MENCHEY MUSIC SERVICE

Review: My husband and I purchased a flute from Menchey NEW several years ago. With that purchase we have renewed an annual contract every year to maintain service on the flute. Each year after the school year is over, she takes the flute to be serviced/tuned/cleaned. Every year we pick it up and the flute looks worse and worse only after being serviced. Last year we took it for service brought it home and realized that the flute was not even in playable condition. I contacted the Service Manager, [redacted] at that time and told him what the issues were and he told me to immediately bring it in to be fixed. They sent it out for service and we picked it up a week later. Last week my daughter took the flute for the same servicing, she was called yesterday and advised that her flute was in. She went this morning to pick up the flute and immediately addressed her concern with them that the flute looks green tinted. They told her that she doesn't clean it. She told them that every year it comes back from them looking worse and worse and reminded them that last year she had a problem when we picked it up (the head joint) and it wasn't even playable. They accused her of lying to them because they apparently did not have proper service records. I called the [redacted] PA store manager this morning on my daughter's behalf and addressed the situation with them. Immediately, the store manager, [redacted], lost her cool with me and started becoming hostile. I told her what was going on and after getting no where with her I requested the manager's name and phone number. It turned out the manager was the same [redacted] I dealt with last year. I immediately called him and could not reach him for a while, only to find out he was on the phone with [redacted], the [redacted] store manager as she was alerting him that I was going to be calling. As soon as he picked up the phone he was hostile with me, cutting off every sentence I said. He was accusing us of not properly taking care of the flute. The one and only flute my daughter has ever had that she plays every day of her life and does nothing but take care of. In a VERY degrading way, he told me the service on our contract (cleaning) is not the same cleaning we are expecting. However, I told him, I totally understand the difference. We have a service contract to service/clean the flute, we know that the flute actually needs to be cleaned. She cleans this throughout the year and when we drop it off we ask them to clean it as well. He told me that's an additional $90 fee and I told him, we would have gladly paid for that, we were expecting them to clean it and it's not our fault that they are sending it back to us without being cleaned. He gave me a complete attitude and said we will polish the flute one time and one time only free of charge. We have never asked them to do ANYTHING free of charge, we just want the flute to be correct. It looks hideous!Desired Settlement: The manager of the lancaster store told my daughter that the plating has worn off the flute and cannot be fixed only replated. The [redacted] Manager, [redacted], said nothing like this and hostily said he would polish it. I want them to provide a DEEP discount for my daughter to have the flute replated. It was our impression they were to be doing this every year when we sent it out for service. They never once advised us of additional fees for polishing. We would have been glad to pay that. My daughter is the flute section leader in her high school marching band and she takes pride in her flute and wants it to look nice. Since this has happened year in and year out without them professionally consulting us on their service or lack thereof, I believe this is the least they can do and provide her with a very discounted rate for replating the flute.

Business

Response:

Please see attached response.

Consumer

Response:

[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, you must give us a reason why you are rejecting the response. If no reason is received your complaint will be closed Administratively Resolved]

Review: [redacted]

I am rejecting this response because in their response the only thing they have mentioned is the "agreement". This complaint has NEVER been an issue over the agreement. I even stated that in my original complaint. The first part of the complaint was that every year when we take the flute to be "tuned and cleaned", it always comes back looking worse. This year they advised me that it would be approximately $90 to clean the flute; after the fact that their horrible customer service occurred. I also stated that I knew cleaning wasn't covered but had asked for the flute to be "tuned and cleaned" since it was summer break and the flute would be all set for my daughter's next school year. I mentioned that I never told them I wouldn't pay to have it cleaned, I asked for them to clean it so of course I would have paid each year to have it cleaned. They took it upon themselves and made the ASSUMPTION that I was merely looking for something free of charge.

The bigger part of this complain is that in their response, they never once apologized to the largest portion of my complaint - horrible customer service. They were rude on the phone. The lady in the [redacted] Office was very rude and snotty on the phone with me, even trying to say that my daughter lied about her flute being returned to their store last year because it was returned to us in an unplayable state; however, I MYSELF was the one who returned it to the store. She then stammered and stuttered here way through the rest of the conversation and did anything should could to get me off the phone.

[redacted], the service technician in [redacted], he had an attitude with me from the moment I called there. For one, I called him the moment I hung up from the [redacted] office and he was already on the phone with them. She apparently set him up for my phone call so he responded to me VERY defensively the entire time I was on the phone with him. I was completely professional with him the entire time but instead he proved that Menchey Music's employees are very unprofessional to their customers. Due to his lack of professionalism, I had to finally terminate the phone call without having been able to receive any further assistance because he was very short tempered and defensive with me.

Our family had been a customer of Menchey Music since my daughter was in 6th grade and is now a senior. We also have a daughter in third grade who will be looking to have her own instrument next year. Because of the way we were treated, we will no longer support Menchey Music and have already started warning many people within our school district to also not support them and have since move their business to another local business.

Unfortunately, for all parties involved, their attempt to pacify me by harshly advising they would send out my daughter's flute to be cleaned, fell on deaf ears due to their lack of customer service and surplus of hostility toward my daughter and myself. They were quick to assume and still do not fully understand what happened. We did not request the flute be refinished. The finish was not damaged, it was filthy because they never once cleaned it as we had requested over the past several years. I have since spent several hours cleaning it myself and it looks like a new flute.

Thank you Revdex.com for your attention in this matter and Menchey Music, thank your employees for showing their true colors; we have since found a better music company to service our present and future needs.

Regards,