Jun 20, 2013 03:23 PM
29584 Views
In February of this year, to combat the long and hot summer months, I bought a Whirlpool AC. This was my second AC. The first one too was of Whirlpool and since I was happy with the earlier product, I bought the second AC too of the same brand, completely unaware of the nightmare that awaited round the corner. The purchase of the AC instead of providing relief from the sweltering heat, managed to increased the blood pressure very effectively. Once the AC was installed and we started using it, we realized it was not cooling sufficiently and the outdoor compressor Unit was make a loud sound. We contacted the customer service and lodged a complaint. We had numerous service engineers visiting us, but providing no solution or relief from the problem. With each passing day, the temperatures were going higher, but there was no relief either from the hot summer weather or the AC problem.
The service engineer who visited was downright rude and arrogant and instead of accepting that the product was faulty, starting telling all nonsense and bull stories of the room being too big for a one tonne AC. I should mention the big room size here was 10X12, which while purchasing was mentioned to the dealer HUNS who recommended the 1T AC. Finally after numerous emails and numerous visits from service engineers from Whirlpool, one engineer Mr. Patil found the cause of atleast the outdoor unit making so much noise. He told that the outdoor unit needs to be replaced due to a faulty compressor and he initiated the replacement process. 3 weeks after the initiation of the replacement, we called Mr. Nair the service incharge to check on the replacement status. Mr high and Mighty Nair responded by asking us to call some other guys for the status update as he was too busy to follow up. After paying so much money, when it came to customer service, the customer is expected to service whirlpool.
I wrote a mail to the customer service again and Mr. Malhotra assigned it to somebody from their gurgaon office. The guy from gurgaon called and again we had to tell the full story and by this time please note, Monsoon made its glorious entry and summer finally bade goodbye. I am still pursuing whirlpool for the replacement. A lady from their Pune office called and offered replacement of another model with additional difference amount. She told the model we had was no longer available as the production was stopped. My question, how can they sell models for which they have not only stopped production but also pulled out support? If this is not cheating then what is? For having such a big brand name, Whirlpools customer service truly sucks. They not only sell outdated products and fleece unsuspecting customers, but also plan how fleecing in future by either not offering proper after sales service or just dragging their feet till the warranty period is over so they can mint money all over again from the customers.
If you want to buy any products, try Samsung which is a leader today in home electronics and also provide world class after sales services. Probably I got a deranged attack when I went to make the purchase that I chose lifetime of headache (whirlpool) over lifetime of peace (Samsung) I am not expecting Whirlpool to do anything till the warranty period lapses, hence I am sure gonna knock the consumer court doors and not let Whirlpool get away so easily.
