Complaint Review: Mr. B's Appliance Service & Parts Center - Newark Ohio

Chrissy:
I am sorry you had such bad service from Mr. B's. I used to work for the owner before your report and am sad to say that this is the very reason he had to close his business last year. I'm not giving excuses, just stating a fact. Poor customer service led to losing customers and good employees. 

The former owner retired and had to close last year and I came back to work for the new owner at the same location. I can tell you the new owner is wonderful! He believes in customer service and understands that customers do come first. Without customers, there is no business. 

If you had a quote in writing, it should have been honored. In fact, a company can only go over 10% of a quoted price. However, quotes are usually only good for 30 days. The new owner here will honor for 6 months. If you would like to try us again, we would be happy to prove that this is a new company with a new attitude.
 
 

This response is in regards to Report # 370920 & 370937 which appear to be the same. I am the service technician which was dispatched to this home owners appliance issue. I can honestly not comment on the phone conversations which took place with my manager as I was not there. I can though, explain how I, personally, conduct my 8-12 service calls per day. In their particular location, our service call charge is 55.00. That 55.00 covers the inital house call to diagnois the problem with the machine (or the first 15 minutes) and provide the customer with an estimate to repair said machine. In cases where parts need to be ordered, we charge half a service call to return (27.50) which also covers the first 15 minutes then 60.00 per hour after that to install replacement part. This home owner was indeed a repeat customer. As a reference, I will use their own previous service call we did on their dryer on 06/27/08 where I arrived at the home, diagnosed their dryer as having a defective thermal kit which I did not have on my truck. Collected the 55.00 service call (58.85 with tax) and gave the home owner a written estimate of 67.45 plus tax to repair their dryer (39.95 for part + 27.50 installation). Part was ordered and I was able to complete the repair on their dryer on 07/07/08. According to my service ticket the homeowner called 09/02/08 with an issue of their front load washer "not emptying water." We scheduled their call for 09/04/08. Upon arrival at the customer's home the washer was fill of water. Per Whirlpool instuctions I put the machine in a self diagnostic mode which checks all the various components of the washer. Upon doing this, the washer immediatly emptied the water. Surpirsed by this, I removed the drain pump filter which is prone to getting clogged with socks, underwires, and coins. Nothing was in pump. I proceeded to removed pump and show Husband ("Chrissy", author of reports, was not home). I asked him if he possiblly had changed soap recently due to "suds lock" which can occur if too much soap is used or non HE detergent is used. With a suds lock situation the washer can not empty the water. The pump can pump water but not suds. The husband showed me how much soap he was using which did look like possibly too much. I put the pump back in, ran another self dianostic and informed the husband that his washer may have just "over suds." We warranty all our service calls for 30 days and recommended that he just use it so see if error happened again. If it did I would return at no charge to double check the machine. My thought was that there was no point in installing a pump that may not have been needed if it was an "over suds" situation. I collected the service call of 55.00 (58.85 with tax) and I left the husband a written estimate of 173.45 plus tax (139.95 for part + 27.50 + 5.00 additional labor assuming 20 minutes would be needed to install) to replace the pump if the issue would reoccur. I was at their residence from 4:10pm to 4:30pm. Apparently the problem continued and the Husband came to office to puchase pump to install himself which is perfectly fine. According to our computer records the pump was sold to him on 09/08/08 for 139.95 (149.75 with tax). In regards to the cost of the pump, I agree that it can be found online cheaper. One website I found sells the same pump for 118.25 + 6.46 (27.89 s&h for overnight) standard s&h for a total of 124.71 which is indeed 15.24 less than what husband was able to purchase part for from us which we had in stock. The only issue I can think of is that the home owner thought the 173.45 INCLUDED the initial service call of 55.00 which in fact is in ADDITION to the service call.