A MUM is furious with retail giant Amazon thanks to a packaging gaffe.
Tina Booth was furious when her daughter discovered the present in a see-through plastic bag on their front porch.
The mum, from Staffordshire, had purchased a £42 Remington hairdryer from Amazon for her daughter, who is in her twenties.
She explained that, as money is tight this year, the hairdryer is her daughter's only gift – but she now knows what it is.
The package was delivered along with two other boxes, which came in concealed packaging.
The 52-year-old told Stoke on Trent Live: "My daughter is disappointed that she has found out what her Christmas present is from us.
"In my opinion, it is the company's fault for sending out items in see-through packaging.
"At this time of year, knowing it’s Christmas and knowing things have been going missing off people’s doorsteps – it’s obvious that if something of that value is sitting there, it won’t stay there for that long."
The mum explained that when she contacted Amazon to complain she was told she should have selected the "gift" option to ensure the packaging didn't give away what was inside.
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But she claims due to a timing issue she hurriedly selected the "quick swipe" option and there was no preference for whether the purchase was a gift.
She added: "The biggest issue is that it was left in an unwrapped state on the porch.
"I didn’t know you had to tick the gift option. It didn’t come up as a warning."
Tina claims she now has to double check everything she buys, adding that she has "spent thousands" on the online shopping site.
The mum insists it's the first time Amazon has ever delivered anything to her in packaging like that.
She added: "They told me it’s their policy to be environmentally friendly and reduce packaging.
"But they contradicted themselves because they sent two parcels in cardboard and the other one in a plastic bag, how is that environmentally friendly?
“They could’ve put all three things in one box and that would’ve solved the problem.”
And she claims Amazon originally told her the only thing she could do was return the item – which would leave her daughter without a single Christmas present, which would leave her "doubly disappointed".
Tina warned other shoppers: "Be careful because this could happen to you. You could leave something really expensive and you haven’t thought about it."
The mum said the retail giant has since apologised and offered her a £40 gesture of goodwill.
A spokesperson for Amazon said: "We offer customers the option to conceal their product at no cost by selecting 'Ship in Amazon Packaging' at the checkout.
"Amazon continually works on behalf of customers to reduce and minimise the amount of packaging materials we use under our frustration-free packaging programme.
"As part of the programme we have worked with manufacturers around the world to design their products to ship in their own packaging without the need for additional packaging.
"Smaller and lighter packages mean Amazon can pack more orders into each delivery, resulting in fewer trips and less fuel used — all of which minimise our carbon footprint.
"Since 2015, we have reduced the weight of outbound packaging per shipment by 36 per cent and eliminated over one million tons of packaging material, the equivalent of over two billion shipping boxes."
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