Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The dying art of customer service

Stopped at a fuel stop, fueled, then went in and happily handed the clerk a 100 dollar bill for $99 and a few cents worth of fuel, stood there with a smile and my hand out waiting for my change.
She, with a rolled eyes smirk placed it down scattering it all over the counter, I raked it all up and off the counter into my hand, turned and threw it so hard it bounced off the wall in the rear of the store, then said, "you pick it up bitch!"

Gee when I walk in to my Rolex dealer at Ala Moana Center I
am greeted and offered a hot coffee.

Then the Assistant Manager asks if he can be of some help, like free steam cleaning my watch. I usually accept, 'cause
that was my purpose of the visit.

If I go in during the month of July, they offer me one year
of no interest on my in house account purchases.

Well I guess the different CS is due to the products sold or
the amount of mark up.

Or possibly because I bought three watches from them.

Customer Service no longer exist in our country. Big business now purposely makes it difficult just to contact them much less help you out.. here's a experience I recently had with Polaris.. .. I have a Polaris 4 wheeler.. 2010 850XP it only had 966 miles on it. one of the issues this model has is the timing gear is pressed on to the crankshaft,thus be being susceptible to slipping,wrecking the valve train and ruining the engine. this happened to mine this past spring. So I got poking around on the internet and found the Polaris sometimes will help owners out with this issue. I called the dealer and he said. "it's long past warranty but call Polaris you never know I've seen them pay for the parts before"..$3900plus for a new engine. So I figured what the heck I'll give it a shot.
after going over some of the details about my wheeler,and what I knew was wrong with it. Polaris tells me "you need to take it to a dealer to get it verified". So I'm thinking great their gonna help me out !!! now the dealership is flat out busy and they did the best to work it in and have their mechanic look it over, take some pictures and send 'em off to polaris. Well four weeks later and two 75 mile trips back and fourth.. POLARIS tells me it's to far out of warranty .... well no F^%^&king Chit!! why did you have me bring to a dealer, waste his time and mine to tell me that... NEVER AGAIN. will I ever purchase ANYTHING built by Polaris industries

plab

Very good customer service hear locally.



I love our local CarQuest and nearby implement dealers.

A good partsman is one of my favorite people on Earth.


Couple local mechanics who will show on up the random Saturday to help a guy out.



But then again it's a small town and a few people actually have respect for one another.


Edit:



Plab, I didn't get the best impression at the Polaris dealer where we went to buy. 150 miles away and a pretty good sized and busy place.


Bought a new Ranger and my wife noticed that the keys for the canvas doors weren't with the machine. I didn't really care but still called them up later and asked about it.


That was 2-3 months ago and still no keys.

Very minor issue but makes a guy wonder how they'll deal with warranty work if need be.

Sounds like the OP went to Dick's!

It's like there are no people on the floor any more specifically to help customers. You have to go bother someone who is stocking shelves or cleaning to get some help......

The Red Lobster, Outback Steakhouse business model. Worst plucking service, on purpose. They underbuild for the demographic, making customers wait to be seated is the goal. How often do you see people waiting, while there are many empty tables. They always seem to have a seat at the bar where you can wait? Big money on overpriced alcohol?
One of us jumps out of the car and asks about the wait. When told 30-45 minutes I say "no thanks, someone else will serve me now."

Yes it makes me mad, rant over.

Almost the same thing happened to me except I threw the change on the floor behind her and told her to keep it for such good service.

IN 2010 I was hard up and needed a job. The only place that called me back was Walmart so I threw out all of my pride and became a Walmart Associate.

It became obvious at the time the only thing the CEO of Walmart was interested in doing was padding the stock holders and his portfolio. No clerks, no floor associates and no stockers. I was on a regular basis working in 3 and sometimes 4 departments, 2 of which by myself.

There was no customer service, there was no checkout clerks, there was no one mixing paint in hardware. Most of the time there was only one person in Electronics.

The point being, the most important person in the store is NO LONGER the customer and not even the Associates, but the stockholders and the folks in the home office. I lasted 2 1/2 years and if I were dying of starvation I won't go back to work for a large chain store company again.

kwg

I'll say this, I HATE to walk in to a store for the first time, to just browse for a product that I know virtually nothing about, with the intent of just trying to discreetly browse their selection and get a feel for what it's all about, only to have a gung-ho salesperson start the 50 questions, we-have-a-special-and-you-have-to-buy-it-right-now-or-it's-too-late bulschitt.

On the other extreme, it really pisses me off to walk up to the cash register with my product(s) in hand and no one cares enough to check me out. Or there are 10 people in line at every cash register when there's nothing special going on. It is nice to have someone let me know that they're available any time I have any questions.

That being said, I have a really good story of great customer service. Maybe 10 years ago, I decided that I had to have a Remington 700 LVSF in .223. Called around and found out Bud's Gun Shop in Lexington, KY had one in stock. I told the clerk I was leaving to head there. He asked where I was coming from. (At that time, I lived about 3 hours from there, had only recently heard of them, and was genuinely curious to see the place in person.) The clerk told me he'd see me after awhile.

When I showed up, I took my time taking in their huge inventory. It was impressive! When I finally worked my way to where the LVSF's were, there were none in .223! About that time, a clerk asked if he could show me anything. When I mentioned what I was after, he said, "Oh you're the guy that drove down from Ohio!" "I put it back here behind the counter so someone else wouldn't buy it while you were on the way." I was stunned! He didn't tell me he would, and I hadn't asked him to, but it made an impression on me! I bought it on the spot.

This is the bottom line in retail anymore. I took a job to get out of the house a couple days a week and see exactly this. there was a department meeting to try and find out why the department turn over was 84% and what they got from the GM was that corporate only allows so many hours. Payroll was blah, blah, blah. We know nothing will change with those answers. So to take crap from people and not get any backup from management is why there is such high turnover. Management just tells people good luck and get someone else in as soon as possible. The people in this department do really try but when things get backed up you can only do so much. Sorry, you probably will not get your feet rubbed when 5 people are on one associate. We're just trying to get your product rung up and out the door as fast as possible to help the next customer. It's brisk without being rude.
And then there is this guy. Spend 20 minutes showing a product and then he finally tells me he can buy direct for 40% off and just wanted to do a hands on before he bought.

Part of the problem is the customers want to lowest price and maximum service. That doesn't happen, you get exactly what you pay for.

Jim

LOL, that will work too Mag, you probably got the same startled OH-CHIT look I got, with hands over mouth and a several steps backpeddle away from her side of the counter.

After ordering I get my card out and hand it to the waitperson to run when they bring the food. I hate having to wait for the check, some times it takes longer to pay for the food then it takes to place the order and receive the food.

Jim

Very true. It also helps to be seen in the store some time in the recent past.

Jim

Sam,

Small town benies. When I am at the Idaho place service provided is more than I require. They are all spot on, including Home Depot. I work to not need service knowing what I want before I proceed. Having lived/worked for many years in places where I really could not shop I enjoy running every damn aisle of a store like a good gun show.

Businesses are out to make as much money as possible, so service isn't a priority in most cases.

My goal is to get what I want as cheaply as possible and I almost always know exactly what I want, so service is a luxury I don't need and don't want to pay for, so I buy almost everything online. Save time, gas, aggravation.

A bonus is that most online sellers are very concerned about your satisfaction. Almost all that sell through Amazon will email me almost as soon as my stuff arrives wanting to know if I'm satisfied. One used book dealer even threw in a free copy of the excellent hunting book he had written.

Life's too short to waste time getting pissed off or pissed on.

Ed, it is nice to be able talk to someone on the other side of the phone who can look at a computer diagram and figure out which part you are talking about. And clarify machine/serial number part upgrades, etc..

And have the right part overnight FedEx'd to the farm.



Back in the 1980's my dad had a Massey Ferguson combine. Drove to Canada to get parts. Talk about a time killer, modern day customer service rules.

Sam,

That's another world for me and most of us here I am sure. Hours are dollars, personal dollars. I am in the throes of correcting a '73 Mach 1 so I am on those forums. The guys whine left and right when their order hasn't shipped in three days. With planning being half of my career I just laugh. Of course, these days, I have nothing but time...

Ed, you took parts man to another other level.


I could never trust a translator.....grin