This is a gruesome truth about the IFB Company. The ‘so-called’ leading company in home appliances. I had a problem with my dryer and hence I called the call centre and filled a complaint telling them that my dryer is making a lot of noise.It is fixed in my kitchen and is impossible to work in the kitchen while the clothes are getting dried. The sound is deafening. My building doesn’t permit us to dry clothes outside the building. I need someone to attend to my problem quickly as i am totally dependent on the dryer. I get a complaint number and am told by the call centre person the problem will be attended to on a priority basis.
No one shows up for 3 days. After three days I get a call and am told that since tomorrow is the first day of Ganpati, so we will not be able to do anything right now. We will come in two days. Finally some one comes and checks and says no madam there is no problem at all. It is working fine. When I try and show him how much noise it makes they try and make me think it is the normal amount of noise that is coming.
One day later we get courtesy call from the call centre enquiring that are you happy with the services provided by IFB? To which I told them that the problem has not been solved. It still needs to be attended to. The response on the other is - that the status as per our records is closed. WOW! Now how did that happen???!!!!
A day or two later someone else comes and looks at the problem. Now this new person who comes over says there is a problem with the some part of the door that needs to be changed. There are 6 parts that are involved which need to be changed. This would rectify our problem. We have them replaced. It costs us about 2124 rupees. For fixing this part they take the drum out of the dryer. Now after replacing these parts this gentleman tells me that the drum is not fixing so you need to get a new drum. Don’t worry about the cost since it is in your service contract. All you will need to pay is 500 rupees the carting charges- since the equipment is big and they cannot bring it by bus so we need to pay for it.
The drum arrives. No one shows upfor two days to fix the drum. I make the reminder call. Then our man comes and tries to fix the drum. The new drum that he has been called for apparently also does not fix into the dryer as well and our man has no clue as to what is happening.
All this time my dryer is lying unassembled in my kitchen. Along with the new drum which is also lying in my kitchen. Half my kitchen space is occupied with all the equipment.
I call the call canter and ask to be put through to the manager in charge, who apparently is either always driving the car or in meetings and never available to customer complaints. The name of the manager is Mr. Sushank.
Finally after fighting’s for days on end the manager decides to come on the phone and says the problem will be attended to.
Next day the engineer from Elite Services – an authorised franchise comes back. As in our man’s back to action. He some how manages to fix the old drum. Fixes my dryer and puts it up on the wall. Great job done. What an achievement. At least my dryer is not lying open. Oh no! the ordeal is not over yet. OUR MAN says now Madam your dryer’s belt has snapped while I was fixing it up on the wall. So a new belt arrives after a day.
This is the third part arriving into my house without any success rate with the dryer. But I am told that after this part is fixed my machine will work like before without a sound.
They all go into hibernation. Every evening I am on the phone with the call centre people who have been fairly courteous trying to get some one to fix my problem.
But in vain.
After 5 consecutive days of phoning and trying my best to speak to Mr. Shashank – The Manager comes once on the phone and tells me I will look into the matter and get back to you. I told him please send some one who knows what he is doing since OUR MAN is unable to fix the problem. To which I am told that they’d send over a senior technician even though he is very busy man. It almost sounded like they were doing me a favour. He would arrive tomorrow evening between 3-5 pm. Next day evening I wait for the senior technician to arrive. But to my dismay no one shows up.
I try to contact the manager once again who as usual was driving and unable to take the call.
I find some other number online and I speak to some other call centre person who gives me the number of the manager who turned out to be Mr. Shashank. To that I explained my problem to the call centre person who gave me a lady’s number. I call that lady and told her my problem right from the beginning. She called the senior technician while I was on the phone. The senior technician told her that how can I reach there when I have so many other calls to make. I had told Mr. Shashank that and he was not willing to listen. So what do I do?
And what do I as a Customer????? The statement that CUSTOMER IS KING is totally falsified by them.In this entire scenario I feel that we are beggars begging them to solve my problem.
This lady promises me that she’d have the senior technician attend to the problem tomorrow positively.
The belt finally arrives along with OUR MAN. I told him to wait for the senior technician to come before he touches the machine. The senior technician arrives too in a short while. The belt is fixed and for that moment the sound does lessen but within a day or so it is back to the horrendously loud sound that doesn’t allow one to even stand in the kitchen while it is working.
Before I forget I must mention - the first part that was changed in my door for solving my problem I told them since it has not helped please put back my old parts which was done. I was charged for my new parts that were removed finally.
I spoke to the senior technician who told me that many people are having the same problem whereby their problems are pending and they are not able to handle them and they have been charged for various parts too. I told him I am aware of it. I know of someone around my area. They had been fleeced in the same manner with no results. He was aware of it too. But he told me there was nothing he could do about it. He told me to ask for the refund of the money which when asked for no action till date has been taken. I have retained the drum at my place. I told them please refund my money then I will return the drum. But to that also there was action taken. The drum has been lying at my place ever since August and we are already in the month of November and nothing has happened. For that matter my PROBLEM has also not been solved leave aside the drum getting picked up.
That is how scary it is dealing with the IFB Company.
