We began our quest for a new fridge in May when ours stopped cooling. The company we ordered from was out of stock, so we waited until July, without a functioning kitchen refrigerator. When it came in stock and they sent out a delivery team, the team refused to install the new fridge due to a single drop of water at the waterline; we searched for a plumber. A week later, the new fridge moved from our garage into our kitchen, and the truck drove away with our 14-year-old, half-functional Samsung.
Upon immediate inspection, I realized the new fridge was missing a key component--the top drawer in the freezer portion. I made the first of what would be dozens and dozens of phone calls trying to get the drawer ordered . . . I'll skip all the misinformation and confusion that ensued over the summer.
When parts began to fall off or malfunction (in minor ways; it still worked), Buck got frustrated and spoke to someone as high up the chain as he could. She told him that we could swap the fridge, no problem, as soon as the late October shipment arrived. They proceeded to call Buck at about 8 PM on Friday to announce delivery the next morning between 8 and 10 . . . the only problem was, they didn't ask us if we would be home (we wouldn't, because the boys had an all-day football tournament an hour away). Buck called back and rescheduled to yesterday.
Yesterday, the delivery guys arrived with the newer version of our new fridge, and woohoo, it contained a drawer! The missing, elusive drawer! We've had ice cubes dropping into a tin foil pan and exploding throughout the overstacked food for months!
I peeled all the stickers, I cleaned all the shelves, I put the food back on top, and the magnets on the front and sides. About four hours later, I saw that the freezer was freezing, but the fridge--as I very much feared from frequent checks--was not cooling. At all. In fact, the temperature increased four degrees to 75 during its stint in our refrigerator nook. Buck and the boys were at a movie, so I called the company back, twice. The second time, the man cared enough to do something about the problem.
"Well, we'll just go ahead and swap that out for another brand new one just as soon as--oh, oh dear. We're out of stock. That will be December 10th."
I said, "Find my broken fridge and bring it back, at least it keeps my food cold." So, he spent the next hour, while I was on hold, doing just that. It did take about half a dozen more calls from Buck that evening to actually confirm our "old" new fridge was located, loaded, and ready to be returned to us. They also promised to Frankenstein pieces off of the new, new fridge (that didn't cool) to provide the missing parts our old, new fridge needed.
Delivery was set for sometime between 1 and 3 today. Caelan went to work, Gabby (whose 104.5 fever of the past few days, seems to have burned itself out) went to Chase's (he's illin', too), and I took the boys to their well-child appointments (they got vaccinations, and it took two hours!) In the meantime, Buck got ready to depart for work . . . but then I received a notification that the delivery people are three hours ahead of schedule! Buck ended up being more than an hour late for work waiting for them to arrive. I pulled into the garage as they were figuring out how to remove our back sliding glass door (again).
The customer service guy said as soon as our original fridge was back in our kitchen, we could initiate the process to swap it out for one in the December shipment. We will likely do that. Or we will order a fridge from somewhere else and return this one when the other is set to arrive. Or we will accept the new dings and scratches that a third transport added to its patina, and hope Buck can talk the company into giving us an extended warranty.
And so, the saga continues . . . ay-yi-yi.
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