Good morning. Has anyone had similar experiences at hardware stores?
I've been coming to the Philippines ๐ต๐ญ on and off since 2013, and there's one thing about hardware stores that hasn't improved at all in all that time.. I won't name names.. you know who they are.
We went to buy tiles for our place and found ones we liked. We needed about eight, but were told we had to buy a box of twenty-five. The company won't sell eight. I had ideas for the leftover tiles, so we agreed to take a box.
Then the salesman tells me there's none in stock? So I asked when they'd get more / whether another branch had any.. you'd think I'd asked for a gold bar! Everyone panics, and nobody can tell me when I can get some.
Are they so popular they sold out? Or are those six on display just sitting there for no reason?
Yep, not one straight answer.
We moved on.. we needed another type of tile too.. picked oneโฆ we need a few boxes.. none in stock and no help finding an alternative.. lucky I don't have much hair left to pull out.
We walked out with no tiles and the money still in my pocket.. they're clueless.
We went to another hardware store to buy one stair tread.. we actually found one that fit, but there was no price tag, so we carried it to the checkout.. enter the chaotic system.. there are two barcodes.. praying one of them works! We paid and left.
I keep asking myself.. there are several people standing around doing nothing.. yet lots of items have no price tag, and when you ask.. it's like you've posed some great dilemma. I guess we interrupted their gossip lol.
I've raised these problems many times, and they're still there.
If I hear one more 'oh, nosebleed' I'm going to lose it. I wonder how these people are trained, or whether they just hire a few warm bodies to fill headcount and put them on the sales floor.
The staff don't know much, and as a tradesman I find it really frustrating when they don't even know nut and bolt sizes!
Before I wrap up.. one more thing I find unacceptable is the constant searching of staff every time they come in and out of work.. they even make them take off their socks and shoes! Utterly degrading and Stone Age.. it shows how little they think of their staff.
โฆ searching our tiny sling bags is a joke too, but.. hey, it's company policy.
It seems some policies are strictly enforced, while the policy of training is forgotten.
Driving ninety minutes into the city only to be let down every time is exhausting, and the companies don't seem to listen to customers at allโฆ we're definitely not the only ones with complaints.
A lot of the staff are only hired for 6 months to avoid paying benefits, so they don't know anything beyond carrying your basket. Management often doesn't know much either ๐ฉ
I feel your pain. But I find the same problem in most places here. Very warm greetings when you walk in, but oblivious when it comes to service. Don't get me wrong, not everywhere, but a lot of places.
As a former tradesman, I understand what you're saying. I run into this kind of thing all the time. For example, a couple of tiles fell off our wall and we needed replacements. Our phony builder said he'd looked everywhere and there was no stock. We went back to Wilcon with samples and were told they don't carry them anymore (no stock). So I looked under the table where they'd been displayed and found 4 or 5 loose tiles. The salespeople were amazed! Haha. It's different here. You just have to keep pushing to get what you want.
I've got one for you. The other day we were standing in line to check out at SM Hypermarket. There were two registers open for 'large baskets', the lines were long and the cashiers were slow. I could see several cashiers just standing around chatting (they wear green). Most items weren't scanning automatically, so the cashier had to pick up the scanner or key them in by hand. One bag boy was working both registers, and he was quick. A female supervisor came over and talked to our cashier, but didn't have the ones standing around open a new register. I thought maybe she was telling our cashier to move faster. When we were done, I asked my husband what the supervisor had said. He said she was telling her she needed to wear makeup to look better for the store. ๐คฆ๐ปโโ๏ธ
Not to knock your post, but I had a great experience at Ace Hardware in SM Ecoland. It was about 7 years ago, and I was looking for odd bits to finish certain areas of our newly built house. In particular, I was looking for a certain type of rod to make hanging poles for some built-in wardrobes. I was wandering around the shelves checking out suitable rods, with my notes on the lengths I needed for each wardrobe. A charming young saleswoman came over to help. I explained what I needed, and what happened next truly amazed me. She took my notes, worked out how many lengths of rod I needed and picked them out, then took them to the workshop area, where her colleague measured them and cut them to the exact lengths with a small hacksaw. She handed them back to me along with the unused offcuts. She walked me to the checkout and made sure the cashier charged me correctly. And yes, when I got home and fitted them in the wardrobes, they fit perfectly. Probably never going to happen again.
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