Best Buy De-Hoses Washers To Save Money?
An alleged Best Buy employee tells us that the company has stopped including inlet water hoses in some Inglis, Whirlpool and Maytag top-loading washers it sells. According to the blurry photos he sent us, employees are now supposed to push this $27 accessory hose product on customers who buy the washers. Update: we don't know if the decision originated with the manufacturers or Best Buy.
Anonymous writes:
I work at a Best Buy store and I discovered this bit of information while going through employee news. Whirlpool and Maytag top-loading washers will no longer come with the inlet water hoses (the hot and cold water hoses), but they will be sold separately. The loss of our free delivery, combined with the previous price hike for range and dryer power cords (from 19.99 to 27.99) a short while ago, irritated me enough to pass this along to you folks.
These two images are from the printout I made of the employee news item. I had to take them with my phone because my scanner is not working and I apologize for the bad quality but everything should be readable.
As far as I know, washer hoses will still come with Whirlpool and Maytag front loading washers.
This is a test using rich text formatting and html links. It's the generic "company" ad that should appear on all posts with the Company category if they don't have an ad attached to a specific company.
Post a comment
Comments:
As long as it's a hose from Monster Cable, I'm willing to pay extra.
That's hosed, man.
Seriously, I wonder if that's legal? I would imagine it is, but I also wonder if it might violate some sort of merchant agreement with the manufacturers.
FD: I sold appliances for 4.5 years, but I do not anymore. Peers still come to me for advice about their purchase.
The hoses they came with were junk anyway. I always tell people to spend the $25-30 on the stainless steel braid covered hoses to prevent catastrophic leaks in the future. The rubber hoses they came with would deteriorate from the inside out and you will never know there's a problem until it is too late.
My guess this should be an anti-Whirlpool post and not an anti-BBY post as this was a MFR decision to cut costs.
What? You say best buy is ripping people off with crappy, yet necessary accessories?? Shocking. Just shocking.
$27 for a washer hose or a power cord?
I think I paid less than $10 for each (hoses or cord) at Ace Hardware.
This sounds like it was Whirlpool's decision, not best buy's, and best buy is responding to the decision to be sure to let customers know that it isn't included, and they can buy the part there?
The blurry top picture says something about "Manufacturing that happened August 1st." Perhaps there were a batch of defective rubber hoses, so they need to be removed and it's easier to replace w/the stainless? I need to see more photos.
Appliance Shrink Ray applied succesfully.
Clearly appliance manufacturers have learned from printer manufacturers. Free printer with computer purchase, but you have to buy a $35.00 cable to make it work.
That phrase: "De-hoses". Hmmn, a Canadian who becomes an American citizen?
@bohemian: Good call. Note those prices are per hose and you would need 2.
But seriously people, its worth $20, especially if you have main floor/second floor laundry.
rpm773, darn, you beat me to it!
@Git Em SteveDave displays attention-grabbing vanity: Also, the bottom line of the top picture reads, "In the future, Best Buy is looking to add new rubber hoses as an altern(ative)" It ends there. Why would they only remove hoses from boxes manufactured after a certain date in order to screw the customer? There seems to be more to this.
Holy tits, you need to be punched in the privates for paying $35 for a USB cable. However, I've actually wondered why this is that no place sells the cable with it anymore?
I just went and brought a Brother printer the other day and it didn't come with a USB cable. However, I bought the same printer on NewEgg and still... no cable - so I know its not something to do with the store itself. I don't even believe its something to do with Brother cause they don't even sell USB cables.
I've got it on good authority that this is a trial balloon of sorts; if it flies, they're just going to start selling the blueprints of the washer for $700.00 and you'll need to buy all the components seperately and assemble them yourself.
Customer A: I already have a USB Cable, I think you should discount this printer $15 so I don't have to pay for something I already have!
Customer B: I need a USB cable that is longer than 6' this printer came with, I think you should give me $15 toward the purchase of a different cable because this came with something I didn't need.
Customer C: I only needed a 3' cable came with a ridiculous 6' cable. Who could even use a 6' cable? I think you should give me a 3' cable a $15 dollars because I didn't need that obscene 6' cable the printer came with!
Anyway, on a side note, back when printers came with free cables they had 1/2 filled starter inks. Now every major manufacturer includes 100% full set of ink with their printers.
Package splitting where a retailer splits an item bought as one piece and sells it as two pieces is, I believe, illegal.
@pgh9fan: Sam's sells a case of candy bars as one unit. They mar marked for individual resale. The guy that runs the kwik-mart down the street from my house sells them to me one at a time. He even sold one to a cop once while I was there. I think cops know about stuff that's illegal. I think you don't.
Ala carte pricing 2008 is now gravitating from the airlines to appliances. This could get interesting. Oh, the possibilities!
Your scanner isn't working? Maybe geek squad could fix it
@Shrink_Ray_Bandit: If the individual pieces are not properly labeled with nutritional information, it likely violates some FDA regulation. Local cop probably doesn't know or care about federal stuff.
@ryan89: Yes, and we learned the hard way, coming back from a three-day trip to a flooded first floor. When we moved to a new place a bought new appliances, we bought the best hoses we could find.
Wouldn't matter to us if Whirlpool included hoese or not--we'd buy our own.
Manufacturers may be trying to head off lawsuits over washer hoses failing and flooding peoples homes. Or, BB is just trying to make a few easy bucks. I worked at a retail store many years ago and we we instructed to remove items from packages and put them up for sale at the counter. DOnt know it that was legal or not.
@Dobernala: Have you ever, ever, ever, ween a piece of candy that was bar coded for individual sale that did not have the dietary facts?
As for your comment about the cop, I sighed, then face-palmed, then walked away.
I worked in the Appliance industry until Feb. 07. Last summer, Whirlpool and Maytag made a decision to not ship hoses with their washers. Due to outcry from the appliance dealerships, they recended this decision with the promise that they would stop shipping hoses in the future. Where I worked, we charged $5 per hose for a total of $10 for the set. It is Best Buy overcharging for basic hoses in response to Whirlpool deciding to stop shipping hoses. They even tout this as a positive thing for the sellers because they can make more profit from selling the hoses. They also stated that it gave the customer more choice, like they didn't have choice before, now they have to make a choice.
My wife and I bought a new W&D from Home Depot about 2 months ago, and it was the same thing: hoses not included. Being that it was the first time I'd ever purchased one, I assumed that was how it had always been.
If it's $25 to $30 for the fancy, no-leak, braided hoses then I don't see it as a problem. If they're asking that much for the cheapy hoses, then Best Buy is bending the customer over once again.
On a side note: When Maytag got bought by Whirlpool the quality of their appliances spiraled down the crapper fast. I don't see myself buying either brand anytime soon.
@pgh9fan: But if the manufacturer decides to start omitting the piece from its units, I think it's legal for the retailer to try and sell you one they they stock.
And of course, most people that buy washers are replacing washers, meaning, they've already got hoses.
Kind of like the printer example above -- I've got more USB hoses (err, cables) than I know what to do with.
@Norcross: When we bought our dryer from Home Depot we told them we didn't need the hose (vent pipe, whatever it's called) because we had one. The guy "accidentally" added one to our order anyway and tried to give us a hard time about removing it. He said he'd have to completely cancel the order, void our transaction, re-order it and run the credit card again. I told him FINE YOU DO THAT, because I was so pissed he was trying to force us to buy something we didn't need. I guess there is a tiny chance it really was an accident but all this arguing over a $9 hose made me really dislike that Home Depot.
Best Buy will also refuse to install a gas dryer no matter how good the gas line's condition is.
You must buy a new gas line before they will install a dryer.
It's kinda like ranges (and garbage disposals, and dishwashers) not coming with a cord. Rather inevitable.
@anatak: that pisses me off so much. i have a great garbage disposal at home that i have never installed, because i have yet to get around to buying the cord. :-/
Floodsafe® makes a hose that not only is braided, but shuts the flow if there is a problem. Plus they are listed from $16-20.
Oh, plus this isn't unusual news from the BestBuy corp-asses.
My brother (he settled out of court) used to work for BB and showed me the text about inkjets no longer including USB cables. They were to push the $24.95 1meter and $44.95 2.5meter Belkin cables. Their cost (on the computer) were around $2.35 to $2.95.
Trust me, NEVER buy accessories from BB. The internet...now that's the bargain!
@ironchef: back in my BBY appliance days, i always understood that to be a liability issue, not a gouging issue.
@ironchef: BBY (and probably most appliance places) will not install using an old gas line. Besides, its a gas line; replace it.
@balthisar: They've already got hoses that are probably 15 years old and corroded to no other on the inside. I wouldn'teven trust the neoprene w/stainless steel braid for that long.
But I agree with you on the USB cables. I think every USB device I've ever bought except printers will come with a cable. I bought a motherboard once that came with IDE cables for the hard drives and cd-roms, and then the drives I bought came with IDE cables too so I have a lot of extra IDE cables.
@bohemian: www.acehardwaresuperstore.com (local franchise?) is different then www.acehardware.com (national store). Anyway I didnt know even if you pay a frachising fee with Ace Hardware that you can have your own website instead of reffering to the corporate site.
But if you buy your accessories for you washer from an "electronic store" then you fail.
I echo the deal about the stainless hoses being better.
One thing is will they still include the drain hose? I prefer the cheap smooth rubber hoses to the corrugated plastic hoses that are like huge drinking straws. I actually owned a house with my ex-wife in which we had purchased the w/d combo in the basement. I think the lady who sold the place tried to conceal the fact that the washer drain over-flowed foam when in use. I figured out it was the corrugated hose at fault in making the foam. The hose design cavitated the exiting soapy water into foam. By purchasing a cheap smooth rubber hose, problem was pretty much solved from massive foam overflow. A little foam now and then but across the floor like before. I would later extend the wall mounted drain a couple of feet to accomodate an air conditioning condensate drain (yeah illegal in many areas but cheaper than replacing the electric pump doing it) which then totally eliminated any foam overflow.
sorry:
but NOT across the floor like before
@ryan89: Seconded about the braided stainless steel hoses.
People, listen up!!! The black rubber hoses that come with most washing machines are not rated for "always on" use, even though that's how everyone uses them. If you RTFM, you're supposed to turn the water on before using the clothes washer, and off after using it. Unless you use the fancy braided stainless hoses.
I just wish there was some way to show 'em off, then I'd get some that were anodized blue and red with chrome-plated fittings...
Sears does the same thing. No hoses.
@jswilson64: And not to mention a lot of them say "REPLACE EVERY 5 YEARS" right on the hose. Take a look next time you are in a place that sells appliances and they have the hoses with the demo unit.
@Shrink_Ray_Bandit: I'm not sure what you're saying here. From your account, the bars are legally marked for individual sale. Therefore even if the cop was for some reason enforcing for federal agencies on the side, there's no reason s/he would object.
However, I wouldn't in general expect a cop to be up on FDA or, for that matter, FTC regulations, as it's certainly not part of the police's job to enforce them. They might know same as you might know, but it's not like they regularly bust grocery stores for selling goods without ingredient lists.
I would have to say a Appliances was the least scammy of all the BBY departments I worked in. Other than PSPs (in most cases), there weren't many add-ons that didn't have a real value to the customer.
They do it with printers, this is the next logical step in customer rape. Take out a part that by all means should be included, sell it at massive markups, MONEY!
That's pretty low. They're removing a part that comes WITH the washer and selling it separately. I wonder what Maytag and Whirlpool would have to say about that. Maybe they should start stamping the hoses with 'this unit not labeled for individual sale'.