Karl’s is the Jedi

“Your servicing dealer since 1956.”

If you’ve lived in the Sioux Falls region in the past few decades (and you watch television), you’ve no doubt seen and heard Elmer Karl’s commercials that end with that line every time. As of today, Jaim and I are big Karl’s fans. Our refrigerator saga is coming to a close. Luke Skywalker has finally killed Darth Vader…

The Dark Side

The evil people, at least in our eyes, are Whirlpool/Amana. The folks at A&E Appliance Service won’t be getting a Christmas card from the Bartmann’s either, but at least they didn’t insult my wife. So, to tell a long story quickly, our fridge quit working three times in less than two months. As of today, we’ve been storing perishable food in a cooler in our garage for over three weeks. It’s much more freezer than refrigerator the past week or so. (Secretly, it’s been an interesting experiment for me–learning if we could live without one. But I think Jaim is on to me.)

A&E has been little help, but they did tell Whirlpool the fridge can’t be fixed and we need a new one. We have a month or so left on our five-year warranty. In the past two weeks, since the repair man showed up for the third time and pronounced our Amana side-by-side dead, Whirlpool customer service reps have lied, procrastinated, avoided and even insulted Jaim just about every day.  One guy told her “maybe you just imagined the service man saying you need a new refrigerator. Or maybe he didn’t say it at all.”

If you know my wife well enough, you know she’s a really nice person to just about everybody. And, if you really piss her off, there will be hell to pay. In this case, it came to F-bombs on the telephone, even. I didn’t even have a chance to defend her with the jerk from Whirlpool, but I’m not too worried about him doing that to anyone else again. Ever.

Obi Wan, You Are Our Only Hope

So, after Whirlpool telling us a decision would be coming in two more days (after adding one day each of the past four), and telling us they don’t know the phone number to the people who make that decision, Jaim finally called Karl’s this morning and told Chuck, the manager, our no-refrigerator-for-nearly-a-month-and-being-treated-like-dirt story. Chuck got on the horn and called Jaim back this afternoon to tell her to come pick out a new fridge–he’s giving us $1200+ and will work it out with Whirlpool! God bless Chuck (and Tom, the sales guy).

Lessons

Listen up kids. Here are three rules I’ve now learned are absolutely unbreakable:

1. Never, ever, ever buy an Amana or Whirlpool appliance. Don’t let your friends buy one either.
2. When you do buy appliances or electronics, buy them at Karl’s.
3. You don’t want to mess with a good woman’s refrigerator.

Big thanks Chuck and Tom.