Complaint Review: A&E Factory Service - Internet

For the last month give or take, I have been working with A&E to get a technician in to do some warranty work on my Samsung washer; which I had less than a year. To give a little background, my washer one night "decided" that it wasn't going to cycle through any wash option and/or fill with water. After going through the basic trouble shooting, Samsung agreed to pay for the warranty work. They provided me two companies and A&E Factory Service was one of them; I went with A&E to my detriment.

The first technician showed up and saw that my machine was unresponsive and he could not get it into self-diagnostic test. He had to open it up and do some other work around. Not being a technician myself, it was clearly evident that something has gone wrong with the mother board. The technician’s diagnosis was, "soap sud build up". I immediately scoffed at such idiotic thing as my machine threw no code and the implication that soap suds would cause an extreme electronic malfunction means that Samsung’s engineering team really really screwed up. His argument was that we use "too much detergent". I asked him why did the machine not warn us like it specifies in the manual, and his response was that the sensors are a "hit and miss". He also said the door lock needed to be replaced and so he did so and ordered the parts for the pump, which delayed my machine being repaired another week.

The second appointment comes and a new technician shows up. This technician was very very knowledgeable about the machine and did his own diagnosing. When I told him what the other technician said about the soap suds and pump, he gave me the same face I gave the other technician. This second technician checked all the same stuff and immediately recognized that my machine was unresponsive. He tried 20 or so times to get the machine to go into self-diagnostics and even called for help which was a blow to his pried. He finally gets it to self-diagnose and nothing popped up as an error. What took him so long was that he found that the schematics were missing which he needed to troubleshoot; that the other technician must have taken them which rubbed me the wrong way about the other lousy technician. The second technician also checked my old door lock and didn't find anything wrong with it because it didn't work due to signal issues and not mechanical issues. He also concluded that the problems with my washer has NOTHING to do with the suds, that the machine will try to clean itself a few times before locking up which in that case would throw an error code. He told me upfront that he can fix the pump, but that's not going to fix the machine because the problems he found had to do with a communication issue between the electrical components. So he schedules an appointment with me to come back and orders the parts. I told him I may not be available then and he said just to call in and request a reschedule. All I needed to do is give them his tech id.

Now starts a new nightmare. So at this point it's been roughly a few weeks or so that our washing machine has yet to be repaired; an avoidable delay had the first technician been more knowledgeable. After scheduling another day and calling twice to confirm with A&E that they will send the same technician, I get a phone call on service day and it’s the wrong guy. So I apologized to him and said that he isn't the tech that I requested. I call A&E back and asked why did they send me a different tech after I called multiple times to make sure they ONLY send the same tech. They looked into it and said the tech I request called out. Ok not A&E's fault this time and luckily I didn't miss any work. Just was disappointed that yet we have to wait again.

So I schedule yet another appointment with A&E, this time taking 4 hours of my limited sick leave. They tell me the time is 8 am to 12 pm and confirm with me that they will send the correct technician given that he doesn't call out etc. Today 6/19/15 was the appointment. I call at 8am to get estimated ETA and they tell me between 11:30am and 12pm and reconfirmed for me that the correct technician has been assigned. I was a little mad about that because I felt like how can a technician show up at the back halfe of my window given the work that needs to be done? Ok so I was ready to deal with that and had to work out something with my employer. I get a call at 11:20am and its the WRONG technician telling me that he is an HOUR away and another customer is ahead of me making his arrival time TWO+ HOURS?! At this point I am very upset because this appointment cost me sick leave and A&E wasted it without any respect or regards for me as a customer. I called A&E very upset, and all I got was "I'm sorry" and they sent me to their resolutions team. Now I have to wait another week! And was given another promise that the right technician will show up this time. I felt disrespected and unappreciated by this company who carelessly wasted my limited leave. I asked them what is the point to giving customers 8-12 and 1-5 time frames if they don’t honor them? I asked them would A&E pay for my time I wasted waiting for nothing? I told them that driver should have called me at 8am and told me it isn't realistic that he can make it out by then, or the call center lied to me and made up an ETA without checking first with the technician. Whichever is the case, I deserve something from A&E for such disrespect, psychological stress they have caused me, and a lack of regard for my time. If this is how they treat people, I would NEVER NEVER NEVER recommend them to anyone. I was better off calling someone on Craigslist. At this point, I need to report them to Samsung that they are an insult to Samsung’s credibility. It’s bad enough my $800+ Samsung machine broke down on me with less than a year ownership.