GUMPTION

A large corporation’s internal communications can sometimes be a nightmare. I expect that any little change in a company wide message or policy, can cause interpretation problems, and usually that means the consumer will take it in the pocketbook !

Or so it seems to me, anyhow. However, recently we got a pleasant surprise while dealing with the local Wal Mart here in Campbellsville Kentucky.

It has been our experience that when confronted with a policy change, a corporate worker often times just shrugs their shoulders and passes the buck saying “ it’s policy”. It is pretty hard for the person that is working in the grease pit to make a decision to go to management and tell them that “we just need to do the right thing”.

Here is Betty’s story about a grease pit worker and a manager that had the gumption to get the right thing done.

We visit Walmart’s that are located all over America’s heartland, as we put on about sixteen thousand RVing miles each year. 

It is logical for us to get the oil changed in our vehicles at whichever WalMart we are near. Our one ton dually has a 6.4 liter Diesel engine that uses fifteen quarts of oil at each change. Now, at an oil change every three thousand miles that’s quite a lot of oil and filters, yet, I expect that many other RV’ers are using more than 75 quarts of oil and more than five oil filters, each year.

In the past it has been our experience that the automotive department at WalMart has “our brand” of oil and the filter in stock. Now, 15 quarts of oil would be a very large arm full, but Motocraft oil can come in five quart jugs. so, three jugs about the size of a gallon of milk is easier to handle.

This time the oil change technician checked his information and told Betty that they had no oil or filter to make the change with. He thought that they had stopped carrying the five quart jugs and had removed the remaining stock from the shelves.

He sent Betty to the local auto parts store for the oil and filter. After she got back and was waiting for the oil change to be completed, she wandered through the automotive department and to her surprise, found the very oil in the five quart size, that she had wanted. As she got ready to pay for the oil change and pick up the dually, she told the oil change tech that the oil was in the store and quite a bit cheaper than at the parts store price.

Now here is where the tech could have just shrugged his shoulders and Betty would have left. But this guy had gumption. He said “ wait a second and let me check on something”. Soon the store manager was there and they handed Betty a oil change ticket that said free. Yes, They changed the oil for free. Here is a look at the service order.

The yellow highlighted part at the lower left is the cool part.

Now, ya’ just gotta’ love it when a person with gumption says,” there was a problem, but were gona’ take care of it. We just need to do the right thing.”

Thanks to two large corporate workers that had the gumption to recognize a problem and make a satisfied customer leave smiling.

Want to know who the workers with gumption were ? Just click on the photo to make it larger their name’s and initials are in the highlighted area.