The Home Depot — Local services in Ottawa

Home Depot's consumer experience has not been good in the last few years. I'm truly feeling like a curmudgeon these days but I promise it's just home depot doing it to me.

Most recently from memory in this location, algonquin and the south keys location, I've had the same issues with:

Staff knowledge or helpfulness. They have not made a strong effort in my experience to actually offer alternatives, ideas or guide me to an item. They also haven't seemed to want to ask other staff for help when unable to. Some staff have outright just said "No" or "I don't know" without further comment- about pretty routine, simple questions, or items that are extremely general.

At this specific location I had come for an item, and the poor (and kind) fella at the counter was very tenacious about tracking down a staff member to find my item. He was working solo with zero support and frustratedly mentioned he had no help and nobody was communicating with him. It was one unique SKU, in stock, and they had several. Firstly, among nearly 34 staff I counted not one was available, busy, that's fine, it happens. 40 minutes pass and the man has made 4 calls and radios to different people, and he tells me that no physically able staff are available to climb the ladder because they're too old to reach the overhead. In an hour there was only one guy to climb up who was also swamped. Then we collectively find out that somehow this skid is lost for the time being. It was received, put out, but simply not findable. All 3 staff involved were apologetic and kind but clearly frustrated and overwhelmed with the day and the lack of communication or accuracy.

On the topic of staff knowledge- many staff don't seem to have a lot of knowledge on their sections or general function of the items. Even flagship stuff like packouts I simply could not find anyone willing or able to give me some brief insight. Dare to ask about electrical or HVAC equipment and I don't think most staff would be able to genuinely help. They seem to rely on your own trade/hobby experience to find what you need.

At the algonquin location I have been confidently (falsely) accused of theft not once but twice. Once while doing my authorized BY HOME DEPOT job, another time when I just window shopped to kill time and walked out empty handed. Clearly staff are not on the same page here and both times they backed off immediately despite making what felt like very arrogant comments about their suspicions. One person actually came out and told me that my very job, which works with HD provincially, on contract, was not allowed to collect there. (Wrong, and this is a regular biweekly stop I make, most front and warehouse staff know my deal by now)

I can recall 2 times i have asked for help and waited around for 20, 30 minutes and nobody ever came. I never moved aisles other than to look for literally anybody. Staff should not be giving assurances if they cannot deliver in that moment. People's time is valuable especially if they're in the process of working or DIYing. I can't imagine coming here for urgent jobsite materials or equipment and wasting that labor on waiting around. Except I've done that too, LOL.

Lastly, this specific Cyrville location I can attest is extremely disorganized. The warehouse looks like a disaster came through, staff are distracted and overwhelmed, and general organization outside of the merchandised items is not great.

I unfortunately deal with HD through my jobs a lot. I worked in hardware retail in a past life. I know how it goes. I get it. HD just seems to not care. "too big to fail" or whatever.

You'd be better off most cases going to Home Hardware, Princess Auto, or Preston. All 3 of those places have some truly exemplary staff and morale, with good knowledge too. It hurts me too because when I worked hardware I genuinely enjoyed solving people's problems and helping them. Staff here can seem more annoyed to be bothered at all or just task-swamped.

I think home depot as a company is just decomposing on the...

Normally I would never take the time to write a review but this was one for the books. I am writing to express my extreme disappointment with the service I received on at your store, specifically from a staff member in the paint section named Rosaline. This interaction was one of the most frustrating and unprofessional experiences I have ever encountered in any customer service setting.

When my partner and I approached the paint counter, we waited for over ten minutes without Rosaline once acknowledging our presence, even after I tried to get her attention. When I politely approached her to ask for assistance, she seemed startled, as though I had disrupted her from something other than her duties. I returned to the counter to wait, and despite standing in front of her, it took another two minutes for her to even walk toward us.

When she finally approached, her demeanor was shocking. She glanced at the paint chip in my hand and audibly said, “Oh God,” in a tone that made it clear she was annoyed by our presence. Stunned, I asked if everything was okay or if we should seek help from someone else. She responded in a bored tone, “What do you want?”—a level of attitude and indifference that left both my partner and me speechless.

When my partner explained that we needed a colour match, she proceeded to fumble with the computer, refusing to respond to simple questions like, “Should we come back later?” or “Can we take a walk while you’re doing this?” Her complete lack of engagement was baffling.

At one point, the manager approached to check on her progress, but even then, she muttered something under her breath that none of us could hear. As the manager stepped in to assist, Rosaline put her head down on the counter with her arms crossed, like a child throwing a tantrum.

To make matters worse, after nearly 40 minutes, when the manager completed the task and handed her the paint to give to us, she made a deliberate show of pulling it back just as my partner reached for it. She then set it down on the counter and walked away without a word to any of us.

This behavior was unprofessional, disrespectful, and unacceptable. Not only did Rosaline waste our time, but her attitude and actions also left us gobsmacked and deeply dissatisfied with the service provided. If I could give a zero star I would.

I strongly urge you to address this matter seriously. Rosaline’s conduct demonstrates a complete lack of suitability for a customer-facing role. I sincerely hope that this feedback will result in appropriate action to prevent such experiences for...

I will not buy another major appliance from Home Depot after my undesired experience, there are other appliance stores out there with better service.

I bought a dishwasher from Home Depot online, along with installation and disposal of the old. I scheduled delivery for a certain date (which was a week out — which was perfect), then I got a call the next day from their third party installer asking if I received the dishwasher (??) and said they would be available in 2-weeks to install. I told them I haven’t received it yet and gave them the date it was scheduled for. I also said their installation is too far out as we’ll have the dishwasher sitting in our kitchen for just over a week.

They said to call Home Depot and reschedule my delivery closer to the install date was my best option, which I then proceeded to do. I called Home Depot, sat on hold for a half hour and rescheduled the delivery to the day before installation. I then asked them to confirm the installation was still as scheduled, which they did.

Well nothing went as per that conversation. Sure enough to our surprise the dishwasher showed up on the original date which then sat in our kitchen for over a week. Then the installer never showed up. I was on the phone with Home Depot for at least an hour trying to understand what happened and sort out. To no avail, I gave up and drove to Home Depot to try and get some answers, keep in mind this was an online order. I came to find out, it wasn’t scheduled at all for installation and was actually cancelled by the third party installer??? At this point I was frustrated and asked them to just refund me for the installation and I’ll hire someone on my own, which then took another hour of my time at Home Depot as the customer service representative went back and forth through a messenger chat with the installer on her computer.

Home Depot relies on third party delivery and installers. Based on my experience there is a major disconnect between them and they have no expectations or control of their installers. Additionally, if you have an issue, it’s impossible to get anyone on the phone related to deliveries or installations.

Buy your nails and screws at Home Depot. Anything else, go somewhere else, there so many other amazing options that provide superior customer service and reliability.

I...