The winner of this quarter's Star Order award for shopping excellence is Asda.com, which replaces Tesco as The Grocer's top online retailer.
The Asda.com website was found to be very simple to navigate with clear instructions about how to find different items and process the order.
Our shopper requested a delivery slot between 10am and 12pm and the van arrived promptly at 10.05am. The driver recognised our shopper was feeling unwell and assured him he would be happy to carry all of the bags up the four flights of stairs. The bags were packed with care and all of the items were undamaged.
Two substitutions were necessary because Asda no longer stocked the required size of Birds Eye frozen peas and McCain oven chips, but the replacements were the same product in slightly different sizes.
In the previous survey Asda could provide a next-day delivery whereas this time the soonest it could deliver was in three days, but Tony Prescott, Asda's multi-channel trading director, explained that this reflected the higher demand on the retailer's online service.
"Throughout the year we have been attracting many new customers and we're growing our business to keep pace with the ever-increasing demand.
"We are constantly expanding our home shopping service for customers and will increase the number of available slots over the next couple of months in existing stores, and will be adding new stores to the network."
He added: "We increased our coverage to 75% of UK households in 2007 and plan to take this to 95% national coverage in 2008."
Prescott also told The Grocer that Asda's delivery charge increased from £4.75 to £5.00 to reflect higher transport fuel costs and said Asda had taken steps to reduce the number of bags used in deliveries.
"Increasing numbers of customers are now returning the plastic bags to their drivers but we are continuously looking at ways to improve the efficiency of our carrier bag usage.
"We are currently redesigning our in-store picking processes, which will reduce the number of bags used in online deliveries. It is our intention to roll out this new format during 2008."
The Asda.com website was found to be very simple to navigate with clear instructions about how to find different items and process the order.
Our shopper requested a delivery slot between 10am and 12pm and the van arrived promptly at 10.05am. The driver recognised our shopper was feeling unwell and assured him he would be happy to carry all of the bags up the four flights of stairs. The bags were packed with care and all of the items were undamaged.
Two substitutions were necessary because Asda no longer stocked the required size of Birds Eye frozen peas and McCain oven chips, but the replacements were the same product in slightly different sizes.
In the previous survey Asda could provide a next-day delivery whereas this time the soonest it could deliver was in three days, but Tony Prescott, Asda's multi-channel trading director, explained that this reflected the higher demand on the retailer's online service.
"Throughout the year we have been attracting many new customers and we're growing our business to keep pace with the ever-increasing demand.
"We are constantly expanding our home shopping service for customers and will increase the number of available slots over the next couple of months in existing stores, and will be adding new stores to the network."
He added: "We increased our coverage to 75% of UK households in 2007 and plan to take this to 95% national coverage in 2008."
Prescott also told The Grocer that Asda's delivery charge increased from £4.75 to £5.00 to reflect higher transport fuel costs and said Asda had taken steps to reduce the number of bags used in deliveries.
"Increasing numbers of customers are now returning the plastic bags to their drivers but we are continuously looking at ways to improve the efficiency of our carrier bag usage.
"We are currently redesigning our in-store picking processes, which will reduce the number of bags used in online deliveries. It is our intention to roll out this new format during 2008."
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