Radio Shack Acts In Consumer's Best Interest, Hell Freezes Over
The Shack Radio Shack is not known in these pages for its high level of customer service. That's why we were stunned and impressed with Chris's story, where Radio Shack salespeople were not only knowledgeable and immensely helpful, but sent him to a competitor.
I needed a USB->serial adapter for a consulting project I was working on. I called ahead to RadioShack to make sure they had those in stock, and they did, so I went to the store. The ability to return this item if it didn't fulfill my needs was important to me, and I was assured I could return it easily. However, when the item rang up, it rang up as "software", meaning it was un-returnable once opened (exchange only). The CSRs present expressed incredulity at this policy, seeing as how I was purchasing a cable. They checked with their manager, who verified that I would indeed not be able to return the cable once opened. To make a long story short, they went way beyond what was necessary to ensure that I got what I needed - to the extent of calling the nearby Best Buy for me when my cell died.
I'm obviously not going to mention where this RadioShack was, or who the CSRs were, because surely their management would frown upon sending a customer to a competitor. I'd just like to say thank you to them for their honesty and in doing more than necessary to get me what I needed. It's not often the needs of the individual are put before the needs of the corporation - and CSRs that actually help a customer are rare.
Had Chris not already redacted the location of this store, we would have removed it for the employees' own safety. Now, we're no communists and don't deny that a store's purpose is to sell stuff. But it's nice to hear of employees acting in the consumer's best interest. Chris will think more kindly of Radio Shack in the future when he is in need of other widgets.
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(Photo: Mike Hepp/Penn Can Mall fan site)
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Comments:
I think its great that the employees did this. Obviously as an employer thats frowned on. But the rep going out of thier way to make sure that if there was a problem the customer would be happy, thats great! Now maybe the rep just wanted to avoid a problem for themself instead of thinking about the customer, who knows for sure. But way to go!
I used to do this when I worked at Radio Shack back in the late 90's. That's probably why I got fired after a year and a half for low sales numbers. The middle management wasn't after customer loyalty and retention - they wanted numbers. It didn't matter that people that customers I'd only met once or twice asked for me up to a year after I'd been let go. It just mattered that I wasn't selling enough Tandy Service Plans.
Good to see at least a few people still working there put the customer first.
Kudos to Radio Shack for calling Best Buy. If they really want to go above and beyond though, they will call corporate and the USB to serial adapter put into the right category of merchandise instead of putting it in the software category to prevent returns. I am sure that is probably the sort of thing that people think they can "rent" when they need it and then get their money back, but that is no ready to change the category of the merchandise.
When I worked retail years ago, I quickly realized my purpose was to counteract the corporate greed that permeated everything. Barnes and Noble music inventory was (is?) way overpriced and even with an employee discount, it was cheaper to go to Walmart. I would quietly share this with the customers when my manager wasn't around. The company wasn't going to pay me much more for making a few extra sales, so I had no incentive to upsell customers.
Bravo underpaid Radio Shack employee! (Former) Retail slaves everywhere applaud you.
@Ferris152: Yup, this is what I tried to do every single day as an AT&T CSR. Screw "the book" - help the consumer!
I'm going to pop off this question once posted before: Was it a corporate Shack, or a Franchise Dealership?
There are a bunch of shackers and posters from RSS, so they know the diff, but I'll post it anyway.
Corporate types are just that, shackled by whats on the shelving and what is in the registers. They cannot help beyond what they were trained with, which is mainly sales. They only know what they have been told or what the cards or packaging says.
The franchise types are the bright bulbs in the shack empire. They can and have done so, taken their time in assisting their customers to the best of their ability and what they can extract from either online or asking their associates, either in the store, or the next franchise down the street. They can bend over backwards to make their customers happy and satisfied with their product they bought.
For some extremely weird reason, I looked at the pic, and immediately thought: "Cally from BSG".
Radio Shack / The Shack / Tandy / Dick Smith Electronics / McDuff Electronics / VideoConcepts / The Edge in Electronics / Incredible Universe / Computer City / Coppercraft Guild / The Carphone Warehouse / Genexxa / Intertan / THS Studio / Battery Plus / The Source By Circuit City / The Source / UpClose / G-Wiz / La Source par Circuit City
Did I get them all, or am I missing some?
I hope you got the right adapter. It can be a real pain in the butt to get one that works correctly. You might collect several days worth of data, plug it in, download it, and assume everything is fine. Then you attempt to translate the downloaded file and KABLAMMO you're screwed. RadioShack's usb->serial adapter is the only one I could get to work aside from the "official" adapter (that costs like $50 more directly from the company). I'm only assuming you're in the same type of consulting of course...
Really? We're giving praise to somebody for sending him to Best Buy? That's kinda like praising AT&T for recommending Comcast.
Seriously though, it was still very cool of them to help him out.
The reason that policy is in place is following:
I work for radioshack, and people of origin other than United States buy these cables to reprogram their Satellite boxes so that they can watch TV from their native countries. I personally sold lots of these cables and about 80% were returned the following week because there wasn't any use for the cable anymore after they did what they needed to do. We are a reatil store not a RENTaSHACK. The message that popped up will only do so for that product and video games.
"they will call corporate and the USB to serial adapter put into the right category of merchandise instead of putting it in the software category to prevent returns. I am sure that is probably the sort of thing that people think they can "rent" when they need it and then get their money back, but that is no ready to change the category of the merchandise. "
There is a CD that comes with the adapter that has drives on it. So it is a software product.
@evelus2: There are CDs in many products to provide the drivers, and I bet this policy doesn't apply unless it's a product that has a very high return rate (such as this one, according to the post above).
Something like this would make me go back to the Radio Shack. Customer service is very important, even if that means you are sending your customer somewhere else. I am willing to spend a bit more $$ on something if I am going to get better customer service.
@evelus2: I recall the same thing happening with the telephone recording devices that RS sold (or maybe still sells?). You'd sell one of those and a tape recorder, and probably 90% of the time it was sold to an individual, everything but the cassette tapes would get returned. Usually it was a parent monitoring a child's phone calls or someone trying to catch a cheating spouse.
I'd make the argument with these adapters that if they'd lower the price the return rate would probably fall substantially. Or, if it is pretty evident that many of these are in fact being rented, then retailers should do what auto parts places have done for years and keep high return items available on a loaner program. Customer pays a deposit plus a small rental fee, and gets the deposit back when the item is returned. No, the retailer doesn't get quite as high of a margin as if they sold it, but it is better than no profit at all when something is returned a few days later.
If you have to scheme to keep customers away from competitots or locked into buying from you, your value proposition is seriously lacking. Your products/service should stand for themselves.
not bad. i would've sold him the cable, gave him my card with my hours on the back & told him to come to me if he had any trouble returning it with another associate.
of course, i knew how to do g/l payouts & reversals. most shack employees don't.
Great how that works, isn't it?
I worked in a small electronics chain before CC and BB wiped them out, and was always looked on as a crappy employee. Here's why:
1. Salesman A had sales of $100K/month and a ridiculous 35% return rate
2. Myself, had 85K/month sales and less than $10K/mo return rate.
Somehow, I was treated poorly for having higher net sales numbers and less overhead due to returned merchandise.
Why did I have lower numbers?
My story was I spent more time with the customer helping them determine what they want. Their story was I was lazy.
So I gave up, quit and went back to college. In the end, I got an MS in Computer Science, they went out of business.
Radio shack has competitors in the obsolete electronics and yellowing, brittle packaging business?
@TechnoDestructo: yes, i actually have a supplier for parts for my atari 2600. and at lower prices than radio shack
I went to a Radio Shack as a last resort looking for a camera battery a little over a month ago, and they had the rechargeable version, while I wanted the disposable version because the rechargeable one has a lower output and would slow my camera down. (Which is a terrible problem when you're trying to take pictures of race cars flying past you at triple-digit speeds).
The sales rep actually told me to go to a competing store up the road that I didn't know about, and they did have them there. If she hadn't told me to go where I did, I would have had to make do with several large handfuls of AA batteries.
The exact same thing happened to me at a Chicago area Radio Shack. I needed a cable to extend computer speakers. It's a simple stereo mini phone plug to jack. The RS employee said they didn't have it, they don't have a catalog anymore & he couldn't look it up online. He said to go to Microcenter.
I spent a couple of more minutes looking at the cables & found it on the wall.
It's stock # 4202492.
Radio Shack needs far better employees & bring back the catalog, at least in the stores!
Actually, I've been to several radio shacks over the year and some of the guys (and shack-inistas!) know what they're talking about. I thought I found the woman of my dreams when I found a woman who could actually help me with a voltage issue I had in a project I was completing for my car.
Most DO have a decent knowledge about electronics (well more than someone off the street)...as they should.
@TechnoDestructo: No...they don't...I believe that's the point. No other retail store sells electronic components (maybe some specialty computer shops). It's quicker than ebay and sometimes they actually have what you need. They DO perform a necessary service...if you're an electronics geek.
@bwildrick: This is what I did when I worked there as well. My store was in a near-empty shithole mall, so correctly qualifying the customers needs and making sure they got what they needed was what kept them coming into my store and not driving 5 miles down the road to a bigger, nicer, better supplied Radioshack.
It was so slow, the number of tickets I wrote some days was single digits.
@dohtem: From your link: "The Chicago Manual of Style (at 6.112) also allows spaces when either of the separated items is a compound that itself includes a space"
@bwildrick: What's up with their insane service plan pushing?
I went to purchase a car charger for my Treo. First, the salesguy tried to tell me I had to buy one that cost upwards of $30. When I pulled another off the rack that cost literally $4.98, he looked surprised as if he hadn't known it was there.
Then, as he was ringing me up, he tried to sell me a service plan. For the $4.98 car charger. Seriously.
I really dislike Radio Shack, though it's nice to know there are a lucky few out there that employ competent people.
Maybe it's just me but why was it so important to be able to return the item? If it did not work they would have exchanged it for the correct cable and that would have taken care of the issue. OR did he just want to rent/borrow the cable to do his consultation and return the cable?
This is a giant issue that plagues the electronic industry. Want to film something go buy the most expensive camera, make your film and return it. Having a big football party? Go buy the biggest and best TV and have it delivered on Friday and return it on Monday!
Wonder why return policies have gotten so strict? When someone does this it costs the company selling the merchandise. They now have a used item that cannot be sold as new and have to be discounted!
Seen the movie Date With Drew? Part of it is where they use the camera bought from Circuit City and had to return it within the 30 Day period to get their money back. Then when he does get the date back to Circuit City to buy another camera to film the actual date and then return that camera! Why is there no more Circuit City's?
Two expensive cameras that were now open box that had to be discounted to sell and they made a movie. At least it made it to cable!
Granted this was not the only reason Circuit City is not around but it is a problem in every industry from electronics to clothing to books!
I've had a similar good experience which I've kept to myself in the interest of the Shackinista's job. My headphones had broken, so I went in to exchange them under the warranty that I had purchased. The Shackinista stepped around the cellphone-plan-pushers and mentioned that I was still under the original warranty and needn't burn the extended one. I smiled and whispered thank you, without moving my lips so they couldn't be read.
I've told no one until now.
@339point4:
To be fair, the iGo charger, which is the $30 is really well made and you can buy different tips for it when you get a new phone. The $5 ones are crap. I have an iGo (I didn't pay for it, a customer recycling an old cell phone but not buying anything brought it in and I pulled it out of the trash.) and really like it.
@temporaryerror:
Oh, I haven't worked there for a couple of years, but I always understood the policy on the USB-serial cables was to prevent rentals.
Im glad that i saw this thread. I am a RS employee as well, a few posts up bwildrick stated that they were pushing those Tandy Service Plans. Well I have god news and I have bad news. The good news is that i'm exactly like you and care wwaayyyy more about the customer getting what they came for giving them a "Total Solution" and at times this is not what my boss wants to hear because that isn't making him a sale although i take returns from him when he didn't listen to the customer in the first place then went on one of his hourly Nerd Rages. The bad news is that they are pushing these Tandy Service Plans more than ever, if you don't have over eighteen percent you are reminded by corporate every other minute to get that up, although realistically we can only get like 8-12 percent depending on the season (fyi i work in a very odd, high end store with a HUGE difference in clientele within the seasons) A few months ago my district manager was in the store to help with sales because we are short handed (no one wants to work in my store because of the manager and distance) and he failed horribly aggravating most of the customers he helped and underselling the ones that he was selling to not giving them our "Total Solution", i would like to see any other person that is telling me to sell these Service Plans actually some into our store and sell them while giving the customer service that i give. One of the most ironic things about this service plan exhort is that in general it causes customer dissatisfaction, we have more problems with the outcome than anything else, besides, our specific store makes almost nothing on selling this service plan and the corporate office is what makes the profit while when there is a problem with that product and we do need to repair replace (assuming we deal with that one, some are done without us and we have no control over it, you need to call a number and wait for a gift card) then our store pays for the repair/replacement, so basically when i sell a service plan especially to our specific clientele they will take advantage of it, they will use it to replace a phone battery even if it is good and this causes problems with customers getting upset at the gift card run around and ultimately them getting mad which is not good at all, besides our store makes nothing on that plan so we lose money when we replace / repair anything. The entire subject is simply a false positive. Ohh and as far as thatUSB->serial adapter being returned i deal with than more than i should when they are sold at another local RS store. I normally google what they have (assuming the customer knows exactly what they have) and check the site or google it to make sure what i am selling them will work for that considering yes it does come with a CD and is a pain to return. As far as overall returns and the RENTaSHACK as mentioned a few posts up, i have said that same exact phrase for 2 years since i started (i actually LOLd when i read that) the biggest problem i have always had was people "Renting" phone and laptop iGo chargers for a a day or 2 then returning it, i have refused a few sales because they said that they were going to return it. Thank you for your time and i can talk about this for hours, this was only the tip of the iceberg...
@dohtem:
Ahem:
In The Canadian Style: A Guide to Writing and Editing, no space before or after an oblique when used between individual words, letters or symbols; one space before and after the oblique when used between longer groups which contain internal spacing:
And why yes, I'm Canadian.
I was going to use commas or semicolons, but I felt that made it ugly and difficult to read, so I changed it to something more readable.
I do try to take my grammar seriously, though, so thank you for the reminder and interesting article!
When I worked in Sam Goody in college, we were encouraged to send customers to competitors, then again, that was if we didn't have what they were looking for, not if our competition sold it for cheaper.
It's not a bad practice in theory at least, Sam Goody's thought was even though we lost that sale, in the customer's mind they would get satisfaction (one way or another) by coming to us.
Now, charging $25 for a CD, that wasn't a good business practive, but anyhow...
@thrlsekr: It was important to be able to return the cable in the case that it didn't do what I needed it to do. I've not used this type of cable before, and I wanted to be sure I could talk to my device though a terminal. Sure, they said it shouldn't be a problem, but you know how things go. (Works fine, by the way.)
I don't plan on running back with it as soon as I'm done, in other words.
@temporaryerror: I get that it's good for people who get new phones frequently to have a charger that can keep up with them, but that's not something that affects me so much. The charger I got was made by Sprint specifically for the Treo and it's worked very well in the past year or so that I've owned it.
My main point in my post was the insanity of trying to sell a service plan for a $5 charger.
@bwildrick: When I went back to finish my degree (circa 1997), I applied at Radio Shack b/c they were exactly between my commute from my apt. to University and had advertised the position as flexible for student schedules. I worked there exactly 4 hours. Those hours consisted of training videos, manuals, and making it very very clear that I would not be a helpful tech or service tech but a commissioned wank expected to proudly hawk whatever the corporate side was pushing that quarter. Regardless of what the customer wanted or needed or what would best suit their circumstances. And these were all corporate-provided materials, not the local or even regional policies.
Since I am about the worst liar ever born, I knew this would be a terrible job match as my pathetic attempt at a smiling "YES! You NEED this ComPAQ with all the shiny (proprietary) whistles!" would surely result only in my hating the image in the mirror and probably being dope-slapped by any customer who was paying attention.
At lunchbreak I drove directly home, called the corporate person who had actually hired me and left a vm for her that I had decided not to waste any more of their, or my, time since this was not a good match.
To the OP I offer kudos to finding reps who apparently are made of stronger stuff than I, and can work the job and still retain their personal ethics and non-asshole-ness. That is a hellofan accomplishment and good on them!
@339point4: my friend got upsold to a brand name cable instead of the same radioshack brand cable for double the price ...
I used to work at Radioshack. As commissioned employees, our FIRST goal was to make the customer happy so they'd become repeat customers, we would do something like that. Even for the homeless guy who returned his headphones on a monthly basis for a replacement pair.
Okay, the CSR did the best he could, but having to drive to a second store because of a stupid policy is still, well, stupid. RadioShack should still fix the initial problem that caused the item to be non-returnable.