Integrity is lacking in the Anchorage, AK branch. Being difficult or disagreeable is one thing; saying one thing and doing another as a different matter altogether.
Here is what I mean by that. I work for the owner of a commercial fishing operation who wanted to upgrade the navigational electronics on his fishing boat this summer, and I was delegated the task of selecting and purchasing the equipment. Before I made the final decision to purchase the display units and other pieces of equipment from West Marine, I asked the man helping me if they had up-to-date software. He told me that they did, so I proceeded with the purchase.
Fast forward a couple of months, and once I had installed the units in our fishing boat, I discovered that they lacked the necessary functionality. Since our fishing boat was located in Rural Alaska (as opposed to Anchorage), we relied on air transportation to get to and from our fishing boat, and this is expensive. We could not afford to be troubleshooting problems out where the boat was, so we brought the display units back with us into Anchorage, and upon further investigation, I learned that the software version for each of the display units was several versions behind the current version (contrary to what I had been told). In order to remedy the problem and gain the functionality that we needed (the ability to enter boundary lines), I needed to update the software via an SD card, but in order to do that, I needed a means for powering up the display units, and the wiring harnesses for both of them had been wired into the electrical system of our fishing boat. Thus, we had two choices: 1) bring an SD card with the relevant software update back to the fishing boat with the display units and HOPE that nothing goes wrong with the upgrade process, or 2) get a spare power cable so that we could power up the units in Anchorage.
Considering the risks, the owner of the operation insisted that the units be fully upgraded with the appropriate software updates before installing them back into his fishing boat. He wanted to make certain that everything worked while we were still in Anchorage so that if something went wrong, we had an opportunity to fix it. The owner also insisted that since the folks at West Marine sold him electronics that did not have up-to-date software, they should provide the means to get us set up to perform a software update. For West Marine, this meant getting us a power cable. As far as the owner was concerned, this was a matter of providing good customer service, and I was acting on his behalf; therefore, I was in no position to disagree with him. When I approached West Marine in Anchorage with our request, an argument ensued (I somewhat expected that.), but in the end, the man behind the counter decided that ordering us a cable was a minor thing and that he would do it free of charge. Once the folks at West Marine agreed to get us a cable, I thanked them and went on my way.
About two or three days later, I called them to ask if it had arrived. When I did get an answer, they said that they did order the cable by overnight shipping, and I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and wait a couple more days. A couple of days later, I called them again and discovered that the cable was on back-order and would not be delivered until about half-way through the fishing season. Now, I was forced to follow through with option #1, and the owner of the operation was not happy with the situation. Fortunately, both display units updated without any problems, and we were able to fish with a navigation system that worked.
After I had returned to Anchorage, I went back to West Marine to pick up the power cable. The good news was that they had it. The bad news was that they decided to charge me for it anyway, and the worst part about the whole thing is that the lady who decided to charge me for it when I came to pick it up was the same lady who was standing right beside the man who told me that they would not charge me for the cable! Her excuse was something to the effect of, "Well, as angry as you were when you came in here last time, and as long as you took coming to pick it up..." I explained that I did not pick it up sooner because I was on the fishing boat when it arrived. At that point, she backpedaled and told me that I did not have to pay for it if I did not want to, but I could tell that her heart was not in it. To end the long story the short way, I paid the twenty bucks or so for the cable because I did not want to argue any further, and to me, twenty bucks is a pittance. The real issue is integrity, and I would not have written this if the folks at that store had kept their word. read more
