Seinfeld? I live it. The Office? I do it everyday 9-5. And by living the life I do, I find myself in situations that couldn’t be scripted any better. Most recently it has been a series of unfortunate events that will ultimately end up more unfortunate for the entities that I have conducted business with. Let’s start with this past Saturday….
I look at my Maui Jim Mahaka sunglasses, which I purchased at Sunglass Hut in Grayson, GA while on travel to visit my family, only to find that there is a weird mark in the core of the lens. These are polycarbonate lenses and this appears to be a crack on one of the interior layers. If I knew how to do this, I would be called a superhero, but I can’t and therefore I’m just an unhappy consumer (only to get worse up until last night). So I go to Maui Jim’s website and figure out what I need to do in order to get a new pair sans internal lens crack. Simple, put them in a box with a dated receipt and a check to cover shipping. I go to look at my receipt and realize that it was hand written except for the receipt number and barcode. The most important thing is: there was no date. Shouldn’t be a big deal, Sunglass Hut around the corner should be able to reprint this receipt given the receipt number. So I call the Sunglass Hut located in the Pentagon City Mall on the food court level just up the escalator and to the right from the Pentagon City Metro Stop. A not so delightful female sales associate answers the phone and the dialog went like this…
Ms. Attitude: Sunglass Hut, may I help you?
Me: Hi, how are you, I have a couple of questions for you…
Ms. Attitude: We’re very busy so if you don’t mind, call back tomorrow.
Me: Excuse me, I do mind, this is about a $150 sunglass purchase.
Ms. Attitude (after a second to realize that I wasn’t just another call…): Uh, Ok, what can I do for you.
Me: I bought a pair of sunglasses at a store in Georgia and I have noticed that there is a crack on the inside of the lens. I would like a receipt printed for them. Can you do that?
Ms. Attitude: No.
Me: What can I do to get the receipt.
Ms. Attitude: Call the Georgia store.
Me: Will do.
Click.
Being in the generation I’m in, I quickly dash to www.sunglasshut.com to find the customer service contact methods. I found a 1 800 number, I called, it was open M-F 9-5. Fair enough, I can respect a normal work week. I’ll just send them a quick email letting them know that the manners in the Pentagon City store were not…let’s say…existent. Here’s the email I sent.
In June, I purchased a pair of Maui Jim Makaha
sunglasses from a store in Atlanta while on travel. I’m now back in my
homestate and the lens cracked near the nose piece. I went to Maui Jim’s
website to see what I need to get them fixed under warranty and they
request a dated receipt as a proof of purchase. My problem is that the
receipt I have was half hand written due to a broken printer, it has no
date on it. I called the Sunglass Hut nearest to my home in Virginia
only to get a shockingly rude response to my inquiry. The sales person
said “I’m very busy, so if you don’t mind, call tomorrow.” I replied
with “I do mind, this is about a $150 sunglass purchase.” She conceded
and curtly answered my questions, proving to be no help whatsoever. She
said that she couldn’t do anything and to contact the store I bought
them at. So I called that Sunglass Hut and they said the only way to get
it to me is by fax. I don’t have a fax machine. What is your advice on
how to get my actual receipt? Please advise as I am extremely
dissatisfied with customer service so far. Mark Armstrong 404 *** ****
Here’s the response I got Monday Morning:
Hello Mark,
If you cannot receive a fax copy of your receipt the Sunglass Hut location can send you a copy by mail as well.
Thank you,
Erica
Sorry SGH, not gonna cut it. I actually followed the Pentagon City’s advice and called the Georgia store. This lady said “Sure, no problem, I just printed it. You can come by and pick it up anytime. “ After explaining that I actually couldn’t swing by and that I’m 650 miles away from that store, she then said she couldn’t email it but could fax it. I actually don’t own a fax machine as its 2009. I asked her to mail it, she said she didn’t get off work until 6 pm for everyday up until next Thursday and the post office would be closed. At this point, I wasn’t about suggest the use of FEDEX GUY WHO COMES EVERY FREAKIN DAY TO DELIVER SHIPMENTS OF SUNGLASSES, that would have blown her mind. I conceded and said that I would call Monday from my office that still had a fax machine.
Monday Morning, I stroll into the office and give the store a ring. I filled in the new associate as to what happened on the phone Saturday…here’s the dialog:
1st year college student home for summer: “Are you Mark Armstrong?”
Me: Uh, Yes. (I though to myself thats creepy.)
Girl: I can’t fax it and mailing would take all week.
Me: What can I do to get it?
Girl: I can email it to you…?
Me: Thats what I wanted all along, that would be great and relevant to this day and age’s technology.
Girl: It will be later tonight, I can’t email from work.
Me: Thats fine, just so long as I get it.
Click.
The day ends.
Tuesday Begins. I get to work only to find an email from bubblebaby8419@aol.com. Note: I don’t wish the wrongdoings of email spammers on her, but there is a lesson to be learned from using personal emails for work with an angry and frustrated customer.
Regardless, the receipt is attached, scanned in as a JPEG front and back. Mission accomplished.
I get home from work, find that I have a package. Awesome, this must be the Xbox 360 I ordered from Dell. I don’t open it yet. So I’m folding the 8.5 x 11 receipt along with the 2.5 foot hand written bootleg receipt to go into a box with the glasses. My roommate asks what I was up to and what I was doing for dinner. I inform him what happened with the glasses and he says I should just take the receipt up to the local Sunglass Hut and they will exchange them. I figure its worth a shot and I would like to see what kind of operation was being handled by miss manners. So we trek up to Pentagon City Mall and find quite the opposite of I what I encountered on the phone. The lady said that I could “SRD” them. I asked what that was and she informed me that its a replacement program where I can swap those out with a brand new pair for half the cost of the glasses. I inform her that I won’t be “SRD”ing anything and that I would like them to just be swapped because the flaw in the glasses couldn’t be anything other than from the manufacturer. She says that her manager would have to approve it. I tell her that’s fine. She called him and he actually approved it. I was surprised, and after it was said and done, they owed me $1.60 from the difference in sales tax.
All is well with the sunglasses, back in action with my new Maui Jim’s. Roommate and I decide to go to California Pizza Kitchen. We arrive to an empty host stand and for about 15 minutes, stood there while another dozen people got in line behind us. The restaurant was busy, not slammed, but busy. There were about 10 tables open. The host returns to the stand and asks us how many. We say 2, he says 20 minutes. Baffled at why we couldn’t sit any of the open tables, we take a seat on a bench and wait. 10 minutes later, he asks us if we would like to sit outside. We said sure in hopes that we might get to eat faster. We sit outside, our server, who took 15 minutes to realize we were there, finally took our drink orders and brought us bread. 7 or 8 minutes later, he returns with the drinks and takes our order. The pizza comes out fast, so fast, it beat our drinks to the table. How about that? So I polish off my first glass of sprite and still have half a pizza left. By now its starting to rain, hard. We are covered by an awning, although the path for the servers was not. After I realized that the server wasn’t coming back, I finished my pizza, thirsty. After about 15 minutes of sitting there, he finally comes back with a bill. No refill, no checking in on us, no offer for dessert. We tip him appropriately (it my or may not have been a 2.50 tip on a $30 tab) and leave. Worst service ever, always good pizza.
We went to Cold Stone too, nothing good or bad happened except I payed $5 for a single scoop of ice cream.
So I’m pulling into my parking garage and find that a Silver Mazda 3 is parked in my reserved spot, which was marked reserved with a number in it and also by numerous signs throughout our complex. The reason its reserved is that I pay $75 a month for that spot (not a choice, I consider it part of the rent). I used to be gracious to these folks, maybe they are only going to be a minute, maybe its a Chinese food delivery. But that ended after the first 15 times. By now, and my mood as of this point didn’t help, I don’t care why you’re there, but you shouldn’t be because its my freakin spot. So I call A1 towing and wait, illegally parked in handicapped spot with my emergency flashers on. He arrives, realizes its a manual transmission, uses a slim jim to pick the lock, opens the door, puts it in neutral and rolls it out of the spot. He lifts its, I sign and he’s off. He made it about 80 feet away when I young guy comes running out of the hallway and flags down the truck. He asks what was happening, the towtruck driver says, comically, “You’re getting towed…for parking in a reserved spot.” “I didn’t know!” “Now you do. The fee is $150 and you can get it at our yard.” I’m not kidding when I say this, the guy starts crying…hard. And it worked because between his dad coming out and yelling in Spanish at the driver and the 17 year old bawling in the streets of Alexandria, the driver had enough and only charged him $25 to drop it. I didn’t care, I just wanted my spot. But the whole situation was surreal. Did I really make a kid cry over getting his illegally parked car towed? Yes, Yes I did. Go figure.
So I go inside, anxious to get to bed because the day was just that good so far but get distracted by new electronics. I decide to open my new xbox. Tearing through the packing and smelling all the new electronics, I get to the games that were bundled with the system, and they shipped the wrong ones. I ordered the Xbox Elite 360 Holiday Bundle with Fable 2 and Halo 3, but I received Kung Fu Panda and Lego Indiana Jones. Honest mistake, similar boxes, same main product. So I jump on dell’s website and report a wrong order. Here’s my response: (My real name is Gary, its on the credit card, hence the greeting…)
Dear Gary Armstrong,
Thank you for contacting Dell online Customer Care.
I understand from your email that, you have received the wrong games with your order 792669776. I apologize for the inconvenience caused to you.
As per the records, I see that your order 792669776 for Xbox 360 Elite Holiday Bundle includes Kung Fu Panda, LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures games with the order and we have sent you the same so, at it will not be possible for us to arrange the replacement for the order as, replacement are set for like to like items only.
Sincerely,
Mohit Kwatra
Here’s my response:
This is almost correct. When I ordered my elite bundle, there were two options. One was the Halo 3/Fable II bundle, the other being this one, the Lego Indiana Jones and Kung Fu Panda. I specified the Halo/Fable bundle. I now see you have taken that deal down; however, when I placed my order, it was still available. You have clearly sent the wrong bundle. Considering my demographic, a 26 year old male with a credit card, did you think I would have preferred Kung Fu Panda over Alien Killing Marines? While the line item on my receipts don’t say which bundle it was I realize its my word against yours. I would hope you choose to satisfy a customer as opposed to losing one.
Good day,
Mark
That story is yet to be resolved. From what I hear, their senior execs aren’t that hard to find, I’ll do what I can…make that have to…to get the games I actually ordered.
The last story, I’ll keep this one short as this post is getting ridiculously long, is with Microsoft themselves. With the purchase of a new xbox, I need to transfer the contents of old hard drive to the new one. Microsoft lets you do this with a free kit. I called to order the kit and after about 15 frustrating minutes dealing with a robotic female voice recognition touch tone menu, I finally spoke to something with a pulse. He said he could help me…but not tonight as their “system” was down. I thought, hmm, customer service got red ringed, ironic. I said I would call back later this week.
Well I hope you learned something from all this. I learned to never shop at Sunglass Hut, don’t go to a CPK when its sort of busy, don’t buy anything from Dell, and keep pushing zero when on the phone with one of those stupid inanimate systems that can’t tell words apart like Boat and Apple. Try to understand this one ms. robot phone answering system: Customer Service at Xbox iz teh suxxorz. And when I do get a hold of a human, put your script down and don’t tell me some made up American name, we know your cheap labor in an undeveloped country.