Bernard's Ace Hardware — Local services in Lowell

Usually this place rocks... however this latest experience has me flustered. I reserved a concrete saw on a Tuesday for a Saturday pick up. On Saturday when I went to pick up the unit I was told it was broken and "that sounds like us, not calling to let someone know". They then showed me an old electric unit that would work, except we didnt have power and I was running on a generator. However they left me no choice since my contractor was going to be at my house in an hour. We used the saw, kind of, that had a plug that was shorting out (hot wire was touching ground wire inside plug) and one of the prongs wasnt fixed in the plug. When I returned the saw I was told that I may not get my deposit back because I brought it back dirty (true, but I left with it dirty). I asked for a refund because it wasnt what I asked for, and since the plug was messed up it wasnt actually safe. One of the managers came back to see what was happening (explained story) and he said that some people shouldn't be allowed to rent tools out (not my problem... your personnel problem). Then he proceeded to tell me the gas unit I rented was only broken on the water side of the saw... the saw worked otherwise. 🤦‍♂️Are you flipping kidding me!? I have a hose! My 5 hour job could have been done in 2 if it wasnt for your incompetence. HOWEVER y'all, I did get my $10 deposit back (whew). Tried to rent local... may have to go to the box stores after all. Sorry for the rant...

Just before Christmas I dropped off my snowblower to get repaired. It wouldn't run when it got wet, which is most times when I would snow blow my driveway. I told the people at Bernard's that my snowblower would run fine if it is dry, but as it soon as it got wet it would die. Well, I go back to retrieve my blower and I'm told that there is nothing wrong with it. It runs fine. In fact, the mechanic claims to have snow blowed with it and it ran great. I was charged 25 dollars for that information. And I thought to myself, I must be doing something wrong. So I got it back home and fired it up the next snow. I managed to get one time down my driveway and it died. So, I got it restarted and got one more time down my driveway, and it died again. I couldn't get it restarted. So I shoveled. Next time it snowed, same thing. One trip down the driveway and it dies. Though I have to admit, I was persistent this time, I kept restarting it, though I'd have to wait about fifteen minutes or so til it dried out, but I did managed to get about half my driveway done until I gave up and shoveled.

Now I can only conclude one of two things. Either I don't have a clue how to properly operate a snow blower, or the mechanic at Bernard's lied to me about it . Hopefully, it's the latter as I wouldn't want to think that a local business would brush off any customer by lying to them about a repair. I, for my part, will...

First time home owner. I bought a Craftsman garage door opener from this hardware store. I even spent a little more money on the nicer model that was recommended to me by their staff. surely enough, a few days after warranty, it broke, middle on January.

I called Ace to see if I could exchange it for a different or cheaper model. I also called for advice on what to do next. It's fine that they couldn't exchange the model, I understand, but you don't have to be complete jerks about it, raising your voice, getting snappy and telling me it isn't your problem. Even when I try to tell them the model number so they don't continue to sell this product, the only response I get is, "Not our problem."

Come on guys, your killing my faith in the...