Shop Runner Review

If you shop online, you’ve likely seen or used Shop Runner. Perhaps you’ve had great experiences with them, because, after all, how bad can free, two day shipping be? Now for those not familiar with how it works, you must reach a qualifying purchase amount to be eligible.

If you’re not set on that two day delivery, then it’s not that bad. Free shipping is huge. But if you’re counting on that promised delivery date, you might want to rethink using Shop Runner.

Now this is my experience with them, but I have many. In fact, all but one of my online purchases where I used Shop Runner were late. Most came on the third day. But several were days late. The longest was a five day delivery.

Again, if that two day delivery is just quicker than standard and free, then this company is great. But most of the times I’ve used it, I needed something from that order within the time frame I selected. So, for example – and this has happened a few times – if I’m headed out of town, that delayed package is now sitting on my doorstep until a neighbor or friend can get to it.

After I made an inquiry to the company itself, they agreed that my deliveries were not on time, but then claimed this was not a problem on their side, but that of the online store’s. However, when I called a few different stores to see what they had to say, their claim was similar: not our problem. What they did offer – which was more than Shop Runner did – the two companies may have different “processing” times. For example, if I paid for two day shipping through New York and Co., they are responsible for the processing and the shipping. But if I go through a third party like Shop Runner, they may take an extra processing day, thereby pushing out that delivery date by one additional day (at least). So if Shop Runner needs an extra day or two to process an order, then it’s the responsibility of the partnering online store to adjust the delivery dates accordingly.

Here’s the bottom line, and both sides agreed but neither accepted fault or offered compensation (after all, it was free): When I get to the shipping portion of the online checkout process and I’m given options with a “guaranteed delivery by (date here),” regardless of whether or not I’m paying, that date should mean something. Because it certainly does to the eager customer placing that order!