Well, after the Christmas Silliness season, things at work were- we hoped- settling down to normal.
But then Head Office passed a number of Decrees.
Over Christmas, we’d received instructions to do whatever it took to make a sale- discounts, throw in free stuff, but under no circumstances were we to let a potential sale walk out the door for the sake of $20, for example. If a customer said that The Stereo Warehouse were selling the same model of Stereo as us for $20 less, then we’d just do it at that price- you get the idea.
The buying office cut the prices on stock dramatically to boot turnover, but- as anyone with a basic founding in economics knows- reducing the profit per item.
Anyway, after Christmas all the stores got an E-mail basically saying “Well, we sold heaps of stuff, buuuuuuuut the profits were too low, so, in an effort to bring the profitability back up, we’re increasing the prices on a lot of products- and NO MORE DISCOUNTING STUFF!”
We’re still allowed to Price Match other people, but instead of the previous price matching system- basically “Well, the customer says that Electronics Emporium have the Widgetron for $20 less, and the Electronics Emporium is generally cheaper than us anyway, so that’s fine, we’ll price match it”
The electronics retail business in Australia has changed quite a bit in the last year or two. It appears that our customers don’t want the lowest shelf price, they want to feel that they’re getting a deal. They can go to somewhere like Harvey Norman, where the Widgetron 9000 might have a shelf price of $497, and the salesperson can say “Ooooh, tell you what, if you take it right now, you can have it for $479”.
Customer says “Bargain! I’m getting $18 off! Foolish salesperson, little did they know I have the Diamond AmEx of Limitless Expenditure! BUWAHAHAHA!”
The thing is, our regular sales price might be $475, but customers will come in and say “Can you do any better?” When we say “No, our prices are set by head office, but if you find it cheaper, we’ll match it”, they invariably say “That’s not the point, I want a deal, and Harvey Norman will take $X off the price for em”.
“Great” we say. “I’ll call them up right now, and if they confirm the price, I’ll let you have the Widgetron for that price.”
Now, the salespeople at other stores don’t want to lose a sale, so when someone rings up asking for a price, the only price you’ll get over the phone is the currently advertised price- no “special deals” or anything. Gotta be in store for those, you know.
So, we put the phone down and say “I’m sorry, but their Widgetron is actually more expensive than ours. I’ve got a nice, new one in a box if you’d like to buy it. Comes with a 12 month warranty and the batteries, which will save you a few more dollars.”
“No, the man at the other shop said he’d do it for (insert lesser monetary amount). I’m going back there.” Sale walks out door because we’re not allowed to be flexible, unless the customer is buying a package of somekind (We can do a bit of wheeling and dealing if the customer wants, say, a computer, warranty, software, printer, etc, or a digital camera, warranty, memory card, etc)
Anyway, we got an E-mail from the higher-ups wanting to know why sales weren’t as good as they had been. We told them. (“We’re the only people in town that can’t do deals, and because you insist we absolutely must confirm competitor’s prices, we can’t match the verbal prices our competitors give us because they’re not silly enough to give out deals over the phone.”)
Their response?
“Use your sales skills.” :rolleyes:
If that wasn’t bad enough, we’ve also been issued contradictory instructions regarding our refund policy.
We have a 7 day change of mind return policy- basically, if you buy something and it turns out to be not what you’re after (wrong cables for your DVD player, computer doesn’t have USB ports for a USB memory stick, TV just doesn’t look as nice as you thought it did, etc) you can bring it back within 7 days, provided you’ve got your receipt, and the item is in perfect condition with all the packaging and so on.
Yes, people do take unfair advantage of this, quite frequently- buying a DVD player to use while they’re on holiday and returning it before they go home, buying a digital camera for someone’s wedding/21st/graduation, using it, then returning it a few days later because they “found it too hard to use”- you get the idea.
After that 7 days, though, you’re stuck with the item. If it breaks within the warranty period, we will gladly arrange for it to be fixed or replaced at no charge (as per the relevant service action on the item), but for simple change of mind stuff, you’ve got seven days, and that’s it. Bear in mind we’re not legally required to offer a change of mind refund at all. We’d be quite entitled to say “Tough shit” if you came back two days later saying that it turns out you didn’t need a SCART plug for your TV after all. But we don’t, because we’re nice like that.
Anyway, I’ve had three people in the space of two days trying to return stuff well outside the return period.
First one was a chap from a golf course, who had bought half a dozen walkie-talkies some three months previously. Two of them weren’t working, and the people at the course had decided that the remainders (2 Watts, with a fairly respectable range on them- especially somewhere like a golf course) “Weren’t powerful enough”, and they wanted to return them.
Since they didn’t have the packaging, and the walkie-talkies had been very well used, we said No. We said we’d be quite happy to have the faulty ones fixed- which was agreeable to the customer- but we couldn’t accept a change of mind return on used goods some three months after the date of purchase.
Turns out the customer they’d sent was just one of the guys who works there, and so he needed something to tell his boss when he went back to the course with four used walkie talkies and not a refund. The bloke serving him and I both said “Look, there’s absolutely nothing we can do at store level. I’m sorry they weren’t right for you, but the time to say something about it and get them swapped over was three months ago. Sorry.”
Customer says “OK, fair enough, I’ll tell my boss.”
About two hours later I get a somewhat irritated phone call from the area manager wanting to know why we told a customer to call our Head Office if they had a problem with it. Cue ranting from Area Manager about how busy head office are and how we’re not to fob customers off on them because we “can’t be bothered” dealing with them at store level, along with more ranting about how much of their day was going to be taken up dealing with this.
“Whoa” says I. “I didn’t tell them to call head office, but even if one of the staff here did, so what? There was nothing else we could do for them at store level (having explained the earlier events). They bought these things three months ago, and our policy clearly says that returns must be within seven days, and with all packaging etc. This return fufilled neither of those criteria. What, exactly, would you propose I do in that situation?”
“Offer the customer a special price on some more powerful walkie-talkies”, says our Area Manager.
“Do you have any idea how insulting that would be? If I went into a business with the same problem these guys had, and they said “You’re stuck with them, but if you want to buy more expensive, shiny stuff, perhaps we can work out a deal for you” I’d tell them to get stuffed and take my business elsewhere. Perhaps you’d prefer I laugh evilly as I suggest customers buy more stuff because they’re not satisified with purchases made in earlier financial quarters?”
“No, in future, don’t escalate this sort of thing to head office.”
Right. Basically, head office saying they don’t want to help us with this sort of problem, and how dare we have the temerity to suggest that their policies may cause situations whereby we are unable to assist a customer any further and if they don’t like it, they’re going to have to take it up with someone with more authority than anyone at the store.
The other two returnees were both told “Sorry, you can’t return a printer/telephone four/six months later because you’ve seen a better one reviewed somewhere”. They were initially unhappy, but once we explained “Look, really, honestly- look at it this from our point of view. What are we supposed to do with this product you are trying to return? We can’t resell it because it has no box and has been thoroughly used, we can’t return it to the manufacturer for a credit because there’s nothing wrong with it, and we can’t just leave it out the back and hope it somehow falls through a wormhole in the time-space continuum. Now, if the item had been returned in as-sold condition within the seven day change of mind period then we’d be happy to help you, but as it stands it is not possible for us to accept a return on this product in the condition you are presenting it to us.”
And I haven’t even gotten into customers ranting that the cordless phone they paid $300 for “Only” lasted seven years(!) or that they can buy a Chinese knock-off of the Widgetron from eBay for half our price (“We’re not an eBay store, and we don’t price match prices from the internet” I keep telling people. “Besides, there’s no guarantees with anything you buy off eBay. If it breaks, there’s nothing you can do to make the seller fix or replace it”), or that they want a DVD recorder- High-Definition Set Top Box with 500Gb HDD-Xbox360 Combo Unit for under $299…
Honestly, it feels like I’m working in a Dilbert comic some days. :smack:
