Hi: I just bought a house in Redmond and pulled the door and garage locks. I wanted them re-keyed. Home Depot looked at the doorlock and said, "nope, we've never taken one of these apart, you should go to a locksmith"
I took them to Lockworks. The guy picked the locks up and said "What do you want me to do with these?". I told him I wanted them re-keyed. He shook his head, picked them up and walked into the back room. He came out and said "These would cost at least $25 each to re-key" I asked him why. He said, "No offense, but these are cheap locks and they won't even fit the machines. You should go someplace like Home Depot - maybe they can help you." His attitude the entire time was beaming with condescension.
I asked what the options were here in the shop. He said, "The only thing you could get here would be, like, $190 for a ***** (brand)." He didn't point to where they were, pull something out from the counter, nothing! He just kept shaking his head, the entire time - like I was keeping him from something or someone more "important." I figured with help like this, I'd buy my locks elsewhere, and I did. $300 worth of Baldwin locks (Home Depot) may be feeding the "Big Box Machine", but if a local merchant can't offer anything other than scorn, I see no reason to patronize them.
I realize this is a kind of vague complaint, and maybe the slacker-dude working the counter isn't representative of Lockworks as a whole, but there you have it. Terrible customer service.
-t
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