This is the story of HOME DEPOT and the SNOW THROWER(we call them blowers, whatever).
I have explained in the past that we have acreage and show some snow photos...I am going to share more photos and tell you the HOW-MUCH-MORE-CAN-WE-BE-SCREWED-OVER-BY-HOME DEPOT story!
Ok, we used to have a snow blower a CRAFTSMAN, niiice!! about 8 years ago it died. CRAFTSMAN says they are products that are guaranteed for life, so we thought, we could get it fixed. Our Local Sears Service center closed down, and for a while everyone was being rerouted to a place outside of Philadelphia PA (about 2 hours from us) So we decided to take it to a very reputable mower, snowblower, quad whatever repair guy. He figured out what was wrong, but told us we had to get the part from sears, it was not something you could get anywhere else, He also told my husband how to replace the part to save us some money. WONDERFUL!!! happy -dance time!
So we ordered the part (not too pricey) and my hubby tried to fix it...In order to fix it, he had to take something apart...I can not remember what it is right now, but he and 3 different men ( all mechanically inclined) could not get the thing apart. Ron got angry and was going to throw it away,
(YES he really can look like this when that angry, LOL--but add a full beard)
and his one mechanic friend said give it to me, I'll keep trying, and I'll trade you tires for your truck for the next 2 tire changes ( years or whatever) Ok , so that is what we did. well, we were without a snowblower and when we DID have money to buy one, no one had any, and when the stores DID have them, we didn't have enough $. BUT... we did have healthy bodied teenagers (and me) to do the shoveling.
Slowly the nest got emptier and emptier, PLUS I had my injury and so on...then we had a few years where there was hardly any snow. GOOD!
But last year was a little rough, and we decided we would have to try again this year to get a snow blower. OK...the same thing kept happening...we would have the money, the stores would not have any snowblowers. I then became eligible for SS and I put money aside...OK we got hit with that first huge storm before Xmas, without a blower (as no one had any)
Ron with his heart disease, and my daughter did a whole lot of shoveling over a 3 day period. This is part of the reason why.
This is if I walk straight out my door to the center of the driveway (about 100 feet or so) and look up to the barn. We have to have a path to the barn, and then around it to the back for firewood and the birds(geese & chickens--this year just geese) Probably about 300 ft.
This is the view from the first barn door (standing about ten feet in front of it) looking to our garden(about 50 ft. away)..here is the garden gate (opened) Now we do not need to get to the garden in winter, but I am just trying to give you an accurate idea of the enormous job shoveling is for this household. We do not live in a development so it is NOT just a ten foot walk way and a normal size driveway.
This is from the front of the barn about 15 feet or so, looking down the hill at the back end of the house. If you look towards the left of the center of the photo you see the swing set that is in the snow shots a few posts back . The top of the ridge of the snow to the right of the center of the photo is a good 50 ft from the back end of the house.
Just for shits and giggles here is my pirate cat (blind in right eye...by his own brother scratching him in the eyeball) KitKat out in the snow, after it had been shoveled and clean and then we got 4-5 more inches 2 days later. You can see his left eye is nice and yellow and the right one is cloudy and dull looking. he is an old man now, about 10-11, we rescued him and his brother from neighbors who only took care of them when they were kittens. Once they grew up they were never allowed in the house, and then they stopped even feeding them. so... His Brother "Whiteface" disappeared a little of a year ago, he was a true TOM cat ( KitKat is also, and they were/are a bit feral, and will NOT use a litter box...so he spends a lot of time outside.
I digress...
I called home depot as Ron had been in the store 2 days before and said they have 2 of the BIG $1G snow blowers left...I next day I had my daughter go to the bank for me, and the next day I called to make sure they were still there...they were not. then the big storm before Christmas came 24+ inches like I said it was a lot of shoveling. so now every week at least once Ron would pop into HD to see if had any, every time they were out. I called on friday before the second big storm was due, and they said they were expecting a shipment that day. I was like Can you take our name, the girl on the phone said; "Well, we were keeping a list, and when the forcast told of this huge storm coming the general manager ripped up the list and said it wasn't fair, as this storm was coming and many people want a snow blower." I tried to explain the difference between WANT and NEED from a physical and medical stand point, and even spoke with a supervisor, his reply to me was; "I suggest you just come down to the store and wait for the truck, like some other people are here doing." (This was at 8:20 am) I tried to reason with him...I am disabled, I have no car, Husband still at work, yada, yada...I got no where. Ron said with any luck the truck will come after lunch and you and Amanda can go get one. I called again at 11:32 am exactly...I was told they came, there were 12 of them, and they were gone in under 20 minutes. They recommended I try the website.
Ok I went to the website, I found one we wanted, I put it in my cart, I called customer service to find out about extended warranties. She said; "Yes there is a 2 year plan and a 4 year plan, I do not know how much or what they cover." I was like ok please add the 4 year plan to my order. She informed me she could not do this. Extended warranties for anything could not be sold over the website. She advised me that when I got my email confirmation of the purchase to take it to my local store, and I could purchase the EW.
Well, I decided to call the store before actually placing the order as this sounded hokey to me, she also told me I could get expedited delivery...not the 2nd day one but the 4-5 day one.
I called the store, they told me NO, we do NOT do that, as the EW has to be on the SAME receipt with the item purchased. So I asked what is the problem that people working for the same company can give 2 completely different answers to the same question...they did not know, they could not help me, I could take my chances of buying it online with out an extended warranty or wait for more to come to the store.
Basically I was getting the run around big time. I asked for the address of the CEO as I felt he needed to know that in his company one hand does not know what the other is doing. They gave it to me. and they also gave me the other "customer service" #.
Ok so I ordered the snow blower without the warrantee.
well 2 days later I get a phone call from a lady that sounded like she had a mouthful of food, while talking.
She said there was a discrepancy with my shipping address and billing address.
(This is my post office and 911's fault) we have been here 25 years, and we were always 230, now they wanted to make us 108...I have been fighting it. Husband said use the 108...so I put 108 and said my billing address was the same...well they actually checked with the bank...the bank said "No, we have a Susan Guzy at 230." They did not and could not process the order until this was cleared up. I called the number and extension for 2 days straight, with it just ringing and ringing...finally I just dialed the number without the extension and pressed the first button on their menu, this person was helpful, and fixed everything and processed the order, she gave me her name and extension.
again happy-dance!!
well that was short -lived as almost 10 days had come and gone, with no delivery of the blower, I went on to their website to check the status. What it told me, made me want to HURL, THROW THE COMPUTER MONITER , and punch someone out!
it said: ORDER CANCELLED/DONE!!
I called the lady that was so helpful, and was like WTF!!! she put him on hold, when she came back she said the vendor canceled it cause they were out of stock. She further stated that the vendor was responsible for letting HD know so they could inform me...by the way it was canceled 3 days after she processed the order...so we lost like 5 days that we shouldn't have and are you ready for this...the day before the local HD supervisor called me to say they had a few snow blowers in stock if i wanted to come get one, and I was like no, I ordered one offline, and was expecting delivery any day.
when we called him back the day after, they were all gone!!!
This was definitely me!!
ok I was STEAMED and using all kinds of colorful language! Which she informed me if I kept it up she would end the phone call, meanwhile in the background the hubster is chanting LAWYER, LAWYER!
Pretty was scared by both of our outbursts.
(not actually my Pretty as you can tell by her pictures in posts below)
So the gal comes back on the phone and tells us they found 1(one) and only 1 left in stock with any of their vendors, and they said it is smaller and not a key start, so we will give it to you 50% off...GREAT ---Happy dance again :)
I said to her ok, my bank has already pulled out the $900 from my bank for our "non-existant' snow blower...she said oh that charge will fall away by end of business today, and the new charge will not show up til tomorrow. We went back and forth over this for about 5 minutes as I was afraid both charges would be pulled out of my acct, and that would overdraw me. She kept assuring me it would not happen, she said she would call back when she found out about delivery. She did about 30 minuted later,Ron answered and came by me (bathroom) I reiterated again my concern about the 2 charges, she told Ron she heard me, and that it would not be an issue, and told him exactly what she told me...the one would "fall away" at the end of business that day, and the other wouldn't show up til the next day. she also informed us that we could not get expedited delivery...it would standard 8-10 business days.
OK
OK what was my worse fear? the bank and the money...the $900 wasn't put back yet and they charged me the $293 on top of that, which over drew me by about 80 dollars, then 3 small charges came in...AC Moore, Michael's and Netflix ...The bank took $105. I called The lady at HD back, and she said that is your banks mistsake, I said "NO...it is yours, I warned you about the bank, and you INSISTED that there would be no issues." She called the bank on my behalf trying to explain to them that the money should have been marked but not actually taken out, and the bank told her that is not how it works, and after a few hours she called me back, said the bank would not admit fault, so HD is going to credit my card $105 and if I do not have it by this coming Wednesday to call her back!! BTW she also told us the snow blower was due to be delivered on March 1, we were like that is a lot more than 8-10 days...she said we do not count the weekends.
At 7:30 this morning we got a wake up phone call asking for directions to deliver the snowblower.
It is now here. BTW, she told us it was going to be an 18" model and it is a 22" model. SO....
it still shows that here in ONE corporation one hand still does not know what the other is doing, and you get different info no matter who you talk to! which is totally F____ed!!
But at least we got our snow blower...NOW it had BETTER SNOW AGAIN!!! LMAO
Hope your day is calm and hissy-fit free!
HUGS,
Susan
I used Bic "mark-its" pens for the Instructions page and they bled thru. :(
