Price Gouging at A & E Factory
Complaint
Elizabeth Butler
Country: United States
A & E Factory Service,a nationwide provider for Kitchenaid appliances, should not be recommended by its suppliers. I called them to have two panels replaced on my side-by-side KithenAid refrigerator. They quoted me a price of $65 for the service call and told that I will be charged for the workman time extra. The service man came and had the panels replaced in 5 minutes. He billed me for $200! I was shocked to see this price. I think they should be obligated to give a more realistic price quote before the service.
Comments
I feel badly for the repair man that he has a crummy job as an individual, BUT I WORK *&#&* HARD FOR MY MONEY TOO! I commute over 100 miles a day and have customers yelling at me etc etc, I am a single parent with 3 children do you think I get to see them whenever I want?? PLEASE !!! Thant's life..I try to make things right when I have a dissatisfied customer. I do estimates, and charge for my time but never in my life have I charged someone for NOT WORKING!
I filed a complaint with Maytag as they sent him out, and I filed a complaint with A & E. If I don't hear from A & E I will file with the BBB and the attorney general office in my state. BTW I called a local repair service they told me right off 70 to come out, I said fine they said they will be here first thing tomorrow morning... notice the different service call charges??Hmmmm makes you wonder.
Their repair person came out to fix my freezer. I didn't know it but he turned off the whole unit. He said he had to get a part and he would be back in 2 weeks. I thought that meant that I would be without a freezer for 2 weeks, but the refrigerator would work just fine. I figured I could live without the freezer. But after he left I realized the refrigerator was also not working. I called back and they said he could only come out on wednesdays... so i had to wait 2 weeks! I called a local person. They came out and looked at it. That's when I found out the other guy had turned off the whole unit! The local guy fixed it in 5 minutes and charged me 1/2. The problem is that A and E had made me pay upfront. so now I was out $193.00. I've been on the phone with them for weeks. I've talked to 10 people. 2 of them have said they would refund the whole thing, but they have only refunded the $45 part. And they are extremely rude. I will NEVER EVER call them for anything and I wish I could start a website to warn everyone else.
I ended up with them because I had called SEARS. Don't ever call Sears for service!
A&E and Sears employs 3000+ techs across both the U.S. and Canada. Just like any other company not all of them are good at what they do nor are they all a ragtag group of idiots. Granted as of late it seems the bad ones far outweigh the good. That is not the techs fault, they can only work to the best of their own ability.
As far as the pricing goes, none of that is determined by the technician. It is all controlled by the computer system they use which has everything set by corporate minded individuals that make 6 figure salaries and have no idea what it means to have to work on something. From personal experience we as technicians do not enjoy having to look a customer in the face and inform them that the 10-20 minutes of work we performed is going to cost them $200+. The parts we supply are more expensive but they have what they call an "on truck premium" added to them. No lie, and we can't change it no matter how bad we may want to. And just in case you are wondering, the only ones getting rich off what you pay for service are the higher ups. If a tech works for 20 mins he is paid for just that..20 mins! The average tech only makes about $14 an hour so it obviously isn't them that makes all that money.
The call center is an entirely different story. The techs have to deal with the same incompetence that you do as a customer. The same group of goof ups that handle you have to take care of tech problems as well. They all hate it as much as you do.
Now lets talk about that "service charge". EVERY and I mean EVERY type of service company has some form of a minimum charge. In this area its around $60-$75. Try getting a plumber or electrician to come to your house for less than $100. Probably not going to happen if you want a good one. That service charge basically covers the basic expenses of the company. The van they drive has to be paid for. It needs fuel, insurance, plates, the tech is paid to drive to you. The only way you end paying just that fee is if you decline to have something repaired. This is after the tech has diagnosed the problem, informed you of what needs to be done and made arrangements to do so. If it only takes 5 minutes I can understand how you may feel this is too high. But think about this, just the diagnosis at times can take 60 min. or more. Not a bad deal for the money.
Whether you are pleased with the company or not, the technician can't control that. Don't make the bottom of the ladder individual that is forced to give you the bad news of how much it will cost to repair the item out to be the bad guy, he can only do what he is told or risk losing his job. How would you like to get yelled and screamed at by 10-12 different people a day for things you have no control over?
Keep these in mind next time you call and schedule service from ANY company.
Good luck and may all your appliances live forever.
A&E sent a service rep to do the replacement.
After he removed the cardboard cover in back I took it into my garage and blew out the dust accumulation in the fiberglass insulation and handed it back to the rep.
He then took out his little portable vacuum cleaner and cleaned out the area around the relay. This took him 5 minutes.
When he packed up to leave he said that will be $39.95 please.
According to my calculation that is $479.40 PER HOUR for his labor
on the vacuum job! He said that is the charge for the "cleaning."
Note to AppTECH: Stop being an apologist for a RIP OFF company. Can't you
read the replies on this board?
A&E is typical of crappy US companies that have ruined our country.
Whatever happened to good old honesty in repair work?
I know complaining about getting ripped off for only $39.95 might sound petty
but I don't like being blind-sided.
If he would have mentioned that "oh by the way, there will be a charge of
$39.35 to clean the repaired area" I would have said no problem...do it.
Note to repair people: Don't blind-side your customers!
The charges that are charged by A&E are not set by the Tech, they are set in the computer by a higher power, it is the same way your local garage charges If the book says it should cost 150.00 bucks then that is what they charges you.
It is called Flat Rate and is entirely legal and normal business practice
A&E stands behind thier work for 90 Days for a same part failure.....
They have a new system which is helping to provide better service Instead of loading a Tech down with 10 calls a day they give them to him one at a time so he doesnt have to worry about the next call he has, he can concentrate on Your call