Maybe you have heard of a blogger by the name of Dooce? And maybe you even heard about a slight dust up regarding Dooce and the Maytag company. Dooce, fresh home from delivering her second baby, was met with a brand new washer that didn’t work. So as the dirty smelly clothes piled up, Dooce got more pissed off and blasted Maytag on Twitter. Of course, because this involved Dooce a bigger dusted up occurred and more bloggers piled on, then the Doocites piled on top of those bloggers who dared to question their leader and a legend was born. One that ended with a new washer for Dooce and another that was fixed. Later the new washer would be donated to a charity and Dooce and her family lived another day in clean clothes.
My problem is that I am not Dooce, but I am one pissed off customer. You see we have a Maytag French Door refrigerator. It is pretty and shiny and did it’s job up until it sent in it’s resignation letter by way of our ice and water dispenser. We bought our lovely new toy about 3.5 yrs ago. How do I remember? Well, 1. it was our Christmas present to each other (Yes, that is what adults do.) and 2. it was a year after Katrina (You know they way us New Orleanians tell time, now). We waited a year, when everyone else was buying new refrigerators after they took one look at the horror that is having no power for a month does to the innards of one’s refrigerator. Most smart people closed the doors, taped them shut and wheeled the smelly, maggot filled monster to the curb where it would sit for weeks until the Parish got it’s shit together to pick them up. One day those refrigerators will make for a very lovely subdivision where air freshener sales will sky rocket. Nope, we were being frugal and smart, so we thought. SoHubby made it to our home a week after the storm and discovered that we had power. However, he knew that it was best to throw out the contents of our old Frigidaire. He even cleaned it up real nice, so that when ever I was able to make it home I would have a nice clean refrigerator in which I could fill with brand spanking new food. The only problem was that I could never get rid of these little black flies. They were always dead in the freezer, but a lifetime of dustbusting our freezer was too much for me. So Christmas of 2006 when we were sure that we did survive after such a disaster we decided that we should be rewarded with a brand new fancy refrigerator. And wouldn’t you know it, Maytag had just come out with it’s French door refrigerator with the…wait for it…dum, dum, da ice and water on the door. On the door, you say. ON the door. I just had to have it. In black. And it served us well until August 7, 2010.
The middle of the first week of August we would press the paddle with our cups and nothing. We were perplexed. What did we ever do to piss off the magnificent, almighty Maytag French door (I do love anything with the words French door) refrigerator that stands proudly in the corner of our kitchen? Okay, a minor set back, but we can deal with getting or filtered water from the long unused water dispenser in the dining room. And, of course, it is a pain to pull the ice maker tray out to get our ice, but hey the French don’t even have ice, so we moved forward. I did consult the Internet and discovered that this was a common problem and could be fixed. I even got a nice response to my question on Twitter regarding my problem and it was from @maytagcares, nonetheless. I decided to move on with my day and keep my anger stuffed way down inside. Little did I know that there was more to come.
We went to bed on Friday dreaming of waking to ice cold milk, orange juice and maybe some Pillsbury cinnamon rolls. I was secure in the fact that the $200 I just spent at Sam’s that day would be safe, sound and cold in our refrigerator. Sure the ice and water didn’t work, but surely that was just a minor set back? The next morning we awoke to luke warm milk, orange juice and Pillsbury cinnamon rolls that begged to be baked, because man it was a bit stuffy in here. I freaked! What the hell were we going to do? We called Maytag and were given some ridiculous service appointment of Wednesday. That was it. Yup, we took your money, we know you have just spent a buttload on a ton of food, but we aren’t budging from that 4 day away service appointment just to tell you what is wrong with the damn thing. Next step was to find a local repair man to take pity on us and come out on a Saturday and not take our first born as payment. We did find one. He promptly told us that we need a new evaporated fan motor, which is why the freezer still remained cold. Did you know that all the cold air for the refrigerator comes from the freezer? Yeah, me neither and I didn’t really care. I just wanted it fixed. NOW! Our repair man told us that it could take up to 3 weeks to get the part in, because you know Maytag didn’t sell many of this model, because, well….you know…it is a piece of crap. A lovely, shiny $2500 piece of crap.
I called Maytag’s customer service number and yelled at the first person to answer the phone. Because he was, of course, at fault and would be more than willing to help me fix my problem after I yelled at him. After getting no where with that person he pawned me off on his supervisor who decided he was going to get smart with me and quickly learn I was not amused. I was guaranteed a free part and a check for $50 to cover the food that would likely spoil. Mildly satisfied I went to work saving our food. Our neighbor offered up their garage refrigerator. You mean people can have 2 refrigerators? And setting up 2 ice chests with the things we use the most. I would spend the rest of the day fuming, tripping over ice chests and wondering why has a pock been put upon our house. Later that day I would get an idea and it would occupy our entire Sunday. We would move sister-in-law’s (She passed away on June 17 and we are in the process of cleaning her home, selling off items and getting the house ready for sale.) refrigerator to our garage. At least, the problem of running to the neighbor’s to borrow my own milk was solved. I tried to be upbeat and consider the walk to the garage as exercise.
That Tuesday our savior part arrived. We called our repair guy and told him to hurry, come right away, because the PART IS HERE! The PART IS HERE! Yeah, well that was the wrong part. Are you freaking kidding me? Seriously, where is the camera, because it better be ready, my head is about to explode. The repair guy got no where with the woman he spoke to about the part, but SoHubby did which gave him every right to scold me for not calling sooner. “Yeah, whatever!”, I said from my place in the corner. Another 2 days later the REAL part arrived and we called the repair guy. We gave the refrigerator a pep talk and waited for it to cool itself off. The next day, nothing. Still warm and, now, the freezer was getting warm, as well….So this is long enough, basically we are, now, waiting for a $200 part that the last customer service rep I talked to gave to me graciously at half the price with free express shipping. Only after he made sure to ask me if my repair guy was reputable. I explained that since he didn’t take my $2500 and give me a very large paper weight, I would say I trust him, unlike your company, sir. I promise I didn’t jump through the phone and throttle him. Now, we sit and wait for our very expensive part to come in and hope it works. I think Maytag better pray, because I am a pissed off SAHM looking for a road trip. I will find their headquarters and run my dud of a refrigerator right up there to give them a lovely lawn ornament. If only, I was a big time blogger with more power to crash a large company with my mighty computer I might have a working refrigerator right now. Until I rule the world from my sofa, I will have to be happy with walking to the garage to feed my babies and satisfy my need for sweet iced tea. The plight of the typical commoner. *sigh*
