I recently ordered three Craftsman ball-bearing tool chests from Sears.com. Total cost around $1000. Here's my experience:
1) One tool chest arrived, as promised.
2) One tool chest got lost and was then damaged in shipment. Sears emailed me that UPS had it in transit.in fact, after several attempts at UPS tracking it turned out that UPS never received the chest.instead, it went to a third party who pretty much destroyed it in transit (partly a testament to the poor build quality of the chest). Bad news is that Sears.com (which advertises 24/7 service) was down most of the week — I tried more than a dozen times to find it up twice. Just as bad, the active site was of no help and also didn't provide a phone for service. I finally found a phone number through Google and then spent half an hour wasted with little help. They tell me I can go to a store. Good news is that after driving 12 miles to the store, it "ONLY" takes 1.5 hours to get a replacemnt.
3) The third item, which I had delivered to the store, is apparently lost somewhere in their system. It was promised it a week ago. I drove to the store — it's not there. It was then promised two days later for sure. I again drive to the store — still not there and the overly-busy stock person doesn't have time to find it. The Sears manager refused to let me take the floor model (an identical model) despite my need to have this ASAP for a planned event. I later call Sears to find out when it will arrive. Spend 10 minutes on the phone. They disconnect me and don't call back. I then call the store. I get "human resources" when I ask for "merchandise pickup" from the phone tree. Human resources say they're doing this job too and won't know for another day if they have it...
The bottom line here is:
1) The quality of Sears Craftsman products is deteriorating, witness the tool chest that bent like a pretzel. I'd given up buying Sears power tools decades ago, after they outsourced parts (thus eventually destroying their power tool franchise). At this point, low price suppliers like Grizzly and Harbor Freight — pretty much the bottom of the barrel — make equally good tool chests.
2) The IT staff running Sears.com is apparently incompetent. I've never seen a major retailer site that was so poorly designed, that led to so many broken links, and then was down for days at a time.
3) Sears logistics is abysmal. They have no idea who has their merchandise, where their merchandise is, or when it might arrive.
4) Sears customer support is hit or miss. I've had more than two dozen attempted contacts and a dozen contacts in my quest to get the three items I ordered. About half the Sears people tried (but failed because they didn't have any systems support or their systems were down) to be helpful. A few were simply incompetent or maddening.
Sears could have been a great success story, gracefully migrating their catalog business to the Web, continuing to offer excellent Sears-branded merchandise, and supplementing their Sears.com presence with a well-integrated physical presence — their stores. Sadly, I suspect it is too late for any of this to happen.
From: Message Author (click here to email author) (has asked not to receive email)
Date: Tuesday, 12-Aug-08 18:11: 48 CDT
Business: Reply Online Consumer: Comment On This
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It's like reading my very own story only I attempted to order a TV.
I won't go into details here, as I posted my rant on this site as well.
It's the people's attitude that floors me and absolutely makes me see red. I don't want excuses, I just want someone to fix it. Don't get nasty with me simply because your company can't tell a hole in the ground when it sees one.
I would have tried sears again if not for the attitude of the reps. As it was, I spent $100 more at a competitor and don't feel cheated at all.
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