Originally Posted by Siu Blue Wind
I'm bad. I'm the type that would walk in there and say, "I was told my bike would be ready in two weeks. It's been four. I'm here to pick it up, how much do I owe you?".
Then stand there with this look on your face of utter excitement. Then as they tell you your bike has not been started, say with that same excited (but cordial) look, "Oh okay, then I'll wait. What, a couple of hours good?" And then start to browse the store.
When they tell you it's not going to be done that day, I'd say (with a bummed out look), "Wow. I've waited all this time and now I'm a little disappointed. I brought it here because of your fantastic service and the expertise. I guess you don't have time for my bike. I really need my bike by tomorrow for I had counted it on being ready. But I don't want to add to your work load. Is that my bike over there? Let me get it out of your way."
Then as you roll away, thank them and tell them you were sorry to bother them.
This is exactly what I would have done ... only I would have done it at one week and one day. I wouldn't have waited till week 4!!
At the end of the
first week, when they said it would be ready, I would have called first thing in the morning and asked what time that day I should come by and pick up my bicycle. If I were told that they had been busy and it was next in line, my reply would have been, "OK, I'll be by after work tomorrow."
And then I would have gone in the next day, and proceeded with Siu Blue Wind's conversation.
I've been in a similar situation with a shop that was really close to where I lived. They were a hockey shop in the winter and a bicycle shop in the summer, like most shops, and I took a wheel in to have a couple spokes replaced. Replacing spokes is a "while you wait" job, it's that quick, but they gave me the line that they were busy wrapping up hockey season and that there were several bicycle-related jobs ahead of me, and it would be a week.
My (now-ex) husband went in to pick it up a little over a week later, paid for it, and brought it home. At one glance, I could see that nothing had been done. The spokes were still broken.
I marched right back there with the receipt and told them to fix the wheel right then and there. They gave me 101 different lines about being busy, and they were sorry they'd lost the wheel, and they couldn't possibly do it then because there were hockey customers in the store, blah, blah, blah. So I told them they already had over a week to do it, and so I'd wait in the store till it was done.
15 minutes later I had my wheel.
It's the old story of the squeaky wheel getting the grease. If you call them up every 2 weeks to ask if the bicycle is ready, your bicycle will be last in line. But if you TELL them you are coming by to pick it up on a certain day (within reason, of course), and you actually do show up, chances are your bicycle will move much closer to the front of the line.