fatboy mayhem

things i seek in life: good food, good friends, good laughs and good service. in no particular order, really. it seems i typically get the first three covered on any given day, but lately, that good service bit has been lacking.

usually i can rectify bad service with a simple phone call or well-intentioned letter. take for instance our crappy travel to key west for my birthday this year. between ORD and MIA running subpar as usual, american airlines not communicating fully if at all and general uncooperative chicago weather, i almost called it a day. but i was going to enjoy my vacation, damnit. and i did. and i’m glad i took the few days to relax before i drafted a polite though lightly reprimanding letter to american airlines. sure, the weather was out of their hands. and yes, they are but one airline represented at o’hare. but their associates could have handled the situation better on the phone and in person at the gate of our missed connection. i explained everything thoughtfully and painstakingly, and then requested that we be refunded for the portion of our unused ticket as well as the car rental since we ended up driving the remainder of our journey. less than a month later, a credit was on our credit card for an amount similar to my request. i never received documentation or an explanation to the exact amount put back into our account, but it wasn’t necessary. i was thrilled that my letter made a difference, and i actually won my case. kudos to you, american airlines. (i hear you have people trolling the interwebs for bad press, so here’s some good feedback for your case files.)

the latest mishap? our fatboy bean bag chair. the obvious design flaws will be addressed at weightshift since that seems to be the appropriate sounding board, but seeing as how i have a secret love for hating on poor customer service, i wanted to highlight the lack of responsiveness and accountability on fatboy’s part.

the boy’s initial email was to design public since they handled our original purchase. our issue was a small tear that was more than likely our fault coupled with a zipper that was embedded in between the folds of material without a tab. given the zipper was malfunctioning, we couldn’t even access the inside of bag to mend the rip and to prevent styrofoam beads from spilling out (of which there are easily millions). citing a possible factory flaw in the zipper, we were hoping for some kind of consideration given that our piece was only two months old. design public, to their credit, handled our case promptly and courteously, but in the end couldn’t help given that the cover was torn due to excessive wear and tear. however, the customer service rep failed to address the zipper issue. naz thanked her for her time and the offer of a 10% discount on a future purchase, but we deemed it unnecessary. (sorry, but 10% doesn’t put much of a dent in an item that retails for $229.)

naz proceeded to email fatboy usa directly, referencing the conversation with design public. their response was speedy but curt at best. when the customer service rep addressed the zipper, she merely said that it is child-proof (hence the supposed reason for no tab?). (but the body of the zipper is embedded between the material, thus making it completely inoperable.) we were also told (by design public) that we could purchase a new cover and that in order to retrieve the millions of styrofoam beads, we would have to cut (according to fatboy) the original cover open. what a waste.

[the entire comment from the fatboy usa rep: The issue with the zipper is not a defect. All of our fatboys now come with child proof zippers. The only way you would be able to transfer the beads would be to cut open the old bag.]

there are so many things wrong with this response. working in customer support myself, the first thing you do is offer apologies and some sort of compromise to make the consumer happy. neither of which did this rep do. and exactly what is a child-proof zipper in the first place? from my standpoint, it’s pretty much an adult-proof zipper as well. and let’s not forget the industrial-strength velcro that adheres the flap together in the first place, almost negating the need for any child-proof anythings. and really? cut open the old bag? that’s it? you’re condoning cutting into your own product? to that i utter nothing but a whispered and mind-boggled, “wow.”

we abandoned any efforts to pursue some kind of compensation or reimbursement from fatboy usa for a failed product. but being one not to let items go to waste, particularly expensive extravagant items (seriously, what kind of tools pay $229 for an overrated bean bag chair? ahem), naz and i embarked on an adventure to repair the damn thing ourselves.

note: my references to fatboy usa are deliberate, and i make no judgment on holland’s customer service practices. perhaps if i felt more gung-ho about this episode i would contact their headquarters and see what headway i could make, but honestly, i’m spent on this whole affair.

08 March 2009