Connolly's Do It Best

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/11/23) */
November 20, 2015
To Whom It May Concern,
Let me first say that we have been repairing lawn equipment for over 20 years, one of the reasons we are listed for repair work at Poulari Equipment is because we have worked on hundreds of pieces...

of Poulen/Weecleater equipment over the years. That being said we
have seen all kinds of equipment come and go, some of which has outlived its useful life,
In this case we took in a very old (15 years) riding mower and thought we could do this
customer a favor and get it running in an _attempt to get a few more years out of the unit. As is sometimes the case with old equipment, the farther you get into a repair job the
more problems you find. Some customers don't understand this and often times think the problem is something that should be taken care of by-the person doing the service. This
is one of those cases where the deeper we got into the repair the more problems we found and the more costly (at our expense) the repair became.
The following is what we found, and did and did "not" do to the mower. As you will see We had far more time and money in this mower than it was worth, and much more than we billed out. However in the end what we delivered was a mower that was functioning and usable.
1. Mower brought in for carburetor work (hood in bad condition with a multitude of
cranks, held, together on unit by rope), Repairs made to hood at no charge.
2. I carburetor (new) installed, did not work - $167.90 for carburetor (no charge to
customer)
3. 2"4 carburetor (used) installed, works - $80.00 (charged to customer)
4. Unit delivered
5. Mechanic returns to site due to husband using mower for 15 minutes and then it
not running, mechanic points out that gas supply has been turned off. Owner's
wife has admitted to turning off gas supply. However mechanic has determined.
that mower will not run in low idle. Unit comes back to store (no charge to
customer)
6. Further inspection reveals governor is bad
7, Install used engine
8. Unit tested on 3 separate occasions over the next week and worked without a
problem on all occasions,
9. Mower deck waS never touched as this was not the problem with the unit,
10. Items not (Aimed to customer:

· 8 hours labor at $45.00 an hour
· 6 hours travel at $45.00 an hour
· 1. used engine $350.00
As you can See we went above and beyond on this unit — discounted parts, heavily
discounted labor charges, on site visits by mechanic but unfortunately we couldn't irnak the customer happy.
Michael [redacted]
Owner
Initial Consumer Rebuttal /* (3000, 7, 2015/11/29) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
I do not accept Mr. [redacted]'s response. There are several untruths in his number of points.
#1. We know the hood was not in good shape. But when they picked up the tractor, the hood was connected to the engine with a rope as a "warning" to prevent further damage by opening. They would see what the problem was and proceed with care. However the cord was removed and hood was opened and broke to pieces. It was not "repaired" but glued and bolted together. A piece was even missing. We did not complain about that and /or demanded compensation.
#2 stated that a new carburetor was installed at no charge to me. There was no charge because they ordered the wrong carburetor. When I called to see what progress was being made they told me they put on the wrong carburetor and had to order another one.
As mentioned by "Connolly's Do it Best" it "did not work". Therefore adding "no charge to customer" is a joke.
The 2nd carburetor was installed (and paid for) in the original engine that, according "Connolly's do it Best", we don't have anymore. I did not know it was a used carburetor until later.
#3 We paid $175.95 before they were going to return the mower. It was at this time that they called back and said they were mistaken and it wasn't ready because they needed to try it again and it did not work.
#4 The "Unit" was delivered after more than 10 weeks.
#5 The statement about me turning off the gas is completely false. It had nothing to do with the mower not working after 15 minutes of mowing.
My husband started the engine, which did not sound normal. He mowed for about 15 min. Then engine stopped and could not be started again. He closed the valve to the fuel supply as instructed. We called "Connolly's do It Best". The mechanic tried to start the engine and that's when I told him he had to open the gas valve first. He concluded himself that the "repaired" engine was not running normal. He took it back for repair. I told them when they delivered it that the throttle was not right but they paid no attention. That was not a problem when we gave it to them.
#6-7 "Connolly's do it Best" called back and told me they would have to take the engine off to fix the governor (throttle problem). They did not tell me they would replace the engine. (It was replaced with a very dirty used engine!)
"Unit" was delivered with statement that "Connolly's Do it Best" did not want to have it back. We paid an additional $58.85. My husband started mowing but after 15/20 minutes the engine stopped like before and could not be started again. After more than 3 month we still had the same problem. The mower did not work and we paid $234.80 and waited patiently for about 4 months.
#8 If you started it on three different occasions and say it was fixed, then why did it only run for 15 minutes and quit again when they returned it?
#9 If the mower deck was never touched than why was it in such bad adjustment when it was returned? It took a couple of hours to balance the deck and have it the way it was when you received it.
It's useless to mention the "Items not charged to customer". Especially for that engine you installed without permission of your customer. You did charge us $234.80, but we still cannot use our tractor. It does exactly the same as with the original engine. So we wonder...
Whatever you list as hours and parts, "Connolly's Do it Best" did not repair our mower. After being "repaired" and delivered for the second time, it again stopped in the middle of our 2 acres in less than 20 minutes and we had to push it back into the garage. It does not work. All summer we had to mow with our push-mower waiting for "Connolly's Do it Best" to fix our tractor mower. Unfortunately that does not make the customer happy.
Final Business Response /* (4030, 10, 2015/12/14) */
Contact Name and Title: Michael [redacted], Owner
Ms. [redacted],
As you can tell from the customers' response labeled #1 - we were not working on a great piece of equipment.
However there seems to be no purpose in our going back and forth on this. I can only trust and believe what I am told by my mechanics. They have never lied to me about a repair in the past and would have no reason to on this occasion.
I'm not sure what the customer is looking for but it doesn't seem there is any resolution to this that they will be happy with and that we are willingly or able to do.
Please let me know if you see any middle ground here.
Sincerely,
Michael [redacted]