Customer Service Is NOT Dead!

Now this isn’t a Real Estate related post, but I just had to write about this experience. A couple of years ago, I bought a pair of Ray Ban sunglasses. Pretty sure I spent about $150 on them (I love my glasses). Anyway, they broke after about a year and a half. No biggie, I figured I got my lifespan out of them so I stopped by my local Sunglass Hut and picked out a new pair- spent about $180 (please don’t hate me). So another year and a half goes by and what do you know, these glasses break. I don’t mean the arm falls off, I mean the rim breaks and they are FUBAR. So now I’m thinking o.k. this is not right. I am beginning to feel the effect of the “cell phone factor”- everything is designed to crap out on you just after a year or so. So I bring them down to Sunglass Hut and give my nice guy pitch to the 12w bulb behind the counter. “Hey, I bought these about a year and a half ago and they broke. I know the warranty is a year, but I have spent over $300 on glasses here over the years so how about a little nice guy assistance?” (just read it and assume no sarcasm). “You’ll have to call Ray Ban” says the robot behind the counter. So just to recap to this point- customer service is feeling pretty dead. I mean what does Sunglass Hut care, just swap out the damn glasses and make me want to come back right?

Phase 2- I call Ray Ban and go through the automated process of collecting the info to send my glasses in. Long story short, I am told to send the glasses, a check for $12.50 and a note explaining the situation. I do it and I Put it all in a box and settle in to wait my 6-8 weeks.

(Now I really have been on a customer service kick lately. I am of the belief that when the economy is bad and money is tight, people, companies, everyone should be doing as much as they can to keep customers happy and most of all, LOYAL! The only problem is that I have NOT been feeling this at all lately. I mean, there are a few that live it, but the masses are still trying hard to HELP natural selection take them out of the game.)

So, the “Yay!” twist you ask? My doorbell rings yesterday and I open it to see UPS driving off and a little brown box sitting by my door. I open it up and what do I see? A brand new pair of glasses, in fact, the exact same model I sent in- not a fixed pair of glasses, not even a crappy refurbished pair, but a brand new, in the package pair of glasses. Sweet! THIS is why I am o.k. with spending $180 on a pair of glasses. THIS is why people buy Lexus instead of Toyota, Infiniti instead of Nissan- The customer service!

So the moral of the story- Here I am with my new glasses, happy as can be and feeling completely taken care of. I have gone from being on the fence about this company to jumping fully into their yard. So I can honestly say that when the time does come for me to buy a new pair (because with a 2 year old, any pair of glasses ultimately has a limited life span) I will happily buy another pair of Ray Ban glasses. Nice job Ray Ban. If I had a “Customer Service Is NOT Dead” award, you would win it!