I accidentally broke a around $11 "air filter inlet assembly" on my Central Pneumatic air compressor that is exclusively sold by Harbor Freight Tools. The headquarters told me this piece would take 12 weeks to order since it comes from China and there is no other way of ordering it. They even recommended I bring the product back in and fully exchange it since the product would be so complicated to get. Taking this advice I called 5 Locations near Northern Virginia even places around two hours away. None of the stores had the product in stock. I had only had this product for two weeks and the four weeks before that none of these stores had the products. The supply chain and set up of the whole operation is so bad the managers don't know what is on the "truck" being shipped to them and have no clue as to what inventory they have as well as do not have any way of ordering or handling customer needs. In the past month I have referred many customers to them and now I feel stupid for spending thousands and referring those people to them since they cannot handle customers needs, frustrations, and complaints. The compressor is needed to run my business and I am now down one truck and a lot of money due to this issue. Some of the employees were understanding of my issue, however some seemed to not care at all. I am at the point where I really want to return everything and just get justice for my lost fuel driving big trucks back and forth to hear that the truck that no one knows what inventory is onboard didn't feel like delivering what customers need in order to operate a business and feed their families. Something needs to be done to help consumers purchasing products from Harbor Freight Tools.
UPDATE
The store manager at the Woodbridge location immediately saw that I was super frustrated and took care of everything assuring me things are getting better at Harbor Freight overall. I really like the store it was sad I had to go through a circus to finally get things done. Also had a manager at another location call me and try to help out. It seems that the employees really want to help but corporate needs to give them more power and ability to do so. read more