Others

The Idle Man Review 2024: Is It Legit or Scam?

  • Quality
    (3.5)
  • Return Policy
    (3.5)
  • (3.5)
  • Customer Care service
    (3.5)
Overall
3.5

The Idle Man is a men’s fashion retailer online that provides advice and products suited to the modern male. The Idle Man a store that exists to make you look good with minimum hassle. The first part (a store that’ll make you look good) suggests that they provide top quality, classy styles; while the second part (with minimum hassle) suggests that they provide excellent service.

Does The Idle Man really provide excellent styles and excellent service? In the first place, is The Idle Man a legit store?

This The Idle Man review will examine The Idle Man to provide the information that’ll help you answer those questions and more.

The Idle Man is a legit online fashion store. It is not a scam because you will receive your purchased items from the site without a problem. And they will never steal your credit card details or charge you without your consent.

The Idle Man review at a glance

  • The UK based online fashion retailer
  • It’s an exclusive men’s fashion store
  • Ships to over 200 countries worldwide; and free shipping is available to all locations
  • Returns are allowed if made within 28 days of the delivery date
  • Exchanges are not allowed

What is The Idle Man?

If you’ve poked around the fashion retailing business, you’ll notice that there is a lack of attention paid to men. It’s almost as if only women should be well dressed. Oliver Tezcan created The Idle Man in 2014 because of this same reason. After a decade of working with Asos.com as the buying manager for their men’s wear line, he decided to create an exclusive men’s wear shop to fill the obvious hole in the fashion market.

Thus, The Idle Man provides only men’s clothing and fashion accessories. The store primarily targets men in the twenty-something to thirty-something age range. Though, relatively young in the fashion scenes, The Idle Man has gained a lot of following and is fast becoming the go-to destination for most men. In the first quarter of 2017, the online store even made it into the Telegraph’s list of “the 30 best Men’s fashion websites”.

The Idle Man sells own-label items as well as handpicked items from popular brands. In fact, The Idle Man has not one but three own labels; The Idle Man is the regular label, T.I.M is the basic label, and Idle Projects is the premium label.

Is The Idle Man legit?

The Idle Man is legit, and not a scam, as of writing this The Idle Man review. Whether an online platform is legit or a scam is one of the first questions that online shoppers ask. And you should too because if you fall prey to scam stores, you’ll find yourself paying for an order, and not receiving the package.

Thus, you’ll want to make sure that The Idle Man is a legit fashion store. In this regard, there’s no doubt that The Idle Man is legit. First, the company is 100% legal. The company is incorporated in the UK as Idle Projects Ltd with registration number 08484139. Suffice it to say that no fake/ scam store will seek company registration.

Also, the company has been operating for over four years, and its operators (responsible persons) are visible and known. Suffice it to say that scam stores are usually short-lived, and their operators are usually unknown.

Also, through an online store, The Idle Man has a physical presence. They work out of their office and studio in London’s Shoreditch; they have their global distribution Warehouse in Manchester and a Customer Care Centre in Nottingham. This shows that The Idle Man is legit because most often than not fake online stores operate only virtually, with no physical offices, warehouses, or fulfilment centres.

The physical presence of The Idle Man also conveys to the store the capacity to fulfil orders. Their Manchester Warehouse holds hundreds of thousands of units of merchandise, and from this place, they ship globally. Suffice it to say that a fake online store does not fulfil orders.

With company incorporation, years of operation, known operators, physical existence, and a long-running record of fulfilling orders, there’s no doubt that The Idle Man is legit. 

If you are not satisfied with the Idle Man review and looking for a similar or better alternative, you may visit Zafu or Asos.

Is The Idle Man safe?

Of course, The Idle Man is a safe platform. The legit store will not rip you off, but there’s a need for it to be safe so that it won’t expose you to other fraudsters. A safe store is that which protects the information that you share with it and prevents the information from getting into the wrong hands.

When you register and use The Idle Man, you’ll share sensitive information such as your credit card details. You definitely don’t want that information leaking to third parties.

Thankfully, The Idle Man is safe. The website is secured by Comodo Secure and uses SSL for secure transactions. SSL is the standard for creating a secure link between a device and a web server communicating on the internet, ensuring that whatever data is transferred is private.

It also encrypts the data ensuring that even if captured, it cannot be read. Comodo Secure thrown into the mix further strengthens the security because it makes the website open in a security-hardened browsing environment isolated from the rest of your computer.

With the use of these technical measures, there’s no doubt that The Idle Man is safe. Thus, you can proceed to shop in confidence in the store.

Features Of The Idle Man:

The Website

The online store can be found at: www.theidleman.com. The website which is available in the English Language is mobile optimized. Not only can it be accessed by mobile devices, but the pages resize to fit the screen of mobile devices. Also, navigating the website is easy. You’ll find that you can easily go to the store, open the product categories, browse listings, move to check out, and pay for your order with minimum hassle.

Product Description and Images

The ideal online store will provide resources that’ll help you make an assessment of any item in the store before committing to its purchase. These usually come in the form of product descriptions and product images.

Every item in The Idle Man comes with these resources. You might find that the product description is not as detailed as you’ll find in some other stores (with evoking stories and all that). The Idle Man uses soul-less bullet points that spit the item’s specs. However, the product images are as revealing as you’ll get anywhere. They provide both on-model and pictured items. You’ll find pictures of different views (front, back, side, etc); there are also close up shots of details such as buttons, zips, seams, etc.

With these provisions, online purchase in The Idle Man becomes less blind, and you’ll be able to properly assess the items and know what you’re getting.

Styling Education

With The Idle Man, it’s not just about clothes. Knowing that men do not have as sharp a fashion consciousness as women, The Idle Man also offers styling education. There is a blog where you can find opinions on styles, music and life. They also offer a “free” personal styling service, where you can get some advice on your wardrobe.

Register for the service is simply signing up and answering a few questions. Though it’s free, you’ll be charged £1.00 to authorize your account. After that, one of the stylists of The Idle Man will give you a call, and in no time, you’ll get what will make you the best-dressed gentleman.

Product

Product Range

The ideal fashion store will have a wide product range. Instead of visiting different stores for your different fashion products, a wide product range will allow you to get all you need in one place. The convenience of checking only one store is the benefit that jumps out at you, but there are other benefits such as cost savings from qualifying for high order discounts and promos.

The Idle Man needs not much introduction to be identified as a men’s wear store. The question should be whether they also incorporate a women’s line. The answer is a resounding no. The Idle Man has existed as an exclusive men’s wear store. The product categories in the store and the different items you’ll find in each category are:

  • Clothing – Jackets and Coats, Shirts, T-Shirts, Jeans, Trousers and Chinos, Jumpers and Cardigans, Hoodies and Sweatshirts, Joggers, Loungewear, Shorts, Suits and Blazers, Underwear and Socks, Swim shorts, Polo shirts
  • Shoes – Boots, Loafers and Drivers, Formal Shoes, Desert and Chukka Boots, Boat Shoes, Trainers and Plimsolls, Sandals and Flip Flops
  • Accessories – Bags, Belts, Gloves, Hats, Scarves, Sunglasses, Underwear, Watches
  • Lifestyle – Grooming and Fragrance, Audio and Tech, Books and Magazines, Care Products, Gifts, Homes

A good look at the items in the store reveals that The Idle Man is a destination for men’s wear for every season, occasion, or event. Whether you want to look sharp in formal office wear, or you want to feel relaxed with cool casual wear, the store has you covered.

Inventory Size

Apart from having different product types, the ideal fashion store will also hold a large inventory of each product type. With a large inventory, you’ll be spoilt with choices, and you‘ll be more likely to find something that fits your taste and budget.

Thankfully, The Idle Man ticks the box in this regard. At the time of writing this review, in the clothing category, there were over 160 different styles of Jackets and Coats, over 110 shirt styles, over 75 styles of trousers and chinos,

They are able to provide a large because they draw products not only from their three brands but from other top men’s wear brands. You’ll find almost 100 different brands in the store; these include populars such as Calvein Klein, Levi, Farah, Timberland, Nudie, and Kappa.

Product Quality

It’s a no-brainer that the ideal store should provide products that are of top quality. It wouldn’t make sense to have to pick from a bunch of poor quality items.

The Idle Man also ticks the box in this regard. You’ll find items that match your every definition of top quality: whether it’s long-lasting items that you’ll use for years; functional items that’ll serve their purpose; or well-made, fitting items featuring excellent tailoring, and more.

Customers’ reviews of The Idle Man on independent online platforms show that, on the whole, customers are satisfied with the quality of items obtained from the store. You’ll find great reviews of the products from the store. Thus, it’s safe to conclude that The Ideal Man provides excellent items that’ll really have you looking good when you don them.

Pricing and Related Policies:

Price

The ideal fashion store will offer prices that are affordable. It’s no good to customers if a store has excellent clothes that are priced above their reach. Thus, the promise of The Idle Man to “make you look good” goes beyond the store having excellent clothes, to the store having excellent clothes that are affordable. After all, you’ll have to wear the clothes to look good; and to wear the clothes, you’ll first have to buy them from the store.

The Idle Man comes out as a store for everyone no matter the budget. You’ll find full-priced Jackets for as low as £40 and sales Jackets as low as £16. However, you’ll find also find some items in the middle hundreds. For shirts, you’ll find them full-priced at £25 to just over £100; and for the sales shirt, you’ll find many at just about £10. At full price, many of the Trousers and Chinos were selling for £25 – £75.

It can be seen that though The Idle Man does not advertise as having low and affordable prices, you can actually get good quality pieces at very competitive prices in the store. That said; it is safe to say that no matter the size of your wallet, The Idle Man will have you looking good.

Promotion

The ideal fashion store will have merchandise that is available to a lot of customers. Apart from having low prices, promotions help in this regard. Promotions allow customers to get merchandise for free or for less than the full price. Thus, the ideal store will have lots of promotions.

In this regard, The Idle Man ticks the box. You’ll know an online fashion store that is generous with promotions when you get to their landing page, and you’ll find The Idle Man as one of such. At the time of writing, we were greeted in the site by a lot of promotions.

The Idle Man is one of the stores that offer welcome bonuses. There was a welcome bonus that gives you 20% off your first purchase. You only have to use the code “welcome aboard”. Also, it is not only new customers that have reasons to shop in The Idle Man; another promotion on the site at the time of writing screamed: “take an extra 20% off”.

This was a time-limited offer ending the 29th of January which allows customers to get an extra 20% off the sale. You get the “extra twenty” offer by using the promo code “EXTRATWENTY”. It should also be said that by shopping their sales items, you may get up to 70% off prices.

There was also an offer to get 10% off your first when you sign up for the newsletter. If you do not mind the extra mail in your inbox, and if your first order will be high, you may use this to get substantial cost savings. Also, The Idle Man offers student discounts. You only have to register with Student Beans to verify your student status, and you’ll get 20% off all full-priced items.

There are many price slashing offers and promotions available in The Idle Man which makes it possible to get good deals from time to time, making it an ideal destination. However, it still gave a bitter taste that The Idle Man does not offer price matching or price adjustment. Granted, not many fashion retailers do price matching, but there are many that offer price adjustment.

Payment Method

One of the promises of The Idle Man is a minimum hassle in the process of getting their products. This will include a stress-free payment process. For an online store with a global focus to deliver this, the store should provide a wide number of payment options, so that no matter where a customer is on the surface of the planet, he/ she can easily find a method supported by the store in conveniently paying for orders.

Generally, online fashion shops do not break the roof with a long list of payment options; and it’s not surprising that The Idle Man has limited payment options. You can only make payments in the store using PayPal and popular credit cards (Visa, Master Card, Maestro, and American Express).

There’s no support for web wallets, the increasingly popular cryptocurrencies, classic checks, or the friendly CODs (cash on delivery). However, they do support gift vouchers. You can get these in the gift and lifestyle category of the site, and use them for any purchase on the site.

However, there are some limitations with the gift cards of The Idle Man. One of such is that they do not have electronic vouchers. After purchase, you’ll be sent a physical gift card with a code for the gifted amount which you can then use online. Needless to say, electronic vouchers will be more convenient and fast.

Shipping

When you make purchases in an online fashion store, you’ll not simply be walking out of the store with your order. Rather your order has to be shipped to where you’ll receive delivery of it. Thus, shipping is an important consideration when checking online fashion stores.

The main shipping aspects to consider are shipping destinations (the locations the shop ships to), shipping cost (how much it’ll take to get your order), and shipping times (how long it’ll take to get your order).

Shipping Destinations:

Online fashion stores do not ship to all locations on the planet. However, the online fashion store that you plan to buy from should ship to your location; else getting your order becomes unnecessarily difficult. Therefore, the ideal online shop should ship to many locations across the globe.

In this regard, The Idle Man ticks the box. They ship to over 200 countries worldwide, with a reach touching every region of the world.

Shipping Times and Shipping Costs

After placing an order, you don’t want to wait for too long to receive the delivery of your package. In this regard, the ideal store will feature fast delivery. Also, the ideal online store will have shipping costs that are as low as possible so that the total expenditure on the item (s) will not be considered too much.

The shipping times and shipping costs are directly related. For Domestic UK orders, there are different shipping options, and the one chosen will determine how much you pay. There is a standard delivery which takes 3 – 5 working days. It cost £3.95 but is free for all orders over £75.

There’s a Next Day delivery, which as its name reveals, will get you the package the very next day following order placement. However, you’ll have to place the order before 5 pm. Also, orders placed on Fridays or the weekends will be delivered on Monday. The Next Day delivery option cost £5.95.

There’s a nominated Day delivery, where you can choose a delivery date of your choice up to 2 – 7 days in advance. You may choose any day of the week, and delivery is available between 7 am – 9 pm of the nominated day. The delivery option also cost £5.95.

Lastly, there’s the Click and Collect delivery option, where you may choose to deliver your package to one of the over 6000 stores in the program, and you’ll go to the Collect Plus location to pick it up. Collect Plus locations are not only The Idle Man stores; they include filling stations, grocery stores, supermarkets, and more. This delivery option cost also £5.95.

For international shipping, you have the choice of only Standard shipping and Express shipping. When shipping to the US, Standard shipping takes 5 – 8 working days. It cost $19.95 but is free for all orders over $100. The Express shipping takes up to 4 days, and its cost starts from $38.

For the shipping cost and time of other international orders, you may check their international shipping page in their website. However, some points are worth highlighting. First, free shipping is offered worldwide. Unlike most online fashion stores where free shipping is applicable to only domestic orders, The Idle Man offers free standard shipping to all locations that they ship to.

Secondly, the qualifying order for free shipping is not too high. It’s just ordered above £75 ($100 for US orders, CAD113.33 for Canadian orders, and €64.17 for most European orders). Although, you’ll find some stores with lower free shipping qualifying orders; the offer of The Idle Man is relatively fine. You’ll not have to spend too much on the site in order to qualify for free shipping.

Lastly, the shipping cost and times are relatively low. Unlike most fashion stores where the cost and delivery time of international shipping can get very high and long respectively, The Idle Man maintains relatively low cost and times. For most international locations, standard shipping takes only 14 days while express shipping takes only 4 days. A comparative analysis of the cost of international shipping also marks The Idle Man as an attractive store.

However, there is something we didn’t like about international express shipping costs. Unlike international standard shipping costs which are flat rates that do not change with an increase in order size (or weight), international express shipping costs depend on the weight of the package. As the weight of your order increases, your shipping cost increases. Thus, with certain items, the shipping costs could rise to prohibitive amounts.

We definitely are for flat shipping rates so our advice will be for you to order early and use the Standard shipping option in order to avoid what we’ll call unnecessary shipping charges.

Returns

One of the important things to look at when examining an online store is its returns policy. Online shopping is characterized by blind purchases, where you do not get to physically see and assess products before completing the purchase. There’s the possibility that you may not like what you are delivered, and will want to return it. As a result, the ideal store will not only allow returns but have a painless returns process. 

Returns Methods

The Idle Man does allow returns. There are two main methods to use: post/ mail or in-store (Collect Plus). However, to use either method, you’ll first have to get the returns authorized.  This simply entails signing in to your Idle Man account, selecting the items you want to return, and stating the reason(s) for wanting to make the return. Where the reason is that the item delivered is damaged, you’ll have to upload an image of the fault.

The post method is available to everyone; you simply mail the returns package to The Idle Man. On the other hand, the Collect Plus option is available only in the UK. It entails taking your returns package to any of the participating stores in the service.

It’s a very convenient way to make returns because there are over 5,900 CollectPlus centres scattered across the country. These include universities, petrol stations, shopping malls and more; and many of these places are open from early in the morning until late in the evening, 7 days a week. 

Returns Window:

The Idle Man allows a returns window of 28 days. This means that any item you choose to return back to them must get to them at least 28 days from the day of receiving delivery of the package. It should be said that 28 day returns window is more or less the industry average. Most of the online fashion stores in the industry give 28 – 30 days for returns. With that many days allowed, you’ll not be pressed against time when you have to return any item in your order.

Ease and Cost of Returns

You want the returns process to be painless and, more importantly, worthwhile cost-wise. The Idle Man ticks the box in both counts.

They provide returns labels for UK and US orders to be returned via mail. After initiating the returns process, you’ll get an email notification if the returns are authorized, and you can then download and print the returns label. The returns label is pre-addressed and pre-paid and makes for easy returns. What is more, it is free; which means that there’ll be no charge subtracted from your refund as the cost of the returns label.

Though, returns labels are not available for other international returns, making returns is also easy and straightforward. The email notification you’ll get if the returns are authorized will make it possible for you to access the return address.

You may then package the items to be returned appropriately, clearly write the returns address on the package, and post it using any postal service of choice. That means you’ll bear the cost of returns shipping, which will vary depending on the carrier used.

Refund and Refund Processing

When you make returns, and The Idle Man receives it within the 28 days window, you have the choice of receiving a refund through your original payment method or receiving store credits. This score points for The Idle Man because there are some stores that will only issue store credits when you make returns, and that means that you’ll have to return to the store to make your purchase.

However, when you get refunded as cash to your original payment method, you may choose to return to the store or go to another store.

Interestingly, if your returns do not get to the store within the window, you’ll still get refunded, but only as store credits. This also scores points for The Idle Man because, in many online fashion stores, returns that are not received within the returns window are rejected, and the buyer will not get any form of refund.  

After receiving the item(s) you returned, it takes The Idle Man 5 days to process the refund. How long it then takes to reflect in your account will depend on the bank you use. However, it means you’ll definitely have your refund in under two calendar weeks. This makes The Idle Man one of the fastest fashion shops in the processing and issuance of refunds.

Conditions of Returns

The items you’re returning must be in the original new conditions. This means that they should not be worn, washed, or altered. They must also be free of stain or odour and must have all original tags and labels intact. Where possible, items should also be returned with their original packaging. 

Positives of the Returns Policy

The only positive from the returns policy of The Idle Man is not only that returns are easy or that free returns are offered for US and UK orders; another positive is that you may get refunded your original shipping cost. In almost all the other online fashion stores, original shipping costs are non-refundable; what you get when you return an item will be the amount paid for the item(s) only.

Interestingly, in The Idle Man, if you return your entire order, your delivery charge will be refunded; you won’t get a refund of your delivery charge only when it’s a partial return (that is when only one or more but not all the items in your order is returned).

Another positive is that you may return items that have been bought using a promo code. Again, in most of the other online fashion stores, returns apply to only full-priced items, meaning that if you used a promo code to get any item for less than its full price, you’ll not be allowed to return it. Interestingly, the returns policy of The Idle Man makes a better customer buying experience by accepting items bought with promo codes.

The returns policy of The Idle Man was almost all sweets and roses. However, there’s one thing that we didn’t totally like, and that is that items purchased with gift vouchers cannot be returned. This is so because gift vouchers are non-refundable.

Customer Support

Customers will always have questions about a company and their offerings; also, no matter how efficient a company runs, issues are inevitable. Thus, the ideal company will provide for answering the questions and addressing customers’ complaints.  

The first step to getting assistance in The Idle Man is the FAQ page on their website. It contains answers to many of the questions that customers have asked in the past. This includes questions about orders, shipping, payment and refunds, promo codes, and more.

If you’re not satisfied with the self-help articles, you may directly contact The Idle Man via an online contact form on their website or via email (using the email address: help@theidleman.com). With either method, you’ll receive the response in your email inbox within 24 – 48 hours.

The response time is relatively okay since there are online stores that’ll keep you waiting for longer. Also, and the responses are always very helpful, and most often than not, lead to effective resolutions. However, we were not very pleased with the limited direct contact options provided by The Idle Man. There’s no live chat support or telephone support. These two missing channels offer instant feedback which is something that is needed in most instances.

Pros:

  • A safe and mobile-optimized website
  • They offer very competitive (low and affordable) prices
  • They have a wide product range and a large inventory of almost all product types
  • Ships to many countries (over 200); and free shipping available worldwide
  • Free returns for UK and US orders
  • You may get a refund of your delivery cost (when you return your entire order)
  • You may return items that have been bought using a promo code
  • Items not returned within 28 days window still qualify for a refund (albeit via store credits)
  • They offer a 20% student discount
  • They offer free personal styling service

Cons:

  • They do not offer exchanges
  • They do not have electronic gift cards
  • They do not offer price matching or price adjustment
  • International express shipping costs increase with the weight of the order
  • Limited payment options (only credit/ debit cards and PayPal)
  • Customer support is only available via mail (no live chat or telephone support service)

Conclusion

The Idle Man is a legitimate UK based men’s fashion store that provides exclusively men’s clothing, shoes, and accessories.

The fashion industry may make it seem like only women should turn up in style; however, men should also turn up in style, and The Idle Man is one fashion store that’s out to make sure of that.




The store promises to make you look good with minimum hassle. They live up to that promise by providing top quality and affordable fashion products, as well as excellent service which includes an easy payment process, fast delivery, easy returns, responsive customer care, and more.

Whether you want to look smart with formal wear or fly with simple casuals, there’s every reason why you should be looking at The Idle Man.

If you have had an experience with The Idle Man, Kindly use the review section below to give us your brief The Idle Man review.

Emmanuel

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