Sofia quality issues?

neens0

Member
Dec 14, 2006
41
0
Has anyone had any quality issues with their Sofia? My strap broke for no reason (was just walking) and I've only had the bag for a week. Haha even worse, the bag fell in the snow :/

I've returned the bag to Ferragamo.com :sad: and waiting to see if they will offer a refund or a replacement.

I really love the Sofia though so I'm unsure to ask for a refund or a replacement. I don't want another bag that will fall apart on me again. Even if it was just the strap that broke, what else will wear down in a month, a year, etc?

What do you think? Maybe I was just unlucky and should try another Sofia? Any quality issues with your Sofia(s)? Please share!
 
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Where and how did the strap break? Did it tear or did the hardware fall off? I've been wearing Ferragamo for years and have not had a problem with any bags. Let us know what happens.
 
The hardware broke off. I was just simply walkinh not pulling on it or anything. Which yes maybe it's not that big of a deal but then I think about urban outfitters bags that the strap never broke off?

I thought ferragamo made good quality bags so I was very surprised this happened. Glad to hear you haven't had problems with yours.
 
I can definitely say their customer service sucks, or more so non existent. I shipped out my defective bag and I know from the Fedex tracking that they received it last week. Yet I have yet to hear anything from them, no response saying they've received my bag or whether they'll refund or repair, nothing.

I've sent numerous emails even when I was purchasing the bag and none of them have ever been answered and no one ever answers their phone on the website. I get better CS from JCrew.
 
Update - I saw the refund on my credit card which is great. FYI they still never sent me any notification that a refund was processed or replied to any of my emails for anyone who is considering buying from their website. I was given no option to have it repaired or refunded since I had no contact from them. Expect little if any customer service.

Great to hear someone hasn't had any issues with their Sofia. I did like the bag too bad this happened.
 
I took my Sophia to the local boutique to punch another hole in the strap to make it shorter. The area from the hole he punched to the tip of the strap seems long. The associate told me to wear it a few weeks to check it out. He said he can send it to New Jersey and see if they can fix it to make it not as long. I wonder if they would cut and resew it. He said he doesn't think they would charge for that service. I assume you don't have a boutique close by to bring it in to let them send to NJ for repair.

I've sent my returns via their shipping label and never received any email that return was received and refund was processed. But they processed it a few days after receipt of item. It would have been nice if they notify me though.
 
I took my Sophia to the local boutique to punch another hole in the strap to make it shorter. The area from the hole he punched to the tip of the strap seems long. The associate told me to wear it a few weeks to check it out. He said he can send it to New Jersey and see if they can fix it to make it not as long. I wonder if they would cut and resew it. He said he doesn't think they would charge for that service. I assume you don't have a boutique close by to bring it in to let them send to NJ for repair.

I've sent my returns via their shipping label and never received any email that return was received and refund was processed. But they processed it a few days after receipt of item. It would have been nice if they notify me though.
sorry to hear you had problems with their lack of response as well. So it definitely seems their email service is non existent.

I also agree, even though they process the refund it'd be nice to get email confirmation so you can verify that all is in good order.
 
I took my Sophia to the local boutique to punch another hole in the strap to make it shorter. The area from the hole he punched to the tip of the strap seems long. The associate told me to wear it a few weeks to check it out. He said he can send it to New Jersey and see if they can fix it to make it not as long. I wonder if they would cut and resew it. He said he doesn't think they would charge for that service. I assume you don't have a boutique close by to bring it in to let them send to NJ for repair.

I've sent my returns via their shipping label and never received any email that return was received and refund was processed. But they processed it a few days after receipt of item. It would have been nice if they notify me though.

good idea
 
i'm from Singapore and a big ferragamo fan. i own several of their bags and purses and i've only ever had problems with the sofia! which was a shame as i love the design but my experience with it has put me off the sofia and all their purses which have the gancino buckle closure forever.

what happened was i bought the bag at the duty free store while transiting through dubai airport. i carried the bag probably about 10x, took great care of it, and the clasp / buckle broke barely a month later! what happened was the entire gancino buckle broke off and that meant i had no way of using the bag since the flap can't be secured.

i had a huge tussle with the staff at the local ferragamo boutique about the quality of the bag. they offered to repair it for free but told me i had to wait 6 - 9 months! they said they have no spare hardware "parts" and all "parts" have to be shipped from italy. naturally i refused as it's incredulous that i've to wait 6 - 9 mths to get my bag back when i only had it for less than a month. so i demanded a refund or an exchange which was when things got ugly.

apparently only items sold at boutiques are entitled to a refund or an exchange. items bought from duty free stores are not entitled to the same, reason being these items are actually not sold by ferragamo but by the duty free stores. they are genuine ferragamo items but ferragamo's policy is not to allow refunds or exchanges for items not bought at their boutiques.

naturally i disagreed and told the staff that from the customer's point of view, this policy is unacceptable and unreasonable. although the bag was purchased from the duty free store, it was purchased from the ferragamo counter. how on earth am i supposed to or expected to know there was this distinction between items bought at the boutiques and the duty free stores? further, as a luxury brand with boutiques worldwide, i find it incredulous that they can't do an exchange or refund when this is clearly their product and it would take 6 - 9 months to repair a clasp.

to cut a long story short, after heated discussions with the staff, threats to write to the media, i got my refund. but it took 3 - 4 painful months before they agreed to the refund (apparently they had to get approval from the regional head office in hong kong) and i got my money back. i even had to go to the boutique in person 3 times and made several calls and sent several emails to the local boutique. it was a very unpleasant experience and if i didn't love their stuff so much, i would have boycotted the brand.

as i had such an unpleasant experience with the sofia, i think you lucked out in actually getting the refund so quickly! :smile: i personally will not buy the sofia or any of the large gancino clasp buckle bags again, but i've had no problems with the bags and wallets that have smaller gancino clasp buckles as well as their leather bracelets with the small gancino clasp buckles. i wonder if it's a buckle quality issue as the weight of the buckle is quite hefty and it may be more prone to breaking than the smaller ones. my 2 cents worth.
 
i'm from Singapore and a big ferragamo fan. i own several of their bags and purses and i've only ever had problems with the sofia! which was a shame as i love the design but my experience with it has put me off the sofia and all their purses which have the gancino buckle closure forever.

what happened was i bought the bag at the duty free store while transiting through dubai airport. i carried the bag probably about 10x, took great care of it, and the clasp / buckle broke barely a month later! what happened was the entire gancino buckle broke off and that meant i had no way of using the bag since the flap can't be secured.

i had a huge tussle with the staff at the local ferragamo boutique about the quality of the bag. they offered to repair it for free but told me i had to wait 6 - 9 months! they said they have no spare hardware "parts" and all "parts" have to be shipped from italy. naturally i refused as it's incredulous that i've to wait 6 - 9 mths to get my bag back when i only had it for less than a month. so i demanded a refund or an exchange which was when things got ugly.

apparently only items sold at boutiques are entitled to a refund or an exchange. items bought from duty free stores are not entitled to the same, reason being these items are actually not sold by ferragamo but by the duty free stores. they are genuine ferragamo items but ferragamo's policy is not to allow refunds or exchanges for items not bought at their boutiques.

naturally i disagreed and told the staff that from the customer's point of view, this policy is unacceptable and unreasonable. although the bag was purchased from the duty free store, it was purchased from the ferragamo counter. how on earth am i supposed to or expected to know there was this distinction between items bought at the boutiques and the duty free stores? further, as a luxury brand with boutiques worldwide, i find it incredulous that they can't do an exchange or refund when this is clearly their product and it would take 6 - 9 months to repair a clasp.

to cut a long story short, after heated discussions with the staff, threats to write to the media, i got my refund. but it took 3 - 4 painful months before they agreed to the refund (apparently they had to get approval from the regional head office in hong kong) and i got my money back. i even had to go to the boutique in person 3 times and made several calls and sent several emails to the local boutique. it was a very unpleasant experience and if i didn't love their stuff so much, i would have boycotted the brand.

as i had such an unpleasant experience with the sofia, i think you lucked out in actually getting the refund so quickly! :smile: i personally will not buy the sofia or any of the large gancino clasp buckle bags again, but i've had no problems with the bags and wallets that have smaller gancino clasp buckles as well as their leather bracelets with the small gancino clasp buckles. i wonder if it's a buckle quality issue as the weight of the buckle is quite hefty and it may be more prone to breaking than the smaller ones. my 2 cents worth.
I got a refund easily because I purchased from the Ferragamo websites. So it seems that they have hardware issues with the Sofia bag. Good to know because I have been wondering if maybe I just got that one bad bag....

Even bags that I've bought from Zara or Urban Outfitters for < $100 have never fallen apart on me like this. Too bad because I really love the style.
 
I have a Sofia and have not had any problems with it.

I do wonder about the gancino closure and how much it can take. It seems to me that if you zip the top main zipper, it appears to put a little less stress on the gancino buckle flippy thing. I had wondered why they would put a zipper inside a fastened flap, but I now believe it is to reduce stress on the gancino