Student Complaints of E & R Mishaps Analyzed
For years, complaining about missing clothing from E & R Laundry and Dry Cleaners has been a trend amongst boarding students. Despite this, few students understand the laundering and dry cleaning processes of E & R and the most common reasons for missing clothing.
E & R Laundry and Dry Cleaners services about 110 different schools in New England, which amounts to around 12,500 students benefiting from their services. According to Director of Sales & Marketing at E & R Patrick Caveny, the company receives calls regarding missing clothes every day, but nearly 80 to 90 percent of the reported “missing clothes” are not really missing; rather, students end up finding their “missing clothes” in their friend’s room or in their own drawers.
“I thought I lost a pair of leggings and the guy emailed me back really quickly and did the best he could to help find them. I ended up finding them in my dresser, but he was super nice. They have awesome customer service.”
“There’s plenty of times when [students say] ‘I’m missing a red sweatshirt.’ We look back at the video and we never got a red sweatshirt,” he said. “‘Oh my roommate borrowed it, sorry about that’ is usually what they say next.”
However, in the case that the clothes are actually missing, E & R takes a step-by-step process to return the lost items back to the customer.
The process all starts with a call from the student. The student would reach one of two full time customer service workers who would record what the student is missing and search the history of all the clothing E & R has processed for him/her. Then, using the tracking system that E & R has in place, they “zero-in” on what exactly the clothing item might be.
“If it was dress clothes, we return all those items on hangers,” Caveny said. “Those items we individually tag and scan during the assembly process, and we also scan them when they go onto the truck, and we scan them at the schools at individual dorms.”
Students who have called E & R to report a missing item have received quick and efficient customer services and have found their clothes within a few weeks.
“I thought I lost a pair of leggings and the guy emailed me back really quickly and did the best he could to help find them,” prep Charlotte Polk said. “I ended up finding them in my dresser, but he was super nice. They have awesome customer service.”
Prep Tess Aalto shared Polk’s experience, as she was able to find her clothes using the customer services that are offered by E & R.
“They lost a lot of my clothes when I first came here, but they returned to me about 4 weeks later,” Aalto said. “I know a lot of people complain about them, but they actually do a really good job at cleaning our clothes, even when they’re a mess.”
Sometimes, the source of the missing articles of clothing is not due to a mishandling by E & R, but due to the extra care of E & R. Caveny explained how if E & R is trying to remove a certain stain, or replace a missing button, they take more than a week to return the clothes back to the customer.
“Or sometimes we’ll keep a piece longer because there are stains we’re working on, or a button missing,” he said. “Probably 80 to 90 percent of all the calls we get from all the schools we service are solvable. We track all this, too. When somebody calls, we put in a complaint, and it stays up until it’s resolved.”
As more and more complaints arise from the students of the Academy, E & R takes into note that many are unaware that this process even exists. After learning about this helpful customer service, lower Bliss Perry wishes that E & R would make this policy even clearer, so that students know that they are advised to call in when missing items.
“Although we shouldn’t point fingers at E&R, who continues to complete a massive undertaking week in week out,” he said. “I think that E&R should have a more clear policy for what to do if they have lost your laundry.”
In addition, Perry believes that for the clothes that are not actually missing but have been misplaced by peers, students should be more watchful and should report to the student to whom it belongs, rather than having the blame be placed on E & R Laundry and Dry Cleaners.
“Students should also be more vigilant in taking the initiative to return other students’ clothing found in their own bag and in making sure they don’t remove other students’ dry cleaning from the racks,” he said. “I’ve had others accidentally take my shirts off those crowded racks a few times, and I can indeed admit to the same.”
Upper Xiaocheng Hu shared Perry’s view on the responsibility of the students. “I think people should notify each other if they see laundry bags not sitting in the correct common room,” he said.
The recent increase of complaints have drawn attention to E & R’s lengthy process in recovering the lost clothes, which hopefully will shed light for students who are in need of finding their missing items.
Caveny always urges students who are missing clothes to call in and speak to one of their customer service workers. This way, the process can begin, and the clothes can be found.
“If kids at Exeter have concerns they should call us, or go to our office hour,” Caveny said.“We’re on it, and we’ll help [students] take care of whatever [the problem] is very quickly, I promise. E & R is here to help, and we hope everybody enjoys our service.”