Service Culture?

[bixy]

This latest rant is occasioned by the appalling service offered by a well known chain beginning with C that supplies tools,  hardware, gardening stuff. I arranged for a heater to be delivered to friends in France. I received an e-mail from the store to say that the address was unknown. In fact my friends live just outside the village and are very well known. I suspect that the driver just couldn't be bothered. Well, several phone calls later the heater was delivered but on later inspection proved to be so badly damaged as to be unusable. When my friends phoned C, did they offer an apology and an immediate replacement? Not on your life. You'll have to write in and don't expect anything to happen for at least two weeks [two months more like].

It doesn't surprise me. This is only the latest in a long line of examples of poor quality service. Here is another example. I bought an electric coolbox from a supermarket, also beginning with C funnily enough,while on holiday but didn't try it out until I got home, only to find that it didn't work. I took it to the local branch of C. Apology, replacement? -no chance. I was told that I would have to take it back to the store where I had bought it - 500km away!

I could go on - about a large furniture chain, also beginning with C [I think I'm seeing a pattern here] where none of the half a dozen assistants standing around chatting to each other were in the least bit keen to serve me and the item I finally bought was damaged by the person bringing it out.

You get the picture. The general impression I get of people who work for these large chains, is that they just couldn't care less. Very often even the normal politesse is missing. This seems to contrast with the kind of service you get in small shops, where it often seems the people can't do enough for you. Perhaps it account for the fact that many more small shops seem to survive in France than in the UK.

Well, I've got that off my chest. Does any of this ring any bells?

Patrick

 

[SaligoBay]

Sadly, Patrick, yes - all of it! 

Ours started too with a supermarket chain beginning with C - we bought a swimming pool, took it home, built it, filled it with water, pump didn't work.  They wouldn't take just the pump back, said they had to have the whole pool back!  

That was 4 or 5 years ago, and judging by today's (rare) trip to Carrefour, things haven't got a whole lot better!

But I think they will.  Slowly.  Eventually.  I'm not sure what the trigger is to improve this kind of customer service, presumably it's when they start to lose customers.  From the outside, it doesn't look like that's happening just yet.

Write to them and complain.  It's the only way they'll know. 

[Penny29]

Ditto here,

This time the supermarket was an L - bought a dishwasher, paid for delivery, when we unpackaged the machine it's entire front panel was completely smashed in. After about 5 weeks they finally collected it & said they would contact us about a new one. After weeks and weeks of phone calls we visited the store & pinned a small man down in the corner. Turned out that the delay was because they were repairing the smashed up model and apparently I was being totaly unreasonable in expecting a brand new replacement model! After making a big fuss we were finally given our money back.

This is by no means a French thing - I have had the most appalling service from many, many large chains in the UK - I agree, I think it is a "huge chain store" disease - these places are usually understaffed and the employees are overworked and underpaid - no wonder they don't care. Also the chains are so huge that the odd disgruntled customer makes no real difference to the stream of punters coming in the door.

 

 

 

 

[Chas]

It's not always bad news.  We bought a freezer from L'Eclerc which failed to operate.  They responded to our phone call within 48 hours and having confirmed that it didn't work by running through the setting to work procedure that we had already tried they unloaded a replacement from the back of the van and took the u/s model away.  The replacement worked perfectly 

[Miki]

It is certainly true that the big supers etc are pretty poor with their service aprés vente.

Leclerc's, funny enough can range from great to dismal (sorry Penny you shopped at the latter !)The reason I believe for this difference, is that their shops are mostly Franchised and so you obviously end up with great variations in the owners and their thoughts towards clients. We have one, where the shop has a good name for SAV, not more than 10 km away, another one is pure hell.

The C's and I guess we all know those shops, are part of huge chains, so I wonder if the hierarchy either put down stiff orders about returns and guarantees or as has been stated, the low pay etc does make them all grumpy so and so's?

Make a huge fuss it either works............................. or you look pretty stupid !! (I know )

 

 

[Iceni]

The best for me was the large store beginning with C. I wanted to buy something and could not find an assistant. I then went to the help desk and a few men in uniform were standing around doing nothing. I finally went and asked one of them if he could help me. He came with me but when he discovered he was expected to actually SELL me something he started shouting at me that this was not his job, shouted some other things I could not understand and then stormed off. It put my French conversation back to zero and I have not got my confidence back.

We waited until the assistant came around (SHE was sent by someone) and then she offered to sell us something so damaged that it was worth the wait to tell her we had no intention to buy anything from them.

What are these ruddy men supposed to be doing if they don't SELL.

[Russethouse]

I'm not sure there are that many people (apart from Estate agents ) who really know 'how to sell' as opposed to just letting the customer decide and taking the money !

Not really sure if this is a step forward - to be a successful sales person you need an amount of product knowledge - seems to be a little lacking.........

Sure Miki will have an opinion on this

[Miki]

[quote]I'm not sure there are that many people (apart from Estate agents ) who really know 'how to sell' as opposed to just letting the customer decide and taking the money !Not really sure if this is a st...[/quote]

Cars and a bit of "this and that" is about all I know how to sell Gay !

Seriously though, a fair amount of the sales staff you see in the shops have probably been through Lycée or pro school to be a sales person (a form of commercant). They will have been trained to be professional in their sales and approach to clients, where it goes for some of them after their entrance in to the store though, is anyones guess.

As was stated here some time ago, to work for B.F, just as a waiter or a server can mean having a Bac +2 and this can also mean the same for selling in a shop. What a lot of study and effort to do that, couldn't happen in the UK like that, could it? I can sort of understand it for specialised selling but for everyday selling?

 

[Georgina]

I was told by friends and a neighbour to buy a washing machine from one of the smaller stores as the service and after service is much better than the larger ones.  I went to Gitem, and was really impressed.  They delivered it within two hours, even though I paid by part cheque, unpacked it, attached it to the pipes and showed me how to use it in great depth (I was not sure I understood everything he said but I nodded my head politely anyhow) and they even took away the carton.  Fantastic.  The only thing that I could complain about was that I had to go to the shop 3 times before I finally found it open so maybe the staff get more time off.

Georgina