Windsor Wins One...

[windsor]

I had to share this saga with you guys – it is vintage shin kickin’ Windsor

A few months ago my husband and I visited the Haggar Outlet in Ellenton Fl (that’s about a 50 mile round trip). We bought about $650 worth of clothing for him included in that were two sport jackets. The sport jackets went in the closet…a few weeks pass…it is now “Open House” night at the school (he teaches). He grabs one of the sport jackets and …AAACCCKKK the big ugly ink security tag is still attached. Grabs the other jacket…same thing … BOTH jackets still have the security tag on them. No alarm went off when we left the store (probably because we had so much stuff …it must have been blocked from setting off the alarm).

Frantic I call the store to ask how to get them off…I am told I absolutely can NOT take them off myself, if the ink in the tag gets on the jackets, they will be ruined. Drat. Then I ask if there is another retailer I can go to locally (again, it is a 50 mile round trip and I’m at work) I am told, nope…no guarantees anyone else’s system will match ours. The store then kindly offers to come out to my house and have the tags removed. Wow. That’s wonderful except they can’t do it that day (only one person scheduled to work – ok makes sense…can’t close the store just for me). I can live with that…and stop at Macy’s and buy another sport jacket on way home, run it up to school so my husband can wear it for the open house (not that we needed another sport jacket…especially not one in the same color as one hanging in the closet with an ink tag stuck on it)

I call the store back a few days later to arrange to have someone come and remove the tags. The manager will need to call me back. OK, leave name and number. Wait. Wait. Call again. Leave name and number again. Wait. Wait. Call again. Yes indeed they will send someone in the next few days – will call to confirm an exact time….Wait. Wait. Wait.

Call back AGAIN – now the story is oh no, you live waaayyy too far away we can’t come there. You’ll have to bring them to us. WHAT?? I don’t think so…..I’m not the one who left the tags on. I ask again…is there a way I can take it somewhere else to get the tags removed? Again I am told…nope no guarantees. It needs to be the Haggar store that put them on. I suggest maybe I can ship them back and have them removed…uh…the young man doesn’t know about that…will have to have the manager call me…leave name, leave number. Wait. Wait. Wait.

Call back AGAIN – and now am told I just need a magnet…I can take them off myself! WHAT?????? Good thing I was on the phone or I would have smacked him….ok fine…scour the house for magnets…find a couple of varying strengths…fiddle with them for an hour or so. The tags remain securely and stubbornly attached to the useless sports jackets. They are mocking me.

So I call back again yesterday, and the young woman who answers the phone listens (less than patiently) to my tale of woe…and tells me to take it another store and have them remove it…at this point my head pretty much explodes…so I ask her if she has any idea which store I should go to…she has no idea…take them to a mall and go around until someone will remove them. Oh, and she doesn’t like my tone. So I ask for the manager – and she laughs and says is the ‘manager on duty’ which I have learned in my many phone calls means ‘I am the only one here so I am in charge’. I ask for the phone number of her boss, which she refuses to provide. I ask to leave my name and number and have her boss call me back, which she reluctantly does – although I expect the number went in the trash if it even go written down at all. Her parting words were ‘take it to mall and find someone who can take the tags off or go to our website and complain’ and promptly hangs up on me. My head begins to spin.


Being one to follow insructions…I head to Haggar.com to find that they only customer service available is for the internet purchases. Damn. OK…I am a geek and I can solve this. 15 seconds letter I know that Paul Buxbaum is the CEO of Haggar. I have determined that the e-mail domain is a simple Haggar.com – corporate e-mail constructs are pretty consistent so I try three permutations and fire off my tale of woe to Mr. Buxbaum (most of it is included above). One hour and 4 minutes after I hit send my cell phone rings. The nice gentleman on the phone is the President of the Southeast Region for Haggar (how shocked was he when I already knew his title when he said his name? Damn I love the web). Unlike most CEO’s Mr. Buxbaums ‘public’ e-mail doesn’t go to admins…it goes to him. He read it. Apparently it went through the executives like shit through the proverbial goose – with a lot of the shit landing on my new best buddy in the Southeast Region.

FedEx picked the jackets up last night. At least two people at the store (sadly) are unemployed…but we will have functioning sport jackets tomorrow. As soon as I do I will follow up with Paul Buxbaum and let him know that the issue is resolved (and suggest that the corporate website include a Customer Service path for store related issues). I’ve been told that I am rapidly becoming a legend among the managers at Haggar – I’d say the odds of any employee ever saying “go the website and compain” are between slim and none…

Do not mess with Windsor.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

Wonderful tale, Windsor! Congratulations! How big of a store credit are they giving you in addition to the removed security tags? Mr. SE Region VP is giving you a (sizable) gift card for all your troubles, isn't he?

I have a friend who managed the outlet store here in Smithfield for several years about 10 or 15 years ago. She'll get a link your story. She'll get a kick out of it for sure!

[CameronBornAndBred]

Do not mess with Windsor.

Wooohoo!!! Way to go!

[TillyGalore]

You go girl!

[Lavabe]

Do not mess with Windsor.

STILL LAUGHING!!

[colchar]

[lawgrad91]

You go, Windsor!

[devildeac]

You go, Windsor!

Think she oughtta go to court with you?

I might send her after a couple of insurance companies.

[gadzooks]

Well done!

I had a similar thing some years ago, when BellSouth suckered me into buying a phone from them (when I called to set up service, the rep said, "We're sending you a phone," and I didn't think anything more of it until a charge for it showed up on my bill). I called, and they basically said, "Sucks to be you." I was a little ticked about that, so I wrote letters to their customer service office, the CEO, the BBB and the FCC. Next thing I knew, they told me they'd take the phone back *and* refund the payment I'd already made on it (I'd have been satisfied with just the former, since I'd failed to read the fine print when the phone came). Never be afraid to escalate!

[indoor66]

Just when my jaded mind had convinced me that there is no justice I read your experience. Now you ought to go the the offending store and identify yourself and see what happens!!!!!

[lawgrad91]

You go, Windsor!

Think she oughtta go to court with you?

I might send her after a couple of insurance companies.

YES!

[CathyCA]

Windsor, quite simply, YOU ROCK!

[Miles]

Awesome! Way to go Winsdor!

[windsor]

As the old saying goes...Never talk to the clown...talk to the one who owns the circus.

Usually going up the chain will get it done - I've reasonably good success. I just got Home Depot to cough up a new cordless drill (really ticked off Mr. Windsor since he got nowhere)

The art is being forceful without being rude and stating very clearly what you want. I don't know if I'll get anything else from Haggar...I didn't ask for anything beyond resolving my security tag problem. (I always thought I had a better chance of success if I stuck to just resolving the issue at hand)

I can take on insurance companies...been there...won that.

[captmojo]

You are on a par with the First Mate, who once upon a time, returned a vacuum cleaner to a large chain department store, that she had been using for 364 days. One (1) day left from the warranty expiration, a store without a service department and whatever else she used, was a mystery to me. I wasn't there.


All I can say about it is...she's good.

A job well done, Windsor.

[ArkieDukie]

Do not mess with Windsor.

STILL LAUGHING!!

Lavabe pretty much captured my response.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

You are on a par with the First Mate, who once upon a time, returned a vacuum cleaner to a large chain department store, that she had been using for 364 days. One (1) day left from the warranty expiration, a store without a service department and whatever else she used, was a mystery to me. I wasn't there.


All I can say about it is...she's good.

A job well done, Windsor.

I never did get around to telling y'all what I did a couple of weeks ago, did I?

[captmojo]

I never did get around to telling y'all what I did a couple of weeks ago, did I?

Do share, sir. I'll have to see the story late tonight.
I like my job but I hate to have to work.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

I never did get around to telling y'all what I did a couple of weeks ago, did I?

Do share, sir. I'll have to see the story late tonight.
I like my job but I hate to have to work.

Well ......... remember that Sam's Club (and Costco) used to have a policy of customer satisfaction guaranteed, no time limit. You could bring anything back, for whatever reason, and get your money back, if you had your original receipt. Many people took advantage of this, especially on electronics, things like computers and TV's and so forth, so in 2009, they changed their policy to 90 days. I mean folks would bring back three or four year old computers just to upgrade technology - ridiculous things like that... But if you bought your stuff before they made the change, you were grandfathered; you just had to have your original receipt. How many of you have receipts from stuff you bought in 2001? Raise your hands? Keep them up please.

Flash back to the day after Thanksgiving, 2001. Back when I had some money (Y2K was pretty good to me ). I bought a 43" Toshiba HD ready rear projection TV at Sam's Club. Very nice for it's day. Not overly extravagant, but nice. Still worked, even though I had it repaired twice in the last 9 years, roughly every 3 to 4 years, having the convergence chips replaced twice, spending about $750 on it to get it done, and toting the dang thing to repair shops in Raleigh, Rocky Mount and Goldsboro in the process (it weighed about 85 pounds). Anyway, I was talking with the salesman at Sam's and he reminded me about the old return policy, but when I went to the customer service desk and asked about bringing my 9 year old TV back, the sales manager at the store said, "No, we can't do that." Humph. Bummer. That's was in one of the Raleigh stores. A few days later I was in the Durham store, and the salesman in the TV section told me the same thing, and his sales manager told me the same thing. Humph. Well, a few days later, I was in the North Raleigh store, and that salesman called over the sales manager and asked him if I could bring the TV back and he said no. But he asked the sales manager to talk to the "store manager upstairs". The sales manager disappeared for about 10 minutes and then called back to the salesman. I was told to bring back my TV with the receipt. My jaw dropped. "Really?" I asked for the sales manager to come down to the floor and tell me that face to face - I didn't want to come up to Raleigh the next day and make a fool out of myself! He did. The next morning, I got a cash refund, full price including sales tax, back for my ~8 year, 51 week, 1 day old TV! I promptly deposited the cash in my bank that was conveniently on the corner.

I had already done enough comparison shopping (or, as one salesman called it, "Powerball shopping") to know what I wanted to buy and where I wanted to buy it. As much as I like Sam's Club, Costco had the merchandise on sale at a 10% lower price and offers a 2 year warranty for free. I spent about half as much as I got back on a 42" LED LCD TV and a BluRay player. Happy Chanukah to me!

[devildeac]

I never did get around to telling y'all what I did a couple of weeks ago, did I?

Do share, sir. I'll have to see the story late tonight.
I like my job but I hate to have to work.

Well ......... remember that Sam's Club (and Costco) used to have a policy of customer satisfaction guaranteed, no time limit. You could bring anything back, for whatever reason, and get your money back, if you had your original receipt. Many people took advantage of this, especially on electronics, things like computers and TV's and so forth, so in 2009, they changed their policy to 90 days. I mean folks would bring back three or four year old computers just to upgrade technology - ridiculous things like that... But if you bought your stuff before they made the change, you were grandfathered; you just had to have your original receipt. How many of you have receipts from stuff you bought in 2001? Raise your hands? Keep them up please.

Flash back to the day after Thanksgiving, 2001. Back when I had some money (Y2K was pretty good to me ). I bought a 43" Toshiba HD ready rear projection TV at Sam's Club. Very nice for it's day. Not overly extravagant, but nice. Still worked, even though I had it repaired twice in the last 9 years, roughly every 3 to 4 years, having the convergence chips replaced twice, spending about $750 on it to get it done, and toting the dang thing to repair shops in Raleigh, Rocky Mount and Goldsboro in the process (it weighed about 85 pounds). Anyway, I was talking with the salesman at Sam's and he reminded me about the old return policy, but when I went to the customer service desk and asked about bringing my 9 year old TV back, the sales manager at the store said, "No, we can't do that." Humph. Bummer. That's was in one of the Raleigh stores. A few days later I was in the Durham store, and the salesman in the TV section told me the same thing, and his sales manager told me the same thing. Humph. Well, a few days later, I was in the North Raleigh store, and that salesman called over the sales manager and asked him if I could bring the TV back and he said no. But he asked the sales manager to talk to the "store manager upstairs". The sales manager disappeared for about 10 minutes and then called back to the salesman. I was told to bring back my TV with the receipt. My jaw dropped. "Really?" I asked for the sales manager to come down to the floor and tell me that face to face - I didn't want to come up to Raleigh the next day and make a fool out of myself! He did. The next morning, I got a cash refund, full price including sales tax, back for my ~8 year, 51 week, 1 day old TV! I promptly deposited the cash in my bank that was conveniently on the corner.

I had already done enough comparison shopping (or, as one salesman called it, "Powerball shopping") to know what I wanted to buy and where I wanted to buy it. As much as I like Sam's Club, Costco had the merchandise on sale at a 10% lower price and offers a 2 year warranty for free. I spent about half as much as I got back on a 42" LED LCD TV and a BluRay player. Happy Chanukah to me!

Amazing.