FS Grizzly Jointer Knives / Grizzy restocking fee joke?

[WoodChuck34]

I bought the wrong jointer blades from my Grizzly jointer. It's my own fault because I was paying attention when I clicked the accessories for this product button and quickly placed an order for the knives.

Anyone interested in a set (or 2) of G6665 jointer knives let me know. They are the ones for the Dispoza-Blade System, which is where I made my mistake. You need the Dispoza-Blade cutterhead ($159). Oops.

They want to charge me an additional 10% restocking fee (I know, its clearly marked on their website) so if anyone wants these I'll sell them for what I paid, $16.95 and I'll pay the shipping. Figure that may make it worth it for someone out there. I have 2 sets, unopened.

And next time, I'll make sure I read everything when I place my Grizzly order.

As a footnote, thanks to everyone's posts about tuning jointers. I did a little research and squaring up a board no longer produces S-Curves.

Chuck

[DexAZ]

The "restocking fee" is now common at many brick and mortar operations also. Best Buy, Target etc. I'm sure this is, in part, because they have been burned by buyers taking advantage of a "no questions asked" refund. However, some places have no mention of this fee clearly posted. It is not mentioned until you are handed your receipt by the cashier (or automated checkout system). and then only if you take the time to read the fine print on the receipt or the faint grey print detailing store policy on the back, will you find some mention of this "restocking fee". Some places set their "restocking fee" as high as 20% so watch out! Grizzly is kind enough to have their "restocking fee" clearly posted on their web pages. And Chuck is man enough to admit _he_ made the error, not Grizzly.

{rant mode "ON"}

I think it is too bad that today's retailers think they need to charge their customers (soon-to-be _former_ customers, in many cases) this "restocking fee". In another life, I was in the retail electronics field. We sold a good product and we worked hard to train our sales staff to assist our customers in selecting the right product to fill that customers needs. We enjoyed a less than 1 percent product failure rate out of the box. So we did not have to deal with many DOA complaints. Sometimes the salesman misunderstood what the customer needed, sometimes the customer did not fully understand _what_ he needed. We were always pleased to replace, exchange or refund to make the customer happy. That WAS the corporate policy, satisfy our customer. And we never charged a "restocking fee", which would only assure that our customer left the store with a bad taste in his mouth. Returns, replacements, refunds etc. were simply a cost of doing business. Some things could be repackaged and resold, some marked down and sold "as-is", others returned to the manufacturer for credit and some things were tossed in the dumpster. Checking these items, repacking, marking down, shipping for credit and all the paperwork involved took time but that was all part of doing business. The main goal was to assure that, even though our customer had to return with the product for whatever reason, we would do whatever was necessary to correct the situation and have our customer leave the store with a smile. (hopefully to return one day and make another purchase) The formula seemed to work, as we grew from 375 stores in '69 to

+11,000 in 1980. AHH, the good old days!!!

Today, many retailers are in for the quick buck, would rather compete with price than quality, hire inexperienced help, offer minimal training and seem content with a "revolving door" staff. Constantly have to hunt down someone to answer a question and finding 4-8 "salesmen" in a huddle, discussing last nights game, who got voted off the island or where to party this weekend, has driven me from Best Buy, Fry's Electronics etc. Now retailers add the "restocking fee" to drive more of us away? I'm sure it makes sense in business school but I can still vote with my feet.

{rant mode "off"}

need to get another cold COKE and see if I can jack the old blood pressure up a little higher

DexAZ

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Quick buck or not, we are bringing this on ourselves. As buyers, many of us look for the lowest possible price. In your case, you had trained people that probably got a decent wage and your customers paid a higher, but still fair price. That type of business often struggles against the price choppers. So when Joe Tyro buys the wrong item, or worse, takes advantage of liberal "now questions asked" return policies instead of renting, who pays? There is a cost to put an item back in stock or it may have to be sold at a discount. Is that fair to all of u s? Shouldn't the abusers pay instead?

There is no one rule to fit every situation, but there should be some accountability for our own decisions. Ed

[Greg O]

I worked for a large wholesale/retail warehouse a few years back. They figured the average cost to process an order was about $50 by the time you figured the salesman's time, the warehouse workers that stock the shelves, then pull the orders, the office help that process the paper work, and lastly the delivery trucks to run the order out . Makes on understand better why they would charge restock. Even with the restock fee, they probably will lose money on the deal. In the long run, on small orders it probably would be cheaper to tell the customer to toss the item in the trash and send him a credit! But think of the problems that would cause! I am positive a restock is to make us think twice before we place an order. Not really for the company to recoup costs, just an incentive for the customer to do it right the first time. Greg

[Frank Ketchum]

I would call them and ask them to waive the restocking fee. All they can do is say no. My company has a restocking fee, but it only kicks in 10 days after reciept of the item. This is to protect people who make innocent mistakes such as this one. It is designed to discourage returns 3 months later, which cause other headaches for us.

Frank

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Similar is to place an order (assuming you want to buy other things they sell) and when they ask for your credit card number you say "Oh, by the way, I have this little problem that you can help me with. . . . . "