On Your Side
Whirlpool and other firms have customers spinning
March 3, 2007
Ellen Roseman
Letters, we get letters, we get stacks of letters. Here are a few recent cases in which we helped connect customers with corporate decision-makers.
MAYTAG CORP. The company advised customers on Feb. 1 that it was recalling 2.3 million dishwashers because of a potential fire hazard. But Maytag, now owned by Whirlpool Corp., wasn't equipped to take customers' calls.
Jim Wrigley said he couldn't get through to the toll-free number provided, no matter when he called. All he got was a message, telling him to go to the company's website.
But his online claim was rejected, he said, because the computer assigned it to a service company that wasn't authorized to do repairs to his Maytag dishwasher.
I asked Monica Teague, a media contact at Whirlpool's head office in Benton Harbor, Mich., to get things moving.
Wrigley said he received two repair kits in the mail (when one was enough) and had a service call set up for this week. He'll be happy to use his dishwasher again after a month of washing dishes by hand.
CANADIAN TIRE CORP. Bill O'Borne couldn't operate the Troy-Bilt snowblower he bought a year ago. Only when the snow fell again this winter did he realize it was unworkable and try to return it.
Canadian Tire said he had missed the three-month period for exchanges or refunds. And the manufacturer wouldn't help. "I'm now faced with the cost of buying another snowblower while the paint is not scratched on the nine-month-old one," O'Borne told me.
Canadian Tire's Lisa Gibson agreed to let him return it as a goodwill gesture. "The problem snowblower has gone to a better place," O'Borne said, "and this household is ready for more of that white stuff."
RBC ROYAL BANK. Jennifer and Lloyd Haines repaid their business loan in the fall of 2005. So, why did the bank deduct $75 from their account as an "annual loan review fee" in January 2006 and again this January?
In both cases, they called customer service and had the charges reversed. Then, they started to ask questions.
"If RBC actually did review our loan, it would have discovered there wasn't one," said the couple, who run the Colonist House Bed & Breakfast in Beamsville.
Beja Rodeck, an RBC spokesperson, explained that a human error was made in the input of computer coding related to the client's loans.
"In our efforts to correct the problem as quickly as possible by refunding the fee to the client, we failed to correct the coding error. This resulted in the fee being charged a second time in January of this year," she said.
Shortly after sending his complaint to us, Lloyd Haines said: "I'm so impressed with your connections. Yesterday, I received a call from RBC in St. Catharines to apologize and to ensure me it was an error the bank is anxious to solve."
DELL CANADA INC. Gordon Campbell ordered a printer online last November. It was defective and was replaced in December. The replacement worked well, but was "too complicated when I'm trying to bring up and print pictures from my digital camera," he said.
"I was told I couldn't return the printer because I had ordered the first one over 30 days ago. This seems unfair as I have had an operating printer for only five days."
I asked Dell to make an exception for Campbell, who's 91 years old and has been retired for a quarter century. Besides, he had ordered a desktop computer at the same time and was happy with it.
Dell agreed to let him return the printer and arranged to pick it up at his home in Toronto.
"I wish my 95-year-old grandpa was in nearly this good shape," said spokesperson Wendy Gottsegen.
LG ELECTRONICS CANADA. Leanne Goode's refrigerator, which she bought in December 2002, was no longer under warranty when she started to have problems last year.
"The ice melted out of the freezer unit and ran down the side of the fridge door, leaking on our new laminate floors and causing them to buckle," she said.
It seems rust was building up in the freezer and blocking the hole where water was supposed to drain off. She spent $250 for repairs, only to have the problem return three months later.
"I'm so disappointed with the level of customer service I've received," she said last month. "We're now having to shop around for a new refrigerator when this one is only four years old – and frankly it's an expense we could do without."
Frank Lee, a spokesperson for LG Electronics, promised to investigate.
"Thanks very much for your help," Goode said this week. "My replacement appliance arrived yesterday, courtesy of LG."
Ellen Roseman's column appears Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday.
Toronto Star