Budgeting trumps Christmas hampers

Margaret Perry with one of her youngest, Kira Makene Baker, 3, at home. Photo / Greg Bowker

A Mangere mother says she loves the Chrisco experience, but has moved away from it after improving her budgeting.

Margaret Perry said the convenience was not worth the premiums on her tight budget.

Chrisco operates a plan under which customers make payments throughout the year towards a hamper of Christmas fare.

The company has pleaded guilty to charges under the Fair Trading Act relating to its fees for cancelling orders, but says it has changed its cancellations policy.

Ms Perry is a voluntary community worker and has a stall at flea markets on weekends for extra income.

She says she shopped around local stores and could get what she needed at a fraction of the price of hampers.

"The problem is I would rather spend my money on fruit and veges than on rubbish."

Ms Perry has six children in the house, and she said saving money and still finding enough time could be a tricky balance.

Simon Clark, who has two young children, said he had started buying hampers last year and enjoyed the surprise.

"It's just easy to get a big group of shopping out of the way."

This year's delivery came last Friday, but a vacuum cleaner he'd ordered was missing. He rang Chrisco and it is now on its way.

"They responded quite well, they just seemed surprised about it more than anything," he said.

But Kate Moffat has had worse experiences with customer service. For two years running she received an incomplete hamper and said she did not think the offer of a discount on next year's hamper was good enough.

The second time, her ham did not arrive, so she had to go to the supermarket among the crowds she had hoped to avoid, she said.

A Chrisco spokeswoman said the company's policy was that if any product was missing from a hamper it would either credit the amount of the product against next year's order or provide a refund for the product.

Chrisco's catalogues state that it charges slightly more than supermarkets. This was because the company did not have the buying power of supermarket chains and its costs included managing customers' accounts and packing and delivery charges, she said.

"More importantly, many people enjoy the convenience of being able to spread payments over the year.

"For many New Zealanders the spread payments allows them to get goods for Christmas which they would not be able to do if they had to pay all in one hit.