I too have experienced the utmost in lousy customer service as evidenced by some other entries. Re-modeled the master bath last summer and sadly picked the Escale line from Kohler (along with Robern chests, I might add).
Evidently, the advertising photos were just that, and I have to ask if anyone had ever actually installed any of the product using running water. The templates were either unbelieveably mis-aligned (how's having your tub faucet open directly over the overflow outlet?), or simply incomprehensible (don't you think you should be able to shut off the water to the toilet without going into the crawl space?). Bottom line, and ignoring the number of pieces of "back-up" equiptment that were DOA (including the $900 Robern chest... Twice!), the install was a nightmare.
Then stuff started breaking.
First time the tub faucet is turned on, it "pops" and will not shut off. After about three months, the hand-held shower is supported with a bent coat hanger because the exquisitely expensive shower bar has lost its tension (which reminds me. Don't you think a $600 shower head should include the internal piping to connect it to the main feed? Well, Kohler doesn't).
I was still rolling along relatively complacent, until I tried to get some customer support. I have never run across such arrogance and total disregard for consumer complaints and concerns. There is this pervasive attitude with everyone in Kohler, Wisconsin, that they ARE the world's leading plumbing supplier, and if you think there's a problem with their product, YOU'RE the problem, not the product. They did send a regional "specialist" in to repair the faucet, which proceeded to not stop dripping thereafter, and when I asked again for service, I was advised "the computer" said my problem had been fixed, end of story. Since I was nuts to think it was defective the first time, I was surely certifiably insane to think it was defective twice.
So, then you start to escalate, or try to escalate.
I would think that after having spent almost $30,000 on their crap, someone would want to be certain you were happy (Their phrase is "delighted, " but don't get me started on that ruse. The "Customer Delight" routine was created by marketing consulting firms as an alternative to actually putting quality controls in place.)
Oddly enough, in all of Wisconsin, whoever I had on the phone at the time was the SOLE employee of the company. There was no one I could be transferred to, no other telephone number I could call, just a huge empty void. The quality of their gate-keeping was really excellent. Somewhere in the bowels of their customer service unit must be a huge banner that reads "We do not transfer calls or provide access to supervisors." It was incredible.
I actually took the time to write to Herbert Kohler, which I rarely do having been a CEO myself, only to receive yet another insipid form letter advising my satisfaction was their sole concern, such that I could still call the 800 number and wait forever in que to speak with another snotty customer service rep.
Lo and behold, one day I come in and find I have a message FROM someone at Kohler, leaving his email (and I still have no idea who he is. I've heard of flat organizations, but Kohler has evidently experienced transconfiguration such that no one has a title or responsibilities. They have become one with their toilets!)
I sent him an email explaining my problems ONE MORE TIME, and guess what? I have since never heard a word from anyone connected with the company, even though a new shower bar did appear in the mail one day from an unknown source, and I did the repair work myself.
Bottom line, they are concerned with your satisfaction so long as there aren't any issues, but if something goes awry, there's another couple million customers out there, so go screw yourself.
It is an experience that saddens me more than angers me, and I'm certain they all sit around the lunchroom in Kohler Wisconsin everyday and wonder why so much, or indeed most, of America's manufacturing has gone off-shore.
It's pathetic.
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