Customer Service

[aspeck]

Seeing Gary's post about iboat's service (and agreeing with him on how great they are) it reminded me of another company I recently dealt with. We are quick to bash companies, but some need praise for doing the right thing.

Last year I ordered 36 plants from Spring Hill Nurseries (online and catalog sales). I got them and was a bit disappointed in their size, but planted them and hoped. All went well till the snow piled up on them in February. Come the thaw, 14 of them were dead.

At 9 pm one evening I emailed the company figuring they weren't going to do anything, but thought they should know their plants died over the winter. I woke up to an email telling me the replacement plants would be shipped to me the end of April and apologizing for any inconvenience!

I never asked them to replace the plants, just explained what happened, but apparently that is their policy. They got a nice thank-you email from me, and I will shop with them again. Like iboats, there are still some companies out there that try to do the right thing for their customers! To those companies, I salute you!

 

[DECK SWABBER 58]

Re: Customer Service

We are quick to bash companies, but some need praise for doing the right thing.

Two that have great customer service are Weber Grills and
True Temper garden products.

 

[scoutabout]

Re: Customer Service

It's nice to see a good news thread once in a while. I'll contribute by plugging the Ford dealer in Sudbury, Ontario I recently bought a used car from (a Mazda, as it turns out, but no matter).

After getting the car home I discovered two cracks in the rear bumper down by where the mud flaps attach. You know today's plastic coated cars - you gotta replace half the rear end when something like that cracks.

I called the sales guy back and said, "You know - this car has a torn bumper you didn't tell me about when I handed you the cheque."

He did a good job of sounding surprised. His first question was a reasonable, "You sure you didn't hit anything on the way home?" (I say reasonable because I bought the car up north as the deal was worth the 200km drive and there would have been plenty of time for me to ding it myself).

I assured him I did not do the damage myself and he simply said to take it to my nearest Mazda dealer, get a quote for the repair and send it to him.

Done and done and the next thing I know I'm getting a call from the Mazda body shop to come get the car. On the back was a new rear bumper, painted and installed and paid in full by the Ford dealer. I didn't even have to go out of pocket and chase them down.

Yeah, sure, any bullet-proof PDI would have caught the damage but I missed it too. Point is, I signed off on the car, paid the money and drove away and he didn't hesitate for a second to make it right. I'm sure the $800 to fix it ate into the profit margin of that car pretty good considering I already talked them down $2K. I have spent far more energy getting far less out of some establishments.

So - kudos to you Cambrian Ford! I'll be back for sure.

 

[waterinthefuel]

Re: Customer Service

I would like to say that Cobra radios has excellent customer service as well. I had a set of radios I bought new from some online company and had no receipt or anything. Well, the charger was acting weird and I called Cobra. The lady said that the charger wasn't working right and that she'd send me a new one free of charge. Come to find out that this charger normally works as I described so I have a free charger coming that I guess I technically don't need. I was told that she should have known how her product works and the way I was describing it meant it was working right. I guess I now have a new backup charger for them.

 

[tallcanadian]

Re: Customer Service

I have to give a nod to our local Hyundai dealer. We bought our second new Hyundai in 2001. 3 years later our car was hit in a parking lot and recieved extensive damage. It had to be towed to a nearby body shop. This was on a Friday evening. We received a phone call Sunday morning from the salesman that sold us the car. He told us that he heard about the accident and told us to come in that morning and pick out a car. It was ours until our car was fixed. No cost to us. Awesome. Another time, after the warranty ran out, the car broke down. It was some kind of sensor and a couple other things. The bill was around 800 dollars. That was a week before we were to go on vacation. They had heard that we were going and when we went to pick up the car, they told us not to worry about the bill until after our vacation. that was awesome. We are now on our 3rd new Sonata. Not fussy about the new style but you can't beat the service.

 

[marlboro180]

Re: Customer Service

Isnt it nice to have a thread like this? I will chime in-

I had installed a Hoppy trailer light converter on my Sprinter van, and it had been working great for a year or so. I was out of town on a volunteer job and was moving a worksite trailer for one of the other crews. I hooked up the trailer, moved it about 30 miles and my lights started going crazy. Turns out there was a problem with the trailer wiring and the converter box had started on fire, even though there was an auto-reset breaker in line.

Called Hoppy, explained what happened, and they sent me a new one in a few days, no questions, just a letter apologizing for my misfortune with their product even though they knew the trailer was probably at fault.

A plug for CRC - Brake cleaner- Bought a few cans at a local store, when I went to use them all 3 cans just kinda dribbled out. The auto parts store would not take them back, so I called the phone number on the can expecting to be in some voice mail jail , but a HUMAN answered. Wow!

I explained the dribbling problem, and the nice lady asked for the number on the can. No problems reported with that lot, she explained. Hmmm. She then asked for my address and how many cans total I had purchased. 3 total I replied and then she thanked me for calling and we hung up.

2 days later there was a coupon for a full case of brake cleaner in my mailbox

 

[Huron Angler]

Re: Customer Service

Just wanted to add that both Minn Kota and Humminbird have excellent customer service for their quality products as well. There are some good ones out there for sure!

 

[Limited-Time]

Re: Customer Service

Bryant Boats customer service is in a class by themselves in my book. Contacted them with an upholstery issue on my 10 year old boat and they made arrangements to re-do several large sections, at the factory using original vinyl. The charge was fair, and the replacement look as if they were original. Bryant does all their own upholstery on site. I was told chances are the original craftsman redid the components.

 

[gstanton]

Re: Customer Service

Let's add Bennett trim tabs to the list. They go out of their way to correct problems - even on a used boat!

 

[DJ]

Re: Customer Service

Some that have wowed me.

-Cabelas
-iboats
-Gander Mountain
-Merrill Shoes
-Ruths Chris Steakhouse
-My landscaper (Mora's)-local outfit
-Ray Ban sunglasses
-Southwest Airlines
-Don S (iboats calendars) Great product and superior delivery and packaging.

 

[Drowned Rat]

Re: Customer Service

Rigid tools,
Southwest airlines,
Apple,
Costco,
REI,

A few I've had good experiences with.

 

[NelsonQ]

Re: Customer Service

Mine include:

- Costco
- Best Buy
- Humminbird
- Cisco Systems
- Lifetime (trailers) I called them for a part I lost to see how to order one. They shipped me a part free from the US to Canada, no questions asked.

I run a Customer Support organization so its nice to know that somewhere on the I-net, the good gets recognized....

I believe great ones just get it, the good ones will correct their mistakes, and the rest, well....let's just leave it on a positive note.

 

[scoutabout]

Re: Customer Service

Scout Boats and their Point au Baril dealer, Payne Marine. I've mentioned this before but will again for this thread.

I bought our Scout used in the States and dragged it the thousand or so km home behind a U-haul cube van. (Not sure how I managed to make it all that way with a NC registered boat on an Ontario plated trailer behind a Utah registered truck without at least a friendly once over by at least one state or provincial police force...but I digress...)

After getting the boat back here I noticed some hairline cracks in the gelcoat at the edge of the nonskid between the consoles. At the end of the boating season that first year I took it to Payne (whom I had never done business with before and just discovered by googling Canadian Scout dealers) and asked for a quote to fix it.

I left the boat with them and instead of just quoting the job, they called me back to say they decided to contact Scout in SC about the problem, took some pics for them and after some discussion Scout and Payne agreed to pick up half the tab for the repair.

Now remember, this was a used boat, purchased in another country and not even covered for minor gelcoat issues in the first place. Payne said the factory was unhappy to hear that my boat had developed any cracks at all and wanted to help make it right.

Then they mixed up a batch of specially tinted gelcoat and shipped it up here as they said the particular off-white colour of the hull would be near impossible for a local repair guy to mix accurately by just eyeballing it. Sure enough, the fix is about as invisible as you could hope for.

Count me blown away and a rabid Scout fan since that time. The fact it's the only Scout I've ever seen on our fair sized lake gives me all the more excuse to blather on about it during those inevitable gas dock conversations where there's almost always someone who saunters over and says, "Hey - what kind of boat is that?"

 

[Bucks45]

Re: Customer Service

Non-boating, but I'll add Chrysler. A few years ago I bought my wife a new Chrysler mini-van. I drove it to work one day and on my way home heard a loud pop, just as I got onto a freeway entrance ramp. Van dropped into second gear and I knew it was going to be bad. Had it towed to a Chrysler dealership in my hometown. This happened on a Saturday. On Monday the dealership called me and told me that the tranny was shot. The van was just out of warranty. The cost was $1800. They suggested that I call Chrysler. I talked to a customer service rep and told her that if it was a starter or alternator I wouldn't even bother calling, but the transmission. She put me on hold for less than 2 minutes. Came back on and said they would take care of it. They just wanted me to pay a 10% "good faith" fee. Well, I got a little cocky (but still nice) and told her that I didn't feel I should have to pay $18, let alone $180 or $1800. She put me on hold again, came back and said ok. They took care of the whole bill, didn't cost me a penny even though it was out of warranty.

 

[kend301]

Re: Customer Service

We must add NAUTICUS trim tabs to the list . I called them for the proper application and they told me what tabs to get and that due to my hull design I may have to move the bracket back on the tab by drilling one hole ... Simple enough. Got them , took my boat out of the water , assembled 1 tab and it was not going to fit . Called them to see if I was to send them back to them or place of purchase for the refund . They rechecked their records and found the same boat with the same problem. They are now custom ordering shorter pistons/struts that will work and sending them to me at no cost at all ...