Sears, Home Depot and the little old lady

[DARISC]

I recently became friends with a local artist who exhibits in a gallery I recently put some work into. She's 82, all of maybe 5' tall, extremely sharp and she cracks me up.

Her upstair neighbor's hot water heater leaked into her walls and carpet last week. She's been dealing with her ins. co., fans and holes knocked in walls to dry her pkace out and I've called her several times to see how the battle is going. She had me in stitches and I told her she really had to put her story down in writing. I just might do that, she said. I had two episodes with Sears and Home Depot awhile back and I wrote it up to send to my family and friends. Well, she found it on her computer and emailed it to me.

I read all the posts by you guys who've had similar problems with incompetants and thought you might enjoy reading it. The following are her words:

"The adventures of a lady who was meant to live in the Twentieth Century:

You’ve heard my tale about the repair of my washing machine by the Sears employees?

First, they lost the repair contract that I purchased which guaranteed full protection of both washer and dryer for three years. After they found it, and I said many bad words over the phone while they were searching, they finally sent one young man out to the house. He was smaller than my washing machine. I’ll have to come back another day and bring another man with me so we can move the washer and dryer stack in order to repair it. He looked at me as if he was ready to call the Humane Society to report me for either buying a stack unit, or expecting it to be repaired. I felt so guilty. He did however, check out some things and said it wasn’t the belt. Good, I said, thinking, I could have told you that.

The next repair date, the two men arrived, and they could now pull the unit out from the wall where I had so inconveniently installed it. They took the unit all apart and decided it needed a replacement part, which they ordered.

The next repair date, a different man arrived, alone, and he looked at the washer and dryer unit, and said: don’t tell Sears that I can pull this unit out myself, or they will always make me do it alone. He pulled out the unit, placed the dryer down on the floor and examined the washer. It’s not pumping he said. I’ll have to order a new pumping device and that will take awhile. Okay, I said, not knowing what else to say.

The next repair date, still a different man arrived. The large box with the total pump system for the washer had arrived a few days prior to his arrival. He had a helper to help him take the dryer down off the top of the washer. They took it all apart and installed the pump (which I had noticed cost Sears $254). They then proceeded to check out the unit, which still didn’t work. After some consultation and conversation, they pulled out the unit once more to check the hoses. There’s something wrong with these hoses, they informed me. They are the hoses your installers put in when I had you install the unit, I replied. The hoses were chosen by your company, and insisted upon before installation.
Well, these hoses shut down with the slightest problem. They are not good to have. We’ll install new hoses.

Which they did. They probably went to standard hoses which most everybody has. And, of course, the machine now works. It has had about $300 of unnecessary parts installed by a series of repairmen.

Once I finished with the repair of the washing machine, I turned to the drapery rods which were over twenty years old and the strings were breaking, etc. Since I had replaced all of the vertical pieces a year ago, I thought all I wanted to do was pay for the installation of new rods through the whole house. Seemed simple to me. Why not, if I would pay for it? I went to Home Depot.

The young lady behind the desk said, ”Of course, we can do that, but you’ll have to let them come out to measure the house, even though you have all the measurements of the windows with you. I’ll have to write up an estimate for them. Don’t pay any attention to the figures, as I’m required to write it up as though we were installing the verticals along with the rods. She whizzed through the details on the computer. I did notice the estimate said: $960 dollars. She said someone would call me to set up a date.

I waited a week and heard nothing. Returning to the store, I asked about the problem. They finally found the order and estimate, and it had the wrong phone number on the order, so the subcontractors could not get an answer when they called. They also found that the person writing up the order had overcharged me by more than $300. We corrected the phone number, and the estimated amount, and I returned to wait for my call. I was so happy when I finally heard from someone.

Two men came out to the house and measured all the windows. One of them said, you should really lower the rod over the sliding door in the dining room to window height, as it will cost you less to cover the windows. You’ll have to fill in the holes on the ceiling yourself after we move it. I didn’t like the ceiling repair, as I’m too old to crawl up the ladder to patch ceilings anymore, but I was ready to agree to anything. At least, they had the right phone number and the address was correct.

I did get a phone number when the rods had been cut to size and delivered to them.
I worked very hard the evening before their arrival to take down all of the vertical blind slats before their arrival (they call them “veins,” and they call the rods “rails.” This knowledge makes me a professional in their trade, as I can now converse with them).

Of course, when they arrived with the rails, they suggested that they install the large rail, which they had recommended that I drop to window height, right where it was, in the ceiling, which meant no hole patching for me. I had to agree. When trying to inst
all that particular piece they noticed that it had been damaged in the factory, and they would have to return it for replacement. That meant another three weeks to wait for them to build (somewhere – China, maybe?) a replacement rod, and my window would be without covering for that time period.

Oh, well, I thought, I least they have my phone number and they have my address correct.

They did return with the replacement, only by this time, I could see that the new replacement Rails required more Veins. I was short one piece in the bedroom, and three pieces in the living room. Okay, I said, It’s not your fault, it’s not my fault. The change of rails has created this shortage. I’ll have to replace them by buying a new package of extras and cutting them to fit.

Of course, yesterday I found that Home Depot no longer carries the color and length of the matching veins. I had to ask their employee to call the manufacturer to ask if they could be special ordered. They could not be ordered from the factory, which has by this time moved to the North Pole, finding China no longer adequate for manufacturing.

Now, what do I do? I asked myself, replace all the veins in the house? Something like having vericose vein surgery? Or, what? I went to a different Home Depot store, and found a package of white veins which was marked 102” long. Thinking I could cut them down to the 93” I required, I would put two such veins on each side of the large window in the living room, and use the one extra vein which matched my old ones to create the missing vein for the bedroom window. Happily, I went home with my package.

Only to find upon opening it up, that the package was labeled incorrectly, and they were really only 84” long. Since I could not cut them to measure 93”, I now had to return them to Home Depot. And, here I was, thinking that the new store was so much better than the first one I tried.

Yes, I have returned the package of veins, and replaced it with the proper length, all but the missing pieces, so I now have verticals with two white pieces on each side and textured pieces in the middle. I’m so creative, and so tired."

[GH85Carrera]

That is what makes me stay away from the big stores for installation. If I can't do it myself I will find a local business that has been in business for a while and has good references.

We had new granite counter tops put in the kitchen, bathrooms & laundry room. The guy was amazing. Since the kitchen sink had to come out anyway we did the old "while we are in there" and bought a new sink faucet & garbage disposal.

I was ignorant of the fact that the new sink did not come with a new drain. The installer looked at the old drain and he did the smart thing. He knew we did not want some old scratched drain in the new sink. He went to the local plumbing supply store and bought a quality drain. He made the simple decision to do it right. I wonder what percentage of contractors would have put the old POS drain in there just because that was easier.

[widebody911]

TLDR: Sears and Home Depot repair/install guys suck