Aldi camera bags

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huxleypiggles

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I see these are back in stock, or will be next week at the apparent bargain price of £9.99.

I bought one six months ago and truthfully used it once a week to take my camera to a night-school class. Two weeks ago we went to Berlin for a few days and it was used daily. After two days the stitching on the shoulder pad started to come away. After four days use it was very apparent that the whole shoulder strap was far too flimsy and truthfully not up to the job. Actually the strap made the bag very uncomfortable to wear - it was too thin and constantly twisting on the shoulder.

I wrote to ALDI and have just received a curt reply:

"Aldi Company policy for 'Special Buy Items' is to offer a 12 month guarantee period; if the product is found as being 'unfit for purpose' within that timescale you can return the item with proof of purchase to your nearest store for a full refund."

On the face of it this seems reasonable. But... the bag was bought with a load of groceries and although I am silly about hanging on to receipts after a few weeks this would have been binned. Now I am faced with writing once more to explain this and from the tone of the reply they are unlikely to be interested.

In my opinion, and bearing in mind this bag has had minimal wear and tear, I would avoid.

DO NOT BUY!

Oh and any problems and you have to write a letter. There is no e-mail facility with Aldi; probably to reduce the number of annoying little complaints like mine.

So as above - AVOID THESE BAGS.
 
Just take it back to the store :shrug:
 
So you buy a bag for £9.99... Fine

You use it and some stitching comes off... Ok..

You write to the company explaining and they tell you how to get a refund... Excellent..

You can't be bothered to take it back and come on here to moan about it... ?
 
Wrong Tom.

I am simply pointing out that the bag is not up to scratch. Refunds or not is a side issue. If I cannot find the receipt I cannot take it back. Money is not the issue.

But thanks anyway.
 
Get what you pay for, it's £9.99 from Aldi. Maybe it was just a dodgy batch but i'd hardly expect it to last for years
 
ManceRayder said:
Get what you pay for, it's £9.99 from Aldi. Maybe it was just a dodgy batch but i'd hardly expect it to last for years
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Have to agree. The likes of Aldi and Primark sell stuff cheap - the quality will not be great. Which t shirt is likely to look better after 20 washes - one costing £3 from Primark or one costing £25 from Banana Republic.

To be fair, how do they know that bag isnt 2 years old? Seems fair enough to me.
 
With a few exceptions, you get exactly what you pay for with a camera bag.

Based on what I have read about these in the past they are just about suitable for a lightweight DSLR with a couple of 'kit' type lenses and associated filters etc.

If you are still using the 20D in your bag along with even a couple of your listed lenses, you are probably over the very basic weight expectation for that bag.
 
I have an Aldi bag (£8.99 I think). It carries my G5, 7-14, 12-35 and 35-100 quite nicely. I actually haven't found a bag I'd rather use...
 
Things like this are almost always destined to fail. I'm glad the stitching came undone slowly rather than the strap coming off as you walked about with the bag. At least the worst off you'll be is £10.

There's no way I'd even contemplate trusting a dslr and lenses in that bag but I tend to mistrust 'bargain buys'. Whether it's being misrepresented in marketing or people just expect too much from it by thinking along the lines of 'a camera bag is a camera bag' I'm not sure but as has been said you tend to get what you pay for. The little zipped bag/case my compact camera goes in was about £10 and that was a little chunk less than rrp.
 
Spuff said:
Agree with this. There is actually no legal requirement for you to produce a receipt.
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I think you'll find that there is a requirement to provide proof of purchase (e.g., credit card statement). Otherwise how do they even know you bought it at that store, or from that company? Or that it was six weeks ago, as you might claim, rather than a year ago (important as the onus is on the retailer to prove the fault is not inherent if the goods are less than 6 months old - otherwise it's up to you to prove that it is an inherent fault).
 
hollis_f said:
I think you'll find that there is a requirement to provide proof of purchase (e.g., credit card statement). Otherwise how do they even know you bought it at that store, or from that company? Or that it was six weeks ago, as you might claim, rather than a year ago (important as the onus is on the retailer to prove the fault is not inherent if the goods are less than 6 months old - otherwise it's up to you to prove that it is an inherent fault).
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Doesn't the Aldi store have an epos system which will show when it was bought? Take the bank statement in which will have the full transaction amount on. They should be able to search for it. Did it have tags on?

I wouldn't expect a 9.99 camera bag to be brilliant but I'd expect a year of reasonable use out of it.

Money saving expert site is the one to look on as it has best run down of consumer rights.
 
srichards said:
I wouldn't expect a 9.99 camera bag to be brilliant but I'd expect a year of reasonable use out of it.
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Absolutely. But the problem is proving that the use was reasonable and that you've not been using the bag to transport bricks up ladders for 8 hours a day.
 
hollis_f said:
Absolutely. But the problem is proving that the use was reasonable and that you've not been using the bag to transport bricks up ladders for 8 hours a day.
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Then you can never take anything back. It's not up to you to prove a negative. It would be up to the shop to prove you have been using it to transport bricks in this instance or to have abused it.
 
Working for a large retail company, we have always been trained to ask for proof of purchase for returns. However, by law you don't need a receipt to return faulty goods. You may not be able to get a cash/card refund without proof of purchase though. The law is a bit vague though, they only specify that the goods should last for a reasonable period of time. Noone actually defines what constitutes reasonable. A very grey area tbh.
 
srichards said:
Then you can never take anything back. It's not up to you to prove a negative. It would be up to the shop to prove you have been using it to transport bricks in this instance or to have abused it.
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If the goods are more than 6 months old then it is up to you to prove that the problem is an inherent fault. If they're less than 6 months old it's the retailer that has to prove it is not an inherent fault.

That's not my opinion - that's the law see pages 3&4.
 
Thanks to all.

I posted simply to warn other toggers that these bags are not up to the mark.

The bag has never been abused as stated in the original post, once a week basically.

Moving on from that I was trying to point out that ALDI sort of failed.

I actually took the trouble to write to them, to let them know that one of their products had failed. I could of course thought "right that's it, I'm not buying any more specials from Aldi", but I didn't. I actually took the trouble to sit down and compose a letter. How many of us actually write when we have a complaint?


Their response has been poor. They obviously know that their 'specials' are bought with groceries so the likelihood of a receipt being extant two, three or even six months later is remote.

The product has failed. I have even gone to the trouble of letting them know - is that feedback?

I am outlining my experiences in dealing with ALDI.

Believe me money is not the issue.


Their response should have been along the lines of:


"Thank you for your feedback. We will refer this matter to our suppliers. In the meantime please return the bag to any of our stores with a copy of this letter and you will be offered a refund / credit note."

Further,

Thank you for taking the time to provide a "user review" of one of our products, your comments will be taken into account in subsequent product reviews.
 
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huxleypiggles said:
Thanks to all.

I posted simply to warn other toggers that these bags are not up to the mark.

The bag has never been abused as stated in the original post, once a week basically.

Moving on from that I was trying to point out that ALDI sort of failed.

I actually took the trouble to write to them, to let them know that one of their products had failed. I could of course thought "right that's it, I'm not buying any more specials from Aldi", but I didn't. I actually took the trouble to sit down and compose a letter. How many of us actually write when we have a complaint?

Their response has been poor. They obviously know that their 'specials' are bought with groceries so the likelihood of a receipt being extant two, three or even six months later is remote.

The product has failed. I have even gone to the trouble of letting them know - is that feedback?

I am outlining my experiences in dealing with ALDI.

Believe me money is not the issue.

Their response should have been along the lines of:

"Thank you for your feedback. We will refer this matter to our suppliers. In the meantime please return the bag to any of our stores with a copy of this letter and you will be offered a refund / credit note."

Further,

Thank you for taking the time to provide a "user review" of one of our products, your comments will be taken into account in subsequent product reviews.
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Which they basically did?

I still maintain, a £9.99 bag is not going to b great quality
 
Thanks again.

Believe me if I took this bag back it would show no signs of wear apart from the shoulder strap. My letter to Aldi admitted as much. The bag itself is ok.
 
Simon,

Thanks for following the thread. The Sale of Goods Act states that products should be of merchantable quality and have a life expectancy in keeping with their intended use.

The bag is falling apart after six months - very light use.

I am not interested that ALDI asked me to pay a tenner. I paid. I am entitled to expect at least 12 months wear.
 
cambsno said:
Have to agree. The likes of Aldi and Primark sell stuff cheap - the quality will not be great. Which t shirt is likely to look better after 20 washes - one costing £3 from Primark or one costing £25 from Banana Republic.

To be fair, how do they know that bag isnt 2 years old? Seems fair enough to me.
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I have to disagree with you there. 90% of my tee shirts are from primark, many of them over a year old. They've obviously been washed alot and still going strong and look good. That's not a personal opinion, I often get asked about where to get them and have to reply in the past.

Whilst I agree there's a misconception of you get what you pay for,you can generally tell if something will last you.
 
huxleypiggles said:
They obviously know that their 'specials' are bought with groceries so the likelihood of a receipt being extant two, three or even six months later is remote.

.
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I don't get your reasoning, why does the fact you bought groceries mean you can't or don't keep the receipt? :shrug: The receipt is still the same as one you would get if you didn't buy groceries.

As an example, I bought a Gorrilapod copy from Lidl last week, along with about £30 of groceries, as it has a 12 month warranty the receipt went into the gorillapod box even before I left the store.

No matter what else is on the receipt, it's still just a small easily folded and stored piece of paper...
 
I bought one of these bags...

The stitching on the padded bit has come loose...
and one of the zip pulls broke.

That's it, and I'm not really bothered as I didn't need the padded bit and the other zip works fine and other than that it's still in good condition despite seeing quite a bit of use and in fact it's still in use.

It's ok for under £10 IMVHO but they should tell the supplier to sort the padded bit out as it's clearly a weak point that you could deduce as such by looking at it and feeling it and could be made better with zero additional cost.
 
Thanks Dave. Obviously your house is awash with receipts.

Go on give us a clue,

Tesco, Morrisons, Aldi, Sainsburys, Asda, Lidl? Any others?

Don't be shy now...
 
I have to agree re: the receipt. I wouldn't have kept one for a £9.99 camera bag either, and the fact it came along with a load of groceries would have expedited the shredding of it. If it had been more expensive then I would have kept it, but I think the crux of the matter is that huxleypiggles isn't overly fussed about the money. It's just a case of wanting other people to know there may be issues with the shoulder strap (at least in one case) and that if there are problems Aldi seemingly won't offer to help without the proof of purchase - so letting people know that if you buy a 'special' from aldi be sure to keep the receipt. Some retailers get a reputation for going beyond the basic requirements with the customer service they offer. That doesn't seem to be the case here.
 
huxleypiggles said:
Thanks Dave. Obviously your house is awash with receipts.

Go on give us a clue,

Tesco, Morrisons, Aldi, Sainsburys, Asda, Lidl? Any others?

Don't be shy now...
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It's not hard, or even take much intelligence to realise that if the item might have a warranty claim to keep the receipt. Other than obtuse people who like sarcasm it would be pretty hard for a house to be "awash with receipts" just for items that have warranties, don't you have box files on your planet? For a few £ you could store thousands of receipts.

Or you could just cry on the Internet because the horrible man at Aldi wrote you a nasty letter because you couldn't prove when you bought an item so couldn't claim on the warranty :shake:.

Perhaps when you learn the difference between safeguarding receipts for items you might need for warranty and your Tesco, Morrisons, Aldi, Sainsburys, Asda receipts from your groceries you might have a chance.

But if being sarcastic makes you feel better, carry on, good lad :lol:.
 
Stu,

Thank you.

At the risk of stating the obvious at least you read the thread.

Believe me money is not the issue and perhaps I confused matters.


My first point was that the bag itself acquitted itself well. The shoulder strap did not.

I wrote to ALDI. How many people write with a complaint these days?

However, ALDI are clearly not interested.

Price , as far as I am concerned is irrelevant: if ALDI asked £10 for a camera bag I am entitled to expect at least 12 months wear, and that means more than one night a week at nightschool.
 
Dave,

Just go back to the start.

I bought a camera bag from ALDI. Within six months it was degrading. I posted this on here simply to warn other toggers. And what have you done.... belittled my comments.

Frankly, it's not about the cost of the bag but I feel I am wasting my time with peole like you.

PS. I don't suppose you drive a German car by any chance?
 
I'm struggling to understand why you think they are not interested when they have told you that you can get a refund.

The fact that you had a dodgy shoulder strap does not mean that every single camera bag they sell will have a dodgy shoulder strap so they probably don't see the need to look any further into it.

Were you expecting them to recall all the bags because 1 broke in under 12 months?

Yes yours should have lasted you at least 12 months after paying £10. That is a pretty reasonable expectation. But it didn't. It's probably a one off defective bag. They've said you can have a refund. But you haven't kept your proof of purchase.

As far as I'm concerned I would have been happy with the response they gave.
 
huxleypiggles said:
Dave,

Just go back to the start.

I bought a camera bag from ALDI. Within six months it was degrading. I posted this on here simply to warn other toggers. And what have you done.... belittled my comments.

Frankly, it's not about the cost of the bag but I feel I am wasting my time with peole like you.
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Why not just post the more appropriate warning that applies to ALL items that come with a warranty? It's really simple, keep the receipt safe for the period the warranty is good, then, if the item has a warranty issue you retrieve the receipt from wherever you stored it and take the item back.

The average person, even if they buy one item a week which might break under warranty still won't fill a large envelope with receipts by the end of a 12 month period.

No moaning, complaining, or blaming others required. You'll get a refund or replacement and won't have to put up with the faulty item.

But some people just prefer to moan and complain :shrug:.

Oh, and to add, I didn't belittle your original post, I posted a sensible response which you decided to answer with sarcasm, that was the post I belittled. Perhaps you wrote to Aldi in a similar manner and that's why they were disinterested in your complaint?
 
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Bloody hell this is like p$$&g in the wind.

I bought the bag with a pile of groceries. After minimal use it has failed. ALDI will refund if I have a receipt - 5 or 6 months after purchase. The receipt is gone.

All I am trying to do is warn fellow hobbyists not to buy one of these bags.........

Why on earth did I bother...............?












Oh by the way.................the current range of camera bags are the best ever and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
 
Why shouldn't they buy one of those bags? Just because yours was defective it doesn't mean theirs will be.

Someone already posted on here that they had one and its served them fine.
 
That £40 dual screen waterproof camera looks a good buy.
 
KryptoNeo said:
Why shouldn't they buy one of those bags? Just because yours was defective it doesn't mean theirs will be.

Someone already posted on here that they had one and its served them fine.
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Of course it doesn't. However if I'm considering two items that are the same price and hear that someone had one of them and it broke in some way or another then that would possibly sway my decision.
 
How much in total does the gear you put into this bag cost?

I'm not being mean or anything, but I really believe if you respect your gear, which would have cost a fair amount, even at the lower end - you'd put some thought and expense into what holds it all together when out and about too.

I love a bargain, but a bag for holding expensive gear is not something I would bargain on.
 
I think i have the same bag you describe because I know what you mean about the thin shoulder strap being uncomfortable. I got it as a cheapy but haven't used it much. Am looking for something more comfortable for my hols later this year.

But I've always found Aldi to be very fair with their refunds. Sounds to me like you haven't even tried to take it back and YOU threw the receipt away. So what is it exactly you are complaining about?

It's not like they've refused to replace/refund and neither did they throw the receipt away. You did that. So the way I see it, you are being quite unfair.

A couple of years ago I purchased a Sony DSLR which broke down after 2 weeks. Would it be fair of me to go around complaining that Sony cameras are rubbish quality and warn everyone not to buy them based on my massive sample size of one?
 
Buy cheap, buy twice! Come on, really what do you expect for a ten pound note these days? If we were talking £100 quid of Lowepro, I'd totally agree!
 
Is it not possible to put a new strap on it?
If the basic bag is fit for purpose but the strap is thin you can have a decent combination by sourcing a new strap.

I'm suggesting this for those who are tempted to purchase the Aldi bag.

Make do and mend.
Keep calm and carry on...:)
 
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