples to try. How else do I try new products? Within a month, 2 of my orders had 2 out of 3 samples 'replaced' by some random product - things that I am not interested in at all. Why can't they specify the quantity they have of their samples and not offer the ones that are 'out'? It's annoying to open your package and not get the samples you were looking forward to trying.

The worst experience I ever had online.
I received only part of my order. (fulfillment made a mistake)
So, I called & they promised to ship the rest, but then they cancelled the shipment without contacting me & didn't refund the money.
If I didn't call again, they would simply kept my money!
But thats not all. After I talked to the customer service to get my money or my order - they deactivated my account!
Still waiting for partial refund!

I SPECIFICALLY ordered online to get the 5 free samples that I trully wanted to give a try so badly and even purchase afterwards. I literally got not ONE! No where did I see before I ordered that the samples would be swapped out if they were sold out of them, the worst part is you're not sold out because they are still available in the sephora app to choose for a sample! So why did I get zero items that I wanted! I'm 25 yrs old and got things like age defying night cream or shampoos that I can't use because if my sensitive scalp and other odd things I don't even know what do to with. Then I waited 30 minutes on the phone to talk to someone and they told me nothing could be done but give me a few points, what am I going to do with points? I'm honestly getting fed up with sephora and its "rewards" or "points" or "mobile offers" it really does nothing spectacular and I've spent a ton of money here for who knows what reason.
Like I said I literally ordered here again for the 5 very specific items I seriously wanted to try so I hurried and ordered, if that can't be followed threw not even for ONE single item then why bother & why have the options up?! I'm very close to just skipping the sephora all together and switching to ulta because that's ridiculous, their point system seems better anyways.

Same problem as others have listed with online ordering. There was an error message with address associated with my card. I did the transaction twice thinking it was some sort of glitch. I just did an online order with that card and had no issues. Then I checked my account and indeed there was 2 holds pending on my account. I called Sephora up and the woman said she would fix it and authorize a release. I waited and checked my account 2 days later. One transaction was taken off but the 2nd one was still there. I called back and was told it was just going to fall off by itself. One week later it is still there. Now I am pissed and call a third time. This time they have me do a three way call with my bank and 30 minutes later things are resolved. What a pain in the neck. 80 percent of my shopping is done online. I will never ever ever use Sephora.com again. I am a VIB too, I spend quite a bit of money there but now I am most likely going to shop at Ulta or just go directly to the vendors site.

Well for one thing I buy a looooot of makeup (yes I have a problem) and sephora offers so many different brands at so many price points which is great for a lot of shoppers. I have never had any problems ordering items from sephora online and they've always arrived on time, but the items come in such a huge box! Save the trees people! I do like that if an item isn't in Stock online you can check and see if it's in Stock in the stores in your area from the website! The best thing about the online store is definitely the samples! You always get FREE samples with your order and there's always some kind of promotion going on which is handy dandy! I love love love Sephora!

I have purchased orders previously with Sephora with little issue. However, recently I had the issue of getting an error message when trying to place an order. Their system rejected my billing address because it "did not match what the bank lists". I tried retyping the address with a variety of changes, apartment versus apt, or spelling out street instead of st (I don't see how any of these things could effect it). I finally gave up and decided to go to the closest store in person. However, when checking my bank account the next day I noticed I had $400 "missing". While the transactions did not go through, and were never confirmed, they still placed a hold for the amount with my bank for each time I placed the order (4 times). This means I can't use this money for anything else until they clear up the issue.

I emailed them a complaint and have not heard anything back. I waited two days and called them and they said the error was caused by my billing address not matching and the only way I can order in the future is to call my bank and verify I have the address exactly the same (which is literally impossible to fix since it was already typed in right). But in the meantime they can't change anything immediately, but that the process takes 1-7 days to go away. I called my bank and they said since it is not a real transaction, they can not dispute it. So either I wait 7 days for Sephora to delete the pending charges or for them to run all four transactions, then dispute them through my bank. Either way I have to wait for Sephora to get off their butts to cancel the orders.

Anyways, I'm sure it will get fixed, at least from my bank's end once they finish the transaction. I just wanted to warn that whatever billing system they are currently using to run verification on addresses is acting up and rejecting addresses. I don't know if it is an issue of it auto-correcting zip codes to what it thinks they should be or what, but it fails to recognize addresses that other websites are finding valid. This is also an issue because it never once confirmed a purchase, but it effected my bank by showing up pending transactions. $400 is a lot to suddenly have tied up unexpectedly. So all I can really do is warn that their site might very well reject your address if it finds a minor "error" with how you typed the address, and if it does, absolutely do not try to re-enter it, as it will charge you for each attempted purchase. It is not worth trying to switch minor spellings, as it will always come up wrong.