Yesterday, we proved that a reasonably knowledgeable and competent installation crew who understands the purpose of the valve to the water supply for a refrigerator can make a successful delivery in about twenty minutes from the time the lorry turned up at the driveway until we were wishing them bon voyage and our best wishes that hopefully none of the nutters infesting Raleigh’s roads will make their drive to the next destination more harrowing than need be.
And yes, I did apologise for putting the lead gentleman through that small quiz as we were heading to the kitchen for him to see what he was removing from the house to make way for the new refrigerator.
As the installation proceeded at pace, I was able to return the favour of eliminating doubts from his mind as he was questioning why the box to the refrigerator was already opened and it’s because the call centre didn’t take us seriously when we insisted on a new-in-the-box unit for the second installation attempt to forestall any thoughts that first crew might have had to damage it in retaliation whilst it was sitting in the warehouse for a few extra days unnecessarily.
Fortunately, the new refrigerator seemed to be intact and in good condition and we spent the rest of the time confirming what I’d already suspected about the first crew and I was genuinely surprised to learn this was not the first time they’d heard of these sorts of monkey shines where certain crews were seemingly intentionally sabotaging deliveries.
Why they would have done that in this or any other instance truly beggars belief when the presumption is that he would wish his employer to be successful and well-regarded for his efforts.
I had done nothing untoward to them in direct contravention to the outright lies they decided to insert into their record in an effort to save themselves from being held accountable for failing to perform the most basic step in the removal process and nearly damaging the kitchen to the tune of thousands of dollars.
Whether he actually knew he’d completely biffed that step and knew he’d subsequently destroyed any chance of a successful installation and wanted to cover it up or it really was a honest accident due to lack of sufficient training and experience that he just didn’t handle at all well with no real effective support from his management will likely never be known.
The tone of his account of the situation and the common sense of the average person in the street strongly suggests the former. I can’t prove that conclusively but I believe it would be very convincing to a jury.
But I can’t say enough good things about the second crew that pulled off a flawless installation.
Even when I questioned why the tape holding the various shelves in place and the protective film weren’t being removed, his explanation of what seems to be a recent change in installation policy actually because of grime on his hands seemed reasonable even if it meant I was going to be removing a bunch of tape and protective foam I hadn’t been planning on doing.
Actually, the actual quote of what he was referring to was “black stuff on my hands”.
I raised one eyebrow and kind of waved my hand along his arm along with the observation that “I presume you mean other than this…” to which he actually laughed to the point of doubling over at what was a rather droll and dry humoured joke.
The fact that a confident and polite African-American gentleman could laugh at such a joke and take it in the kind spirit it was intended honestly did more than a little to help me on the path to recovering from what was up to this point a rather harrowing experience.
It also restores my faith that not everyone in this country is so thin-skinned that they can’t enjoy a little edgy joke even as polarised as our current society is these days.
To be honest, removing the tape and protective film wasn’t hard or really even time consuming and was a small thing to have a working refrigerator in a more convenient spot once more was worth it.
This Conversation Was A Very Pleasant Surprise…
Being able to get Katie to work on time and then go do the DJ thing for Nick’s beer league hockey games he was officiating before coming back to White Oak to collect Katie from work ensured that the discussion on compensation had to wait until this morning.
There was no way I was going to ring up that offshore call centre that none of their employees seems to like any more than the rest of us do and give them yet another shot at wasting my time.
This is the sort of conversation that requires bearding the lion in it’s den and that’s why I was at the Knightdale Lowe’s this morning!
I was surprised to learn that I’d happened to catch the district manager in the building and was rather hopeful that they’d be able to hear the tale I was about to tell but Ms Kayla the store manager felt she was capable of handling the matter on her own.
Fair enough and I relate the basics of the story (she’d gotten a copy of the actual blog posts that had been written to that point as well as a copy of Miguel’s bill!) as I’m putting in my claim for compensation.
I do think I hit all of the major points of contention and I commend her for not only admirable patience but being very attentive and excellent at active listening and seemed sincerely apologetic for a service experience her facial expressions at various times during the telling seemed to indicate she was as appalled as I was.
Had the decision been left to her when I pitched a very big magic number that would make this go away without further need for recrimination and accountability from my end of things, I think that the totality of the circumstances combined with overwhelming evidence of negligence and having an expert witness in my corner would have made the decision for her to agree my number and be done with it an easy one.
The last time I went through this with Lowe’s, the final decision to replace the refrigerator their tech had intentionally destroyed with the one I truly wanted (that was just carted out of the house) was the store manager and he made it after making a valiant attempt at trying to get me to accept a lesser and unacceptable settlement offer.
Apparently, one of another of the changes that’s been brought in by the new management regime is that should the store manager’s offer not be accepted, it has to be kicked to an “appeasement department” and “partnering” with even more parties.
First off, I’d say that’s a truly unfortunate name for them…it’s unnecessarily pejorative because it quickly brings to mind the pre-WW2 policies of the United Kingdom and other allied powers to give in to a murderous regime that led to disastrous consequences for the world.
The customer rightfully seeking compensation for damages and inconvenience in a contractual dispute shouldn’t be compared to an ineffective diplomatic response to blatant treaty violations and forced annexations leading to global conflict and the needless deaths of millions of people!
The notion of appeasement rather than “customer retention” or “service recovery” seems to presume that the customer is somehow in the wrong or partially negligent which may not be the case and that the corporation is “too big to fail” that it doesn’t really care if the customer bothers to return.
For a company where most of the products on offer tend to be used on projects that are “wants” rather than outright “needs” facing the uncertain economic headwinds prevailing in this country, it seems that giving every person who comes through the door and makes big purchases a reason to keep shopping at the store should be far more of a priority.
But in this situation where the only things up to the point of this conversation with Ms Kayla that had gone right was the person who sold the refrigerator and the second crew that successfully installed it in spite of my best efforts to effectuate a successful installation, Lowe’s making it right isn’t “appeasement”…it’s “doing the right thing by the customer who really is on the mountain of right in this particular situation”.
I’ve always been leery of creating new departments to do jobs a properly supported manager ought to be able to do and this one strikes me as no different. I can understand the corporate side of the house probably not liking how generous and accommodating in settlements previous managers have been (the settlement that resulted in the refrigerator that just left is probably a case in point) and that by shielding that generosity behind a bureaucratic wall meant to get the person seeking compensation to give up in frustration, they figure it’ll save them an appreciable amount of money.
It may well do so and has certainly worked a treat for insurance companies of all persuasions but it’s still incredibly short-sighted and tends to lead to extreme customer dissatisfaction which is the absolute last thing you want in an economy that’s sliding toward recession thanks to chaotic trade policies and even more evil domestic policies and budget priorities.
As to whether it will do the trick to hold those accountable who desperately need it, who knows. A pile of money going the wrong way in a business usually tends to be noticed by the bean counters if anyone and I’ve found over several decades that it’s often the only way change has a chance of occurring.
I’ll give Ms Kayla full marks, though. At all times during our conversation, she was respectful and professional and courteous beyond belief in spite of a nasty problem being dropped in her lap to solve that she really had nothing to do with it’s creation.
I also was quite surprised at her initial offer of $600 (for Miguel’s bill and for my inconvenience) to settle the matter which was far more generous than I was expecting but when so much had gone wrong, it’s also not sufficient to send the message to the powers-that-be that needs to be sent.
I’d actually told Marvia on Saturday that I thought it quite daft they wanted me to leave this conversation until days after the failed install with me having several days to pass by an inoperative refrigerator and think of all the reasons I’m going to pitch for a really big number and I’m going to do everything in my power to see that number happen. I was also quite concerned that the incentive for Lowe’s to negotiate in good faith would go out the window once the refrigerator was in play.
Ms Kayla’s proposal makes me think there’s more hope that we may well get to the magic number I suggested than I may have dared to believe.
I don’t envy her the conversations she’s going to have to have but I think the case is clear that whoever has to sign off on this needs to understand that the time for a cheap resolution died on Saturday when Marvia refused to negotiate a settlement and that the harder they resist doing the right thing and restoring the balance that honour demands in this situation, the more the number goes up.
It’s time for the happy ending and I hope Ms Kayla’s efforts on my behalf are successful.
We’ll see.