| A small and insignificant source of commentaries on what's going on in the world today. By Jozef Purdes. |
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Why I don't shop at Home Depot From the "Random Ramblings" department I remember when I was still in school, and at an info session for Home Depot position I asked why the quality of their customer service decreased so much. I used the example of glass cutting, which is still available in Lowe's, but which has been removed at Home Depot. The short answer was that such services did not add value to the company's bottom line. Later, I was scolded for my question by my career advisor. I didn't have anything to lose: I decided not to apply for a position at Home Depot, hearing first-hand stories about the complete disregard for applicants from the company's HR department. Ultimatelly, a few of my friends joined the company, but even though they are very smart and responsible individuals, the company's culture of disregarding its own employees, applicants and customers will drown them. But that's not the reason why I stopped shopping at Home Depot. The real reason is the service I received. About two years ago, I was housesitting a house where the owner ordered a new garage door from Home Depot. It took over three months of confusion, such as the door parts ariving at the owner's billing address and not shipping address, the shipping of the wrong door engine and other issues, until the door was installed. Granted, it was a Home Depot contractor who did most of the installation, but the material was delayed at Home Depot's end, and the contractor was endorsed by Home Depot. Undeterred, the owner decided to keep doing business with Home Depot, and I agreed to help him. In May, he ordered and paid for four unassembled bookcases. Together, they cost over $1000 (about four times as much as I's pay for similar bookcases at Target). They were supposed to be delivered on June 17. The key word here is "supposed". After much delay and playing phone tag with the Home Depot store for several days, we finally settled on a new delivery date, the July 8. That accounts for nearly a month worth of delay. I came to the house to accept the package, as the owner was away. I was there on time, at 8AM, as I was told that the delivery would come between 8 and 10AM. The van finally showed up at 2.30PM. A single, very large box rolled out. I asked the delivery people whether all four bookcases were in the one box, and they assured me it was so. The owner came back a week ago, and opened the box. Instead of four unassembled bookcases there was only one, fully assembled. Since then, the owner has been playing phone tag with Home Depot again, and most recently he was told he would have to fly down to Atlanta and come to the particular Home Depot store personally. If it wasn't so much money he'd swallow the cost and order bookcases from Lowe's, but as it is, he wants at least his money back.
A few weeks ago, Business Week has placed Home Depot among the four companies who suffered the most significant decline in market share due to poor customer service. Here's a good reason why. |
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