<p>I have a Kenmore front-loader washer, and it has been making grinding noises. I have an extended warranty, and I scheduled a service appointment for yesterday afternoon. The technician told me that replacement of several major parts was necessary, that he would order the parts to be shipped to me, and schedule another visit. The parts shipment would take a week. I told him that we are leaving for vacation in a week, and that we wouldn't be back until August 12, and I asked him to delay the parts order so that nothing arrived until after the 12th. I don't want huge boxes sitting on my front porch for days or weeks while no one is home, advertising the fact that the house is empty. I can't ask a neighbor to pick them up, because they are going to be very large and heavy. He said that he couldn't do that, that he had no choice but to order the parts and set up next appointment. I told him that I needed a better solution. At one point he said that I could call and cancel the parts order and the appointment, and start all over when I came back with a new appointment (where, presumably, someone else would repeat what he had just done). I said that I would do that, but he asked me not to, saying that he would get in a lot of trouble if I did. I told him that he had to find a better way to handle it. He said that he would check, and he went out to his van for quite a while and made phone calls. He came back in and handed me a receipt for the order of over $1k worth of parts, with an appointment scheduled for August 5 (while we are not here!). I told him that I was very unhappy that he had gone ahead and placed the order without my consent, and I asked him to have his supervisor call me. I heard nothing for the rest of the day, so yesterday evening I called and cancelled the August 5 appointment. I tried to cancel the parts order, but I was told that I would have to call back this morning. I called at 9, and was told that the order had already been processed and couldn't be cancelled. I asked for the UPS tracking number, and was told that they didn't have it yet. I told the person on the phone my story, and he said that UPS would just take the parts back if no one was there to sign for them. I do not want to count on this, because UPS usually just leaves packages on my porch. </p>
<p>Does anyone have any ideas on how I can deal with this?</p>
<p>My very good friend had endless problems with Sears repair for her washer....it became an ongoing saga. Multiple weeks with no washer, etc. She eventually called the store manager. Even that took a while to resolve. I'd say keep moving up the chain of command until you get someone who can resolve it. And see if there isn't a neighbor who can come by and check for the box. I know I would not be happy with a box sitting by the front door advertising my absence. Even if they could just open the door and push it into the house, anything but sit out front and advertise.
Good Luck!</p>
<p>Find the CEO's contact information online and fax over your complaint. I did that with Home Depot a couple of years ago after beating my head against the wall for weeks. Just to shut me up, they did exactly what I wanted.</p>
<p>Thank you for the suggestions, Mom2M and zoosermom. After I posted, I managed to find a phone number for "escalation" that someone had posted online. (It's 800 326 8738 X3667, in case anyone else needs it.) A very nice woman fixed the situation for me. She managed to cancel the order. I have to start the whole process again when I come back - apparently it is not possible to put in a delay - but at least my major concern is taken care of. (I am also not happy about having had to tell multiple people in multiple call centers that my house would be empty for several weeks!)</p>
<p>zooser, I once faxed a letter to the CEO of IBM, after several unsuccessful attempts to have my brand-new laptop repaired. I had bought a very high-powerer laptop - I am a physicist, and do lots of lengthy calculations. The laptop was not able to handle this, and it kept overheating and shutting down. The repair center, twice, found nothing wrong with it. Within an hour of having faxed the letter, I had a call from the CEO's assistant, who arranged to have the laptop sent to a better repair center. They found out that when the thing was put together, someone did not remove the protective plastic cover from the fan. So the fan was not cooling the computer at all.</p>
<p>I had a problem with Comcast cable TV this week and was getting no satisfaction from "customer service" (and I use the term loosely). I would get conflicting answers depending on which representative I talked to and when I asked for escalation to a supervisor, I was just shuttled to a different customer service rep with no more authority than the others.</p>
<p>I went online and searched for other Comcast complaints, where I found the "Comcast Must Die" website. It linked me to another, newer complaint site where I found the e-mail address of a Comcast employee who monitors the site and tries to help. I sent her an e-mail and in less than 5 minutes she replied. The next morning I had a call from someone in the executive offices at Comcast who had arranged to have my problem taken care of.</p>
<p>Years ago, H had a dispute with BofA motrgage division. After getting no replies from the company, he posted a rant on the Yahoo BofA stock message board, sent a complaint to the IR and higher up the chain. Miraculously, he got a call with apologies and a refund of the fees.</p>
<p>My neighbor and I both had repair people out for our front-loaders last week. We've both decided not to invest any more money in repairs (Mine is a Whirlpool. Hers is an LG). We're going back to top-loaders. I made the mistake of calling Sears out for an appliance repair two years ago and they came from Detroit and charged me an extra hour for the drive-time. They also looked at two appliances and charged me for another two hours, saying they can't combine the time working on each. I won't be calling them again.</p>
<p>Thank God for DH who can order parts online and fix most anything himself! Of course, we got the parts for a burner with my cooktop a month ago and they are still on my hutch...I guess he has til Thanksgiving because that's the only time I use all 5 burners.</p>
<p>I have had serious customer service problems with Comcast. I'm not a customer anymore but when I was, i would just call one of the "executive assistants" to Brian Roberts and I always got my issues resolved quickly. Works like a charm - so I try to get to the CEO office for ANY company when I have serious problems.<br>
Most companies do have formal escalation policies. Unfortunately, you sometimes have to be a bit nasty to get there. Don't like it but I do what I have to. Sent a quick unhappy email to verizon the other day and got a response from some rep with "escalation" in the email address. LOL. Got my rebate though...which they never sent to me originally! the squeaky wheel gets the grease!</p>
<p>toneranger..Comcast is notorious. They use contract employees who are the worst. I have someone here right now and he actually seems decent. The last time they were here my husband threw them off our property. They were awful.</p>
<p>H had to "uninivite" a Comcast rep and a Verizon rep last week who invited themselves onto our front porch. Both claimed that they were doing work next door and were just double-checking if we were interested in their fantastic package deals. Ugh, no. I have to recycle so many Fios and Comcast mailings, it drives me nuts!</p>
<p>OK, back to Sears repair service - the one and only time I called them, I could not get through their automated phone system to actually talk to someone to make an appointment. That was my first and last attempt to contact them.</p>
<p>BunsenBurner, I am not paying for the parts, or the labor. I have an extended warranty, so everything is covered. </p>
<p>I swore a few years ago never to buy another appliance from Sears. We bought a top-of-the-line Kenmore dishwasher a few years ago. It stopped working well after a couple of years. I had a service call, and the repairman checked a few basic things and said that it was working fine. I insisted that the dishes were not getting clean. Finally I ended up going online with my laptop in the kitchen, where I found someone knowledgeable on a message board. My unknown friend fed me information that I used to instruct the repairman on how to check on other things. A problem was finally identified. </p>
<p>The dishwasher also had a design flaw. The steam vent angles up, where it has removed the finish from the wood counter edging above it.</p>
<ol>
<li>you have asked them to do so</li>
<li>The package is not insured and a signature has not been requested.</li>
</ol>
<p>All you have to do is call UPS, tell them you are going on vacation and they will simply not deliver the package. Ask them to hold it at the depot until you come back, you then have the choice of them redelivering it or you going to pick it up. This stuff happens all the time. Ive done it numerous times with Fedex, and UPS and all companies were more than happy to service my request. I asked them to never leave packages and they never do.</p>
