Facie’s Ramblings

Well, my brake-car conundrum did not turn out as I had expected. Not surprisingly, the gurgling sound my car was making pretty much stopped after I made the appointment with my mechanic, which is precisely what happened the last time my car was making funny noises . But since I needed an oil change anyway, and my new brakes do squeal, I went ahead with my appointment. According to a guy at my mechanic's, my brakes are fine . He said a "different" material was used on the brakes, and I am probably just not used to the sound. Although I feel good (well, better) knowing that there does not appear to be a problem with my brakes, I don't feel great knowing that I can most likely expect to hear these various sounds again. One would think with the money I spent on my brakes in June, I could expect them to be noise-free. One (i.e., I), however, would be wrong. Worth noting is my mechanic did not charge me to try to figure out what was the wrong this time, although let me ...

About 2.5 months ago, I wrote about my brake rip-off at Monro . Unfortunately for me, I neglected to do a follow-up post. If I had, I would have told you that I filled out an online survey about 10 days later, completely bashing my experience. The very next day, I received a call from J, the guy at the local Monro, who tried to explain himself. I won't bore you with the details, but suffice it to say he did nothing to convince me to come back. Around this time, my car started to make funny noises, some of which sounded like knocking. I took it to my usual mechanic, who simply tightened my caliper mounting bracket. When I asked what this was about, my mechanic asked if I had recently had brakes put on. Grr. Apparently, had my mechanic not made this fix, my brakes could have eventually fallen off. Lovely. I called Monro that afternoon to tell J what happened. He told me if I brought the bill in, he would pay for it. Or I could have two free oil changes. I, stupidly, opted for the...

Coming on the heels of my last post, I have another customer service issue. Except this appears to be less about customer service and more about my being a woman. Today, I brought my car into Monro for my 8:30 a.m. brake appointment. When I made the appointment yesterday, I explained that my brakes have been squealing for the past couple of months, and more recently, they have felt spongy. Today, J, the store manager (the same guy I spoke with yesterday) again asked me what was happening with my brakes, and I repeated the information. I also added that when I had my car inspected at my "regular" mechanic's back in December, he said that my brakes should be good for a few more months. [As an aside, at that inspection, I told my mechanic if my brakes were "close to failing," he should replace them because I would rather have new brakes through the winter. My mechanic said my brakes still had some tread and replacing them would be like throwing out half a loaf of...

Nowadays, it seems as if it is nearly impossible to find good customer service. I wanted to share some recent experiences. Hopefully you have had better luck than I, at least in the automotive area. Jiffy Lube Jiffy Lube is overpriced, but years ago I decided my time was more important than saving something like $10 by going elsewhere. I knew I could take my car in on my Wednesday off, and be out of there in about 15 to 20 minutes. Except in April, I was there about 45 minutes, which is ridiculous for JL during the week. So I filled out a comment card with scathing reviews, answering things like I was very unlikely to come back, that I was highly unsatisfied with the wait time, that the services were overpriced. Almost two months later, even though I included both a phone number and email, no one at JL bothered to contact me. Bye-bye, Jiffy Lube. Giant Eagle Last month, and I called GE to see if a $99 gazebo on display was in stock. The woman said yes, so I told her I would be ri...