There is a specific route for this, it works in your favour, and it is time-sensitive.
Report it from the order, today
The order has an option for exactly this — you came and it was closed, or it was not ready.
Report it before your collect-by time expires. That is the condition. Do it and:
- The clock stops.
- A dispute opens, and Metzee decides.
- If it was the store's fault, you get a full refund and no strike.
- If it was not, the clock carries on with the time that was left — so you have not lost anything by reporting it.
That last point is why there is no downside to reporting honestly. The worst outcome is the clock resuming where it paused.
Why the same day matters
"I turned up on Tuesday and it was shut" is a strong statement made on Tuesday and a weak one made the following week. The seller's own records, their stated hours and your trip all line up while it is fresh.
Leave it a week and you are asking somebody to decide between two accounts of a day nobody can check.
What helps
- The date and time you went, specifically.
- A photograph, if there is something to photograph — a shut shutter, a closed gate, a note on the door.
- Any message you sent the seller before going.
Tell the seller too
Separately from reporting it. "I came at 4 on Tuesday and the shop was closed — when would suit?" Plenty of these are a seller who had an emergency, and they will reopen the arrangement.
Doing both is right: the report protects your clock, the message gets your item.
What this is not
Not a no-show by you. A no-show is the collect-by time passing with nothing agreed and nothing reported. You reported it, so it is not that. I missed the collect-by time
If it was not ready rather than closed
Same route. A store that has not marked the order ready has not started your clock at all — the collect-by time runs from ready, not from payment — so arriving before that is early rather than late.
Which is worth checking before you travel: wait for the order to say it is ready. That is the signal, not your own sense of how long it should have taken.
If it keeps happening
A store whose stated hours do not match reality is a store to stop buying from, and the report is how that becomes visible to anybody but you.
More: how pickup works, what hours can I collect, how to collect an order.