Guitar Center just lost me as a customer

[JakeStone]

I agree with others..

Firstly sorry for the problem!!

But this really shouldn't be a "rant" against the seller.

I imagine this will get cleared up.

[Rmz76]

Originally Posted by rokdog49

I disagree. Why should GC pay for Fed Ex's error.
If GC had to pay for every lost or mis-delivered package GC ships by Fed Ex over a years time they wouldn't be making money for long.
As much business as Fed Ex does with GC I would contact GC and ask them to intervene with Fed Ex and throw their weight around a little.

Why should GC pay for Fed Ex's error?

While they aren't obligated to, there is an opportunity here for GC to step back and look at things from the customers perspective. In this case you have a customer who spent a lot of money with Guitar Center. You can argue that doesn't matter in the on-line world and I can tell you for good retailers I think it does matter. When you talk with an Amazon rep that rep has access to all kinds of interesting data on the customer they are speaking with and the rep is actually empowered to make quite a few decisions to go above and beyond.

I had a bad experience with a product from Sweetwater and they also went above and beyond and in that case it was my first transaction with them for a guitar purchase. So the retailer always has a choose to toss up their hands and say "not our responsibility" or to actually to take calculated losses in some situations to make customers happy.

In tough situations like this there's a rational question the business should be asking "In the long run is it worth our loss on this transaction to make this customer happy". That goes beyond the finger pointing game and is just stepping up and owning the problem. The customer didn't likely choose FedEx, FedEx was the carrier Guitar Center made the default choice and negotiated a rate with. Did the customer have a choice between UPS, USP or FedEx? Probably not unless they wanted to pay a large premium for expedited delivery. I know first hand you can live in one location and have excellent FedEx service and another and have poor FedEx service and same with UPS. So while it's the carriers fault, who made the decision to go with that specific carrier? From that perspective I do think the retailer bears some level of responsibility. Not legally, but just on the grounds of taking the high road.

[S.bowman]

I will be the odd man out, and disagree that this is a fedex problem. The OP didn't order products from fedex, and he did not contract with them for delivery. GC chose the shipping service, and paid for it. That has zero to do with their obligation to OP, which is to give him what he paid for.

[vindibona1]

I'm not sure why PayPal isn't in your corner on this one. When a package is shipped to you the shipper selects the carrier and is responsible for shipping instructions, including delivery/signature options.

One way to deal with such nuisance issue, whether it be with GC, FedEx or anyone, is to keep going up the food chain of personnel in a company. If I don't get satisfaction with a line person I go to their supervisor. If I get no satisfaction for the supervisor I go to their boss, and the next one up etc. At some point someone is going to be sympathetic and resolve my problem. I suspect the OP didn't go high enough up on the food chain at GC. $50 is small potatoes, even for a company like GC that is financially teetering.

[Mr. Jelly]

I have my purchases delivered to a FedX store near me. Then I stop on the way by and pick it up.

[llew]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

I have my purchases delivered to a FedX store near me. Then I stop on the way by and pick it up.

I've started doing this too. For both FedEx and UPS.

[JakeStone]

Call your CC company...

File Claim.

100% End of story.

[GBS]

Originally Posted by S.bowman

I will be the odd man out, and disagree that this is a fedex problem. The OP didn't order products from fedex, and he did not contract with them for delivery. GC chose the shipping service, and paid for it. That has zero to do with their obligation to OP, which is to give him what he paid for.

X2! And one can bet that Amazon has negotiated with at least some of their delivery services a "no hassle" claims clause - meaning in return for the contract to be a major delivery service for them, the carrier will accept some share of the loss automatically, without fighting with the customer. Either GC doesn't have enough financial clout to do that, or they don't have a competent contract manager who might have negotiated it. In any event, it was GC that determined how the product was to get to the customer, and it was GC that took the money.

[jwellsy]

We have packages delivered to the wrong house about once a year. They are always dropped off at the same number on the West end of the street, but we live on the East end. E and W get mixed up easily. We've gotten to know the good folks at the West end pretty well.

[jazzguy]

Man - this is a scary thread. Imagine if this had been a $3000 guitar?! Yikes!!

[HeyMikey]

FedEX definitely screwed up and clearly is doing the CYA thing. I can say without a doubt that they didn't deliver to my house because my wife and I were both home sick on the day (actually week) the delivery supposedly took place.

I understand that GC has their policies and procedures, but to me this is about doing the right thing for the customer. I imagine at a certain price GC would require a signature, but obviously they don't for a $50 drop and run item. I've gotten similar small things delivered from them in the past, but big items I've had shipped to store.

Who's right? Who's wrong? I don't care. All I know is I am that the mercy of a company that apparently values $50 more than retaining a customer.

[AndrewG]

Originally Posted by Rmz76

Sorry to hear about your situation. Although I agree that the problem is FedEx (I assume you had a tracking number at some point), the reality is Guitar Center has an opportunity here to step up and they are choosing not to. When you buy from someone on-line the carrier who delivers is a partner in the transaction. Guitar Center made the choice to use FedEx as their carrier and in situations like this Guitar Center has the choice to make a customer happy or to wash their hands of it and point you to the carrier.

I'm guessing you took this up with their customer service reps over the phone and they told you to take it up with FedEx? They've probably been trained to do that and to disregard the amount of money you've spent with them in the past. Sadly, this level of customer service disconnect is a big part of what I suspect has hurt Guitar Center (they are really teetering on the brink of bankruptcy). For the business owners who may be taking Guitar Center's side on this I get where you are coming from, but I'd like to share a story. Last year I purchased a television from Amazon. The TV was delivered by UPS and when I opened to box it was shattered.

I got angry and contacted Amazon's customer service. I was upset because the UPS delivery person in my area is horrible and I had already arranged return and had been given a time window for the UPS driver to show up twice which he had missed (without so much as even leaving a note). So I contacted Amazon explained he situation and requested to drop the set off at UPS's service center myself. Amazon apologized (for UPS's behavior mind you) and then they did something that shocked me. The customer support rep did a "refund without return" and made the funds available immediately for me to buy a different model TV. Amazon could tell I was angry, they knew how much I had spent with them and also knew that in my 10+ years doing business with them that I had never made such a claim. Amazon has the software to analyze customer behavior so their customer support staff could easily assess my level of integrity (at least for their purposes in responding to this event). Guitar Center is a big box retailer with the resources to empower their customer service department with the same technology. Their competition does. I'm pretty confident had the OP been dealing with Sweetwater this would be a non issue.

Look at Amazon continuing to blast into the stratosphere, meanwhile Guitar Center is trembling in the gutter waiting to be rescued by investors or to be put to death.... When the world innovates and you refuse to invest in keeping current and end up handling a customer service claim one way and your competition is bending over backwards and setting the bar at a new high, then your business deserves what it gets. Retail at any level is highly competitive. If your competition has found a way to take care of customers in a way that you can't then they win and you loose. In the end no one cares what you as a business owner can afford or can't afford to do. If you can't afford to match their level of customer service then you better have something else significant to offer.

It's stories like this one I'll be remembering as I'm driving by the abandoned Guitar Center buildings this time next year.

My experience with Amazon parallels yours. I ordered what was advertised as a six-pack of Kodak Tri-X film. What turned up was just two films. Amazon not only immediately refunded my money, but told me to keep the film with no charge. To say I was impressed is an understatement. Ok, I hadn't spent a fortune, but good service is what keeps people coming back.

[rlb9682]

Originally Posted by HeyMikey

FedEX definitely screwed up and clearly is doing the CYA thing. I can say without a doubt that they didn't deliver to my house because my wife and I were both home sick on the day (actually week) the delivery supposedly took place.

I understand that GC has their policies and procedures, but to me this is about doing the right thing for the customer. I imagine at a certain price GC would require a signature, but obviously they don't for a $50 drop and run item. I've gotten similar small things delivered from them in the past, but big items I've had shipped to store.

Who's right? Who's wrong? I don't care. All I know is I am that the mercy of a company that apparently values $50 more than retaining a customer.

I agree with you. It's not that Fedex screwed up, which it sounds like they did, it's that GC won't do anything to help rectify the situation. It wouldn't take much on their part.

I've had similar experiences with various online companies and all it took was a call from the retailer and the problem was solved one way or another.

But hey, if GC doesn't value it's online customers there's other companies out there that do.

[Gary1953]

I have had orders lost, misdelivered or broken by the big three; USPS, UPS and FEDEX. We are all lucky if we get ANYTHING.

[ahorsewithnonam]

So, if it was a $3,000 Martin, GC should just say....no problem, we will refund your money?

If some of you guys owned a business you wouldn’t be in business long with that policy. And if word got out people would be ordering guitars left and right and saying they never got them. Please refund my money.