The vast Consumerist archives are not lacking for tales of customers left holding the short end of the stick following a Best Buy purchase. And for a while it looked like Jon and his wife would be adding their names to the roster of fist-shaking Best Buy customers. But, as occasionally happens in this wacky world, this couple came up a winner when they spun the customer service wheel of fortune.

Recently, Jon’s in-laws did something nice and bought a new Whirlpool stove at Best Buy for him and his wife. The appliance arrived on time and the installers did their job without wreaking havoc on the walls and floors.

We’ll let Jon tell the rest:

However, after they left, we began looking through the owner’s manual. Mysteriously, some of the stove’s features that we were expecting to see, were suspiciously missing. Further inspection revealed that even though it looked a lot like the stove we ordered, it wasn’t the correct model.

A call to Best Buy’s customer service department revealed that Best Buy was actually out of stock of the particular one we ordered. So, rather than call us and explain, or at the very least confirm inventory levels at the time of the sale, they ordered and delivered the next model down. Oh! And while they were at it, they were still going to charge my in-laws for the better model’s price. You know, because Best Buy has a reputation to uphold, and all…

Luckily, when we called, we managed to get a customer service rep who seemed to genuinely want to help us. Best Buy was still out of stock of the stove we were supposed to get. So he ordered us the next model UP, making sure to discount the price back to what was originally paid.

He put it on a rush order, to ensure that we would get it quickly, and on top of all of that, since we obviously didn’t have a backup range, he encouraged us to use the incorrect one, until the new one arrived. It did arrive quickly, was installed nicely, and we rejoiced happily.

I will admit, because of all of the Best Buy horror stories I read on Consumerist, I really try to limit my purchases at Best Buy. However, in this instance, Best Buy actually helped us. They resolved the issue, went above what was expected, and left us feeling like Best Buy actually wanted to keep a customer.

Well, an appliance customer, anyway…

Thanks Jon! We do love to hear about above-and-beyond customer service, especially if it’s because the company royally screwed up in the first place.

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