What Would You Do?
// 7.24.06 // Filed under: Thriving
After the Great Power Outage of 2006, I was concerned about the food in our basement freezer. We have a delivery service for our meats – it’s better quality than the meats offered in the grocery store and the price is not outrageous – and our latest shipment (6 months worth of meats) was just recently delivered.
After checking out the meat, it looked like some of it had thawed a bit. There were “indentations” where the meat leaned against the shelf, and since the meat was originally delivered frozen, the indentations indicated to me that it had softened and re-frozen. I remembered that the food service offered a guarantee to replace the food in times such as these, so I called them up. They agreed to replace the food.
Tonight, a sales rep called. At dinnertime. And this was a guy I had dealt with before and didn’t like very much. Two strikes right there. He told me that we when we signed our agreement we “had the opportunity to purchase a protection plan but we had declined.” This was not my recollection, and I told him so.
He went on to tell me that the food was absolutely fine. It would keep for up to four days. I told him I was not comfortable taking the chance since it appeared some of the food had thawed a little. Again, in his slow, condescending, “you are a paranoid freak mother,” voice, he assured me it was fine and he would come out to take a look at it. Apparently he could tell immediately if any strange bacteria were growing on my food.
At this point (remember: dinner, kids whining, his attitude), I ripped him a new one. I told him that NO MATTER WHAT HE SAID THERE WAS NO WAY I WOULD EVER FEED THAT MEAT TO MY YOUNG CHILDREN! I went on to say that if his company could not provide this basic level of customer service, I would not be ordering from them again. He sighed and gave me this huffy “Unbelievable!” He tried, again, to give me more reasons why the food was JUST FINE, so I told him I needed to take care of dinner and my kids and I hung up on him.
Deep Breath
After I calmed down a bit, I looked through my files. Indeed, I have no written record of a guarantee – although I distinctly remember this being promised verbally. PHAT Daddy checked online and we decided that the food probably is 99.9% safe to eat, based on the length of time the power was out and the amount of food in the freezer.
I called the owner of the company. They were not willing to offer me anything except to pre-date the protection plan (thus replacing our food) if we chose to purchase it now at $999. Thanks, but no thanks. He also advised me to call my homeowners insurance company.
OK, I was probably way too mean to the sales rep (although he needs some lessons in handling customers). And it may be just a bit too severe to cancel the service over this issue. They are waiting for a call from me. Do I call and say, “OK, you’re probably right and we’ll just eat the food, thanks.” Do I apologize to the sales rep for being such a bitch? Do I maintain that they should replace the food and cancel my service?
What would you do?
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8 Responses to “What Would You Do?”
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What? You wanted a serious answer?
Really, this is one reason why we never keep more than about 2 weeks worth of perishable food on the premises. It limits our downside.
I say it’s time you ripped him an even bigger one – I’m with you…they should stick by their “guarantee” and especially during the Great Power Outage.
Extreme circumstances and all.
Unfeeling bastards!
So they actually sell a protection plan? Is it like a super extra protection plan? Because it doesn’t seem likely that they’d sell one but then still give that coverage with just the regular service. And you might distinctly remember being promised the coverage, but lots of people distinctly remember things that never happened, especially when they spend lots of time trying to remember it or the issue is emotionally charged. How would someone tell the difference between you having a false memory and you having an unverifiable true memory (a very interesting topic)? Even if they did promise it, if it wasn’t documented, and especially if you were never charged for that service (easily verifiable), I think you should just bite the bullet.
Whatever the shortcomings of the sales rep’s communication style, and keep in mind that this is probably a stressful time for him too, it sounds like you overreacted. Even though the company would probably be happy just by you not canceling the service over this, I’d apologize in this case. I mean, it’s how I’d want to be treated in the same circumstance.
If they agreed to replace the food, then called you back and reneged on the offer. . . I’d have a hard time letting that go. When something like this happens to me, I put on my “rational but annoyed” voice, calmly make another phone call, reiterate what a good customer I am, etc., and that if it’s going to cost me money to replace anyway, I’d rather it cost me money with another company.
This scored me a brand spanking new cell phone two weeks ago, which I promptly lost.
Shannon, I would keep the meat. A little bit of thawing won’t hurt. And try to get someone else on the phone next time, since you and this guy don’t get along.
Shannon-I had a similar problem a few years back with a service contract-the girl accutally said I was crazy-I made them look up my account and they were the crazy ones! They never apologized, just offered to complete the service that I already had paid for! Stand your ground!
I would call and say you did some research and now understand that a) the food is 99% likely safe to eat and b) you don’t have a written record of the verbal guarantee, and therefore you will keep the food and their service.
As for the rep, if you want to bring it up with him you could just say, “I understand now after some research that you were right about safety of the food and the terms of our contract. I’m sorry that I hung up on you, that’s not normally my style. You caught me at dinnertime with my small kids and I felt that you spoke to me in a patronizing, condescending manner and I did not appreciate that.”
Or something like that. Can you tell that I would have done pretty much the same thing you did?
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