A Series of Unfortunate Events

We are doing some home repairs and it involves a bit of paint and a bit of electrical hardware. And it has been a series of unfortunate events that cost more time than money. It helps to prepare ahead of time but sometimes you don't know what you don't know. This is the point where I should mention I am not that handy around the house.

Touching up paint shouldn't be a difficult thing. We had cans of the 3 colors of paint we needed but I wasn't sure if it was all in good condition. So I took one can to the store and asked the rep at the paint counter to shake it up to mix it and see if it was good. For some reason, he wouldn't shake/mix the paint but opened the can to look at it. He declared it was "too thin' and that he would add something to thicken it. But he wouldn't shake it up. And here is where my lack of knowledge bit me when I allowed him to "thicken" the paint. He put a teaspoon of something in the paint then said he couldn't reseal the original tin. So he fetched an $8.00 new tin for me, poured the contents of my damaged tin into the new can and declared it was all good.

I went home, waited for Friday evening after work, opened the paint and found it was cottage cheese. That's when I realized he had used paint hardener to "thicken" the paint. I went back to the store, explained the situation to two other employees but they didn't have the right small can of paint and they couldn't match the paint because their equipment was dead. But they were shocked their colleague had added the paint hardener to the paint, agreeing that he ruined the paint. But without the right kind of paint in small quantities and without the color matching machine working, there was nothing they could do. They suggested I visit another local store.

Fortunately, I visited another store today and they were wonderful, mixed up the other two cans of paint for me, and sold me a quart of new paint, mixed to match my old paint. It turns out a quart of paint was only $11 while the smaller tin would have been $7. Add in the $8 paint can I never really needed and the value of the half-gallon of my paint they turned into cottage cheese and I was only down a bit more than $30 dollars.

Next, I had to replace a wall switch for a fan and light in the living room. The wall switch would turn on the fan but not the lights. So on one of those trips for the paint I bought a less-than-universal "universal" wall switch. The original switch had wires for power, ground and lights. The new switch had four wires. Of course, I didn't know that when I left the store.

So, I took the new wall switch back to the store and found they don't keep the original manufacturer's switches in stock in the stores. Yes, they only keep the switches that don't work with the major brand of fans they actually sell. There I ran into an employee who was eager to help but was utterly unfamiliar with their inventory. He really couldn't fathom that I wanted a replacement wall switch and not a remote control unit for a light and fan. I even had the old and new wall switches in my hand to show him and it took more than 5 minutes to explain what I wanted.

I called the "tech support" line for the company that made the new wall switch and let's just say they were less than helpful. I got the distinct impression someone was at the end of their shift and didn't really want to take my call. I stayed on the line to answer the brief survey but their survey system would not accept my responses. I guess that's one way to avoid a bad survey.

It turns out I can order a wall switch from the big box store on-line. Except their on-line chat couldn't guarantee that the "H" model they sell is actually compatible with the original "T" model I had. They don't actually sell the "T" model switch now, even on-line. How many strikes is this now? I lost count.

I was surprised that the on-line chat agent from the big-box store couldn't guarantee that the "H" model was compatible with the "T" model though I appreciate his honesty. I really didn't want to make yet another return and waste another day.

But Amazon came to the rescue and had the "T" model available for next-day shipping for only $10 more than the less-than-universal "universal" switch the big box store stocked.

So, four trips to two big box stores, two on-line chats and one phone call and I have the paint I need and should have a new wall switch by tomorrow. And I didn't electrocute myself playing with high-voltage wires!

Why do stores not stock parts for major brands they sell? Surely, I am not the only person who has had to replace a wall switch for a fan.

Why do stores not train staff properly? Why do stores not train staff sufficiently to avoid destroying customer property? Surely the person manning the paint counter ought to know that paint hardener is not the same as paint "thickener!" And just as surely, the fellow in the electrical aisle ought to know what I am showing him in my hand, which was also on their shelf, is not the item he insists I really want.

And the on-line chat agent seems disinterested in actually answering questions from customers. The disinterest was palpable. I hope I never sound like that when I am on a call with a customer.

I could have probably saved myself a bit of money, time and gas by planning ahead bit more and not visiting big-box stores late on Wednesday evenings but I'm not sure I knew all of the right questions to ask when I started out. Now I know a little bit more than I did on Wednesday and the lessons weren't excruciatingly painful. I guess that's a win.