Paul McGinley's spanish club hire 'service'

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Paul McGinley's spanish club hire 'service'

He needs to either sack his man in Spain or give up this idea. Reliability surely has to form the core of any successful business.

Mr Gael decided he'd try hiring clubs (wanted to try out latest Taylor Made model and what better way than to play them for a week). Unfortunately, when it came to handing them back at the pre-arranged meeting time, McGinley's rep was nowhere to be seen and the contact number turned out to be unobtainable. After 20 minutes had passed and our flight departure time drew ever closer we were fast approaching the stage when we'd have to either dump the clubs or face missing our flight ... the latter not being an option!

As it happened, the chappie in the car hire firm next door had a more up to date number and phoned disreputable rep who informed him he'd be there shortly. Ten minutes later, still waiting and, just as we were about to dump them outside the door, disreputable rep phoned the car hire firm to ask how many sets of clubs were being left. Car hire chappie advised him that it was just the one and that point he said he wouldn't therefore be arriving at the shop until 6 o'clock (10 minutes before our flight was due to take off!), the implication being that disreputable rep would have only made the effort had it been multiple sets? Anyway, car hire chappie kindly allowed us to leave the clubs with him for later collection. We thanked him and made our way to the airport.

One thing did puzzle me at the time all this was going on. Car hire chappie didn't seem at all put out at being 'put upon' by disreputable rep. Indeed, he was so laid back about it all that I decided to check out McGinley's club hire website myself on returning home. Quelle surprise ... the name of the car hire company next door is included. Club dumping area in exchange for free advertising? Not that I have any problems with that other than I wish they'd informed us that this might happen!!!

Huge black mark to McGinley for causing needless stress. Some folk might not be at all bothered at the prospect of dumping someone else's property in the street but it bothers me!

diggers wrote:The fact is they shouldnt have to contact them to get an apology for poor service. As I have said in my last post the company will have been 100% aware that they made an error. Once again they are a service industy, I am certain they will have a company mission statement and I guarantee that statement will involve putting the customer first.

The company would have thought there was no ongoing problem. Do you expect a small company to contact all of their 15,000 customers to find out if they have any problems they want an apology for?

diggers wrote:And if Paul McGinley puts his name to a product that provides poor service then he deserves 100% to be criticised, he was hands on enough to be talking about it as his company in the Sunday Times last week so he should be happy to have feedback via any medium and possibly he might seek to address any issues.

That's completely ridiculous. You're saying it's OK for someone to slag someone off for something they have not done. I blame you, as a Labour voter, for the actions of the last Labour government.

LadyPutt wrote:I worked for a while in customer service (and also as a complaints manager for an NHS trust!) and the first thing I learned is that you should aways apologise to someone who is complaining, even if you don't think it is absolutely necessary. "Sorry" diffuses so many situations and does not signify acceptance of liability - just saying "I am sorry you found our service was lacking in some respects" is all that is needed. A pity the company concerned did not think it worth saying in this case.

Have you read this thread?

I think you mean it's a pity gaelgowfer didn't make a complaint to the company.

Yes I did read it and while it was a pity Gael didn't complain to them as well as posting on here, I still think the company could have added the magic word to their response which JPX posted on their behalf. They were aware of a complaint and should have responded appropriately.

LadyPutt wrote:I worked for a while in customer service (and also as a complaints manager for an NHS trust!) and the first thing I learned is that you should aways apologise to someone who is complaining, even if you don't think it is absolutely necessary. "Sorry" diffuses so many situations and does not signify acceptance of liability - just saying "I am sorry you found our service was lacking in some respects" is all that is needed. A pity the company concerned did not think it worth saying in this case.

I think saying sorry in any shape or form does indeed signify acceptance of liability and i wouldn't be appologising for anything until the completion of a proper investigation. I think saying sorry before something has been investigated is just about the worse thing you could do!

LadyPutt wrote:Yes I did read it and while it was a pity Gael didn't complain to them as well as posting on here, I still think the company could have added the magic word to their response which JPX posted on their behalf. They were aware of a complaint and should have responded appropriately.

Yes, the company could have added the magic word but I wouldn't point fingers at them for not doing so if the complainant hadn't bothered to make a complaint to them.

Respect should come from both sides.

Tarka, its papently clear they were never going to say sorry in this instance. The guy has clearly admitted in his email that there was mistake in the rotas. They will have known from the rep reports that day and the fact the clubs were picked up from the car hire counter nad the client wasnt seen.
Whether or not this is any particular big deal is one thing but there is no doubt in my mind that the company are at fault here and LP is spot on, an apology for any inconvenience caused will stop 99.9% of any issues.
The problem with a set up like this is that McGinleys company will be relying on third party distributors to get the clubs to and from the clients, they cannot control the companies but they are 100% responsible to the client anyway as they appointed the company to act on their behalf.
There response will be based on whatever the company tells them was supposed to happen.

Diggers wrote:Tarka, its papently clear they were never going to say sorry in this instance. The guy has clearly admitted in his email that there was mistake in the rotas. They will have known from the rep reports that day and the fact the clubs were picked up from the car hire counter nad the client wasnt seen.
Whether or not this is any particular big deal is one thing but there is no doubt in my mind that the company are at fault here and LP is spot on, an apology for any inconvenience caused will stop 99.9% of any issues.
The problem with a set up like this is that McGinleys company will be relying on third party distributors to get the clubs to and from the clients, they cannot control the companies but they are 100% responsible to the client anyway as they appointed the company to act on their behalf.
There response will be based on whatever the company tells them was supposed to happen.

Diggers, I am not referring to this particular case where it is blatently obvious that an investigation had been carried out and the mistake was attributed to a rota confusion. I think an apology should be given by the firm and some compensation; i.e give us another chance on your next holiday and it will be free.

What I was referring to was the school of thought from Lady Putt that an apology should be offered even if it is not your fault. In this ever litigious society that would be tantamout to an admission of culpability and would be both reckless and fly in the face of everything I have been told and read on this matter. This is not to say that the hands up guv Mia Culpa doesn't diffuse certain situations but this would only be my approach if it was plainly myself or my business to blame.

I used to use a good line when dealing with a trivial complaint.
It was
'I am sorry that you thought that.......{the larks were chirping too loudly when you played yesterday}'............ That would then be their opinion

Diggers wrote:Tarka, its papently clear they were never going to say sorry in this instance.

How can you say that? You don't know how they would have responded.

And the reason you don't know how they would have responded is because gaelgowfer didn't do what she should have done.

As an aside, a couple of weeks ago, I was reading an article in Today's Golfer and they were singing the praises of PMc's golf club hire service.

They say they have contacted "the client". We don't know if an apology was included or nort. My guess is it would have included an apology.

We may never know unless gael updates us when she returns.

It could just be that the apology wasn't grovelling enough for her liking (if everyone else can speculate, so can I)

Davie wrote:It could just be that the apology wasn't grovelling enough for her liking (if everyone else can speculate, so can I)

Maybe you guys should buy shares.

I think a lot of ones on here already have shares in it

Looks like it's an LLP rather than a company so impossible to get shares

Interestingly, when you type 'club hire paul mcginley' into Google, this thread is now the top 3 results, the club website itself being 4th.
I wonder what that does for his business?!

oldparwin wrote:I think a lot of ones on here already have shares in it

Do you also think a lot of people on here have shares in Nike, adidas, Mizuno, Callaway, etc?

Mercurio wrote:

oldparwin wrote:I think a lot of ones on here already have shares in it

Do you also think a lot of people on here have shares in Nike, adidas, Mizuno, Callaway, etc?

I'm pretty sure Super has some Nike shares, he's a big fan. Never stops talking about that Tiger fella.

mustputt

It gets even better, this thread is now number one on a google search for "paul mcginley club hire".

Just shows that smaller companies need to pay attention to complaints on sites like this. Much like some of the smaller business's on trip adviser.

They should be thanking Gael for all the lovely free advertising!

Can i ask why people think that an apology would be put in that response?.

The response is for everyone else that is not Gael on the forum, we do not know what has been sent to Gael.

The company have done nothing to the rest of us that deserves an apology.

All they have done is offer an explanation to what happened, and sought to clarify some points with regards to deposits.

McLaren wrote:mustputt

It gets even better, this thread is now number one on a google search for "paul mcginley club hire"..

Err that's what I said

Try

Spanish Golf Club Hire Service and strangley there is no sign.('')

LOL I just did that and found it burried on page 6.....

Hmm .. seems Tony Judge is more concerned with Paul McGinley's feelings than he is with the poor service we received from their Malaga store which, I would remind him, effectively left us stranded with their clubs and no working contact telephone number through which to offload them!

Of course, mistakes happen in any kind of business but it's how they are dealt with that reveals the 'service value' of that business.

Before I go any further I would like to remind everyone that at no time did anyone representing the Malaga store attempt to speak to us when either of the two telephone conversations took place in the car hire front office.

So, purely for the benefit of company's chief executive who would appear not to have fully understood my concerns first time around, this is how events unfolded in Malaga ... and, since returning to the UK.

Having already waited 20 minutes for the rep to arrive to take receipt of the clubs and, together with the contact number being unobtainable, we approached the car hire firm next door to see if they could help. He had another number available and was able to contact someone from the Malaga store. At no time did club hire man ask to speak to us (an apology would have been good at this juncture). Instead, he passed on a message via car hire man to the effect that he would be there shortly.

Given the increasingly time-precious situation we were now in, you will forgive me for interpreting "shortly" as being no more than a few minutes. When more than 10 minutes had passed with still no sign of club hire man, we resolved to give him a further 5 minutes before dumping the clubs outside the shop and leaving for the airport via, of course, the checking in of our own hired car and shuttle to the airport which of course all takes time. At this point, car hire man received a call from club hire man who had requested (on establishing it was only one set of clubs) if he could keep them to allow us to make our way to the airport further informing car hire man that he (or someone else) would now not be coming to the shop until 6pm. Now, it may have been that during the course of this second conversation with car hire man that club hire man said it would take 20 minutes to arrive at the shop. I don't know because we weren't given the opportunity to speak to him then either!

Having had no contact with club hire man either in person or by phone in Malaga, I had fully expected to find, on returning to the UK, an email not only confirming the safe return of the clubs but one which included an apology. Nowt! Zilch! Not so much as a squeak from the company. So, I, make no apologies for not bothering to chase up reps to point out their diplomatic shortcomings electing instead to come on here and give those who were considering hiring clubs, the heads up. As I stated before, forewarned is forearmed.

I would also remind the company's chief exec that the Malaga store only bothered to contact us to say the clubs had safely been received after this board's snake in the grass, otherwise known as JPX, contacted his company!

Since then, Mr Gael has contacted the company with his concerns by email. That was four days ago. No response has yet been received. Clearly, there are still issues to be dealt with in the Malaga store.

Incidentally, someone asked about the clubs themselves. This was included in Mr. Gael's email ...

"In closing I would just say that the clubs were fine although your web site gave the impression that all four "metal woods" would be the R11 model not just the driver with the remainder being the Burner model. I can't remember whether you mentioned this to me when I picked them up but it was a disappointment albeit not a major one. It would be worthwhile to remove any possible conflicting information from your literature/web site."

gaelgowfer wrote:

I would also remind the company's chief exec that the Malaga store only bothered to contact us to say the clubs had safely been received after this board's snake in the grass, otherwise known as JPX, contacted his company!

Not quite sure what you are getting at regarding JPX, seems to me he has done you a favour? If you didn't receive confirmation that the clubs had been safely returned, you would have been open to all sorts of allegations of missing clubs etc.

gaelgowfer wrote: this board's snake in the grass, otherwise known as JPX

I see Paul McGinlay has withdrawn from the Andalucian Masters at Valderama.

Is this because his club hire service ran out of clubs for him ??