Here's the first email I sent to Home Depot on December 26, 2014, describing what happened when I tried to take advantage of an extended, "Replacement" warranty I had purchased for an air compressor at their west Wichita, Kansas, store …
This evening, I had one of the most horrendous customer service experiences of my life at the west Home Depot Store in Wichita, Kansas. I had purchased a Campbell Hausfeld air compressor in May of 2013, along with the two-year extended warranty. I never buy extended warranties because I think they’re a high-profit add-on item with little real value for the customer, but for some reason, I did this time. The compressor stopped working recently, so I carried it into the store, along with all of my warranty paperwork, relieved that, against my usual habit, I had the means to receive a replacement, as the warranty states.
Step one: the man at the returns desk told me I had not bought the compressor there because they had never carried Campbell Hausfeld, and proceeded to interrogate me like a criminal. I showed him the receipt a second time, which clearly showed “CH” as the manufacturer, along with the item number. Still unconvinced, he sent me to the repair department, explaining that my replacement warranty would allow me to get the unit repaired, at best, but not replaced.
At the repair desk, I was informed that they don’t work on that brand and the unit would have to be sent to Arizona for about a month to be repaired. I explained that I needed the unit immediately because I was in the middle of a fab project for my video production company, and asked if they could offer a similar replacement unit. No go.
I asked to speak with the manager.
The manager took his sweet time getting there and turned out to be the same genius who had told me they had never carried that brand in the 8 years he had been there, and that there was nothing else they could do. I was instructed to call the Home Depot customer service number to receive a gift card for a store that, at this point, I was fairly certain I never wanted to visit again. I stepped outside and did so on my cell phone. The customer service rep explained that the compressor has a five year manufacturer’s warranty and Home Depot’s replacement warranty places them under no obligation to replace the unit until the manufacturer’s warranty runs out. The Campbell Hausfeld website clearly states that the unit has a 1-year warranty, not a 5-year warranty. More genius. More stellar customer service.
I went back into the store and had the repair technician go ahead with sending the unit on it’s one-month journey to Arizona. Being in dire need of a compressor, I stopped by the tool department to see what other units they had available, only to see—wonder of wonders—another Campbell Hausfeld compressor model on the shelf, the brand that the store manager had angrily assured me they had never carried.
So now I wait for my month-long repair, and consider my next course of action, which will begin with a series of extended tirades about Home Depot’s deplorable customer service to my nearly 3,000 Facebook friends, who will tell others, who will tell others. Being a prominent and well-respected person in my community, I will make it my mission over the next 5-10 years to send everyone with whom I have a chance to discuss the issue of customer service (a favorite topic of mine, being a business owner) to Ace Hardware or Lowe’s or basically anywhere else in the known universe besides Home Depot, for their hardware and home improvement needs.
This is a textbook symptom of big business losing track of what’s happening on the ground and forgetting that, at the end of the day, the only thing of value they really have is not inventory or buildings or profits, but customers.
Way to go, Home Depot; you really knocked this one out of the park.
Kindest regards,
Wynn Ponder
Creative Director
Cinema 1 Film & FX
www.cinema1film.com
2 - (Huge corporation replies to little guy's email):
On Dec 27, 2014, at 9:32 AM, THD Customer Care <thdCustomerCare@homedepot.com> wrote:
Dear Mr. Ponder,
Thank you for taking the time to writes us. I am sorry that your air compressor stopped working.
I appreciate you providing us with your feedback regarding your customer service experience at your local store.
The Home Depot always strives to provide excellent customer service. We regret to hear that we did not meet your expectation in regards to this issue.
Please know that the feedback you have provided is taken seriously and that we will share your concerns with our leadership team.
Mr. Ponder, we value your comments and hope that you will continue to write us with your feedback, which allows us to improve our company.
Should there be anything further that I can do for you, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Once again, please accept my apology for the challenges you incurred in this regard.
Your reference number with Customer Care is 53801731.
I trust that you will allow us to regain your trust and rebuild the customer relationship in future projects.
Sincerely,
Lakiva Gipson
3 - (Little guy replies to huge corporation's email.)
On Dec 27, 2014, at 10:32 AM, Wynn Ponder <wynn(at)cinema1film.com> wrote:
Dear Ms. Gipson,
Forgive me, but what do you mean by anything “further?” After poring over your meticulously proofread email several times, I can’t seem to find the part where you’ve done anything for me except dispense the same kind of vacuously scripted platitudes I was given on the phone last night by Ashley, the corporate minion who told me that Campbell Hausfeld has a five year warranty.
But thank you for your thoughtful email. I can’t tell you how reassuring it is that, at this point in my customer service experience, my identity has been reduced to an eight-digit number that appears to have no purpose in the context of genuine customer service.
Please advise your leadership team that, as case number 53801731 slowly rises to the top of their presumably lengthy meeting agenda, the first 12 hours of my Facebook post about this issue have generated 43 shares and 30 comments from people in the Wichita area. We’re now at the point where people I don’t even know are gleefully sharing my post with an ever expanding circle of other people, who are also sharing it.
Picture a pebble that has been dropped into a sea of corporate customers, setting into motion a wave that will negatively impact Home Depot’s sales for years to come. Remind your leadership team of the customer service “Rule of 3000” (Here’s a link, in case they need to brush up on what was probably a relatively uninteresting course in their MBA programs: http://www.amazon.com/Satisfied-Customers.../dp/038552272Xhttp://www.amazon.com/Satisfied-Customers.../dp/038552272X). As a 25-year marketing veteran, I would, in a genuine effort to help your company, advise them to undertake a study of how many sales will be lost in the Wichita market (adjusted to reflect the hourly wages of staff I will continue to engage under the moniker of case number 53801731) over the next few years because of an issue could have been solved in the store, in a few minutes, at very little human resource and inventory cost with an old-fashioned, “take care of the customer” attitude rather than a retail reenactment of the Spanish Inquisition followed by an ever deepening well of human resource expenditures that now include your time.
I run a small company and not a huge corporation, so I wouldn’t presume to preach to your leadership team about the calculus of profits and losses on which they surely spend countless hours of study, but simple arithmetic would seem to indicate that when a customer has made the difficult decision to pay extra for a “replacement” warranty, the most profitable course of action might be to do the honorable thing and find a way to provide a replacement product when the opportunity presents itself.
Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m not ordinarily a complainer. Quite the opposite, in fact; when I have a positive customer experience, I’m very conscientious about telling as many people as I can about the company that provided that experience. I’m also very, very busy, and this kind of thing usually rolls off of me out of necessity—and because life is too short to sit around feeling angry about the small stuff. And this is small stuff; the compressor didn’t even cost much; I can afford to buy another one (just as Home Depot can afford to replace it). It’s just that our society currently stands at the dangerous precipice of a potentially oligarchic chasm, and it’s occasionally important to remind ourselves that a healthy society is made of people and not ledger entries.
Kindest regards,
Wynn Ponder
Creative Director
Cinema 1 Film & FX
www.cinema1film.com
p.s. You should probably tell your social networking team to keep a close eye on Home Depot’s corporate Facebook page. I’ve been sharing my experience as a comment on quite a few posts, which gives me access to your 1,756,235 fans across the country.
4 - (Local store makes the mistake of telephoning the little guy; resulting in resolution of the issue.)
About an hour after the email exchange with Home Depot's corporate customer service department, the west Wichita store manager (presumably having heard nothing from corporate at this point) called me to complain about the fact that I had left the unit with his repair tech to have it sent to Arizona (the very course of action he had first told me would be necessary). He reminded me that I had been instructed to call corporate for a gift card, and was not pleased that I had disobeyed. After that, the conversation did not go well for him, and before we were finished, he invited me to come to the store for a replacement, which I did, and it's a significant upgrade from the original unit. In fairness, he seemed genuinely apologetic and extremely accommodating when I arrived. Just took a stupid-long time to get there.
At the time of this blog post--36 hours after the initial Home Depot visit--my two Facebook posts about this experience have received 129 shares, 149 likes and 113 comments.
Never be afraid to take a stand, America. This country belongs to citizens, not corporations. In a time when our country is placing so much media focus on the fight against tyranny around the world, some of the worst bullies are right here in our back yard.
