Friday, Feb 22, 2019 at 13:09
There are a number of "big name" global bearing manufacturers today, who source their bearings from any factory in the world.
They also have less-than-stellar QC in place, with the result that numbers of their bearings suffer premature failure. Let's just call it the "Chinese-ation" of global supply chains.
These manufacturers will not put on the boxes where those particular bearings were made.
I believe this is a deliberate obfuscation to lull customers into relying 100% on their "brand name" for the bearing quality, rather than the country of manufacture.
I personally believe this is a marketing stunt doomed to failure.
I am not going to list those manufacturers, but they are particularly
well known, and their names start with "SK" and "Ko".
I have both sighted those "brand name" early failures and also experienced them myself, from bearings I have purchased and fitted.
As a result, I am now very reluctant to buy those brand names, unless I can specifically see "country of manufacture" listed either on the box or on the bearing.
Naturally, you buy bearings from China at your risk, even if they come in a "brand name" box.
Good to read good
feedback as a result of highly satisfactory customer service.
The old signs used to read, "Poor customer service, tell us (the business) - Excellent customer service, tell others" - but I believe the technique of public
feedback on the internet relating to the level of service received, is quite important in todays world - so much so, the managers of many businesses follow
feedback on many sites, and reply with alacrity to perceived or actual poor customer service.
I have had two experiences in recent times as regards
feedback that resulted in positive improvements.
I bought a Smeg dishwasher several years ago, that performed so badly with electronic faults, that I went onto Product Review and related my woes and disgust with the machine.
Within hours, the manager of Smeg Australia came onto the P.R. site and replied to my gripe and negative
feedback with an offer to fix the problem with a new replacement machine at no cost.
I contacted him and his customer service was superb and he did exactly as he said he would.
Unfortunately, the replacement machine was no better than the one I purchased previously, they just simply suffered from dud electronics.
I sold the replacement machine about 12 mths later, to a buyer who I suspected was installing it in a display
home.
I just wanted to get rid of it, it was nothing but trouble.
But I couldn't fault Smeg Australia's customer service, it was faultless - but it's a shame their product was below par.
In the same vein, I bought a plastic fuel tank filter for a 13HP Briggs and Stratton on a 4000psi pressure washer (a Chinese B&S of course), from a local mower parts supplier - and got ripped to the tune of $27 for this tiny plastic filter.
I left negative
feedback for the mower supplier, about how they were ripoff merchants - and within a couple of hours, the manager of the business was on the phone to me, extremely concerned about the negative
feedback.
He explained that the Briggs & Stratton company set the prices and he generally had little say in what those prices were.
I explained that I was cheesed-off, because the engine was Chinese, the parts were Chinese - yet they were charging as if the parts were American-made.
He said he would be in discussions with B&S in the next few days and would bring up my complaint, and see what pressure he could exert.
To my great surprise, he called again a few days later and gave me the news that B&S had agreed to reduce the price of the tap to a more reasonable $15, and that I could come back in, and they would give me a $12 refund.
I did so, and the manager asked if I would modify my negative
feedback to better represent their high level of customer service.
I did so, and left them highly positive 5 star
feedback, which I believe they rightfully earned.
Cheers, Ron.
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