Northern tool *****, especially at communication...

[jcar302]

A few months back I bought a bendpak rj45 from northern tool.
Nobody could tell me when it was arriving or by whom.
Night before it arrives they call to say I need to be home in the morning to sign for it. Not the end of the world since i'm self employed, but still a pain.
I get it, it comes by freight, but I purchased it from you, not the freight company so if you guys can't work together to keep customers in the loop then you should find another company to work with.

Fast forward to the beginning of February. I have a gift card from the bendpak purchase for northern tool. I need a sheetrock lift to finish my garage ceiling.
I order one, to get free shipping I need to join some tool club, so instead of $60 shipping, I join and get free shipping (club is $39 a year).
I keep checking on my order, says processing to ship.
Yesterday I check (they take calls for orders 24/7 but not customer service) and my order is just plain old gone.
Today I call, they tell me it's cancelled and it's my banks fault. I look, plenty of money on my debit card. No signs of activity. They sure didn't have any trouble taking my $1100 a couple months ago.
So after suggesting it's not on my end, he says "of wait, looks like we cancelled the order".
I ask why, he says because what I bought was discontinued.
I asked why not call or email me, he says they don't have the man power for calls and they sent an email.

First off, I have gotten all their emails, which includes their advertising, I certainly checked my junk mail about 50 times to makes sure)
Second, through emails they have been damn near forcing this sheetrock lift on me, with things like "it's still in your cart, just checkout", or "it's still on sale". Literally, there had to be 10 of them over the past month since I looked at it.

Seriously, you push a product on me that you don't even have in stock?
Then you don't contact me to let know you don't have it and what's going on?
Why ask for my phone number and email if you aren't going to use them?

The guy on the phone didn't even seem sympathetic to the situation, just had an attitude like I was one of a million customers and losing me meant nothing.

I'll find something with free shipping to spend my $100 gift certificate on and i'm done with them as a company.

 

[shanny19]

I could tell a tragically funny story of my three month quest to get them to package spools of welding wire in such a fashion so as to arrive at my home in an unexploded state, but it's as long as it is funny and sad.

I'm convinced, that at the current point in history, that they have WAY more business than they can successfully support with current infrastructure. That WILL even out, one way or another....

 

[cjarvis]

I ordered a PTO shaft that took a week to ship and looked exactly like a welding cart when it arrived...

 

[jcar302]

For the record, I told him I would likely take my grievance online (like this post) and his response was "is there anything else I can help you with today, sir?".

Most companies know bad news travels much faster than good news and have employees trained to handle that.
Didn't even offer to sell me another model.
So here we are...

Bought a Milwaukee cordless vac for my work van with my gift certificate, I always wanted one and I know Milwaukee is easy to deal with for returns and repairs.
God knows I wouldn't want to deal with northerntool on a return.

 

[anndel]

For the record, I told him I would likely take my grievance online (like this post) and his response was "is there anything else I can help you with today, sir?".

Most companies know bad news travels much faster than good news and have employees trained to handle that.
Didn't even offer to sell me another model.
So here we are...

Bought a Milwaukee cordless vac for my work van with my gift certificate, I always wanted one and I know Milwaukee is easy to deal with for returns and repairs.
God knows I wouldn't want to deal with northerntool on a return.

In Hawaii, his statement is equivalent to AINOKEA which in plain english = I Don't Care. I bought a Hein Werner 2 Ton Floor jack from them 15 years ago and the sale went through smoothly plus I got email updates when it was shipped via Yellow Freight. The sales manager said shipping was $200 so they paid for half of the shipping. But lots can change in 15 years.

 

[Wyoming09]

Last summer I purchased three 12 ton bottle jacks from them. Fair price, I thought. Shipped quickly, and for free and arrived on time. The next week I looked at the same item and found it listed on their website $7 each cheaper. I emailed them about refunding the difference. They credited my card for $21 that day. This was not my first purchase from them. Have not had any problem. YMMV

 

[70chevellegsp]

About 5 years ago I ordered a tractor seat from them. 3 came in the mail. I called to let them know, but they said to keep them as it was too much trouble & cost to ship them back. Still have one new in the box in my attic.

 

[jd_1138]

About 5 years ago I ordered a tractor seat from them. 3 came in the mail. I called to let them know, but they said to keep them as it was too much trouble & cost to ship them back. Still have one new in the box in my attic.

Wow, that level of idiocy is not good for business. Expensive -- product shrinkage, excessive s/h/materials expense.

Rock Auto has a lot of fans. I ran across this on YouTube:

Pretty sad about the modern notion of customer "service". That's why I choose to buy 95% of my stuff locally even if it costs a little more. Usually the price is the same, and I get the item faster with no s/h charges. I don't mind stopping at Napa or Family, Farm, and Home as I have to run other errands anyway, and it's all along the way.

 

[jcar302]

Wow, that level of idiocy is not good for business. Expensive -- product shrinkage, excessive s/h/materials expense.

Rock Auto has a lot of fans. I ran across this on YouTube:

Pretty sad about the modern notion of customer "service". That's why I choose to buy 95% of my stuff locally even if it costs a little more. Usually the price is the same, and I get the item faster with no s/h charges. I don't mind stopping at Napa or Family, Farm, and Home as I have to run other errands anyway, and it's all along the way.

Rock auto lost me a couple months ago. Fixed a throttle body on my brothers suv (ac delco part with new pigtail, the way gm does it). Went bad 6 months later, went to call and return it, guess what? There is nobody to call.

I buy local, dealer or amazon prime.

 

[kythri]

One irrational, unreasonable Youtube whackadoo with a single video does not prove poor customer service.

I'm going to guess that I'm not the only one who isn't on his side, considering he's disabled comments on his video.

For the record, Northern Tool and Rock Auto have always done right by me, and their customer service has been fantastic the times I've needed to deal with them (which have been very minimal).

I guess I just have different expectations - if I was selling my services, I'd be prepared to pony up to overnight a replacement so I didn't have a customer waiting.

I wonder if this nutjob would have threatened to "go to social media!" with a local parts place that didn't keep his door handle in stock?

 

[kythri]

Rock auto lost me a couple months ago. Fixed a throttle body on my brothers suv (ac delco part with new pigtail, the way gm does it). Went bad 6 months later, went to call and return it, guess what? There is nobody to call.

I buy local, dealer or amazon prime.

If the product is still covered under manufacturer warranty, Rock Auto has a very simple, automated warranty replacement process that can be accessed from the order status page.

We're well into the 21st century. Telephone customer support is outdated and, quite frankly, not cheap to provide.

 

[jd_1138]

One irrational, unreasonable Youtube whackadoo with a single video does not prove poor customer service.

I'm going to guess that I'm not the only one who isn't on his side, considering he's disabled comments on his video.

For the record, Northern Tool and Rock Auto have always done right by me, and their customer service has been fantastic the times I've needed to deal with them (which have been very minimal).

I guess I just have different expectations - if I was selling my services, I'd be prepared to pony up to overnight a replacement so I didn't have a customer waiting.

I wonder if this nutjob would have threatened to "go to social media!" with a local parts place that didn't keep his door handle in stock?

It's not irrational of him. As the Rock Auto receptionist said in the recording they don't provide phone customer service. And their solution to his problem (making him remove broken pieces from a customer's car and returning it first) was stupid and super inconvenient to the customer.

They could at least have a couple CS folks for when their email customer support breaks down. Then the receptionist could've transferred him to that particular voicemail. Simple. Sure deflect most people to the online system, but for the tiny percentage of really pissed customers, at least have a small human dept. to deal with them.

We're talking structural fundamental problems with their CS.

 

[Ole Slewfoot]

Funny, I get a real midwestern lady on my first call to RA, makes returns super easy.

 

[woody 73]

I don't know what to tell you op, I guess the best advice would be if you do not like the company then never buy any more of their products.

I have a phone and it is an older model called the IPhone 5, for reasons beyond me it has slowed down to a crawl, (something about they are doing this on purpose so that you will buy their latest new phones)... When the day comes that it is no longer working will I buy their new phones ? You can bet I will be done with them when that time comes.

**** happens it is an old story.

 

[kythri]

It's not irrational of him. As the Rock Auto receptionist said in the recording they don't provide phone customer service. And their solution to his problem (making him remove broken pieces from a customer's car and returning it first) was stupid and super inconvenient to the customer.

They could at least have a couple CS folks for when their email customer support breaks down. Then the receptionist could've transferred him to that particular voicemail. Simple. Sure deflect most people to the online system, but for the tiny percentage of really pissed customers, at least have a small human dept. to deal with them.

We're talking structural fundamental problems with their CS.

I think we're looking at a fundamental problem with this individual's expectations.

Lots of places don't offer advance replacement - you want to warranty out a part, you need to supply the broken part.

In this particular issue, with a customer's car waiting in his shop, he should have just bought another one, adjusted shipping priority as necessary, and then processed the defective unit separately.

This wasn't a breakdown or a problem with RockAuto CS. They specifically don't offer that level of customer support. That's why they're as cheap as they are.

 

[jd_1138]

Funny, I get a real midwestern lady on my first call to RA, makes returns super easy.

I don't know for sure, but it sounds like the guy in the YouTube video needed to escalate it due to them wanting him to remove the faulty part from his customer's car and return it first. So it might be a problem with escalation.

I just played the dude's video which sounds kinda bad that their corporate number has nowhere to transfer a disgruntled customer.

 

[jd_1138]

I think we're looking at a fundamental problem with this individual's expectations.

Lots of places don't offer advance replacement - you want to warranty out a part, you need to supply the broken part.

In this particular issue, with a customer's car waiting in his shop, he should have just bought another one, adjusted shipping priority as necessary, and then processed the defective unit separately.

This wasn't a breakdown or a problem with RockAuto CS. They specifically don't offer that level of customer support. That's why they're as cheap as they are.

Very true.

But I think RA needs to train their corporate receptionist better and perhaps at least offer a mailbox for the super pissed off people to leave a message on (even if it takes a while to answer).

 

[vavet]

I didn’t watch th video, but I think I got the gist of it from comments, I don’t think asking for a replacement before sending the defective unit back is unreasonable. You can certainly charge the customer for the new one in the event the defective unit is not returned.

I love me some amazon, but try to warranty a car part through them. OMG! I spent about an hour on the phone with then and finally had to accept a goodwill return even though we were outside of the normal return window because they could not comprehend, through various people, that I was not trying to return the part. I was trying to warranty it. It was a moog suspension part.

As far as op’s situation with northern...I think he is right to be miffed. I had more notice then he did when I ordered my lift direct from China! It sounds like all northern did was muddy the waters about who needed to be called and when, from the freight company’s perspective.

 

[Schurkey]

I love me some amazon, but try to warranty a car part through them. OMG! I spent about an hour on the phone with then and finally had to accept a goodwill return even though we were outside of the normal return window because they could not comprehend, through various people, that I was not trying to return the part. I was trying to warranty it. It was a moog suspension part.

Last week, I gave up on an 18-month old Optima battery that won't hold a charge.

Bought it through Amazon. (REAL Amazon, not a third-party seller on Amazon.)

I look at the Optima web page on the Amazon site. Optima 36-month warranty is valid when sold by Amazon. "Contact customer service".

I send an e-mail describing the problem, and that the vehicle has been tested for parasitic drain, (none) starter draw, (good) and alternator function (good). I tell them I want a replacement battery.

I get back a reply that says "contact Optima".

I send another e-mail to Amazon customer service, quoting the warranty procedure directly from the Amazon web page. Second CS person says "Refund or replacement"? I say "replacement".

I get a third e-mail from Amazon: We're backordered from Optima. "We've credited your card with the full purchase price plus the applicable sales tax." I'm satisfied.

 

[jcar302]

If the product is still covered under manufacturer warranty, Rock Auto has a very simple, automated warranty replacement process that can be accessed from the order status page.

We're well into the 21st century. Telephone customer support is outdated and, quite frankly, not cheap to provide.

If i so choose, i'd like to speak to a live operator.
Maybe i need to, maybe i don't. But IMO it should be a choice.
I'm not saying that guy was right about how he went about it, but some of us like the peace of mind of speaking to a person if something goes wrong with a purchase, especially if the money gets messed up like a double charge, overcharge etc.

 

[jcar302]

I love me some amazon, but try to warranty a car part through them. OMG! I spent about an hour on the phone with then and finally had to accept a goodwill return even though we were outside of the normal return window because they could not comprehend, through various people, that I was not trying to return the part. I was trying to warranty it. It was a moog suspension part.

There is no reason to warranty an item with amazon.
Just let them handle that. They are like Costco, just return it and buy another.
Or buy another and return the old one.
Most of the time you will find that they just tell you to keep the old one and give you a refund.
One time i received one of those chrome kitchen shelves, 2 were all bent up (there were 6), called them up, they gave me the choice of returning it or 50% off. I took the 50% because A i could bend it back into shape and B. i only need 4 shelves anyway.
I could go on and on with positive return stores.

 

[kythri]

If i so choose, i'd like to speak to a live operator.
Maybe i need to, maybe i don't. But IMO it should be a choice.
I'm not saying that guy was right about how he went about it, but some of us like the peace of mind of speaking to a person if something goes wrong with a purchase, especially if the money gets messed up like a double charge, overcharge etc.

Well, it's not a choice. It's not a service offered.

If you don't like that, then do business with someone else.

ETA: I would point out, the video clearly shows where he's communicating with a real person via email - apparently, that just wasn't good enough for Mr. Unreasonable.

 

[jcar302]

Well, it's not a choice. It's not a service offered.

If you don't like that, then do business with someone else.

I kinda said that already...

Right now i don't see it as a huge loss.
Cross shopping internet pricing isn't all that hard and many times i can find things either local or on amazon for close to the same prices anyway.
I prefer real ford or motorcraft parts and the price on them can only be so low.

 

[jcar302]

So if phone communication is too expensive, what is hand written mail?
Today I got a letter on a hand addressed envelope.
The letter inside had all the blanks filled in by hand telling me my order was cancelled.
Post dated February 16.