The only one for the Weekend

With the receipt of my new laptop, which is running fine, and the return / upgrade of my previous economic stimulus effort, I am now sitting here thinking unpleasant thoughts about Kenmore specifically and Sears generally. At least it should only be a week before the new Bosch appliances are delivered. Below is the open letter I wrote to Sears on their website. I imagine that my less than ideal reviews of the appliances and their customer service staff will never see the light of day, but I feel better for having ranted. So, here it is...

Good Day,

I recently purchased a Kenmore washer & dryer on Sears.com and the dryer was defective from the start. I suspect the washer was too, but it is of little consequence at the moment.

After three rounds of field service failed to repair the appliances, I contacted customer service via e-mail and after two rounds of e-mail was tremendously dissatisfied with the result. In a nutshell, I was told that I could exchange the defective equipment for same brand and model or I may be charged a restocking fee. Let me be perfectly clear. I had owned the appliances for less than 30 days, one (and probably both) were defective upon installation and the best that I get from e-mail interaction is that I can pay to return them and/or get another set of potentially the same aggravation. By the way, these customer service people understand that we buy washers and dryers in sets, right?

Yesterday (28 March 2009), I carefully loaded them into the back of my pickup and drove to the Sears store in the Galleria Mall in Hoover, AL - where I picked them up originally. The appliance manager started with the I will help you call customer service but in no way appeared ready to resolve the issue. Fortunately for me, your phone customer service took forever to answer the call, hung up on him twice and then proceeded to tell him to call someone else to get the help he needed. At this point, he was ready to help.

We went downstairs, he returned the two defective appliances, issued credit and got me in touch with a very knowledgeable young man to help me make my new purchase. At this point, I will tell you that the manager's name is Sajid and the associate's name is Alex. These two gentlemen should be commended for their helpfulness and the phone / e-mail customer support people should be summarily terminated.

The story ends with this. I have now paid $1200 more than I started out with, in order to wait a week for a more highly rated set of appliances delivered and installed with a 5 year protection plan so that I don't have to deal with any of this again. So, as I sit here unable to do laundry in my own home for the next week, I will be thinking about my future relationship with Sears.

All I can say right now is, if I ever set foot in one of your stores again, it will be to find the two who helped me and thank them for their help with an additional purchase. But, I find it unlikely that I will set foot in one of your stores, and certainly not on Sears.com, again.