Some Business Policies Befuddle Me

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RSteve

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Many years ago. I had a Lands End golf shirt that started out as purple in color but over many years and washings had become a fairly light lavender. It was sans holes, but looked shot. One day, I wanted to wear it and asked my wife where she'd hung it. I couldn't find it in the drawer where it usually resided. With a smile she handed me a new version of my old shirt.
"I want my old shirt. I appreciate you bought me a new one, but I want my old broken in shirt. I'll wear the new one another time."
My dear wife replied, "These shirts have a lifetime warranty. The shirt was falling apart and the material was almost see through. I sent it in to their customer service office and they immediately replaced it with the new one, no charge." I told her that I felt like a thief. I'd had the shirt for at least a decade and gotten my money's worth. I phoned customer service and told the representative what had happened. The first thing she said was, "We have no way of returning your old shirt. All the worn returns go in bins to go to various fabric reprocessors." I said I didn't want it back, but did want to pay for the new one. "I'm sorry we have no mechanism for that. You returned an item under our replacement policy and we replaced it. If I charge you for a new shirt, I will have to send another one."

Which brings us to this week. I ordered a small generator on-line just to provide enough juice to power my garage door opener. It's about 15 lbs. When it arrived at my house, I checked the model number on the shipping carton against the model number on my sales receipt. They were not the same and I decided not to even unbox item. I called the seller's local outlet and asked what to do. The rep said that this generator was a drop ship item from a distributor and wasn't carried in the stores. However, I could return it at the store if I had the sales receipt with transaction number. I did have all the paperwork and brought everything to the store.
A clerk scanned the barcode on the box and on a screen I could see, a refund $30.00 more than I paid for the generator came up. I told the returns clerk that the refund was incorrect and showed her my receipt. She went through the return/refund process again, then apologized saying that the refund would only process at the higher amount. I said okay. Then I saw that the refund was even more than $30.00 over what I paid. I asked the woman what happened. She said they were refunding the shipping charge. I said it came with free shipping. "Sir, I can't manually change anything in this process. If you decide that you want to move forward to pay more, you'll have to file a complaint through the company's home office."
 
Then there are other company policies that work against customers.

You tried to fix the problem and they wouldn't let you so I wouldn't worry about it. You shouldn't have any bad Karma over it. :)
 
There's a story about Patagonia and a very old pair of pants. Old pants with a lot of sentimental value and considered a perfect utility item after years of use. They sent the pants in for repair, which is a service Patagonia still offers, and the repair clerk went into their old filing cabinets to find the original pattern. They repaired the tattered pants, and if I'm remembering correctly, they also made a new pair. Free of charge. I've heard many stories about Patagonia having not just incredible customer service, but downright insane customer service. LL Bean used to be known for that as well, but they don't have all the services and craftsman like they used to employ. Patagonia is said to still operate like they did a long time ago.

Not here to advocate for Patagonia. I don't own a single piece of Patagonia clothing or gear. Highest respect for their operation, though. Not just their customer service and policies, but all kinds of ethical things that go beyond that. HOWEVER, you DO pay for those perks, and you pay handsomely.
 
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