Ruger Customer Service Experience
BY Herschel Smith
7 years ago
My cat stole a part of my revolver, Ruger replaced it free of charge, paid for shipping both ways, improved the trigger and sent me a pretty nice oiled up cleaning rag free of charge.
Here’s the rundown, after going out shooting I came home and disassembled by revolver – besides the cats I was the only one home. After I disassembled it I went to the bathroom, came back and found my cat on the table – tossed her off and then did a thorough cleaning.
My hammer dog mysteriously disappeared. I searched for that thing for an hour. It even got the point where I tried to shake it out of my cat. GONE. VAPORIZED. F***.
Well, I had heard some great things about Ruger’s customer so I gave them a call. The lady I spoke to on the phone was polite as I embarrassingly explained the situation.
What I expected: 25$ shipping there, 25$ shipping back, 25$-50$ for labor/parts.
What I got: A free of charge shipping label from ruger to send the Revolver in, no charge for labor, no charge for parts and no charge for them to send it back and a sweet cleaning rag to boot.
F***ing wow. To make things better the trigger is better than it was before, and it was pretty nice to begin with for a GP100.
I want to reiterate what just happened, because I’m still pretty stunned by how great the company treated me.
I f***ed up and they fixed it for me free of charge.
Easily one of the best customer service experiences of my life.
Now, some folks would say that this is a good way for Ruger to go out of business. Those people have probably never run a successful business either. I had a similar experience with my GP100. It’s a beautiful firearm, and it’s trigger is as good as any S&W Performance Center trigger I’ve ever shot, in both single and double action.
Well, I’m not going to tell you what I did because it’s embarrassing, but Ruger handled it free of charge and I will never, ever get rid of that GP100. I’ll keep it the rest of my life, I’ll recommend that other people buy the GP100, and I’m more inclined to get another Ruger product because of the great customer experience from them with the GP100.
So here’s a note to Ruger. You know how to run a successful business. Don’t ever change.
On November 2, 2017 at 8:16 am, Frank Clarke said:
It appears Ruger understands cost-benefit analysis better than most.
What’s this going to cost us to fix? What will we get out of it? It costs us $20 in shipping, a $0.13 part, and 17 minutes of technical time. Total, maybe $60. We get: a loyal customer who will give us free advertising for life and the positive feelings of everyone who hears the story. Value, maybe $600 conservatively. 10-to-1 payout on a peanuts investment? A clear and present no-brainer.
Cross pens once replaced my pen after I ran over it with my car. Even re-engraved my name on the barrel. Same analysis.
On November 2, 2017 at 8:56 am, ambiguousfrog said:
I’ve described my experience here in the past, from a customer service standpoint they aim to please. But, I think their customer service is making up for the lack of qa in other areas. I understand the possibility of issues when purchasing a new firearm, but in my case it was a brand new SR-762 ($1600) that had problems right out the box. I had to send it back twice (their dime). That doesn’t instill confidence in the weapon’s reliability to save your butt. They eventually called me seeming to say the rifle was irreparable and gave me a refund. Again, that’s great from a customer service standpoint but, I “might” think twice before buying another Ruger for that kind of change. How could it leave the factory and have FTF/FTE out of the box? I may have too high of expectations.
On November 2, 2017 at 9:08 am, Fred said:
Called for a replacement stock for a 10/22 takedown and mentioned off handedly that the bag it came with got damaged, my fault. I kept telling her that it was my fault and that the bag was not defective in any way. Yeah, she wouldn’t hear it.
They sent me the second stock free from shipping charges and a new bag gratis.
On November 4, 2017 at 1:55 pm, Peteypete said:
This is the bi-polar opposite of my experience with Ruger a few years ago on a known defective product. That is to say that others had the same problem and were treated differently according to forums, including refunds and credits. That day they lost me forever and ever. Fortunately the retailer made good on their guarantee. I have zero confidence in the replacement item and it has never been used.