Question:
A few years back, I buy a pair of pull-on wellington workboots from Sears.
Black leather 8-inch pull-ons, 'non-marking' sole, etc, etc. I wear them
about 3-4 times, and set them in the closet. (too hard to get on, since
there were no pull loops on the tops.) Anyway, today I am trying to cross at
least one chore off the always-too-long list, and decide to sort all my
shoes into the usual keep/Goodwill/trash piles. I pull the boots off the
rack, blow off the dust, and notice they are leaving black sticky crud all
over my hands, and on the wire shelves. It seems the molded 1-piece sole has
reverted from a shoesole back to crude oil or something. Almost it was made
out of tootsie rolls or something. You can literally gouge out hunks with a
fingernail.
Answer:
I take them back to Sears, and politely inquire if there is any sort of
warranty on theire house-brand workboots, seeing as these are essentially
unused, and have never been in solvents or anything. All I can get out of
the clerks is 'We've got nothing like that here', and a disgusted
expression. When I try to show them the Sears label on the inside of the
boots, they just walk off and resume what they were working on. I guess if
it isn't a current style, they figure the customer is trying to pull a scam.
After standing there a couple minutes, I put my sticky boots back in the bag
and leave. At no time did I raise my voice or act hostile.
Okay, I figured a warranty swap was a long shot- but there was a day when
Sears stood behind stuff with their brand on it. I have no idea how much I
paid way back when- probably around 50 bucks. And they don't carry that
style any more. But I figured they would at least offer a few bucks off on
another pair of boots or something. And to have the clerks just wander off
and pointedly ignore me, and not even try to determine if I had a valid
complaint, seems like very poor customer service.
So, anyone have similar experiences?
1. Has anyone ever had black workboot/service shoe soles (the non-lugged
kind) revert to their original liquid state, in storage?
2. Was I utterly delusional to think Sears would be interested in making an
adjustment, or even offering an explanation of what happened?
I don't think you were, but you went the wrong way about it. Sears
employees are among the dumbest and lowest paid ones around. It's
usually either high-school kids or senile seniors. The only person you
could expect anything from would be a store manager. That's who you
have to see.
No - this seems unusual, however, being we're discussing a workboot it may be
possible that these need to be treated specially - did they come with a booklet
when you bought them on how to treat them? Perhaps they needed to be "seasoned"
with a special oil or something? Just a thought. Another contributing factor
may be where they were stored. It's possible something else came in contact
with them that you are unaware of that could cause the problem. Or perhaps
there were severe temperature changes in the place of storage
Yes, you were toally delusional in expecting anything from Sears. (1) You no
longer have a sales receipt indicating what you paid, (2) they no longer make
the style boot you purchased.
Stores are NOT responsible for you purchasing something then deciding several
years later that you never used it and want a refund or exchange. It's like
buying a pair of jeans, putting then in a closet and then gaining 20 pounds and
expecting the store to return them 5 years later because you weren't able to
lose the weight, but all the tags are still on the jeans. They are not
responsible for taking them back. Same with the shoes -- even though they look
in good shape, after a certain period of time (probably 60 days or maybe a 1
year warranty for defects) they are no longer responsible for the shoes. They
would have no way of knowing whether the shoe was defective or perhaps
accidentally you place the shoe on a heater or something causing the sole to
melt.
