Hi!
I apologize for the problems and some serious steps have been taken to correct them.
First, let me explain that Shaver Furnace has been a small, family-run, service oriented business for 36 years.
Due to fast rising fuel prices - and people wanting to eliminate those monthly bills - furnace orders went through the roof.
While it is normally dead from Jan on - with a small spike in Spring, and then dead all summer because it's hot out and people are vacationing; so no one is thinking about heating their homes... THIS year it never slowed down except for one week in late winter.
Quite frankly, while we ramped up tremendously, adding new buildings and welders, etc., we were not prepared on the front-end, because this has NEVER happened before!
Sales TRIPLED from last year, which was already double from the year before.
We have tripled production and have added a new building (90% complete) with huge cranes, as long as a football field is wide. We now have a small train to move 20 cars from the building with all the sheet-metal, to the building where tinning takes place.
Unfortunately, we didn't add staff in the office - mainly because we couldn't! There simply wasn't room. We also weren't aware of the manpower necessary to handle all of the calls.
A lot of people complained that it was always busy but we can't control how many people are calling in!
That is why we added voice-mail. At least a message can be left now AND we did clear out another room for an office, this weekend and had a new VERY GOOD girl, start this past week.
She is on the phone non-stop calling people, to let them know what is going on.
So now it should be 33%, if not 100% better now.
~~~~~~~~~~
We are having the supplier ship out Solarguard now, to avoid shipping delays, because we NEVER intended to be a Solarguard supplier! In fact the manual gives the phone number to Solarguard to find out the closed dealer to you, so you can get it from them. We just TRIED to help as a serive becuase we could sell it cheaper.
About furnace shipping delays, we needed a computer system to handle the tremendous number of orders coming in and to track them.
THAT HAS BEEN DONE and is ready now. All the past orders are being entered now (which takes a lot of time). Dealers will be able to go online to see exactly where their furnaces are in the manufacturing process AND e-mails are automatically sent a different intervals in the process.
When everything is being done on paper (as it was for 36 years, with no prior problem), you just can't keep track of how many sales are taking place when it's like this - let alone project an accurate delivery date.
This was fine 2 years ago - but when orders started coming in from 100 dealers, we simply didn't have a good handle as to what was happening. This was unprecedented. The whole industry was turned upside-down. Any manufacturer that has a good quality product was backordered.
In early August, we sent an e-mail to all dealers advising them that the 7-8 time period (PLUS shipping, which everyone forgets about) was wrong.
As a point of reference, they were told that orders taken on July 23 would be ready Dec 3rd.
Unfortunately some dealers didn't read or remember this or/and didn't tell their customers. Now they were hounding us and we were doing OUR BEST to help but it was too overwhelming. In their defense, many of our customers are new to this, being customers first and then becoming dealers because they liked the furnace so much. Many don't have store-fronts and most probably don't have a lot of business experience. They just love our furnace!
So dealers were supposed to know about the delay and relay it but just like your dealer did, they kept calling asking us and when 100 do that, it's overwhelming and we can't get anything done or even get a clear head!! We certainly can't answer or return all of those calls!
Anyway, I hope that all of that is past.
I assure you, you were NEVER hung up on! We have had non-stop phone problems in the small rural town of Arkansas! The phone lines would just go dead and people would be disconnected. Other times you would call in and there would already be a conversation going on when the phone answered - between 2 other people! Some days only one phone line works. They are polite country folk! No one would ever dream of hanging up on anyone - even when they are terribly rude to the girls.
I hope this addresses some of your concerns. Everything is SO MUCH better now but now we just need to catch up!
Best regards,
Ben (Factory sales - writing from my office on NC)
The above is a quote from you in a post on 10/12/08 on this topic, below is the email you sent me 3 days ago.
Hi Craig,
The disputes only have to do one thing: Too many orders and slow delivery. We've had a perfect reputation for the last 35 plus years!
We acknowledge the problems and we are very sorry - and serious steps have been taken to correct them.
First, let me explain that Shaver Furnace has been a small, family-run, service oriented business for 36 years.
Due to fast rising fuel prices - and people wanting to eliminate those monthly bills - furnace orders went through the roof.
This had been a year beyond belief and quite frankly, we didn't expect such a constant demand for the furnaces!
While it is normally slow from January on - with a small spike in Spring - and then slow all summer (because it's hot out and people are vacationing; so no one is thinking about heating their homes)... THIS year it never slowed down except for one week in late winter.
Quite honestly, while we ramped up tremendously, adding new buildings, equipment and welders, etc. we were not prepared on the front-end, because this has NEVER happened before!
Sales TRIPLED from last year, which were already double from the year before.
We have tripled production and have added a new building (90% complete) with huge cranes, as long as a football field is wide. We now have a small train almost complete, to move 20 cars from the building with all the sheet-metal, to the building where tinning takes place.
Unfortunately, we didn't add staff in the office - a big mistake but mainly because we couldn't! There simply wasn't room. We also weren't aware of the manpower necessary to handle all of the calls.
A lot of people have commented that the phone line was always busy but we can't control how many people are calling in! ..and there were a LOT as most of you know! Everyone wants a furnace now!
That is why we added voice-mail but then people complained about that, so we had it disconnected. At least a message could have been left that way.
We did clear out another room for an office this weekend and had a new office girl start this past week. We are already seeing benefits of this additional help.
For now, she is on the phone non-stop calling people, to let them know what is going on.
So it is at least 33%, better (one extra person) - if not 100% better now, in the communication department.
By the "same", I've noticed quite a few lines that are exactly the same, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out you copied and pasted the same email. Yes the truth is the truth, but when someone emails out an explanation and sees it word for word on a post 2 months earlier, it looks like a standardized form. I'll point out a few of your words...
"We did clear out another room for an office this weekend and had a new office girl start this past week"
Well if you hired that girl 2 months ago and hired another last week good for you, now you'll have 2 New girls.
"We have tripled production and have added a new building (90% complete)"
2 months ago, you stated the same thing, your still 90% complete?
I find this whole thing strange. It falls into that old saying...if it smells like S%*T than it is S%*T. Something doesn't add up. I've brought my business elsewhere, I hope you work out your issues and wish you the best. Craig
FYI my blower quit because I had a leak on my pex connector that dripped on it. I appreciate your enthusiasm to protect people, it isn't like Shaver is intentionally trying to cause hardship. I've read your posts on other forums and it's obvious (to me) your simply upset with Shaver and being vindictive. My 290 along with one of my friends are working well. I would have no problem recommending a shaver to a another friend, they are inexpensive, solid boilers. They may not be perfect, but for the money I'm happy. 
