I couldn’t believe it. Yesterday I experienced an instance of real, genuine customer service from a telephone customer service rep. The employer of this paragon? Bosch appliances.
The Bosch in my kitchen, which at about six years old can be described, in today’s dystopic world, as “aging,” dropped the sprayer arm off its upper rack. A Bosch has a rotating sprayer arm in the bottom of the tub and another rotating arm attached to the bottom of the upper rack.
Well, you’re supposed to take each arm off and clean it now and again, so in theory I know how to put it together. But it would not go back on.
I called my favorite appliance dealer here, hoping they could tell me what I was doing wrong. Their CSR couldn’t figure it out and gave me a phone number. When I called that, the phone tree made it clear the line was for merchants. But as I was listening to the robot yack, I noticed the sticker bearing the serial and model numbers happened to have a customer service number. Hung up on the robot, called the number on the sticker, and lo! Quickly reached a live human being!
Can you imagine?
If that weren’t amazing enough… I asked her if she could give me a URL for a diagram that would show how the parts were supposed to fit together. She said she would e-mail a PDF of their parts manual. “On page 6,” said she, “you’ll see a schematic that shows how that piece goes together.”
Before I could walk back to the computer, the thing had hit the in-box.
And well. Yeah. At a glance it indicated a part was missing…where should I find it but on the bottom of the tub, where it had fallen off and bounced beneath the lower rack. Noooo problem! Snapped the gadget together, and it clicked right into its place on the upper rack.
I always cringe whenever I have to jump through those frustrating, infuriating telephone-tree hoops. Is there anything more disingenuously insulting than a robot voice going on about how “we value your business”? Dude! If you valued my business you’d pay someone minimum wage to answer the flicking phones!
At Bosch, I did have to climb past one limb of a phone tree. But it wasn’t too annoying: the CSR in question came on the line after one punch-a-button before finding a live person. She was sane, polite, and she actually spoke real, unaccented, idiomatic English. Absolutely mind-boggling.
It paid for the extra cost of a Bosch.
That’s amazing – where was the sticker with the serial number and customer service phone number? I want to make a mental note of it since we bought a Bosch dishwasher two years ago.
When you’re facing the unit, it’s on righthand along the inside of the right edge.
Awesome story! And a shame that it’s such a surprise.
My dishwasher decided to die the same month we HAD to do an emergency bathroom remodel AND buy a new car. I got the very cheapest one in the city that had two spray arms. It sounds like a jet taking off, but it’s been incredibly reliable for 3 years now, which is more than can be said for my neighbor’s ultra-fancy stainless steel in and out dishwasher (which has already been entirely replaced once). They were actually told that the dishwasher wasn’t meant to take dishes that weren’t rinsed clean first. I would have sent the DW back then! To me, it either WASHES or it doesn’t, and if it doesn’t, I don’t want it in my house! 🙂
The repairdudes are STILL using THAT story??? Tell me they’re not from Sears…
Way back in the 70’s (just think how long ago that was) a Sears repairman told a dear friend of mine that the problem with her Kenmore dishwasher was that she was so stupid she didn’t understand she had to wash the dishes before she put them into the washer. This, when I had a Kitchenaid that would wash an unlaved pig trough.
This is like a doctor who doesn’t know what ails you telling you that you’re suffering from “stress”: a way to say “I haven’t a CLUE what the problem is.”
Mightily agreed: if I have to wash the dishes before putting them in a dishwasher, I’d as soon just wash the dishes.
My in-laws had sooooo much trouble with their top-rated Bosch dishwasher(s). Glad yours is working out.
I’m sure your run of happiness is a direct result of WALKING.
Mais oui, I think you’re right about the (vigorous!) walking. How did I ever manage to forget this?
There’s an issue with Bosch dishwashers: à la mode européenne, they don’t waste energy with a superheated “drying” cycle. So after the thing has run through a wash cycle, the American who opens the machine’s door forthwith thinks it hasn’t finished the job, when in fact it has done so within its cultural context.
I also think it’s a pain in the tuchus to have to dry wine glasses and other objects that collect little puddles of water. But it’s important to know that’s what the thing is designed to do.
By and large, mine has run trouble-free and consistently.
I do dump a little vinegar in with each wash to combat Arizona’s startlingly hard water. On the two occasions that I’ve had repairdudes visit, each man has marveled at how clean the interior is. And you understand…I’ve never cleaned the thing manually. Ever.
Afterthought: I doubt if mine was the top-of-the-line Bosch. Got it at Sears; it was about the same price as the Consumer-Reports-recommended Kenmore.
I had that Kenmore in my old house (or an earlier model of it). Service guy told me that Kenmores would start out quiet, as advertised, but get noisier as they aged, whereas the Bosch would stay quiet pretty much for life. And as it develops, the Bosch has indeed run quiet for all the years it’s been here.