Terrible customer service of Altenew
I had in total 4 orders from Altenew (and there won't be more) and while the products are pretty nice, contact with customer service feels worse than a talk with AI 5 years ago.
First two orders went pretty fine (just Relief Paste was not secured properly and it flooded from the jar - Altenew offered sending second one in next order but they also did not protect it from flooding. It was a miracle it didn't because the jar's cover was opened and only thin foil inside protected it).
With 3rd order the problems started.
I order from outside of USA. Each time Altenew forces me to pay tax and duties to them. So the fees should be passed to the shipping company. Sadly, in the 3rd order Altenew messed with chosen shipping method (I paid for faster delivery while they chose the slower, cheaper one) and forgot to pass the paid tax and duties.
Then few days later the shipping company (that I never chose) contacted me asking for all the details about sent items so they can calculate the tax and duties.
I contacted Altenew to get to understand why shipping company wants me to pay tax and duty fees again (I sent to them all the received invoice documents, etc.). Altenew pretended they have no idea what has happened, they did everything properly. After few e-mails to shipping company they informed me finally that Altenew did not pass the tax and duties to them so they need me to pay the fees agai or contact Altenew.
At that moment Altenew still played idiots. Finally after around 30 e-mail massages exchanged, they admitted that they forgot to pass money for tax (no sorry for messing it up, only repeated casual 'sorry to hear you have problems'). So they returned tax fee to me but then I asked what has happened with duty fees I paid to them during checkout as well?
They again played the dumb ones and tried to convince me they have nothing to do with duties in my country but screenshots of order finally made them realize they need to return that money too.
And finally I asked what about the extra money I paid for faster delivery. If they chose wrong shipping method by accident, the difference should be returned to me but of course it never happened. Because of all those problems, my 'fast' delivery took around 3 weeks instead of 1 week and I had to pay extra to shipping company for securing the tax payment for me at customs.
I felt bit robbed by Altenew because of their wrong actions and no real sorry's.
I decided a week ago to give it one more try (wanted to check if it was one time accident or company really does not care for customers and deserves this opinion I am writing here) but this time I ordered items worth less so duty fees are not applicable in my country for this purchase. I paid for faster delivery because the time was important. During checkout I got information that with fast shipping method I will receive the package between 7th and 9th of October (I even took a screenshot of that). It is 8th of October and Altenew did not even send it yet. Any contact with them ends with information that it usually takes 4 business days to prepare a package and pushing the blame on me.
So, dear Altenew, a bit of facts that should make you think:
1. Order confirmation says in bold it is 2-3 business days usually to pack the order and ship it.
2. Even if it was 4 business days, I ordered at 1st of October and it is now 8th of October so even including the weekend, it is still more than 4 business days.
3. Your checkout page says clearly the exact date range of chosen delivery method, not the number of shipping days so it has to include packing time as well.
It is rather important for those who paid more for FASTER delivery, as they paid for it for a reason, don't you think?
4. When you mess with the order, learn to take the responsibility and apologize for it instead of trying to push the blame on the customer because even good items' quality won't help it when the customer feels robbed.
8 October 2025
Unprompted review