Mike's Small Engine Repair

"We would very much like an opportunity to resolve this matter, and welcome a mediator to the process Snowblowers that came into the shop during the Spring and Summer months were not looked at until the beginning of late October. Since we only had one Ariens snow blower at the shop in late October, Mike, the owner and technician, assumed that it belonged to this customer. There was no name on the unit. Initial testing revealed that the unit had major engine problems, and that some disassembly and inspection would be required. Eventually, an estimate for repairs was given, approved, and the snow blower was delivered to the customer, and he paid for the repairs. At that time, he said, "That's not my snowblower!" I was mystified, but with a major snow storm in the next day's forecast, we left the snowblower with him so he would have something to use. I promised to look in to the matter the following week and I did follow through. It was time consuming, but I checked all customer invoices from early March through Jan 21st, and found that no other Ariens snowblowers matching the description and model number of this customer's had been worked on. We were forced to conclude that unfortunately, his snowblower had been stolen. Equipment is secured within a fenced in property, with a locked gate. We had not been negligent, but in spite of our best efforts, something had gone wrong. Our initial offer, to try and resolve the problem, was to allow the customer to keep the snow blower we had delivered and to refund what he had paid for repairs. The snow blower we delivered was an Ariens, with a 24'' clearing swath and an electric starter (as was his) and it was in good working order. It started and ran, belts, auger, impeller, and chute were fully operational. He refused. Next, we looked into replacing his snowblower with a used one -- something comparable that would meet his demands. Several weeks were spent looking, but to date, the search has not panned out. I would like more time to keep looking, but I realize that it's now been a month, an appropriate replacement snow blower is just not on the market at this time, and I fully understand this customer's frustration about further delays. Mike and I do feel that we would like to offer some compensation, but believe that the amount should be something closer to the actual value of his missing snowblower, factoring in some depreciation. It was 7 years old, was used, not new, and some sort of service or repairs were needed or he would not have contacted us in the first place."

"It was a pleasure doing business with this customer, and we very much appreciated his patience waiting for pick-up of his snow blower. He called in May to request snow blower service when we were busy repairing lawn mowers, lawn tractors, trimmers, etc. -- these jobs couldn't wait. His wait time was not typical. Rest assured, if you need something serviced or repaired soon and it's the season to use it, your turn around time will be speedy!"