Less than two years ago I bought a bag from A. G. Spalding & Bros. Recently, its two zippers came off, so this week I went to their shop located in the Marais in Paris.
Sales assistant: "To benefit from the 2-year guarantee, I would need a proof of purchase"
Me: "I do not have it. But I purchased it recently - you will be able to find the collection in which this model is shown..."
Sales assistant: "I do not know this model. But then, I have been here only for a very short time...."
Me: "How long will it take to repair?"
Sales assistant: "From 3 to 4 months ... We will send it to our workshops in Italy. There is a despatch every month ... it's too bad that the one for December has already been despatched. So we will send it in January..."
Me: "How much will it cost me?"
Sales assistant: "Around 30 Euros per zipper..."
While I was leaving, to reassure me he added, "You know we have pleasant surprises sometimes... It may take less than 3 months..."
This was my encounter with the zero degree customer experience - with a salesman who was really very courteous:
- An after-sales service deadline that is stupefying;
- An organization (monthly shipments to Italy) that deters rather than encourages the client from having recourse to it;
- The impression that even if I had obtained service under the guarantee - the time taken would have been exactly the same...
One could dream of a situation where the salesman was able to determine that my bag was part of the 2009 collection and it was therefore certainly still under warranty ... but that would be expecting too much. The only thing I wanted was to retrieve my working tool – the manufacturing quality of which really proved to be very mediocre. Alas! Sergiolin, the Italian leather goods manufacturer (they recently bought Lamarthe) which owns the American brand, A.G. Spalding, probably never considered the question of customer service, content to be just a seller of products...
