Warmer But Now Rainy Weather

I started writing this Blog article on Tuesday morning. I have to admit that I am tired right now because it rained quite heavily early in the morning and woke me up. Naturally, it was difficult for me to go back to sleep. Unfortunately then, I lost out on some of my sleeping time and so I feel a bit weary. It just means that I will have to be careful about what I do today.  And especially what I write!

What is remarkable about today is that the temperature is supposed to go up as high as 15°C. That would be absolutely wonderful for the winter this year. It has been so cold that I have never gone out for a walk once yet. Exercising in our basement is what I have learned to do to feel better. I must say, however, that in the last few years we had a lot of warmer weather during the winter months and, in fact, I even did some barbecuing when it was around this higher temperature last year.

Unfortunately, I did not take out any food to thaw so I could run a barbecue today. The weather prediction was that it would rain between 90 and 100% all day. The last thing I needed to do was to go outside with an umbrella in order to produce some tasty, BBQ meat. I am recovering even now from my ear ache since it still hurts. Accordingly, the last thing I wanted to do is go outside and get really ill and then have to take pills for who knows how long.

What I am going to do, dear reader, is talk about some products that my wife and I purchased a number of years ago that seemed to be defective now. I am going to tell you about our experience in trying to get a resolution of the problem. Keep on reading because it was not a simple event:

REPLACEMENT OF DEFECTIVE POTS

I just wanted to give you a short story, dear reader, about my experience in getting some pots replaced. It was a "fun" time dealing with the Canadian representatives of the manufacturer in getting a satisfactory conclusion. However, wait until you see what they decided to do in the end.

I do not intend to provide the name of the company involved, but if you need to know it because you are interested in buying some new pots, then just drop me a note. Just to be clear, I think that you will be pleased with what happened after you finish reading this story.  You will also like their products a lot.

My wife and I, a number of years ago, purchased a very expensive set of pots and pans. They seemed to be a product that would serve us well in cooking for a very long period of time, i.e. virtually forever. To be direct, they were that good it seemed. We bought a set that contained a number of different items that would be used for all different kinds of cooking. They worked wonderfully. That is until one day, when my wife and I discussed some concerns which appeared to be flaws in several of the pots. We saw some extensive issues on the surface of one of them and the wearing out it appeared in another one of them. It did not make sense for something like this happening with this kind of expensive goods so we thought that we would contact the manufacturer, or rather its Canadian representative, to talk to them about it and get replacements. Their warranty I thought was broad enough to cover this.

I am not going to go through in detail the various telephone conversations that my wife and I had with some of the representatives for the manufacturer. Just to let you know, it did not go all that well during some of the times that we spoke. In fact, I checked to see whether or not I should deal with the US office because I was quite offended on occasion about the manner in which we were dealing. To be honest, I was quite surprised because the US Company pretty much refused to deal with me at all.

My wife was the one who started speaking with the Company originally but since she was not getting along well with them, she passed it over to me. My conversations with some of the lower level employees eventually worked out, but it did require certain requests for this to happen. Upon one of my requests, I was elevated upwards and spoke with one of the more senior staff members. 

My conversation with her was remarkably excellent compared with some of the people on the lower level. We seemed to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion very quickly and arranged for a proper solution to be made. All that was supposed to happen is that we would obtain 2 new pots and in return, send to them the 2 defective ones.

Just in passing, dear reader, that is something you should understand if you have problems with a company that sold you some products that may be defective. Deal with the first level of customer support people for your first conversation to try to get a proper resolution. If that does not work out relatively quickly, then immediately ask, OR DEMAND, that you be transferred to one of their superiors. In my experience with a number of companies where we have had problems, that person generally seems to work out better with the customer than the lower level one.

Arrangements were made to have new products sent to us and they would replace the ones that were defective which would then be returned. No reason to complain is there, dear reader? Oh, there was a slight problem with respect to one of the pots which had to be replaced but in order to do so, they were going to send us an extra pot because, I assumed, they did not make such a big pot any more. That was appreciated.

Of course, my wife and I were quite pleased with what was going to happen. Unfortunately, it did not happen and failed miserably. "Miserably" is the word I am using because I don't want to use some other term, which may not be very nice to put in one of my articles that have public readers! We did not receive pots at all but rather 3 glass dishes!! In other words, there was a horrific mess-up in the products that were sent to us. They were absolutely the wrong ones!!

Guess what, I had to phone back the company to complain. What fun that was. Again, to be short about it, more difficult conversation with a different lower-level employee. Based on my previous experience, I again asked to speak with another upper level one.

Just to bring everything to your information without going through a whole bunch of more stories, here is the relevant section of the note that I received:

"First off we wanted to apologize for any mishap and inconvenience you have experienced.  

We take all concerns very seriously and try our best to accommodate and help our customers to the fullest.   

We are extremely sorry if you did not get that customer service satisfaction , as a will of good faith and to have your ongoing support in the near future we would like to send you a full set of [Name of  Brand] hard anodized non-stick cookware."

I was stunned by what was proposed! I just could not believe it. Nevermind receiving just a couple of pots, I was now going to obtain a new, full set of their cookware! I just could not believe it.

A bit more. I was told in a separate email that I did not have to return to them the new products they had already sent to me previously. I could keep them as well!

Later that afternoon, I was told, who their shipping company was and found out that they were supposed to deliver the products to me so that I received everything the next day i.e Tuesday.

I am sure that you will understand how surprised I was about what was being sent to me and why. I am sure you will also understand how thrilled I was with what was being done.

Clearly, this very positive action is something that I thought that I should post on here because it is a way of keeping a customer "very happy" notwithstanding some of the issues that happened up until now. Not only now do I still like the products, but I will be happy in dealing with the Company again and feeling very positive about them and their products!

UPDATE:

I was somewhat concerned about the delivery date for Tuesday because of all the nasty rain that was expected. I thought that truck traffic might be delayed so that we would have to wait until Wednesday. However, at about 1:45 PM, I heard a knock on the door. Yes, it was the delivery truck bringing a 31 pound box of pots for us!

Naturally, we removed everything and washed everything. Fantastic products in great shape.  Now, by viewing this photograph that I took, you will understand, dear reader, why my wife and I are so happy: