Select Customer Service

"Ring Ring!"

"Ring Ring!"

"Hello, Select Comfort? I'm calling to cancel an order that my husband and I placed last night for one of your beds. I'm afraid we had a change of heart."

Last night my husband and I spent hours reading online reviews for Select Comfort beds after purchasing one. Normally you do this in reverse, but we like to live on the edge. The reviews of malfunctioning parts had us so concerned that we decided we didn't want to take our chances.

"Let me transfer you to the correct department" said the sweet, elderly lady who answered the phone when I pressed the phone option for general inquiries.

"Hello! Returns department!" said the brash voice on the other end of the line, "Can I help you!?"

Uh oh...

I spoke with quiet confidence in hopes to disarm her. "Yes, my husband and I placed an order for a Select Comfort bed last night at one of your stores. We've changed our minds and would like to cancel it."

"Well...I can certainly help you with that, but may I first ask what changed your mind?"

"Certainly. We spent several hours reading reviews online and found that there seem to be a lot of problems with malfunctioning parts."

"Malfunctioning parts? That's a rare circumstance."

Rare circumstance my patooty. Select Comfort has an entire phone tree option for malfunctioning parts. In an effort to remain polite, I did not tell her this.

"Yes, malfunctioning parts." I said. "My husband and I are both engineering types and reports of malfunctioning parts makes us nervous."

"Well, I see. You know, for every good review there's a bad review. Did you even *look* for the good reviews?" Her voice lost its friendly edge.

"We certainly did," I told her, "In fact, we wanted to find the good reviews in order to feel better about our purchase, but I'm afraid they were far outweighed by the bad reviews."

"Well for every good review there's a bad...what else did the reviews say?"

"That you have poor customer service." I duly reported. This is true. The reviewers complained long and loud about how poorly they were treated by Select Comfort's customer service department.

"Oh, I see. Well I'm sorry they feel that way. We don't feel that way."

"Of course you don't," I thought, "that's precisely why you're service is so poor." I bit my tongue.

"I'm afraid your customers do."

"Well, you should look for the good reviews, you know, because for every bad review there's a good review."

What was this? Groundhog Day? How many times was she going to read me that script?

"We'd just like to cancel our order," I instructed, "Please let's continue with that."

"Fine," she said. "Let me pull it up right now. Hmmm...I see that you also purchased two accessories (read: pillows) which you have in your possession. I'm afraid you will not be able to return those."

"Actually, yes I will." I told her.

"You...what?"

"I will be able to return the pillows. In fact, according to the contract I'm holding right now, I must return the pillows if I cancel the order or I will be charged for them." I love a good fight.

"Oh no," said Brash, "That is not the Select Comfort policy. Our company policy states that you can only exchange accessories, not return them!"

Side bar: Why do these tools call pillows "accessories"? That's like when I bought my condo a few years ago and they kept calling the fountain out back a "water feature". I looked right past the fountain trying to find this illustrious 'water feature' before I realized that they were talking about the fountain."

"And the piece of paper with your letterhead that I am holding in my hand tells me that I must return them when I cancel the order." I retorted, still polite.

"Well..." She was losing ground. "That's not our policy. You can only exchange them. We will not accept your return."

"I'm afraid you can't do that," I told her. "I've got it in writing. You simply have no recourse."

"Well, I'm sorry (no she wasn't) but company policy does not allow for returns of accessories..."

"See...this would be an example of your poor customer service," I said slowly.

Silence.

My order was canceled without further discussion.