Customer Support

There is nothing more frustrating then having to deal with a customer support department when something you own breaks down and you needs to be repaired. The internet has made it easier to get answers to questions and fix simple problems but there are times when you need to make human contact to get a problem resolve.

Over 9 months ago the buttons on our 3 year old Samsung refrigerator stopped working. The problem didn't affect the operation of the refrigerator it just meant we could not switch between ice or water or change any other setting on the refrigerator. It took two repairmen 4 visits over 4 months to diagnose the problem which turned out to be a broken wire in the top of the door. The reason it took so long to find the problem was that is was hard to find a repairmen for a Samsung refrigerator. We have a repairman who we usually call but he could not find enough technical information to do the repair so after replacing a couple of boards he had to give up. We of course called Samsung. At first they said they would send us the name of a repairman to contact but after two weeks we hadn't heard from them we called them back and they told us there were no Samsung repairmen in our area.

A call to another Samsung number finally got us a number of a repairman who was pretty good but still took two more visit to find the broken wire. You would think that fixing a broken wire would be easy however the wire broke about 6 inches below the top of the door inside channel that was inaccessible. What was even worst was there was no way to get to the inside of the door and replace the wiring harness. The only way to fix the broken wire was to replace the entire door. At $300 + for a new door I was a little reluctant to replace it but that would be cheaper then a new refrigerator.

Three weeks after ordering the door I called the repair place to ask when the door would be in I was told that it was not just out of stock but was no longer available. This meant that there was no way to fix the broken wire. I did a bunch of online searches to try to track down a new door and found a few only to be told a few day later each time that what was shown in stock was actually not available.

Samsung customer support was also totally useless. Every time we contacted them they would send us to the same part site which clearly showed the part was no long available. When I responded to the email telling them that the part was no longer available I got response telling me they were sorry for the problem with not having to part then sent me the same form letter directing back to the same site that I told them didn't have the part.

In a desperate attempt to get some one to realize that not having parts for a 3 year old refrigerator did not inspire confidence in the Samsung brand I searched for the contact in the customer complaint department and sent out a messages to every address I could find.  Most of them came back with the same form letter I got customer support with a link to the useless parts site. However one of the messages I sent actually got a response from a real person in North Jersey that wanted more details about the problem. Once I explained the details of what the problem was and the fact that I could not get a part for a 3 year old Samsung product she was very apologetic and promised to look into it see if she could resolve the issue. I expected wait weeks to get a response but a few days later she confirmed that the part was no longer available said that she would look into getting me some kind of refund on the refrigerator even though it was out of warranty.

I sent her some paperwork on the price I paid for the refrigerator and where I got it and was told I would get some kind of refund. I expected to get some prorated amount based on what I paid and if lucky figured I would get half the original price back. I was then surprised to find that Samsung offered me a full refund of the price I paid for the refrigerator. So although the whole process was a perfect example of how horrible most customer support is, it proved that if you are persistent, I mean really persistent you might get some satisfaction out of the process. I am not happy at the design or repair-ability of Samsung appliances but have to appreciate the way they stood behind the product and provided a full refund when they really didn't have to.

We are using the refund to replace the refrigerator with a brand that won't be a Samsung. They make great TVs but I'm going to stay away from their appliances. Appliance today don't seem to be any more reliable than they were 20 years ago and they are more sophisticated  which means a lot more things can go wrong. I have an old Amana refrigerator in my garage we use during holidays that is 40 years old and still works. It even has a built in AM/FM cassette player.  They just don't make them like they use to.