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It’s a BLOG basically Martin, google for that and you’ll learn as well as seeing a lot of very sad people are out there. 😉
K.
If you were the manufacturer would you not want a bunch of people stocking two rather than one? The more stock you have on the shelf the more money the manufacturer has in his bank.
I think it’s a Whirlpool WM timer that there are 6 or so variants of, the only difference is the software loaded into them yet Whirlpool (or whoever) refuse to allow even their own agents to reprogram them. So they have to carry all of them as stock where three of one would do if they could just program the timer. At first it seems insane, until you think on it from a business point of view and then it makes sense. 😉
Someone from Zanussi once told me that all the date code/part number revisions and changes were there primarily to hinder the pattern spares market and sell more of their own stock to agents and other repairers.
Of course they’re not all like that some of the manufacturers are very good on spares.
K.
Never heard of them, but it sounds well dodgy to me as it would appear from your desciption that there’s nothing to instill any faith in the retailer at all.
I’d apply the old adage of, “If it seems too good to be true, then it probably is”, if you’re a regular net user you’ll know exactly what I mean. 😉
K.
Re: ACS training and exams
There are ways to breed gas engineers without going through all that rigmarole, but it’s not so easy and you already have to be doing gas work. But the point is that, for this industry, with it’s extremely limited scope of gas product, why is it there?
Why have the manufacturers not made representations to CORGI? Is there anyone on the CORGI Council even related to this industry, if not, why not? Do none of the retailers or their associations have anything to say about this as it will affect them too? Why has DASA not taken a more active role in this matter, why are they not working in partnership with other trade organisations to combat this? Does anyone bar us even care?
TBH, I am sadly and quickly reaching the conclusion that nobody bar us repairers do actually care, no-one else in the industry seems to give a fig.
They will though.
Even on the heating side there is deep unrest with CORGI’s new plot that they’ve hatched, so much so that they too are also seeing a decline in the number of trained operatives out there. If they don’t have enough to cover their own core work that is their bread and butter do you really think they’ll want to know about a silly hob? How long will it be before even the kitchen fitters drop CORGI as being not worth the hassles as well, sooner than the heating boys I should think?
Were it not for the installation work we do I’d drop CORGI n a heartbeat, it’s expensive to get, expensive to maintain and a pain when it’s inspection time as well. For the volume of calls recieved to the level of agrivation from it, it’s just not worth the hassle and, that’s now, not when all this new nonsense kicks in!
Up and down the country repairers are already dropping CORGI registration or the number of registered operatives that they have on the books. Many have already dropped LPG altogether as well as the ability to cover anything bar cookers/hobs.
You may think that this is a rather bleak and negative look at the current situation with CORGI but, it’s the stark reality of it sadly.
K.
Neat, this mornings shares report from Bloomberg included this:
Shares of Merloni Elettrodomestici SpA, Europe’s third- largest maker of home appliances, dropped to their lowest in more than a year after the company cut its earnings forecasts for this year.
K.
Re: Amusing Ancedotes & Other Tales
Oh we get them..
This mornign a call comes through for a dead cooker hood and the customer informs me that we called there before and never returned with spares, in 2000! Apparently it’s our fault that nothing happened for 4 years and that we never returned, in fact according to the customer the engineer never bothered to order up any spares needed.
Really, the Care In The Community program has a lot to answer for! 😆
K.
And in breaking news this evening…
Apparently an email has been sent out to all NESN agents earlier this evening advising that the Merloni deal has been postponed. The mail cites this as being due to “a number of issues including the the lack of technical support and our current inability to open spares accounts with Merloni”
If this is correct (I have no reason to think otherwise) then NESN have, IMO, done the right thing there for manufacturer service both reasons given are essential to a smooth operation. What the other reasons are, thus far, are still a mystery.
K.
Yes I know, but not everyone may appreciate that.
The idea is to simply use the logo and “ukwhitegoods.com” as it’s short, easy to remember and most people with any brains cells at all know it’s a URL. Then to carry that forward to van livery too if desired.
The idea is that, whilst a customer will not remember “Enterprise Services – 01299-XXXXXXX”, they should remember “ukwhitegoods.com” easily enough and with e-Jobs online soon enough any work that you want should come back to you pre-filtered. Least, that’s the plan.
The notion of using the logo as you suggest did cross my mind but in all honesty, I didn’t think people would like being forced to use the logo that we specified and, as is my way, I’d rather give people the option to opt-in by choice as opposed to forcing an issue wherever possible. How the art is arranged however, is up to you as well remember to a large degree.
The point is, before I ramble too long about it, is that YOU have the choice of how you promote or don’t promote UKW. We can always revisit the notion at a later date though. 😉
K.
The UKW logo will be done, the addition of that and/or a company one is down to the individual to leave as much choice as possible.
K.
John,
Can you get any pictures of the stuff and a list of the common things from the chap that we’ll use?
If I can get some pics we can fire them up in here.
K.
Re: Merloni
Just so you all know and are in the loop…
I got a bit of info last night on our Mr Merloni that he doesn’t know, yet.
You will remember that I was going on about British Gas recruiting more engineers, well that appears to be going ahead and they have about 23 or so to employ for Scotland. Last night I got a glimpse of the names and skillsets of the potential engineers as well as where they were coming from. From memory…
3 from Electrolux
4 from Whirlpool
A few from other places, like two BSH guys and, wait for it…13 from Merloni/Hotpoint!
And they think they have problems now! Worse if you extrapolate that over the UK they could easily be losing 50-60 bodies to British Gas in the next few months or maybe even weeks and, these guys are irreplaceable right now.
When you measure that against the general discontent in the camp that has been shown by those currently employed by them or recently employed by them this ain’t looking good for Merloni one little bit.
But here’s where we should get political about it, the NESN thing is doomed to failure as the contract hasn’t even been agreed or signed by either party and, frankly, neither of them could organise a piss up in a brewery. CDSL didn’t get it because they wanted a 2 year contract which Merloni refused to give, that shows the level of commitment doesn’t it? Expert got the fridge work alright, but inherited a backlog of work with it, the contract was hurried through and work commenced almost immediately, 700 calls in the first week alone with many customers waiting over three weeks to get that call!
So here’s what I would suggest to all those offered this work… DON’T touch it!
If we keep refusing to do it they will eventually have to admit defeat and capitulate to terms or commitments that they currently will not as they will be left with no option. Hotpoint as a brand name is already being tarnished by this shite, let’s let them continue to ruin it through bad service. Eventually they will either see the light or see their sales tumbling and that will provoke a response.
Whether they go direct or not is, in all honesty, irrelevant so long as we get the right deal.
K.
Dave_Conway wrote:Longer kilt required 😆
Nope, a little knowledge in advance would have been nice, hence I posted up the saga.
K.
