Friday, October 03, 2008

Range Rant

Today I'm doing having a very domestic day, which includes a lot of cooking. I have a post percolating about it, but I thought that first I'd let you see what I wrote to the manufacturer of my stove yesterday.

Dear Jenn-Air people:

My husband has already written the logical, masculine letter regarding the failure of our stove. This is the other side.


When my mother died in 2004, I came into a modest inheritance. My parents were simple people, a teacher and a pattern-maker, and frankly, my brother and I were surprised that they had managed to save so much. We used the money to pay for our daughter's wedding, and paid off our credit cards. And I had some left, and since our stove was old and worn out, I decided to replace it.


Our local, trusted appliance shop had lots of choices in stock, but the owner recommended that I consider spending a little more than I had planned. He knew that we are the type of people who use appliances until they are worn out, and suggested that this Jenn-Air stove would serve us better and longer than some of the other models I was considering. Boy was he wrong!


In the last four years our stove has needed repair THREE times. The first time was under warranty, and that was fine, but last year the same part (the right front burner thermostat) failed. That repair cost us almost 20% of what we paid for the stove. This summer, the same part failed. My husband , knowing that the stove was no longer under warranty, contacted you and asked if there was anything your company could do on this obviously defective product. You DID pay for the visit of the same repairman, who confirmed that it was indeed the same part. His comment was “Yeah, they fail all the time.”


Since we bought the stove with inheritance money, there are now no spare funds to pay for repairing it AGAIN, and likely again in another year or two. Why bother? I will limp along, using that burner for things like boiling water for pasta, where the temperature doesn't matter. And I won't ever buy a Jenn-Air product again. (The representative on the phone offered us 25% off on another stove. Why would you think we'd throw more money away?)


Sincerely,



(OK, yeah, I'm trolling for a little sympathy from you guys. What else is the internet for?)

4 comments:

Tracy said...

Much sympathy here for you. I wonder if there is a lemon law for stoves. Especially stoves that need the same repair again and again.

rant away!

HereWeGoAJen said...

How annoying! I hate it when expensive things don't work!

My brand new dishwasher doesn't clean the dishes if I don't coddle it exactly right. I have to prewash everything, use just the right amount and kind of soap, and run the dishwasher at the right time of night. If I get one of those things wrong, no clean dishes for me and dried on soap on everything!

I will make note and not buy a Jenn-Air. I already boycott AT&T for bad service, I can add Jenn-Air to that.

Rosemary said...

You have my sympathy, that's for sure. Did they respond? Expensive faulty products. Maddening.

Ted Way said...

That stinks... please let us know how they respond! You'd think that more expensive, higher-end stuff would be more reliable. Then again, they could be just for rich people who have appliances for good looks. I remember reading about this dense philosophy book that quite a few people bought, but nobody realized that there was a printing error and the last section of the book was missing! The book only graced the shelves of many to impress their friends... go figure.