Incredible Customer Service: Moen

We often hear of customer service horror stories with forigen phone operators to just rude companies. Recently, I had a much different (and positive) expericence with Moen.

The faucet in our kitchen had started to develop a leak. Those who know me, know that I am not the most handy of guys (outside of technology anyway), but I have been trying to get better in the handyman area and tried to figure it out.

I took the faucet apart and did a few google searches to find that the problem was a bad cartridge in the unit. I found the part I needed, went to Home Depot and tried to fix it. The bad news was the due to hard water, the cartridge inside our faucet would not come out. I called Moen for the first time to ask for some help. They were very quick to answer the phone and had my account information right away without me giving them much of anything.

What struck me first as that I got through to an english speaking person with just one call, to one number, and just pressed 1 button. That really should be the norm, but when dealing with a company the size of Moen, it is not. The operator answered the phone and simply said “Thank you for calling Moen, how can I help you today.” They didn’t have a big string of questions for me to answer or anything else, just “how can we help?”. They sent some information to me by e-mail to help me get the cartridge out.

After looking at the info they sent, I quickly realized that this cartridge was not coming out. I thought I was going to need to buy a whole new faucet.

I called Moen back to ask what they could do since the unit should still be covered by their lifetime warranty. My file had been well documented and agian I got right through to a person and didn’t need a long drawn out explantion of the situation.

After explaining where I was with things and how frustrated I was with the faucet, the guy on the other line said something like “I know this is frustrating for you. I am going to have a new faucet shipped directly to you.” He said it would take about 5-10 days to arrive. I asked if it could be upgraded to quicker shipped and he said it could be overnighted for $15. He then realized their nearest facility may have been snowed in and it might take an extra day. As a result, he waived the overnight fee and we had the new faucet by noon the next day. When I asked what to do with the old faucet, he said to just throw it out. (Keep in mind, this faucet retails for around $300-400).

The Moen customer service rep didn’t need to check with his supervisor, he didn’t need to give me 100 questions, he didn’t need to have someone call me back, he didn’t need any paperwork, he just sent a new faucet because they had the information they needed, trusted the customer and wanted to make me happy.

Their slogan is “Buy it for looks. Buy it for life.” and they really mean it.

I could not have been happier with this customer service experience, their exceptional care, and high quality products. Thank you Moen. You have a customer for life.

Resolved: 2011

Another new year, another set of resolutions. My 2010 resolutions went pretty well, so it’s time to continue to improve upon those.

Here are my personal resolutions/goals for 2011 in no particular order:

#1 Run a 5k in under 30 Minutes: I don’t really like to run, I have never been good at it, and I am not that good at it. So why not improve on something I am no good at? I can run a 5k in about 35 minutes. I want to shave 5 minutes off that time this year and do it in under 30.

#2 Read 9 Books or More: This is a rollover from last year. Specifically, I want to read the entire Old Testament of the Bible and at least 2 books in each of the following categories: Religion, Politics, Finance, & Fitness.

#3 Share the Gospel: I don’t mean I want to become the guy downtown with the big REPENT NOW sign on his card board box, but I do want to share the gospel with more people. Through my actions, business, and words.

#4 Drop 15 lbs of fat: Lost 10 last year, time to drop a few more and be in the best shape of my life before I am 30.

Those are the big ones for now. I may come up with a few more over the next few days. More later on how I plan to accomplish each of these goals.

What are your goals for 2011?

2010 Resolution Recap

About this time of year, everyone starts talking about what their “new years resolutions” will be. Before I start crafting those plans for myself, I thought it would be a good idea to look back and see how I did last year.

I started the year with 3 specific resolutions:

#1 Inbox Zero, Every Day.

#2 Read More

#3 Count Calories, Cut Fat!

For Resolution #1, getting to Inbox Zero. While I didn’t get to Inbox Zero every day (pretty ambitious), I did get to Inbox Zero at least once a week and usually several times a week. As a result, I will call this a 75% success.

Resolution #2, Read More. This was something I really wanted to get better at. The use of the Kindle App on my iPad made this much more convenient. This year, I have consumed a range of books including: The New Testament in the Bible (does that count as half a book, 1 book, or 27 books?), The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman, Mere Christianity by CS Lewis, Rework by Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson, Bit Literacy by Mark Hurst, Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuk, On the New Testament by Mark Driscoll, Vintage Jesus by Gerry Breshears, and have started on Radical by David Platt & The 4-Hour Body by Timothy Ferriss.

Resolution #3, Count Calories, Cut Fat! I wanted to drop 20lbs. I did that, but gained back another 10 the last 3 months of the year with too much work, not enough work out and bad eating. Bottom line is that I am still 10lbs lighter and much healthier than when I started 2010 and will make 2011 even better.

2010 resolutions were a decent success for me. Hopefully 2011 will be even better.