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The Pitiful State of Customer Service (2 Viewers)

JohnRice

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Yea, I wondered about that from the onset as this same compressor is probably used across multiple models [even some outside of the Electrolux family of brands] and should be fairly easy to source.
You would think so. The problem is, everyone I talk to or correspond with tells me something different. The tech warns me that they might not have the part, but he eventually finds it from Electrolux and tells me it'll arrive within a week. When it doesn't arrive, I called Frigidaire and am told it is available, but they can't find an order for it, and if it was backordered, that would show up for them. Plus I get scolded for expecting it so fast and that it takes at least two weeks. Then other "support" tells me repeatedly that it's backordered and they're waiting for a response from the servicer. They ended up telling me for a month that they're waiting to get a response from the servicer. The really annoying thing is everyone treats me like I'm the problem. If I would just shut and go away, there would be no problem as far as they're concerned.

The one thing that explains all of this never really occurred to me, which is that the tech never ordered the parts in the first place. In addition, they are ignoring repeated calls regarding the whole deal.

This past Saturday I decided to submit yet another complaint through yet another avenue, and yesterday I got someone who gave me this response.

Hi, John. We're sorry you're having such troubles with your refrigerator. We're working to get an update from the servicer, once we have this information, we will reconnect with you. We apologize again for your experience.

That's exactly what I've been told since the tech was here five weeks ago, so I responded with "I've been told that for weeks now. If it takes weeks or months just to find out what part is needed, and nobody can tell me if a compressor is even available to fix it, how long will it take to get it fixed?"

And this person... finally... did this.

Hello, John, Because we are unable to get in touch with the servicer we will be sending your information to our Frigidaire Electrolux Service team. You should be receiving notification soon regarding a time and date.

I had already received a text and email with a new appointment from, apparently, a factory tech, not the people I had been dealing with. So, I'm where I should have been five weeks ago (minus $500 for a second fridge), but maybe, just maybe it'll be taken care of now.

The appointment requires me to be here all day on Friday, or wait longer. I'm really fortunate that, unlike most people, I can actually do that, though it's still a hassle. What if I was a regular person with a regular job? How would that go over?
 

Kevin Hewell

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And a friend has opinions waiting 12 months for Tesla SolarCity to repair his solar panels after a lightning strike damaged the system. And then another month with an inoperable system because the replacement inverter failed and needed some attention.

I always wondered about that.
 

John Dirk

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You would think so. The problem is, everyone I talk to or correspond with tells me something different. The tech warns me that they might not have the part, but he eventually finds it from Electrolux and tells me it'll arrive within a week. When it doesn't arrive, I called Frigidaire and am told it is available, but they can't find an order for it, and if it was backordered, that would show up for them. Plus I get scolded for expecting it so fast and that it takes at least two weeks. Then other "support" tells me repeatedly that it's backordered and they're waiting for a response from the servicer. They ended up telling me for a month that they're waiting to get a response from the servicer. The really annoying thing is everyone treats me like I'm the problem. If I would just shut and go away, there would be no problem as far as they're concerned.

The one thing that explains all of this never really occurred to me, which is that the tech never ordered the parts in the first place. In addition, they are ignoring repeated calls regarding the whole deal.

This past Saturday I decided to submit yet another complaint through yet another avenue, and yesterday I got someone who gave me this response.



That's exactly what I've been told since the tech was here five weeks ago, so I responded with "I've been told that for weeks now. If it takes weeks or months just to find out what part is needed, and nobody can tell me if a compressor is even available to fix it, how long will it take to get it fixed?"

And this person... finally... did this.



I had already received a text and email with a new appointment from, apparently, a factory tech, not the people I had been dealing with. So, I'm where I should have been five weeks ago (minus $500 for a second fridge), but maybe, just maybe it'll be taken care of now.

The appointment requires me to be here all day on Friday, or wait longer. I'm really fortunate that, unlike most people, I can actually do that, though it's still a hassle. What if I was a regular person with a regular job? How would that go over?
It's starting to look like this "servicer" doesn't deserve to be one any longer.

Really sorry you're having to deal with this level of ineptitude/indifference.
 

Scott Merryfield

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I hope we have better luck than you have with Frigidaire, @JohnRice . We have a new one being delivered this coming Friday from Home Depot. Our 20+ year old fridge has been on the fritz for awhile. It will occasionally freeze things in the fridge section. A few weeks ago we awoke to a half gallon of milk froze completely solid, which was the final straw. The ice maker died a few months ago, too.

On the positive side of this purchase, though, is that we had a new water line run for the new fridge's ice maker (our old one wasn't to code, so I used this as an opportunity to correct that situation). We tried a local, family-owned plumbing company for the first time. The two guys who came out were great, and the cost ended up being $100+ less expensive than the estimate I was quoted beforehand.
 

JohnRice

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I hope we have better luck than you have with Frigidaire, @JohnRice . We have a new one being delivered this coming Friday from Home Depot. Our 20+ year old fridge has been on the fritz for awhile. It will occasionally freeze things in the fridge section. A few weeks ago we awoke to a half gallon of milk froze completely solid, which was the final straw. The ice maker died a few months ago, too.

On the positive side of this purchase, though, is that we had a new water line run for the new fridge's ice maker (our old one wasn't to code, so I used this as an opportunity to correct that situation). We tried a local, family-owned plumbing company for the first time. The two guys who came out were great, and the cost ended up being $100+ less expensive than the estimate I was quoted beforehand.
Well... the Frigidaire tech came on Friday and hopefully I'll be up and running by the end of September 14. Almost two months after the fridge was delivered. We did discuss the other "servicer" who came out a month ago. He asked me who they were and when I told him, he just rolled his eyes. He said he's had at least four other problems with them recently. I encouraged him to have them removed as an authorized service provider, which he seemed to agree with and claimed he would follow up on.

I was looking back at my communications with Frigidaire and was rather amused by them. Just continually doing nothing and shining me on. One of the most recent ones...

We are unable to replace the unit at this time and would need the part information from the servicer so we can see what options are available. We are confident their manager will be able to assist with getting the information needed. Thanks again for your patience.

The tech was here on 8/2 and that response was on 8/26. So, 3 1/2 weeks later and still no response from the "servicer" and they were still expecting me to wait for a response that was clearly never going to come. I have three phones calls, four responses from their "Social Care" and one more from another online CS rep all saying I need to keep waiting to hear back. Eight responses across a month to just shut up and be quiet.

I was actually ready to simply punt and eat the cost of the fridge, and buy another one for the same location and have this one hauled away. I didn't because through endless searching I discovered this is the only one made by any brand that truly fits the space I'm limited to. I certainly wasn't going to reward Frigidaire by buying a second one of their units, so I kept trying. Of course, I did end up buying a second, smaller fridge and I have no idea what I'll do with it.

So Scott, if there is a problem, at least I have suggestions on how to deal with it. :P
 

Jeffrey D

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Sad story John tells in the first post about the experience he had with his car dealership. Hopefully John has good luck with his newer Jeep. Unfortunately dealerships just plain forget or neglect their good customers. My buddy’s father, who was a regular at a Ford dealership, was treated badly over an issue that the original bumper to bumper warranty should have taken care of. He bought his F-150 in, claiming water was getting into one of the taillight assemblies. The dealership refused to cover it, saying he hit something, causing the leak. This was not the case.
Very poor. I guess the hard lesson here is, if you feel screwed by a car dealership, there are others within a reasonable drive.

Speaking of fridges, my driver friend bought a fancy fridge from a Home Depot, paying well over $1,000. He set up a delivery appointment. He was on the road at the time, but his mother was in town for a visit, so she was there. She didn’t know that big fridges sometimes have to be taken out of the packing box, and the doors removed in order to get it inside the dwelling. The delivery guy eyeballed it, without taking it out of the crate, and told the mother that the fridge wouldn’t fit. A few weeks later, my friend set up an appointment for when he was going to be home. The fridge was delivered successfully without his having to take the front door apart. Obviously the first guy didn’t want to bother with doing his job.
 
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JohnRice

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I'm finally realizing that a major factor in poor customer service is that the growing attitude among a lot of workers is, if a task is difficult or inconvenient, then just don't do it. This includes a lot of supposed CS reps just posting the same response over and over to every single complaint. I see this on in feedback sections, where they simply refer the customer to a phone number. I had that same thing happen repeatedly with Frigidaire. Even though it should be obvious I have been in contact with them multiple ways, they just post the most obvious thing I've already tried.

I mentioned that I finally broke down and got a second fridge so I could have food in the house while I wait for the first one to be repaired or replaced. I have a fridge downstairs that I used to keep film in, which is also dead. I figured I'd take the opportunity to have it hauled away as part of having the second one brought in. The guys who delivered the second fridge said they didn't have room on their truck, so they would have it rescheduled for pickup. The thing is, I was listening to them discussing this outside and the real problem is they didn't want to take the time or effort to remove the old fridge. So, in the end, they didn't haul it away and I've never been contacted to reschedule it, even though I paid extra to have it done.

And this brings me to what I suspect is the basis of so much bad customer service. Everything is gauged by metrics. If they haul out the old fridge, their metrics will suffer and they'll get crap for taking too long on that stop, so they just don't do it. I've discussed this with my UPS driver, who has explained why some rural addresses simply will never be delivered to by UPS or FedEx, even though they are supposed to deliver to them. Online CS reps simply paste the same response to every complaint, because it doesn't take any time and they can produce good metrics, without ever doing any actual work or solving a single problem.
 

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We’re at a bad place with the over-reliance of cost-benefit analysis when making decisions. Now everything is run by Fight Club rules. (There was a scene in that film where Edward Norton explains that his job is to determine when a car has a defect or design flaw if it’s cheaper to do a recall or to pay off the families of victims who perish in accidents.) It’s no longer about whether it’s the correct thing to do, or setting morality aside, if it’s worth honoring a contract or sales agreement. Now it’s a calculation for whether it’ll cost more to honor the contract or do nothing (or letting things languish in customer service limbo in perpetuity). The likelihood that any one individual will triumph over their labyrinth of avoidal is so low that it’s now easier to give everyone the run around as a first move and then handle the few that don’t give up, rather than doing the right thing in the first place.

It’s the same calculation that will have Amazon sending out poorly packaged items - the cost of replacing an occasional damaged product is less than the cost of packaging them properly to begin with, even though the damage could have been avoided to begin with. The people making the decisions high up don’t see it as their job to get your item delivered in perfect condition each time - their job is to maximize revenue and minimize cost.

Another key problem in all of this, which I think is equally worthy of discussion, is that rank and file employees aren’t paid enough to care. In many cases they’re discouraged from actively caring because the business hierarchy is often set up to reward employees who follow the pre-established procedure, not those who take initiative. When people aren’t paid a living wage, or when work is outsourced to contractors where the vendor doing the outsourcing cares more about volume of service calls answered than percentage of issues successfully resolved, that gives those employees handling the service calls very little motivation and very few resources to do the job they’re supposed to do.

It’s a terrible status quo all around.
 

Scott Merryfield

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I mentioned that I finally broke down and got a second fridge so I could have food in the house while I wait for the first one to be repaired or replaced. I have a fridge downstairs that I used to keep film in, which is also dead. I figured I'd take the opportunity to have it hauled away as part of having the second one brought in. The guys who delivered the second fridge said they didn't have room on their truck, so they would have it rescheduled for pickup. The thing is, I was listening to them discussing this outside and the real problem is they didn't want to take the time or effort to remove the old fridge. So, in the end, they didn't haul it away and I've never been contacted to reschedule it, even though I paid extra to have it done.

John,

Check with your electric company. Ours (Detroit Edison) will pay you $50 for an old refrigerator. They will haul it away and recycle it, and you get a $50 check. I did this with our basement beverage fridge.
 

JohnRice

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We’re at a bad place with the over-reliance of cost-benefit analysis when making decisions. Now everything is run by Fight Club rules. (There was a scene in that film where Edward Norton explains that his job is to determine when a car has a defect or design flaw if it’s cheaper to do a recall or to pay off the families of victims who perish in accidents.)
I was thinking the exact same thing, remembering the same quote.
 

JohnRice

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John,

Check with your electric company. Ours (Detroit Edison) will pay you $50 for an old refrigerator. They will haul it away and recycle it, and you get a $50 check. I did this with our basement beverage fridge.
I keep looking at that, but here it always states the fridge has to be functional.
 

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I've had many sales people get annoyed as I fully read all contract details and verify it's what was agreed upon before signing.

Why don't they want you to make sure that everything is kosher before you sign?
 

JohnRice

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Why don't they want you to make sure that everything is kosher before you sign?
If you think about it, you answered your own question. As I originally said, when I discovered what he'd pulled with the Jeep, the next day when I called him he ended up screaming at me over the phone. I mean, screaming for several minutes at the top of his lungs, while he was at his desk in the showroom.
 

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If you think about it, you answered your own question. As I originally said, when I discovered what he'd pulled with the Jeep, the next day when I called him he ended up screaming at me over the phone. I mean, screaming for several minutes at the top of his lungs, while he was at his desk in the showroom.

Very true-- I would not want to be on the receiving end of a screaming salesman (as I'm understanding it here).
 

JohnRice

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It seems like and endless stream of absurd customer "service". Something happened that was so absurd, it actually made me laugh, and I wanted to share it, since it fits the topic.

At work I have commercial shipping accounts with UPS and the USPS. Commercial shipping with the USPS is actually through a third company. Last Monday I discovered that a specific USPS box we use a lot was greyed out in the shipping software. So I logged into my account and submitted a ticket with their technical support to report it. I didn't hear back, but on Wednesday morning, there was a software update and the problem was fixed.

A full week after that, I received a response from "support" with what I've found is the new corporate way to not address problems. Now remember, I didn't even receive this response until a full week after the problem had been fixed. It started off with "That must be very frustrating..." and told me to call their technical support team if I need help. So, not only did they have no idea at all that a problem ever existed, they had no idea it had been fixed, and wanted me to call them after the problem had already been fixed. What I love is the "personal" aspect of the non-response. Besides, the entire benefit of this kind of online support is they didn't need to have people to answer the phone on demand and the customer didn't have to waste a bunch of time on the phone. It's stinking efficient. You report a problem when it's convenient for you, and they address it, hopefully, within a reasonable amount of time. It had always been that way in the past. At least now I know they're concerned about my level of frustration.
 

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I do "legacy software support" as part of my job (IT at a large school district). One of the systems is used to run the 9 cafeterias (roughly 30 POS systems) and can be a bit flaky. So *one* campus reports an issue with *one* of their checkout systems. I do the requisite troubleshooting and go so far as to completely rebuild the system, reloading the POS software in the process. They still have the issue. I contact, via online form, support and outline what I've done with a "Any suggestions?" at the end. They reply *3 days later* with the "suggestion" to try what I've already done and also provide a set of folders to exclude from AV scans (a *standard* thing for these systems that's pushed via Group Policy). The directions in the email say, and SOP is, to simply reply to such support emails with updates/questions. So I reply to tell them I'm the Senior System Admin and know those settings are done as I'm the one who administers Group Policy for the district. And the email comes back with a "submit your ticket via the online ticketing system." type message. I finally got through but it was painful.

A major irritation is Apple Support. For some unknown reason Apple does *NOT* support chat or email of any type for system issues. Everything has to be done via a phone call. And you often get people whose first language is *not* English. I generally understand them (I'm blessed to be able to understand dialects fairly easily) but getting across strings of ~10+ numbers that make up a SN can be daunting (I use the Zulu alphabet but not all of them get that) and far longer than it would if they'd simply support chat as those numbers and lengthy debugging steps could be easily spelled out before hand and simply cut/pasted into a chat window. It normally takes a good 30 minutes, outside any time spent on hold - which can easily run 30-60 minutes - to do a service call. It could all be done via chat in half the time, and waits for an agent would also be shortened. I guess I should be grateful I don't have to take the defective devices into an Apple Store...
 

Clinton McClure

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I do "legacy software support" as part of my job (IT at a large school district). One of the systems is used to run the 9 cafeterias (roughly 30 POS systems) and can be a bit flaky. So *one* campus reports an issue with *one* of their checkout systems. I do the requisite troubleshooting and go so far as to completely rebuild the system, reloading the POS software in the process. They still have the issue. I contact, via online form, support and outline what I've done with a "Any suggestions?" at the end. They reply *3 days later* with the "suggestion" to try what I've already done and also provide a set of folders to exclude from AV scans (a *standard* thing for these systems that's pushed via Group Policy). The directions in the email say, and SOP is, to simply reply to such support emails with updates/questions. So I reply to tell them I'm the Senior System Admin and know those settings are done as I'm the one who administers Group Policy for the district. And the email comes back with a "submit your ticket via the online ticketing system." type message. I finally got through but it was painful.

A major irritation is Apple Support. For some unknown reason Apple does *NOT* support chat or email of any type for system issues. Everything has to be done via a phone call. And you often get people whose first language is *not* English. I generally understand them (I'm blessed to be able to understand dialects fairly easily) but getting across strings of ~10+ numbers that make up a SN can be daunting (I use the Zulu alphabet but not all of them get that) and far longer than it would if they'd simply support chat as those numbers and lengthy debugging steps could be easily spelled out before hand and simply cut/pasted into a chat window. It normally takes a good 30 minutes, outside any time spent on hold - which can easily run 30-60 minutes - to do a service call. It could all be done via chat in half the time, and waits for an agent would also be shortened. I guess I should be grateful I don't have to take the defective devices into an Apple Store...
Apple has an iOS support app. You can also go to https://getsupport.apple.com/ and start an email or chat support session.
 

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For a different take on the pitiful state of customer service, I have a story from about five years ago.

I was at Walmart late at night one evening back in the days of 24 hour service. The aisle with vegetable oil and such had been poorly stocked and there were several burst bottles on the floor that had fallen. As I skirted by on the far side to reach something like the sugar or flour at the end of the aisle, another bottle decided to fall just as I passed. It of course burst and splattered brand new dress clothes with oil.

The night manager said no problem and just come back tomorrow and they'll reimburse me. Two weeks later and a dozen managers later (Never the same person twice) and lies such as about their security camera footage, I was fed up. I asked the lady that day if she had ever heard the old saying that too many cooks spoil the broth (in reference to the seemingly endless line of managers at one Walmart), and she got irritated.

She told me that she doesn't have to listen to language like that and started to walk away. I called out that it gets settled when I drop by tomorrow or I'll see you in small claims court. They wrote a check the next day without any issues.

And another time I was at Walgreens with my mother when she was making a return. As I recall it was a package from Walgreens.com that had never been opened, since she had changed her mind. The clerk had a little issue with the cash register and the manager came by to assist. He asks to see the box, studies it closely for about 30 seconds, and then asks us "did you buy this at Walgreens.com?".

Despite his close examination, somehow this genius hadn't noticed the Walgreens name plastered on the box, on the label, etc. Needless to say he was no help and eventually the clerk got her computer to cooperate and the return got completed.
 
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ManW_TheUncool

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Just odd/nuts they'd wanna alienate everyday-facing/shopping customers that way (enough for someone to have to threaten to go to small claims court) before they'd address issues reasonably/properly that they should know they must (and promised).

Not even like they'd never have to deal w/ you (and family/friends of yours and whomever else) ever again in such a bizz afterall...

_Man_
 

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