Offenbachers Home Escapes — Local services in Herndon

As the saying goes, "the best laid plans of mice and men…” Please stay with me here - this is maybe one of the longest reviews you’ll ever read; my husband says I talk too much - but this story has a happy ending!

In June we saw a patio furniture set we really liked in a generic outdoor furniture store - but being the “frugal” types we are, thought to see if our preferred outdoor furniture store carried the line. They did, but were a little more costly. When we mentioned we were going to return to the original store, our sales lady mentioned that store had literally just gone out of business and closed its doors! Trust, but verify - and she was right - so we returned and placed our order. Not being in any rush, the delivery date of early September was fine with us.

My husband is “that guy,” he doesn’t let grass grow beneath his feet - so we reserved a truck for the second week in September to pickup and drive our new furniture to our Florida home. Cancelled that truck and made a reservation for the following weekend. Cancelled and made a THIRD reservation as it was now the END of September and seemed crazy that our furniture was still not ready! Mr. “guy” was totally ready to cancel our order, but Jackie did a YEOMAN’S job “working the deal” with the Tropitone manufacturer to get our furniture delivered. GO FIGURE - COVID was the reason given that the fluffy fill for our cushions was insufficient and all our pieces weren’t ready. Turns out the actual Tropitone factory was in the SAME town as our Florida home - and Jackie was able to get us special permission to pick up whatever furniture/cushions we could get on our end of September trip! YEAH! Well - yeah until we arrived at the Factory and found the furniture had been SHIPPED TO the store in VIRGINIA! Are you kidding?! (And if Mr. “guy” HAD been ready to cancel - you can imagine what he said then)

At this point, the Tropitone Sales Manager stepped in as well - no doubt thanks to Jackie contacting him and explaining all that had been going on - and they arranged for our furniture to be return-shipped back to Florida. Of course it was due to arrive after we left - but we have amazing neighbors who agreed to facilitate and take delivery. I had a call (just as we were boarding the plane) to call back and arrange the actual delivery - but when I called back, NO ANSWER! I tried the 2 numbers I had 6 (SIX) times - and finally a LOVELY lady from SOUTH CAROLINA answered! She relayed that she had literally just received an email that the Florida location had lost all power - no phones, no computers! She gave me 2 email addresses, and I sent emails asking them to reach back out to me once they had our delivery scheduled for either of the 2 days our neighbor would be available. Yes, they did! “Lori” - of Old Dominion Freight facilitated and the delivery was set for this afternoon!!! I communicated with our neighbor and all was well ~

True to form - of course that didn’t go quite as planned - and the delivery truck driver called that he was 30 minutes away and would be there THIS MORNING (vs this afternoon). Our neighbor was home - and we now have our lovely Tropitone patio furniture set! I’ll have to be patient and wait ’til our next visit to try it out - but WHAT A TEAM EFFORT this has been!

Many kudos and thanks to Jackie (of Offenbachers Home Escapes), Scott (of Tropitone), and “Lori” of Old Dominion Freight, our neighbor, Kris - and to the delivery truck driver and many others whose names...

My household purchased a service- warranteed Geneva Spa in 2020 and initially received service under warranty within reasonable timelines. Immediate call backs. A tech on-site the very next day.

Until this summer, where it’s as if my voice mails, phone calls, and repeated request for service are being entirely ignored.

As of this summer, our hot tub purchased here is out of service going on 6 weeks. My husband and I have been regularly contacting Herndon Service department, by talking to FOH reception who promise to hand deliver the request to Service Manager Joanne. By leaving voice messages for service to respond to. Our incoming calls have been in repetition 3-5 times a week since Mid-July. It’s August 24 today. We have received NOT A SINGLE return phone call to discuss repair issue. We have not been put on the service schedule. It’s been like communicating into a black hole.

We are now 6 weeks without a working salt spa. One that has a service warranty with this company, who runs a back of house service desk, and collaborated with other reseller service desks in the locale to provide repair. Until they stopped - with zero explanation, and empty promise “hand delivering your message to service desk now”.

Check the price of the Geneva, and ask yourself how willing you are to find yourself in the same situation as a result of the way this company stops providing warranteed service, and ignores customer service requests 2.5 years after purchase.

This isn’t even an issue of price — this is an issue of Offenbachers repeatedly failing to initiate any response whatsoever to the repeated incoming service requests we have placed during business hours. They haven’t even denied the service or told us if there is a price for service — they haven’t even asked what service is needed; they haven’t placed a single return phone call or email to us. We have called in an estimated 15 times. We are out of a hot tub entirely as a result. This is absolutely untenable.

Offenbachers, the ball is in your court to provide service and communication within a reasonable timeline. The ball is in my court to make transparent my experience with receiving denial of warranted service while being a customer of your store. Fix this. Now, for...

Buying a swim spa is a big decision and it is very important to put a priority on the place/people from whom you purchase this. While you may be lured by big discounts you see over the internet, consider SERIOUSLY where the support will come from when you need it. And you will!

I chose to work with Home Escapes and this proved to be an excellent decision.

I may not be their typical customer in that I asked to do a TRUE test swim. Not 5 or even 15 minutes but a full 45 minute test swim. This was information I needed to know. Would this compare to what I'm used to in a lap pool? Not only did Rosanne "allow" that, she ENCOURAGED it. It was as important to them as it was to me that I truly had confidence in my purchase. You don't get that just anywhere.

Once I decided to purchase, their partnership and support continued to astound me. Throughout all of the delays in my renovation project preparing our home for this indoor installation, they housed my pool and were so incredibly accommodating and understanding. When called upon to provide technical specs or to participate in meetings where construction decisions were needed, they were reliable and forthcoming. You could completely count on them at every step of the way.

Now that I've had the pool and have been using it for over a month at the time of this review, they continue to partner with me on making sure I'm getting everything out of it that I needed/expected.

They were, without a doubt, the best part of this whole process and I look forward to working closely with them to keep my pool in top running condition for many...