Two Year Old Ryobi 3 in 1 Self Propelled 21 “ Mower
I have a two year old Ryobi 3 in 1 self propelled 21” lawnmower This would be my third season with the mower. The first year, no issues. Loved it like I have loved all of the other Ryobi yard and garden tools I have purchased. Then last year, year two, the self-propel part of the lawn mower stopped working. It would work initially, at the start of a mow, but within 15 minutes the self propel would stop working and would kill the motor. I could restart the motor, but not the self propel (every time I tried to engage the self-propel it would kill the motor) so I would have to push the mower to complete the cut. So I contacted Ryobi. After much back and forth I was given the option of sending the mower to a repair center in a box they would provide, through UPS if I remember correctly. All I needed to do was box it, get to UPS, and wait for the mower to be repaired and returned. Or…..I could drive 75 miles (one way) to the closest repair center, drop it off, and wait to be informed when it would be repaired and available for pick up. I asked the agent with the company that handles Ryobi customer assistance which of my options would be quicker. I have no back up lawn mower, He said dropping it off would be quicker since you weren’t adding the time required when mailing and returning, so off I went to the repair center. It took five weeks to repair. The service center said they were waiting on a part. So for five weeks I rented, when I needed one, a lawn mower through Home Depot, at my expense, to cut the grass. I was finally informed the mower was ready and I drove the 150 miles around trip to pick it up, I used it once and it worked like it did when I first bought it. The second time, and since, the self-propel……doesn’t. Same issue. So earlier this week I got mad while pushing the self-propel lawn mower through my lawn (less than half acre) and decided to start the whole communicating with Ryobi’s customer service department thing. Was told there was a process when it comes to product issues that they follow. This year I was asked to video the lawn mower not self propelling and send the video for their review, That’s where we stand currently. My experience is Ryobi has very nice people in their customer issues department but they do nothing to back up their product. Obviously, I have been very patient. I have followed, up to this point, the Ryobi “process” of dealing with unhappy customers with product issues. I won’t be driving to a repair center or boxing the lawn mower up to mail this time. Follow-up: Ryobi has offered to replace mower with a second generation version. That restores most of my faith in Ryobi. I really liked all of the Ryobi products I had previously purchased and still use most of them today. We will see if the replacement comes through.